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Comment by PheonixPharts | Hacker News Reader

Can we as a HN community stop downvoting comments because we don't like the reality of what is happening?

I know the reality of unavoidable climate catastrophe is uncomfortable to talk about, but aggressive denial is really a problem in the HN community.

I can completely understand people who haven't studied this topic in depth not being aware of how dire the situation is, so asking questions or debating is healthy and expected. Downvoting a comment consisting of a statement of fact combined with a logical hypothesis derived from that fact, backed up by 3 well known citations is not a healthy direction for this community to develop in.

Denial is a part of dealing with this reality, but as a community we should work a bit harder to move towards better acceptance and understanding.

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I didn't even downvote it, but saying "we are not doing nearly enough, therefore we are doomed" encourages some people to conclude "well, then we can pollute as much as we want, it doesn't matter anyway". Yes, we are on the wrong path, and it's becoming more unrealistic by the day, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't still strive towards 2 degrees.

> but saying "we are not doing nearly enough, therefore we are doomed

OP did not write that at all! He only wrote a single sentence, why did you create new text to criticize and attribute it to OP?

I myself keep pointing to the NOAAA page for the CO2 growth rate (https://gml.noaa.gov/ccgg/trends/gr.html) - which is positive and increasing. OP is correct and the parent is too. Even the growth rate still increases, it still keeps getting worse faster! It's unpopular on reddit's /r/de too to say that, with similar justification. As if lying and keeping truth away won't hurt much more because no, people are stupid but not completely.

In addition here in Germany I got so watch from a front seat how the people in the country react when even just a single fossil fuel is cut - and only partially (even for Germany Russia only supplies a part of the gas, even if it's a substantial one). We actually needed to stop regardless of the Russian situation, for climate change alone. Which nobody ever even dares to mention, the public discussion and what politicians have to say is all about "crisis mode". I have not seen a single politician try to reframe it as "we need to do this anyway", it's either about supporting people financially to be able to afford more expensive gas, about who needs to save, or how and where to get other gas faster than 2024 (deal with Katar for LNG).

The head of the state of Saxony warned of "deindustrialization". But we need to cut fossil fuel anyway! Worldwide!

The current crisis should be a chance, but it is only seen, and only framed, as "crisis", to be remedied to get back to full gas storage and fully flowing supplies.

The situation IS this dire! Try significantly reducing usage of fossil fuels in any country. You get riots.

You can plant as many trees and ban plastic straws all you like, the only thing that would make a dent is a significant reduction in removing any more fossil fuels of any kind from below ground to feed it into the above ground carbon cycle. And it is truth that it looks really really bad. That would just limit the growth rate, it still would do nothing towards actually lowering atmospheric CO2.

It's called paraphrasing (and yes, dramatization to make a point).

From the comment I replied to:

>reality of unavoidable climate catastrophe

>how dire the situation is

I read this as "doomed". And if we are already doomed and nothing can be done about it, shouldn't we eat as much meat and take as many flights as we want? This is how a lot of people think when they read stuff like this, and honestly, they have a point. Either it's unavoidable and dire OR we can do something about it (by limiting emissions). So why ask people to make sacrifices and then also tell them we are doomed anyway?

I think that's more of a reflection of you than the OP. You read it as "doomed", I read it was "dire, but still fixable if we do more"

How do you see: “I know the reality of unavoidable climate catastrophe is uncomfortable to talk about.”

As a suggestion of “fixable” they literally said it was unavoidable.

If it is unavoidable than the question becomes how do we build to handle it instead of how do we prevent it - the first question may involve much more carbon output during the building phase, for example.

Please have a more charitable interpretation of comments here. Even if some event (like climate change, a hurricane, etc.) is bound to occur that doesn't mean there is nothing that can be done to mitigate damage or impact

I think the problem we're having talking to each other is you think an unavoidable climate catastrophe is "doomed", and I think "doomed" is more like the complete extinction of the human race, which is definitely still fixable, from what I know.

Doomed mean to unavoidably suffer some negative outcome in the future, but not necessarily death/extinction.

Someone that forgot about an upcoming test is doomed.

There are degrees of how doomed we will be, depending on what we do. That's why "paraphrasing" using words like "doomed" that imply something binary are really unhelpful. There's still a vast difference between a +2.5° and a +4° world.

Exactly my point, why not say it like that?

OP literally didn't say anything except

> There's no chance of limiting warming to 2 degrees anymore. It's just not a realistic goal.

They said nothing about 2° being the tipping point between hope and hopelessness. Only that we're more screwed than some people still hope we are.

Germany re-opening coal mines that were closed 10 years ago https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/08/01/germany-coal...

Honestly I'm not sure if coal is worse than shipping gas from the gulf (which produces lots of CO2 from the compressing and shipping)

> ... encourages some people to conclude "well, then we can pollute as much as we want, it doesn't matter anyway"

I hold "contrary" opinions on the climate debate, but I don't take these kinds of articles the way that you noted at all. I see it simply as an opportunity to change tactics.

I was talking about the parent comment, not the article. The article is actually encouraging and says that it's not too late and we can fix this.

I know that. Sorry I wasn't more clear. But even in that case, I do see it the way I described (though I do realize not everyone has this mindset).

Denying the scientific reality in the name of 'beneficial climate messaging' is just as bad as doing it in the name of 'beneficial fossil fuel messaging'. The so-called 'tipping point' has come and gone and now the planet is committed to steady long-term warming. Eliminating fossil fuel use would not result in not reaching 2 degrees (which is a global average, so the poles would be significantly warmer by tens of degrees) - even this paper doesn't claim that, they merely note that it might be pushed back some decades past 2100.

Warming is unavoidable so major expenditure on whatever adaptations are possible is just as necessary as getting off fossil fuels, and ignoring that reality will set many areas up for long-term disasters in the near future.

Another uncomfortable reality is that politicians in all fossil-fuel producing nations may give lip service to climate concerns, but in reality none of them are going to try to shut down the most profitable economic activity in their countries. That's what the record shows in the USA as well.

This was my thought as well. There have been several comments in this thread (and others like it recently) where the content of the comment was:

- A thoughtful, non-flippant response and sometimes included citations

- In disagreement with the article/other comments

- Downvoted almost instantly

I personally enjoy reading many of this community's comments, thoughts, and ideas, especially when someone has taken the time to write out a thoughtful response, and even if I may not agree with the conclusion. I really hope others do, as well.

This post is about the imagined mindset of people who downvoted a post, that isn't even downvoted.

Proposal: make possible to vote up/down only if a new comment submitted.

Or just have upvote and “disagree” buttons separately.

This is such a great idea!

Very often I disagree with some comment and nevertheless upvote, because that comment is really thoughtful and is an important contribution to the discussion with important subjects or perspectives that need to be considered.

Edit: Sorry about that duplicate. I couldn't see my other comment and thought my phone has failed submitting.

Yes, I totally agree. Often I upvote a comment I disagree with since it nevertheless is a thoughtful and important contribution to the discussion. I feel I learn most from people I disagree with.

Slashdot used to disallow voting if you also comment on the same article.

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