Image: Ad Parnassum, by Paul Klee Wherever I go and ask people what is missing from their lives, the most common answer (if they are not impoverished or seriously ill) is “community.” — Charles Eisenstein ChatGPT, the A.I. robot, often gets things badly wrong
"The only option is to accelerate the transition and incentivize our way of living to shift to a system that is systematically less energy intensive."
(1) The climate scientists are telling us we must reduce ghg emissions by 50% in the remainder of this very decade, then continue to reduce emissions to something like "net zero" over the remaining years of the century.
(2) Rapid "energy transition" defined as the mainstream environmentalists, politicians and media are presenting it to us, if its energy costs are simply added to energy-economy business as usual, will result in what Richard Heinberg describes as a 'pulse' of increased net energy use, 84% of which is presently fossil fuel source energy -- thus resulting in a very significant increase in emissions this decade.
(3) This is a complete contradiction of the very intent and purpose of "energy transition" -- which ostensibly seeks to reduce emissions.
(4) Proposing that a 'pulse' of emissions now is acceptable for lowered emissions in the following decade amounts to yet more of kicking the can down the road and avoiding action on climate.
(5) Since governments are utterly devoted to unending economic growth, it's actually up to us, we ordinary people, to take matters into our own hands, and not demand that governments change their spots. They will not; and we should really stop pretending that modern nation states in the 'developed world' are democratic. They are not. They are instead the ideological playthings of big corporations, who use their power and money (and media ownership) to "manufacture consent".
(6) Up used to mean up; and down meant down. Left used to mean left, and right meant right. Now even our words become meaningless, because we're being asked to believe that the way to reduce emissions is to increase emissions.
"The only option is to accelerate the transition and incentivize our way of living to shift to a system that is systematically less energy intensive."
(1) The climate scientists are telling us we must reduce ghg emissions by 50% in the remainder of this very decade, then continue to reduce emissions to something like "net zero" over the remaining years of the century.
(2) Rapid "energy transition" defined as the mainstream environmentalists, politicians and media are presenting it to us, if its energy costs are simply added to energy-economy business as usual, will result in what Richard Heinberg describes as a 'pulse' of increased net energy use, 84% of which is presently fossil fuel source energy -- thus resulting in a very significant increase in emissions this decade.
(3) This is a complete contradiction of the very intent and purpose of "energy transition" -- which ostensibly seeks to reduce emissions.
(4) Proposing that a 'pulse' of emissions now is acceptable for lowered emissions in the following decade amounts to yet more of kicking the can down the road and avoiding action on climate.
(5) Since governments are utterly devoted to unending economic growth, it's actually up to us, we ordinary people, to take matters into our own hands, and not demand that governments change their spots. They will not; and we should really stop pretending that modern nation states in the 'developed world' are democratic. They are not. They are instead the ideological playthings of big corporations, who use their power and money (and media ownership) to "manufacture consent".
(6) Up used to mean up; and down meant down. Left used to mean left, and right meant right. Now even our words become meaningless, because we're being asked to believe that the way to reduce emissions is to increase emissions.
-- from a comments thread following this article:
https://www.resilience.org/stories/2023-03-23/why-we-cant-just-do-it-the-truth-about-our-failure-to-curb-carbon-emissions/
Richard Heinberg talking about 12 years ago.
Richard Heinberg: Are Enough Americans Facing Reality?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MxbTKLFVUww