Climate change sceptics, come on over

[LayAllYourLoveOnMe]

if you doubt or reject any of the key propositions about climate change namely:

It's happening
It's us
It's bad
We can do something

Please come on over and voice your doubts. I can't control the thread but I will try to gather information and reply respectfully and hopefully other like-minded people will try to do the same. And hey, if you're right and I'm wrong about proposition 1 (it's happening) then that would be fantastic! :)

My background is that I studied the subject (not an expert, just undergraduate level stuff). Then I set up a local Friends of the Earth group. Then I got dispirited about the insults and accusations levelled not at big multi-nationals but at anyone who voiced doubts.... I know what it is to be in a minority in a room where everyone else is virtue-signalling so I'm hoping to re-engage some people who 've given up and switched off.

I'm not exactly a sceptic but if your fourth point is correct, what can we do and why aren't we doing it?
I;m autistic and have dyspraxia and have trouble understanding how society works and science. Both of which are important in understanding this I think.
I don't drive, fly, have children or eat meat anyway and mostly I can only afford second hand clothes, so my carbon footprint isn;t as bad as some.
I don't understand the science behind climate change and also I don't understand why we don't all just get given a carbon ration card or something.
Also, why are people getting electric cars when electric is made by fossil fuels?

I'm sceptical about no.4.

I don't think 'we' can reverse it. I think it would take a monumental change from the whole world and that isn't going to happen.

I am a bit like you raven.once you accept proposition 1,2 and 3 it’s hard to understand why we aren’t doing more.

Years ago there was an article in the Friends of the Earth magazine called “Why isnt everyone campaigning?” which was how I felt.

Laiste I think the hope is to halt it at 2% rise

I've said on another thread, there seems such an element of religiosity to the whole thing, a kind of cultishness. We try our best - reusable nappies, minimal plastics, grow a lot of our own food, very rarely fly anywhere. But I'm not willing to have the industrial capacity of the whole country ruined, or make our electricity supply unreliable or any one of the many other issues when china burns 4 billion tons of coal a year and 86% of global plastic input to the oceans is from Asia.

I work at a Uni with an environment section and they will tell you it's now or never! Look at the news today. Bush fires sweeping Australia, Jakarta flooding due to deforestation and water extraction and record temperatures in Sweden. The big companies want to keep on making money. Until there is more money to be made out of green science then we are on a downward path.

“there seems such an element of religiosity to the whole thing, a kind of cultishness”

Yes I think a lot of people got turned off by that. I tried to stop the “climate change denier” phrase in my group but people seemed tone deaf to it.

I wonder if China is our only hope (as they don’t have democracy to contend with and their leaders like clean air and healthy children as much as the rest of us)

“Until there is more money to be made out of green science then we are on a downward path.”

I think the EU has worked hard on that. Certainly investments in R&D have changed over the decade.

I don't understand the whys and wherefore but in the past we had ice ages when the scientists and people who research these things say they came and then receded.
They say that England was covered by a sheet of ice 1000m thick. Obviously this was before man existed let alone had any influence on the climate so why did the climate get so much warmer.
I can see from history that even in the recent past nobody had as much stuff as we have now nobody had central heating cars and planes were invented in the last 120 years and plastics didn't exist until the 1920s.
I really don't know what the future holds for the planet and even if cars, planes, heating plastics, fashion etc were banned would it make any difference to the planets future.

We are also encouraged to buy and improve and change stuff due to advertising. This year's colour the new i phone when the one we have works fine,the new furniture new cars or clothing because what we have is now unfashionable or there's something better now.
Until this ethos changes then the cast majority will continue to be brainwashed into needing the latest thing.
Plus we are used to having goods we want when we want them dies anyone really need beans or flowers flown across the globe, its nice but non essential ( apart from the fact the flower growers would not survive without western money buying the goods)
It's a lot more complicated than don't buy the things the few pence the bean growers and others get keep them from starvation.
If we don't buy the goods they have no money loose their income, no universal credit or similar for them. I know universal credit is crap but its slightly better than nothing.

Obviously major companies and governments need to step up and no, it won’t be solved (if it ever will be) until they do so.

However- you’re being selfish and deluding yourselves if you think that we can’t do anything ourselves. We all have to do our bit. Eat less meat, fly less, have less children, don’t buy single use plastic and so on. Just do your best.

If you can afford it, switch to an environmentally friendly gas provider too.

I get massive anxiety about it so find myself burying my head in the sand to protect my well being.
I try to do my bit but don't see how that can change things in the face of massive corporations, fossil fuel companies, corrupt governments etc

I agree Borkins, all you see these days is warnings about the climate, but what can I as an individual do? I've never flown in my life, been vegetarian most of it too and don't own a car. However, I feel powerless when as stated, countries like China, the USA, and UK just pump out more warming gasses and pollution. What can we do?!

I suspect Big Oil etc. lobbyists may be moving on from creating deliberate ambiguity about the causes of climate change, and instead wanting us to feel individually powerless/like it’s too late. It’s quite likely their new way of ensuring industry doesn’t have to take responsibility and drive change.

I'm not a climate skeptic, but I have studied the topic at uni too.

At an individual level we can eat less meat and foods from local sources, we can change energy to 100% sustainable, we can take public transport, we can buy second hand (if at all), we can not fly. However, individual action isn't enough. There needs to be huge global changes. The reasons why we're not doing making those changes is (I think) because the generally accepted worldview right now is capitalism, and for capitalism to carry on working we need continued consumption and economic growth. Many people think making the kind of deep changes to our society and economy that we would need to reduce emissions is inconsistent with that. I think there's also a significant element of politicians not wanting to lose popularity for policies that only bring long term benefits (rather than short term ones).

what can we do and why aren't we doing it?

Why aren’t we moving to nuclear? If you are an environmentalist and don’t promote it, then I don’t take you seriously. Bottom line.

Also, capitalism has tremendously reduced human suffering and improved the lifespan and child mortality rates in countries who’ve adopted it worldwide (China’s reduction of poverty has been nothing short of astonishing).

foods from local sources isn’t it more efficient to import food from other countries? I think farming in the UK is very resource heavy is it not? Transport is only a fraction of the CO2 emissions anyway.

(Local food can be tastier though and more artisanal, so good for the tastebuds but it’s not going to feed the masses or anything)

@MangoFeverDream
Don’t see why countries like the UK can’t move to wind power, ditto but also with much solar power in places like Australia; which are unfortunately facing the terrible results of climate change.

I feel the only way to go forward is to go back.
Single use plastic could be stopped quickly but the government's won't do that, just from a industry/ jobs point of view.
If we all bought electric cars tomorrow,we couldn't charge them.
People now commute for work, you are not guaranteed a place at your local school so people drive everywhere.
We eat to much processed food, food with to many air miles.
Everything needs charging, heating, cooling.
I do what I can but will it make a difference?!

Don’t see why countries like the UK can’t move to wind power, ditto but also with much solar power in places like Australia; which are unfortunately facing the terrible results of climate change

They do not provide a stable source of energy and have terrible land use issues (you get more bang for the buck with nuclear, so to speak).

Look at the numbers. France has some of the lowest CO2 output in Europe thanks to their nuclear fleet (70% of energy source) while Germany is struggling to reduce their carbon emissions while putting massive investment into wind and solar. The numbers don’t add up

This is an interesting article: www.forbes.com/sites/michaelshellenberger/2019/02/07/green-new-deal-excludes-nuclear-and-would-thus-increase-emissions-just-like-it-did-in-vermont/#1c8672789afd

A key passage: Their explicit goal was to make nuclear expensive. “Our campaign stressing the hazards of nuclear power will supply a rationale for increasing regulation,” wrote the Sierra Club Executive Director in a 1975 memo to the board of Directors, “and add to the cost of the industry.”

Anti-nuclear campaigners managed to kill all but roughly 100 reactors. What got built in their place? Coal plants. Had just 400 of the promised 1,000 reactors been built, the U.S. would today be producing nearly 100 percent of its electricity from zero-emissions sources, obviating the need for a climate crusade to clean up electricity.

That’s right. “Green” activists prevented the US from enacting a zero-carbon energy policy in the 70s. We would have none of this panic if they’d not influenced public opinion to turn against nuclear. This is their fault and I’ll not listen to them again.

Just adding that zero-emissions of carbon refers to electricity production. (No way could this happen for, say, the agricultural sector)

I don’t think it can be stopped. It would take such an overhaul of our economic system and governments simply aren’t prepared to risk implementing such unpopular policies.

It’s a bit daft to criticise the anti cc movement for its religious fervour. If anything merits dramatic panic it’s this.

I think things can be done, starting at a local level.

I live in a block of 50 flats, within there we have 6 bins and only one is recycling.

This means that for me to recycle anything I need to take it down to my local tip. That is a good 20 minute walk and I would need to do it a few times a week. The kicker? I cant get in there unless I have a car. I don't have one, the next nearest recycling place is 30 minutes walk.

I have emailed my council and due to people not cleaning out their tins properly they will not give anymore recycling bins.

Also, it turns out most of the recycling they don't bother anyway and it all goes into the same place.

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.

They were predicting a new ice age for Britain on the Seventies...

I do what I can, I haven’t flown in 13 years, I have a few meat free nights per week, I’m conscious of what I’m buying and I rarely have the heating above 18 unless very cold but I do have children and I do have a car for my job in community nursing which is essential to cover the huge rural area which I live in, this isn’t going to change anytime soon as people will always need nurses and there is a push for more hospital care at home now. I would like my next car to be a hybrid but a full electric one wouldn’t cover the miles I do at the moment. The way it is shoved down my throat sometimes though just makes me want to disengage, Greta thunberg for example with her big screaming speeches etc just made me switch off