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Comment by cryptoz | Hacker News Reader

The main problem with that thinking is that if the story is just about adaptation topics, we're going to be fighting a losing war for centuries. Adaptation is urgent to save human lives, yes - but vastly more important is to reduce greenhouse gas output. There is only one story right now for the US News to focus on:

Donald Trump thinks climate change is a hoax.

Ted Cruz also thinks climate change is a hoax.

Hillary Clinton thinks climate change is not a problem and that we should increase our greenhouse gas output as fast as possible.

Bernie Sanders considers climate change to be of critical importance and will act as a leader to curtail our greenhouse gas output. He is also the least likely leader in the race right now.

The story is not just about adaptation. The story is about how the US political leadership is passionate about increasing the rate of climate change and calling the entire science of climate a 'hoax'.

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Donald Trump is a problem, yes, although arguably for bigger reasons than just his stance on climate change. Ted Cruz is from Texas, so... :).

I'm not sure where you get the impression that Hillary Clinton thinks climate change is "not a problem". Her website certainly states otherwise: https://www.hillaryclinton.com/issues/climate/

Hillary Clinton profits directly from oil companies. She can say what she likes on her website, but her entire presidential campaign seems bent on doing the exact opposite. She is in favor of creating new technologies and building new infrastructure that will increase our greenhouse gas output. She is in favor of investing our time and money into creating new oil and gas energy systems.

Her campaign finances are a good indicator of how she will act if she is elected - much better than what her website says right now, or at any time. If she wants to really stand behind what that page says, she should stand up and say:

"Oil companies are destroying our planet's life and our health here in the USA. I will no longer take money from them. I will no longer vouch for new oil technologies."

And then she should do those things. Until then, her website is probably full of lies and I do not trust her word at all.

I'm not a fan of the clintons, reading about the whitewater scandal was enough for me to determine there's corruption abound with them; and I also support reducing oil consumption and further taxing of oil companies, but I have to say the arguments you outlined are not that good.

1. New technology leads to greater efficiency therefore reduces carbon output - So what's wrong with that? And Obama proved blocking pipelines does not stop the oil from flowing - right?

2. Taking money from oil companies doesn't mean much other than she's not anti-oil, which as a leader who understands the current dilemma, is probably not all that bad.

Obama came out of his first election pumping money into coal which was just a waste of money. Obama blocked keystone yes, but that just pushed it through via train cars and trucking (which adds more pollution). Also, Oilsands production only dropped by 0.1 percent during the whole price plummet, so not much happened there- did it? So was Obama a good investment on that front?

If you want to change the world for the better we, the people of the world, have to stop choosing to consume so much of it, but no one wants to discuss that, not even in politics.

The question was "why doesn't the mainstream media cover this news?" and my assertion is that it is no longer news to their audiences. That can be global warming it can be Spacex launches it can be dubious dealings at Panamanian law firms.

My thesis is that stories about taking action would be considered "newsworthy" with respect to this topic, the lack of action is not.

But alas do not forget that you are in your own echo chamber. Sadly there are many others who are not as informed as you or have such a capacity for critical thought. Adaptation is a neural network problem where all nodes need to have the same information so the efforts can be coordinated.

That's a really good point, but to your notion about neural networks, I talked with a Ph.D student who was working on some interesting 'damaged network' ideas vis-a-vis RNNs that have connectivity issues. Their thesis is that most systems work in a partial vacuum and by adding the sort of disconnection in a network you can tease out a more durable network in all conditions. I thought it was a pretty novel field of study.

So adapt or die? Sounds like nature to me....

So do we as a species just give up on every one else because they are incapable of adapting? With that line of thinking we will never be better then the animals that only react to their environment and don't really plan for the future.(save the few specific cases due to evolutionary pressure)

I think that environmentalism is more akin to a civil rights movement. People must change their behaviour not just practically, but on an intellectual and emotional level. Actions that seem trivial can impose a horrible burden on other people. Their is a huge reluctance to take personal responsibility for this, even among climate change believers. Climate Change Deniers simply don't want to accept responsibility, and the conspiracy theory is a neat way to do that.

> Hillary Clinton thinks climate change is not a problem and that we should increase our greenhouse gas output as fast as possible.

I'd ask that if we must discuss politics, let's avoid hyperbole and be careful to make accurate statements. All the quote above communicates is that you are angry about her position/actions re climate change, or that you simply want to damage her in others' eyes.

Hillary was for the Keystone pipeline before she was against it.

Dr. James Hansen of NASA has written that the Keystone pipeline would be "game over for climate" [1]

So I think it's fair to say she doesn't really treat climate change as a pressing problem, unless forced to by political expediency.

She also opposes the most sensible solution, a carbon tax.

I think the difference between her recently stated positions, and her actual political DNA, as well as that of her financial patrons, makes her a wolf in sheep's clothing on climate.

[1] http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/10/opinion/game-over-for-the-...

Is Dr. Hansen really more credible than Sec. Clinton?

Well Sec. Clinton thought the invasion of Iraq, and arming the so-called moderate opposition in Syria and Libya were good ideas.

Even now with Europe at the brink, she still wants a no-fly zone to protect the moderate mujaheddin and to continue the anti-Russia/Assad chessgame she put into action.

She also later decided her initial Keystone support was wrong, and changed her mind.

So I'm going to say her judgement is not very good.

As far as Dr. Hansen goes, his stance is pretty simple. Look at the weird climate effects we are seeing at >400ppm carbon.

Climate was more stable and hospitable at 350ppm, he proposes leveling off emissions and then reducing them greatly by 2050. Pretty basic, rational stance in my opinion.

The amount of carbon the Keystone pipeline would deliver would blow us right past our targets.

Have Trump or Cruz ever used the word "hoax", or is that your reinterpretation of their position?

Have either one of them ever said that there is no such thing as climate change, as your statement seems to imply? Or, do they just question the details of how the evidence is presented and emphasized, the tradeoffs in the proposed responses, and the perverse incentives involved?

https://twitter.com/tedcruz/status/721460062355468289

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/26589529219124838...

I suppose you could interpret these as not necessarily saying "there is no such thing as climate change", if you wanted to be denser than a neutron star.

> CO2 is what every human breathes out; every plant, in turn,consumes CO2

That tweet from Ted Cruz is bizarre. We've removed 3.6 million square miles of forest (from the original 6 million)[1], not to mention the billions of tons of CO2 produced annually through fuel combustion. What does the fact that humans expel CO2 have to do with it?

[1]: http://www.nature.org/ourinitiatives/habitats/rainforests/in...

Wait, so to you, a statement affirming part of the carbon cycle is equivalent to "there is no such thing as climate change"?

Wow. Wow.

> Have either one of them ever said that there is no such thing as climate change, as your statement seems to imply?

Cruz:

  OK, you are incorrect, actually. The scientific
  evidence doesn't support global warming. For the
  last 18 years, the satellite data - we have
  satellites that monitor the atmosphere. The
  satellites that actually measure the temperature
  showed no significant warming whatsoever.

  ...

  Climate change is the perfect pseudoscientific
  theory for a big government politician who wants
  more power. Why? Because it is a theory that can
  never be disproven.

http://www.npr.org/2015/12/09/459026242/scientific-evidence-...

Neither quote says or implies "there is no such thing as climate change".

In fact, the second one - "it is a theory that can never be disproven" makes it clear that he understands that climate change is constant and has always happened.

"The satellites that actually measure the temperature showed no significant warming whatsoever".

That's a narrow comment about a specific dataset, and is supported by evidence.

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