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Comment by stratigos | Hacker News Reader

People are thinking way too much about how much this saves them at a personal level.

I think people should instead be thinking about how we can save the existence of the entire species, and all other higher order forms of life on earth, rather than focusing on their individual tax breaks, savings, or other trivial concerns. Yes, your cash flow is rendered quite trivial if life on Earth ends.

Invest in the Life Economy, and turn your back on the Death Economy. The value here is in the benefit to life, concern over state monopolized currencies clearly facilitates an economy of death.

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While noble, it seems the opposite is true. I think most people don't care about future problems, let alone other life forms. Musk has done so well precisely because he's marketed his products in a way that they appeal to people on a personal level. I mean, he could have started with a low performance, average-looking, electric, family sedan. Instead he sold something much more emotive/egotistical, with huge success.

If you want to do the right thing long term, provide products that do the right thing and market them on a personal level.

> I mean, he could have started with a low performance, average-looking, electric, family sedan.

There are other reasons Tesla started with a high-end model. Because building the cars was going to take a lot of R&D, Tesla supported the cost by starting with fancy sports cars, which have a better ROI, and then used the technology to manufacture less pricey cars later on.

Source (ctrl + f "the business plan"): http://waitbutwhy.com/2015/06/how-tesla-will-change-your-lif...

> There are other reasons Tesla started with a high-end model.

True, I didn't mean to imply it was the only reason - more that it's good example of appealing to human self-interest to fix a larger problem.

It is called selling! Nobody would have bothered to buy a electric car if it was launched as "family mass produced car", the reason why people are are raving about Tesla is because their cars are now a status symbol or a lifestyle symbol, just like the iPhone, Musk did his selling well.

When you are building a company, being able to sell a product is more important than just building a world class product.

The reason a high-priced car was the first offering is because that's the only way to bring the new technology to a reasonable price

I didn't mention price. It could have been a high-priced, low performance, average-looking, electric, family sedan, and it would have been more effective at transporting people (more seats in a sedan) plus better for the environment. The point is that the appearance and performance sold for personal and emotional reasons.

That only works if enough people want expensive, low performance, average-looking, electric family sedans.

Which is exactly his point?

> I mean, he could have started with a low performance, average-looking, electric, family sedan.

A lot of other companies went that way but there was no result out of it. There is a reason for the way Tesla went :) They needed a bucket load of money to finance building a mass produced vehicle.

I agree with the sentiment, but I have to correct your idea that global warming is a species-ending problem.

The worst-case scenario of global warming (which might be inevitable given the current CO2 levels) is a 216 foot rise in sea level [1]. This will cause mass migration and be extremely expensive and unpleasant for society as a whole, but poses little threat of ending humanity.

NASA's JPL did a great lecture a few months ago talking about the current scientific consensus on the consequences of global warming - it's well worth the watch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZJYs8L84L4s&t=3714s

[1] http://www.nationalgeographic.com/magazine/2013/09/rising-se...

213 feet??

Should I start buying 215 foot above sea level for future beachfront development?

Maybe if you want the place to be in 1 foot of water?

Global warming is causing the destruction of whole ecosystems, any of which might lead to a chain-reaction that undoes biological infrastructure that entire species rely upon, including humans. Many species have already been ended, so I'm not sure why you believe it's not a species-ending problem. Mass migration also means the movement of predators into territories with unadapted prey, which can also result in extinction. (The Dodo went extinct due to habitat destruction and the introduction of predatory mammals, for example.) Almost every extinction in the history of Earth has been a result of global climate changes.

I don't understand why you're being so myopic? The worst case isn't a few people having to buy new homes, it's mass extinction and war. Which may as well be total nuclear war, as far as you or I can predict.

Um...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clathrate_gun_hypothesis

You are looking at a very small fraction of the problem. Yes higher water is not an extinction level event.

But with increased CO2 there's also increasing acidification. So the plankton dies, coral dies, mollusks die (their shells erode). The food web at sea dies.... as does the food for a decent fraction of the planet. Acid rain causes more damage, food production becomes tougher... especially on the decreasing number of acres above flood level. Much of the most productive farm land in the world would be inundated with acidic salty water.

There is a great book by a marine biologist that goes into detail about these topics. It's called The Ocean of Life - The Fate of Man and the Sea by Callum Roberts. It was recommended to me here on HN several years ago, and I think that recommendation bears repeating. He goes into great detail about conservation topics for half the book, and the other half has to do with climate change and its effects on the oceans (and how that affects humanity).

Also, don't discount the rising level of violent conflicts that will ensue for shrinking resources.

Conflicts don't cause extinction. The winner survives.

Not necessarily. We all know of the theory of Mutually Assured Destruction.

As an analogy, think about what happens if a deadly infectious bacteria or virus "wins" by infecting every human on earth. If there is no cure and no human has an adaptation or mutation to stop it, by winning it has sowed the seeds of its own destruction because there are no more hosts to infect.

It is easy to imagine several scenarios where an all out war for dwindling resources can lead to extinction.

I think what a lot of people miss as well is a lot of our oxygen output comes from life in the ocean. I don't know real numbers here or what other consequences this entails (just wanted to point it out).

Unsettling existing populations increases chances of political instability and potential war. You can see the reaction to migrations and refugees (Syria, for example) now. That could quite easily be magnified if larger populations were forced to desperate measures. War is a species-ending risk, IMO.

If the economics don't work, then you can wish you are saving the planet all you want, but it ain't gonna happen. Elon Musk understands this very well -- he always points out that solving the global warming problem will only work if the solution is economical.

Also, this is far from the optimal thing to do with the money, even if you want to spend it on saving the planet. High quality RECs or carbon offsets would be far more efficient ways to spend it.

This is naïve, useless advice.

First off, we are not at existential risk from climate change. Most reasonable estimates suggest on the order of single-digit percent productivity losses for society over the next several decades. Substantial and unfortunate, but not existence-threatening, and in fact not even enough to outweigh reasonably expectable productivity gains from technological development. There are much more serious existential risks to humanity than climate change.

Second off, no one has enough information about the global state of the world that "just think about the big picture" is actually good, actionable advice. People only have enough information and processing power to do local maximization, and this actually works exceptionally well. If you want whatever arbitrary "big picture" stuff you're into to factor into people's decision-making process, the best way to do that is things like tax incentives. How well this works is up for debate, but it's certainly better than vague appeals to "save the environment".

I'm not sure what you're calling the "death economy". Could you explain that further?

> Most reasonable estimates suggest

What is the variance of those estimators?

> First off, we are not at existential risk from climate change.

A bold claim indeed.

Not really. Even RCP8.0 wouldn't lead to extinction of the human race.

Does that include the increased risks of nuclear war, new disease vectors etc? Because, while the probable outcome is relatively little impact the butterfly effect means you can get some less predictable results indirectly.

Aka migration causes war X which due to _ spiraled into WWIII. Granted the world without global warming could alos end randomly as well so you can just say unknown unknowns are always a risk even if it does mean a slightly less stable geopolitical environment that does not nessisarily mean anything terrible happens.

increased risks of nuclear war

you do realize that initiating nuclear war is suicide, right? the u.s. took advantage of the only chance of actually using one because they were the only nuclear power at the time.

> you do realize that initiating nuclear war is suicide, right?

Given there are plenty of suicidal humans, that's not entirely comforting.

Yes! It's just a matter of time!

you don't need to consider the entire set of humans, only those with the ability/drive to obtain enough power/influence to gain control over a nuclear weapon.

That bar seems to have lowered substantially a few months back.

Accidents happen, but a nuclear exchange between India and Pakistan seems vastly more likely during a war than outside of one.

Is it enough if we're ok, but we continue to cause a mass extinction event?

Yeah good luck with that plan.

("Honey, if we get a solar roof it will help the planet, but we'll have to put junior in the cheaper preschool to pay for it. Whatya think?")

It's unfortunate that people can't see that junior dealing with the effects of climate change in 30, 40, 50 years could be a lot more devastating to his life than the prestige level of his preschool.

could be. the impact of going into a bad school has almost immediate effects. Do you think people dont think at all when they make decisions?

We seem to care about relative outcomes vs peers more than absolute offset shifts for the larger group.

It's a classic case of prisoners' dilemma. Taking your kid out of daycare isn't going to help the planet very much, but could hurt your kid a lot.

Why does there need to be "the best" preschool. Can't we have a society with standards? A society that gives a damn about iniquity?

I think you mean inequality...iniquity is sin...which society doesn't care much about either lol

I will forever Samuel l Jackson reciting Ezekiel 25:17

Fire and brimstone doesn't get much mileage these days It's all global warming.

It all falls down.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BswphxnAibE

We have a society with standards. To combination of free enterprise and government is the strongest standard i know of. Have any better structures?

You are not seeing this from its full potential. By going to a better school kid is more likely to get better access to opportunities which then allow them to better survive any potential climate issues. So the parents are thinking rightly about this.

What about the robots? Better to just keep them home and let them color.

"In the long run we are all dead." - John Maynard Keynes

You aren't wrong, but solutions have to be economically viable in the present.

There's some threshold people can pay to improve their lives (and potentially all lives) in the future -- but the difference between a standard roof and Tesla roof and battery is like 70k for me. I just redid my roof last year, cost me $14k -- and it's a very nice roof. Spending $85k on a roof... that's about a quarter the price of my house.

When it's a 2x price difference, I'd consider it. Realistically, even factoring in the cost of the electricity it will offset, it has to be similar in cost to a conventional roof for most people to invest. I think about one hail storm wiping out an $85k investment... and what insurance rates go up to in order to support this roof... and I just cringe.

Also keep in mind... supply and demand. As more people use solar... the price for electricity -- all electricity -- will go down. Since my electric bill from the power company is likely to drop (in the relative short-term), that lowers my incentive to pay a premium. We're likely to see a spike in oil and gas as prices for those plummet too... We'll need government to artificially inflate the cost of these to remind people about the environmental damage, or we'll do a lot of damage if the switch to solar happens too quickly.

Anyway... it's cool, just way out of my price point... and I feel like I make a fairly good living and tend to be a bit leftist on environmental issues... for your average Red-Stater, no way they're going to even consider paying a price like this. Looking forward to the "3" version of this in a decade or so, when the price drops to about 1/3 of what it is now, I'm sold!

What matters is it being a benefit on a personal level. There is a massive collective action problem. Even if I wanted to spend money on this, it wouldn't matter unless vast numbers of people also do it. There is no way that vast numbers of people are going to act against their self interest all at once.

This is a case of should be this way, but never will be. People have and always will respond to personal incentives, which is why framing this way is doing well.

If people are incentivized to get solar roofs for personal benefits and it happens to also help the "Life Economy," this is good. Especially because more people will get them when they're framed in terms of what an individual gains from installing it, not what Humanity gains.

Even if you want to calculate this on ecological cost basis rather than economic, you could better spend that money to achieve a larger impact.

People serious about saving the planet aren't putting solar shingles on their mansions.

They're downsizing.

In a community of entrepreneurs and developers of all stripes, scaling down is an unpopular solution. But, it is the only one that I have been able to follow through on, myself. I have actually come to enjoy the newfound simplicity in my life.

I'm not disagreeing with you, but I'll throw out this perspective:

If you want to invent tomorrow's computer today, you can do it by spending a lot of money per unit. That was thinking at Xerox Parc and at SRI before it.

Tying it together, often the only people who can afford and bootstrap early prototypes are wealthy people. Elon has tapped into this strategy by making the early prototypes of his cars and shingles sexy so wealthy people can signal to other wealthy people that they are high-minded and forward thinking people.

Good.

If we can use that to bootstrap the production of cheaper shingle/panels for billions of people in the long run, we're better off in the long run.

Nevertheless, I agree with your fundamental premise that downsizing, possession sharing and clever recycling is the best solution for most people. Personally speaking, I'd much rather live a life where I share my personal possessions and consume as little as possible. Call me a hippy, but I could care less for owning most shit. It doesn't make me happy for the most part.

I'd also love to see us get away from heating/cooling buildings and research heating/cooling bodies with interesting clothing. Again, I think targeting high-minded/forward-thinking wealthy people is a good strategy for cultivating an important industries and products like this.

If you are really serious, your goal should be to be net positive, downgrading won't get you there, never.

Tesla roof isn't going to save the species and life isn't going to end. I expect this type of comment on reddit, not on hacker news.

> Invest in the Life Economy, and turn your back on the Death Economy.

Are you serious? This doesn't pass the smell test. This sounds like something from a PR firm hired by Tesla to "evangelize" on social media.

Why are you trying to get in the way of the Life Economy?

You need some Dayman:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A4DNXBkfksI

Why are you still trying altruism?

Aligning the economic incentives to promote an outcome is much more effective at getting that outcome

WE ALREADY KNOW THIS

Why does every climate change story have someone spreading the same false information? Climate change isn't a threat to the human race. Inventing extreme ideas entrenches opposition and gives them valid reasons to say "you're wrong and I won't do anything to help". If you really believe that, then it's an unconventional idea that deserves references.

Read away: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_warming#Observed_and_ex...

I don't see anything in there related to the extinction of humans. That's what the OP was concerned about.

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