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Comment by iso1337 | Hacker News Reader

I think that there needs to be an equivalent of a climate 9/11 event. Maybe Miami getting wiped off the map by a category 9 hurricane (and call me a pessimist but the loss of a city in a developing country to climate change just won't register in the minds of the developed world).

We as a species are very emotionally driven and slow trends and statistics just aren't as compelling as a big event. I don't know how bad the environment will have to get for that to happen though.

Otherwise, the people creating the most carbon emissions will just view this as an inconvenience and crank their AC higher. The numbers involved in the reporting (2C, 3C etc) just sound small and insignificant when in reality of course that's just an average.

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It is worth remembering that less than 2 years ago thousands of Americans were killed and 3 million plus Americans spent months without electricity due to a hurricane. It is impossible to link that single event to climate change since climate is about trends and not single events, but that event came and went and generally speaking the country barely seemed to care.

Are you referring to the one that hit Puerto Rico? Cynically I think that's because many people don't consider that truly part of America. (Note that's not my personal views, but just trying to make sense of why there was such a lackluster response).

My original comment was really trying to get at the human factors involved as to why we don't care. We just seem to be bad at responding to trends but better at responding to single events. Just like how the US generally don't care about the 40k+ USians killed every year in traffic accidents, but the US responded strongly to the singular event that was 9/11.

Edit: care about on an emotional, popular media level. Deaths per vehicle mile traveled have been going down over time in the US, due to increased safety regulations imposed on the manufacturers.

Yes, I was referring to hurricane Maria that impacted Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands.

>We just seem to be bad at responding to trends but better at responding to single events.

That is the problem since climate change is only visible when looking at trends. 100 year floods were very much a thing before climate change so you can't point to a single 100 year flood as a sign of a problem. You instead have to point to X number of 100 year floods in Y number of years.

As far as human factor go, do you think political groups would do well to take more 'extremist' positions like outlawing gas burning cars and outlaw kerosene-based air travel, etc? It seems extreme, but isn't that what we are going to need to do anyway?

The environmental political base would stomach it, the opposition would think you're crazy, but they weren't going to help anyway. The tuned-out folks might take notice, "You want to do what?"

Talking about an abstract fossil fuel tax is not visceral enough. Threaten to take away something tangible and you might have their attention. Once you have their attention, explain why you're (we're) in this bind, then ask them to help. Ask them what they want to do if not your plan? Don't settle for anything less than serious fossil fuel withdrawal.

It feels heavy handed, but not too far off the mark from what's needed.

Even then... I saw 9/11 an incredible opportunity to start a nation-wide movement to drop off oil. Because look what they did! Let's stop pouring money in the industry that supports them! Let's change our ways from driving SUVs just to eat out and buy groceries.

But... money come first. Always. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Why_We_Fight_(2005_film)

I'm thinking we need NYC and Miami to be completely wiped off the map by rising waters before anyone takes action, when D.C. is the new coastline they might wake up and start to change things, I hope it's not too late by then.

Edit: Or they might bask that they (congress) now own beach-front property.

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