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Comment by gambiting | Hacker News Reader

Only yesterday I had a "discussion" with someone online who was trying to explain to me that climate change is fake concept made to charge more money for everything through environmental regulations. I kept sending him more and more data proving that no, we really really are screwed, but eventually I just got called an eco-cuck(whatever that even means) who believes made up research. And no, this was not the first time I had a similar conversation with people.

I don't know, I just don't have a strength to do this anymore. Humanity is clearly in danger and yet there is a very vocal minority that keeps pretending none of this is happening and actively attacks anyone who says otherwise. I just feel like giving up on even trying anymore.

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Humanity is clearly in danger and yet there is a very vocal minority that keeps pretending none of this is happening

You'll get cranks and opponents on everything. The real problem is the overwhelming majority of people who think "OK, sure, bad stuff is happening, but what impact do my simple efforts make to improve it? Meh."

Platitudes about how the world will be destroyed will not sway those people to act en masse - there needs to be some other element to it, but what? (I personally lean towards the eventual technological solutions, since technology has dug us out of many a hole before.)

I am sorry, but believing in a magic technological breakthrough at this stage is just another form of denial, and another version of "but what impact do I make. Meh, I'll just sit and wait for the technological solution".

No, denial is asserting that something is not happening or does not exist. I posit that the majority of the world is broadly inactive over climate change but acknowledges and observes its effects.

I do broadly think that only a technological or government-driven solution is viable, however, because unless everyone does something significant, the needle won't move, and everyone won't do something significant without being forced or radically assisted.

I do agree with you. The question is how do we get there. The government won't act by itself. It won't act unless we the people demand it. What gives me hope is that we might not need to wait for the majority vote. Apparently it only takes 3.5% of the population to get serious about something to effect change - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YJSehRlU34w

So, let's get out of our technology bubble, away from keyboard, and let's go do something.

The problem is that all the deniers are pushing us further down the road where the magical technological breakthrough is really the only option we have left.

This has been a problem for people already thousands of years ago. Stoicism is one way to deal with it. https://zenpencils.com/comic/aurelius/

> I just feel like giving up on even trying anymore.

Please don’t. Consider that your audience is not a vocal minority (you can pretty much ignore them), but silent majority. Majority of Americans actually believe in man-made climate change (google gallup polls), they just don’t have it at the top of their priority list.

Don't engage them, that just gives them a platform

I'd argue that if you don't engage them then that just bolsters them. If you go on Facebook and look at any post about this there will be hundreds if not thousands of comments spewing nonsense about climate change being fake. They all do that because they see other people doing it and absolutely no one challenging them. They feel like everyone is on their side because....that's what it looks like.

well, what are you gonna do about the global warming?

convince people to stop using their IPhones, stop using your PC, stop driving cars, stop using electricity. Bam, problem solved. Or try to overthrow corporations with big carbon monoxide signatures. Yeah, I didn't think so.

It is an immensely complex problem that has no easy solution, and people talking about it is not gonna do much, or is it??

If you believe in Capitalism:

Step 1: Assign a cost for CO2 emissions.

Step 2: Let the market deal with the costs.

Step 3: Asses if the cost was at the right amount. Adjust if necessary and repeat.

If you don't believe in Capitalism:

Step 1: Change the governmental system to a system of your liking.

Step 2: Find a way in this new system to control what companies do. e.g. state planned economics, regulations, etc.

Best control is no control. Taoist anarchy is my political system of choice.

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