Mount Everest is visible from Kathmandu for first time in living memory

The 'living memory' claim seems a bit far fetched, too. Let's pretend living memory means the last 100 years, that'd mean air pollution levels in 1920 wee so poor you couldn't see Everest from Kathmandu. I'm no expert, but I don't think Nepal and the surrounding area of China were industrialised at that time, and there definitely weren't many vehicles on the road at the time, so where would the air pollution have come from?

As far as I can tell this isn't true. Mount Everest can be seen from Kathmandu but not from the city center as it is obscured by Kang Nachugo see this image: https://i.imgur.com/4N3gs5V.jpg

If you got to the south of Kathmandu e.g. Chobar where this photo was taken, Everest is no longer obscured as seen from this image https://i.imgur.com/JCMmhTs.png where the line between the Everest summit and Chobar is seen passing Kang Nachugo.

I've been to Chandragiri and I can attest to this. You can almost see the entire Himalayan range on a clear sunny day (including Mt. Everest). They even have powerful binoculars set up for better viewing.

Well whether or not true is another discussion. Important is , there definitely is a pattern in air quality increase in many places, and what seems to be contributing factor is the minimized human moment. I hope we find a sustainable solution to improve the air we breathe.

I am from Kathmandu. Yes, technically, you could see Mt. Everest on a clear dawn from Fulchowki or Chandragiri.

But, seeing Mt. Everest sitting from my terrace at home in Kathmandu (theoretically as I am in Boston, but some of my folks in Nepal see Sagarmatha (Everest) now) would not have been possible without all this pollution throughout Nepal going away.

Chandragiri hills is at a higher altitude than Kathmandu valley.

COPD + COVID sounds like a death sentence, so if I suffered from it, I too would avoid hospitals (and anyone else) like the literal plague.

I've been to mexico city a lot of times. One day I had to take a taxi at 6 am sunday morning after a hard rain the night before.

The air have been cleaned by the rain and the sky was clear. And I noticed that the city was surrounded by these picturesqe mountain peaks (that I had never seen before, or since)

I imagine you seeing the same thing.

As predicted.

Well, the day that humans manage to wipe themselves off the face of the planet will be a day of rejoicing for all species other than rats, raccoons, and cockroaches.

Another point to balance the "how much environmental damage seems to be recovering":

CO2 in the atmosphere has a long inertia. The (reduction of) emissions in the past few months will not have any effect on the global warming for a few decades.

Basically in the short/mid-term, CO2 emissions are accumulated to previous emissions, not replacing them

Unfortunately, it looks like this will be short-lived. China's emissions for some pollutants are already above what they were pre-shutdown.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-china-...

Imagine - what will happen when next big virus/bacteria pandemic hits the earth...Other species will stand a chance when human population makes some room ...it probably sounds bad but unfortunately the humans are the problem - not the CO2 or something else (they are just consequence) - proof is how nature thrives around Chernobyl

>a catastrophic global recession

Is it catastrophic though? Market doesn’t seem to think so.

A month or so back I thought I was going crazy because I began to notice just how clear the NYC skyline appeared from where I live. It's always been visible, but the clarity is what struck me.

And the bad news is that, to reach our climate goals, we need to do much more. https://wedocs.unep.org/bitstream/handle/20.500.11822/30797/...: “the required cuts in emissions are now 2.7 per cent per year from 2020 to year- 2030 for the 2°C goal and 7.6 per cent per year on average for the 1.5°C goal.”

With the help of this year’s crisis, that 2°C goal seems in sight, but 1.027¹⁰ is about 1.3, so even if that “as much as” is globally, we would need about 10% more, so we still would have to find new ways to decrease emissions. I don’t even see us keep our current gains.

That 1.5°C goal certainly is way out of sight, IMO.

Though hopefully using them less, at least?

If you’re sufficiently worried about COVID to switch from public transport to a car, why would you use it to travel into an office every day?

I like how the car industry is hoping based on a once-in-a-hundred-year pandemic response. Gives me no confidence for their long term future.

If people are getting by without a car now, I wouldn't think this situation would make them rush back into owning one. For one thing, if you don't have a job to go to, then you don't need one and probably have better things to spend your money on. And for another, and as a member of a 4-person, 2-car family, a car is expensive to buy, expensive to run day-to-day, and expensive to maintain, which is a reason some people have re-arranged their lives around not needing one. Thirdly, the purchase of a new (to the person, not necessarily brand new off the production line / ship) car, where I'm from anyway, is announcement-worthy; it's a date-on-the-calendar circling in red pen event. There's an excitement about the new 'you' that you're going to be seen as on the road. This gives the act of the purchase of a new car some intrinsic value and a bump in personal 'brand'; a dopamine hit. That whole schtick doesn't exist when you have to buy a fucking car to avoid a virus. It's a begrudging purchase, and all the expense that goes along with it will only increase the resentment of the requirement; the reminders of dealing with traffic, the hassle of getting petrol (not even necessarily the paying for it). All these will be reminders of why they avoided car ownership and will see them re-pursuing that option ASAFP.

If there is a bump in car ownership, as that article states is the case in China, then I'd be tipping there'll be a bump in second-hand car sales within 12 - 18 months.

I've been saying for the last five years that my next car will be electric. The last couple of years I'm questioning how I can arrange things so my next car is a bike, or my feet, or a scooter, or anything smaller, cheaper, and less hassle.

Something else to file under obvious, but not until you think about it: I donate plasma once a month or so, and in chatting to the people that work at the blood donation centre, they were saying that they now have too much blood, too many donors. With less traffic, there are far fewer major trauma incidents as a result of car crashes. Normally blood donation centres always need more. It's a good situation to be in, but also unfortunate because it's going to eventually settle back to where it was before. Traffic where I am is almost back to normal.

Snowbrains.com was registered on 2012-06-19, it has a very short living memory.

Or perhaps the definition of Kathmandu being used was the one where it is 32 km west of Nagarkot?

I think that's the point! I found some possible candidates on Google Street View (which only has isolated spots):

From Chobhar in March 2019, facing Everest: https://www.google.com/maps/@27.6541403,85.2796492,3a,75y,78...

Elsewhere in Kathmandu in April 2020, facing Everest: https://www.google.com/maps/@27.6745306,85.3249687,3a,75y,59...

There's no hope of seeing that far through the haze.

Honestly, the amount that public discourse can be swayed by "meme makers" and other such things has left me very disillusioned.

No doubt there are people who either have a marginal vested interest in denying this ("I love my truck/status quo/flights") and also normal people who are typically contrarian. -- these people can be easily swayed by people who have a financial investment in keeping things fossil friendly.

I saw a video from Vox recently[0] where they have some people from 'knowyourmeme' making memes for the US democratic representative debates, it was eye opening.

When you think of Memes you think of grassroots folks, people who just sit in their living room and think of something funny, make a low effort pop culture reference and then continue living their lives. You _don't_ imagine people sitting in boardrooms thinking up the best comedic caption that simultaneously promotes brands or ideas.. the concept feels absurd, yet, it happens.

Now I'm completely jaded; I am immediately distrustful of comments or memes containing even subjects I agree with, I still have some form of trust in ordinary media because at least it's not as anonymous.

[0]: https://www.vox.com/2019/11/1/20942599/glad-you-asked-episod...

Or was it because you had more time to slow down and look at the sky??

The lack of rubbish on the streets, quiet nights, quiet streets, families out walking/biking and increased bird numbers nearby have been great. Being a lockdown enthusiast is probably a bit much, but I’ll miss aspects of it.

Here's an article that's a bit more in-depth on the effects https://www.nature.com/articles/s41558-020-0797-x

Impossibly best case scenario, two months and change? A drop in the bucket.

Wrong thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23246672

So you're taking steps and not having children then?

Having 2 children to replace the parents is already enough to drive population down longterm (because statistically, there could be a lot of reasons that those kids might not reach a time to have their own offsprings).

There’s a very real chance that strategy would significantly increase the likelihood of human extinction in the medium to distant future. We need minds to solve problems.

Of course, that’s not to say that it’s impossible to have too many people, or even that decreasing the likelihood of human extinction is necessarily one of the most important goals.

Sadly, at this point it does seem like in order to significantly curb emissions it will take a catastrophy of biblical proportions which wipes out much of humanity.

That, or an endless succession of airborne diseases that keeps the population isolating itself .

Whatever genes make it possible for you to say that, even if they are as strongly selected for as the ability to write, are going to go away...

> No one says that

Hmm, I feel like lots of people say that, because overpopulation has been a large topic of discussion and concern for like 40 years.

10% seems pretty extreme, though.

>No one says that

Why do people who say we need fewer humans on the planet always say, "no one says this?"

Literally every discussion about population, pollution, global warming, fusion, farming, or social sciences has some thread where someone says, "there are too many people and no one is talking about it." It's getting tiring reading this martyrdom, and I generally tend to agree with the viewpoint.

But this is not some edgy take. The most populous country on earth enacted policies that seem to support this idea in the 70s.

Why 10%?

Why not 5%? or 25%?

Also, how would you chose who gets to stay?

In any case I find it quite hard to justify a reduction of population based on being able to have better sights

Up until less than a hundred years ago the only way to make sure any of your kids survived was to have seven or eight of them. This has change dramatically in the developed countries and is on the way every else as well as standards of living increase.

Child births need to be at around 2.1 per woman if the population is to remain constant. Right now most developed countries are way below that.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_and...

If you view 7.5 billion humans as being too many people, what are your views on the 70 billion farm animals we have?

> But imagine Earth with a stable 10% of our current population.

I can't imagine maintaining that in anything other than a brutal and arbitrary way. It's very difficult to separate humans from their humanity, and even in countries where birth limits have been tried, we know that it is an ineffective policy and is ultimately cruel.

> Clean, abundant, and without the catastrophic extinction event already underway.

Just take your ideas one step further. Earth is not a home for humans, it is a crucible that seeks to find the most suitable form of life. There's no reason we should expect to succeed, and if we can't, half-measures that only prolong suffering and the failure of our biology are illogical.

Thanos is that you?

I’m not sure how to interpret your directive (“we need less humans...” “10% of our current population”) without deep disgust. Your critique of others’ presumption of rights as humans clashes with your ideal where 90% of humans lack even the right to live. Most appalling is that this world view might be treated as anything less than macabre.

After you.

Fewer humans is a cop out. We need humans who won't pollute the earth to death. We need borderline Authoritarianism that protects the environment. 90 or so percent of humans just want to survive. If society tells them they need a carbon emitting vehicle to survive, they do that. Humans aren't the problem, our society is.

I can definitely say that the statement 'Have as many kids as you want' is not considered a basic human right in a resource constrained place in India where a lot of discussions among educated public was the ill effects of population and the competition for scarce resources it generates. It is a privileged first world view where education, development and high standard of living led to falling birth rates. On a second level it is to do with religious ideologies like Catholicism, Mormonism and Islam where even educated people have 3+ kids many times. Also it was a norm in societies with high infant mortality rate and lack of education (Africa, India of the 50s to 80s etc.) I feel a replacement level fertility of 2 kids should be the norm personally and Govt should never provide any future assistance like UBI to people with more kids.

Any ways this assumes that the world resources (land, water, minerals, technology ) are divided fairly in the population. This is definitely not true and the people who managed to conquered distant lands have much more of this available per person. Simply compare per capita stats of Canada v Bangladesh and the answer becomes clear.

Humans emit different levels of pollution.

Your rich cheap-airline flying, consumerist car owner will emit far more than many families in the developing world.

Which ones of your friends and family members should be culled? You get to keep 10%.

Usually this argument boils down to "everyone I know and like should still be allowed to live, but we should totally get rid of billions of anonymous (poor) people"

We have just shown we can do it with our current population. It hasn’t been done in a sustainable manner, but it’s a decent start.

Nature will take care of itself in the long run. It is adopting to reality and designing vehicles (ex: virus) that is getting closer and closer to optimal level of lethality to humans and it’s own survivability. Cold/flu viruses were not lethal enough anymore, Ebola was too lethal, SARS/MERS were with little more lethality, SARS2 with little more own survivability (likely, still to be known).

Unless you're advocating some sort of genocidal cull of the population, which would be quite extreme, population reduction isn't going to work fast enough to solve the climate problem. Even if you could globally enforce that every couple could only have one child it would take 6 or 7 generations to reduce the population to ~10%. We don't have the 100+ years that would take. It needs fixing now.

I don't think that would fix the issue. The majority of the pollution used to come from developed countries, now it comes from developing countries and their products are used by only the minority of the total population. Reducing the population would only make the surviving ones more lavish. I don't believe in humanity enough to see that work.

well, yes, it is a basic human right, obviously

> No one says that, ...

Malthusians do, and have, for more than 200 years. Two hundred years.

Now, if we keep growing our population, then yes, eventually the Malthusians must and will be right. And perhaps that eventually is now. It's worth exploring that, even if Malthusians are like the boy who cried wolf.

But I'm skeptical that we're finally at our and the planet's limit for the simple reason that population is already predicted to go flat and then begin declining very soon.

Europe, North America, Japan, Australia, Russia, China, India, Iran -- all of these are below replacement rate fertility now or nearly there and getting there fast. Much of Latin America is well on its way there too. That leaves places like Nigeria, for example, as having high fertility rates, but even there it's a pretty safe prediction that fertility will eventually go down.

Decreasing fertility correlates very well with GDP per capita, and it's understood how wealth has caused low fertility rates. That dynamic need not be universal, but it's a pretty safe bet.

Meanwhile, Malthusians have been perennially wrong not only because they've failed to predict or accept the reality of low and declining fertility rates, but also because they've consistently failed to predict or accept the market's ability to adjust to demand growth. So far we've always found ways to produce more food and so on -- no, there's no guarantee that we will continue to be able to, but the fact that total population will peak soon then begin declining means we probably won't need too much more in the way of food production revolutions.

Malthusian also complain about pollution but don't seem to understand that more wealth == cleaner environment -- not at first, maybe, but certainly at some point. Just look at Haiti vs. the Dominican Republic: Haitians are so poor that they cut down their tree for firewood, while Dominicans are wealthy enough that they do not -- same island, same climate, different stories. Or look at the U.S.! In the 1930s river fires were so commonplace as to not be news. In the late 40s river fires were rare enough that they made Time magazine's cover. Now they're even rarer. Those are just some examples. Of course, most Americans have no idea how clean the U.S. is because they've not been to, e.g., Beijing, but that's good anyways: we can always get cleaner.

> ... because having as many kids as you like seems to be considered a basic human right. But imagine Earth with a stable 10% of our current population.

If some family wants to have six children, in a country that has below-replacement fertility rates, that won't move the needle. These are macro trends.

What you write comes across as rather ominous: a threat to impose Chinese-style family planning rules. Not only is it a very bad idea (ask China!) but it's also quite tyrannical, and completely unnecessary given the macro fertility trends.

How do you imagine we'll get to 10% of the current population anyways? War? Draconian family planning? Something worse? How much time do you think we can afford to let pass before we reach that 10%? Centuries? Decades?? If you say "centuries", it might happen naturally. Saying "decades" would strongly imply that you must have some truly awful ideas for how to make it happen.

so why am I only able to see the tip and not the whole mountain?

I'm surprised there isn't more of this in the thread.

As soon as I saw the picture, I thought there will be a load of flat earthers saying this just provides them with more evidence... But TBH I didn't expect to see it as a comment here.

I find the whole FE thing fascinating but disturbing, so I'll anticipate new videos on YouTube trying desperately to show that this backs up their argument despite (as another commenter here says) only the top being visible.

It doesn't hang around in the air at its point of origin for decades.

Mostly a severe reduction in air travel (airplane fuel is really really really bad for the environment)

You've probably never been in a city that has bad pollution if you think this way.

Of course, 3 months of lockdown won't eliminate decades of pollution, but clearing the air and letting all the airborn suspended particles fall to the ground and pulling the dust out of the air makes it clear.

The other viewpoint is that you just don't realize how bad modern pollution is. In Toronto, ON, people are reporting being able to see Niagara Falls from a regular vantage point in the city after a few months of shutdown.

Its similar to Vitamin C being water soluble.

It has to be replenished daily or you get scurvy.

The environment has scurvy.

A huge amount of low-level airborne particulate comes from the wear between tires and the road and vehicular exhaust, and compounded with exhaust fumes from industry this creates much of the low-level airborne particulate.

The high-atmosphere pollution remains, as does the soil and water and biomass pollution, but the low-level airborne particulate is heavily influenced by automobile traffic and industrial activity.

Pollution is not permanent - it has a half-life in the air/water/ground. (Assuming exponential decay, which is a decent heuristic.) "Permanent" forms of pollution are just those which have unreasonably long half-lives, like some radioactive waste in the millions of years.

So CO2, which is of course a big deal now, isn't actually permanent, but its half-life is on the order of a couple of decades (the decay model is one of the big open problems in climate modeling) - hence the talk about how even if we stop emitting today, the problem will still be around. Whereas methane, a stronger greenhouse gas, has a half-life of only around 5-10 years.

Particulates have a much shorter half life before they settle to the ground; and, because they are a local form of pollution, they have a very short half-life before being blown away and diluted. If you've been following California news, this is why the massive pollution caused by recent forest fires went away within a few days of the fires dying out. If you're in any big and polluted city, this is why air quality can vary wildly from day to day with weather conditions and economic activity, leading weather forecasts to include an air quality forecast.

A better way to approach it is:

Imagine in your home city overcast clouds, dark skies. All of a sudden there's a downpour of a rainstorm. After a whole night of raining, the next morning, why does the sky appear blue and clear?

Is it that all of the clouds were destroyed and that they will never reappear again? No - it's because the clouds were carrying the mist and the water vapour, which "precipitated" out of the sky as liquid since the water droplets are heavier than air.

After it rains, the clouds disappear. The clouds didn't go away into nowhere. You can be skeptical about whether I'm writing about a magical statement, but you can observe yourself that after a period of intense rain -> the clouds go away and you can see the blue sky and clear across the city all of a sudden.

Will you be skeptical about this scenario as I described it?