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Comment by fragmede | Hacker News Reader

I don't know about the others, but for the last one, "reduce pollution" only works if people, who aren't bike riding hippies by a large margin, see any point in reducing pollution. Why is pollution even bad, anyway? Seriously, factories have been working for centuries and nothing has gone wrong, so why should we regulate where they can pour their waste or make them pay for environmental nonsense like carbon capture? It's just this weird hippy tax that has no point since nothing has gone wrong.

Climate change (because people were too stupid to use the phrase "global warming" without making fun of the "warming" part whenever it was remotely cold) encapsulates the need for people to care about pollution with the understanding that it may be future generations will reap the benefits in a way that "reduce pollution" does not.

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And yet people are terrified of radiation at any level, of carcinogen at aspartame level danger, from "toxins", from evil Chinese poisoned food, from modified genetics plants and foodstuffs.

But a direct scientific link to ... well, almost all of those fears is totally acceptable because we love our cars?

The world... is insane.

(See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33713513 )

> Seriously, factories have been working for centuries and nothing has gone wrong, so why should we regulate where they can pour their waste or make them pay for environmental nonsense like carbon capture?

Pardon? Factories have caused all sorts of problems with discharge, intentional or unintentional. Here's some from the top of my head:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhopal_disaster (mismanagement at a pesticide factory causes an explosion, poisoning many people and permanently contaminating the surrounding landscape).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minamata_disease (a factory discharged mercury into the sea for years, where it interacted with anaerobic bacteria in the sediment to become incredibly deadly organic mercury and poisoned an entire town)

Keep in mind, these are from the top of my head and I am a nonexpert; we have environmental regulations because people have been hurt or killed by pollution numerous times.

Here's a quote that I hope will emphasize just how powerful pollution can be on an industrial scale:

> Pollution was so heavy at the mouth of the wastewater canal, a figure of 2 kg of mercury per ton of sediment was measured: a level that would be economically viable to mine. Indeed, Chisso did later set up a subsidiary to reclaim and sell the mercury recovered from the sludge.

They literally dumped enough mercury into the river to turn it into a mercury mine. If that doesn't convince you that factories haven't simply been operating with "nothing going wrong", then I don't know what to say.

Presumably, in that "Seriously, ..." quote, rather than asking an earnest question, the HNer was roleplaying their idea of the general population that's resistant to "reduce pollution" messaging.

Maybe. I've reread the comment and it can be read either way. Worst case scenario is that my comment remains correct but tone deaf, so I'm not going to retract it, but am open to a correction if GGP chooses to offer one.

Factories have done unmeasurable damage to our ecosystem, that is unequivocable. But we had to rename it climate change because people couldn't get over the phrase global warming whenever it was cold so I don't see "Reduce Pollution!" as a winning slogan. People who care, care about the underlying concept no matter what it's called. People who don't care don't believe it's a problem in the first place and won't do anything to reduce pollution.

Well, I disagree with the cynicism (as I believe people are caring more & more) but my bad on misinterpreting.

but thank you for sticking up for planet Earth!

it's not long since it was normal for rivers to set on fire:

https://history.com/news/epa-earth-day-cleveland-cuyahoga-ri...

If people are too stupid to understand pollution is bad and should be reduced (most people will agree to this, just talk to them about it in a garage with the door shut and a truck running inside), how are they going to understand climate change, which is a more obscure term without a direct meaning?

If the general public needs to be convinced of a project to save the planet climate change is not good messaging!

> Climate change (because people were too stupid to use the phrase "global warming" without making fun of the "warming" part whenever it was remotely cold)

I think climate change works better anyway, as global warming caused other changes, not just a rise in average temperatures

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