Hacker News Reader

Comment by RcouF1uZ4gsC | Hacker News Reader

I would say overall that oil and fossil fuels have done far more good for humanity than harm.

They enable us to feed our population. The global trade network have lifted billions of people out of poverty. Global literacy is at the highest it has always been. Fossil fuels enable us to be able to accurately track and predict hurricanes. Basically, our whole modern economy is built on fossil fuels.

The most valuable resource on earth is human knowledge and ingenuity. Thanks to our high population, reduction of poverty, and global education, that resource is the highest it has ever been.

View on HN

That's not the point

I'd be surprised if anyone tried to argue that fossil fuels have been anything less than instrumental in achieving our modern comforts.

The issue is:

1. Oil companies knew about fossil fuel harm to the environment, and then lied about/tried to cover it up. They've directly played a role in climate misinformation. They've done that so well that we now have armies of people with no relevant knowledge on the topic arguing that climate change is a hoax.

2. If the danger of fossil fuels was acknowledged long ago, we could have prepared for it in advance. This would have eaten into profits, hence the motivation to deny it's a problem.

I’ve met very few people who believe climate change is a hoax. The belief is that the climate is not static and that it’s better for humans to adapt (as they always have) than to commit economic suicide.

This is unpopular online, but is the actual view of a majority of Americans imo. The reason climate activists are not getting anywhere with these people is that they are having an argument with the climate denier in their head.

I've met many climate change deniers, both in real life and online. They used to be very thick on the ground on sites like this one and particularly on Slashdot. (Ugh, remember "Climategate”?) It has been something of a pleasure watching them gradually disappear from sites with more thoughtful readers. Sadly, the reason they're disappearing is because boldfaced climate denial doesn't fly with reasonably intelligent HN folks anymore, given what we can see with our own eyes.

The smarter new ones have switched away from rants about "AGW" and scientists being untrustworthy. They now tell us climate change won't be that bad and we can "adapt."

Continuing using oil as we do today might also end in economical suicide. And embracing more green technology might offer more economic opportunities than oil.

"The belief is that the climate is not static and that it’s better for humans to adapt (as they always have) than to commit economic suicide."

Whose belief? I don't understand how belief is relevant.

"This is unpopular online, but is the actual view of a majority of Americans imo" Not true. Most Americans accept the scientific consensus - that recent changes in temperature are driven by human activities: https://www.ipsos.com/en-us/news-polls/extreme-weather-poll-...

You didn’t read my comment because you aren’t engaging faithfully. I said that most people do believe it’s caused by humans but that humans will have to adapt to it as they have to multiple other changes in climate.

I’m not kidding about you arguing with yourself here. This comment is actual proof

"You didn’t read my comment because you aren’t engaging faithfully."

Except, I quoted most of your comment directly.

"I said that most people do believe it’s caused by humans but that humans will have to adapt to it as they have to multiple other changes in climate."

You absolutely did not say this.

> The belief is that the climate is not static

It's a justified belief. Climate isn't static. For example, Sahara desert used to be an oasis: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_humid_period

Water has done more for humans than oil, but that doesn’t mean you can’t die if you drink too much.

Correct. But that doesn’t mean you get to sue the water company for supplying you with water, even if they knew that it is possible to drink too much water and die.

But what if they switched the water supply and tried to cover up the health effects of that?

> I would say overall that oil and fossil fuels have done far more good for humanity than harm.

Without the oil and fossil fuels we wouldn't have had cheap and abundant fertilisers, that would have meant no Green Revolution, that means we wouldn't have been able (as a species, that is) to feed 8 billion people. Literally speaking hundreds of millions to billions of people wouldn't have been alive right now if it hadn't been for the industry of extracting hydrocarbons from underneath us.

It's crazy to see how reactionary a lot of people have become when it comes to this subject, even apocalyptic.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com