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Comment by nske | Hacker News Reader

I don't think things are as simple as that. Maybe for example there are some technological or scientific breakthroughs with cross-domain application that come as a result of work that at present is practical only with the resources of giant companies like Google/Facebook/Microsoft. I think it's fair that engineers and scientists get to work for whatever employer they choose, doing what they do best and advances their expertise, without being judged negatively. I think the acquired experience and knowledge itself will leak, one way or the other, in applications that bring a net positive, even if the activities of the specific employer are not directly positive. Morally-wise, I think the onus shouldn't be on the workers any more than it should be on the consumers, so someone working in the fossil industry shouldn't be considered more responsible to the climate change than someone consuming fossil fuel.

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someone working in the fossil industry shouldn't be considered more responsible to the climate change than someone consuming fossil fuel

right, they shouldn't directly be more responsible than consumers, but they should be responsible for the influence that they do have at their job.

obviously consumers are responsible for the pollution they create. just today my son had a fit because a friend tried to use plastic to start a fire. this may not have been the right response, but he knows that burning plastic is bad, and he acted on that.

i have more sympathy with the oil workers because their options most likely are to quit and be out of work. but anyone who studies to work in the oil industry is making a questionable moral choice. (depends on their attitude, maybe they are trying to contribute improvements to make the impact of fossil fuels less damaging. that would be good)

The reality is that fossil fuel is still necessary, choosing to not work in the oil industry doesn't change that. If suddenly no people chose to work in the business under some belief that it would be morally wrong, then what would happen? Wide spread energy crises, affecting everything from heating to transportation/travel and all production chains.

I don't think anyone except the most hardcore climate activists would be willing to accept that cost, so I don't think it's consistent for anyone except these to judge negatively people who choose to work in this industry. This doesn't change that we as consumers should try and use as little fuel as possible, opt for renewables where possible etc., that's the only way to guide the change. If we do that, the market will take care of the rest as the conditions allow it.

If suddenly no people chose to work in the business under some belief that it would be morally wrong, then what would happen?

salaries would rise, making it more costly, but motivating a few people to continue working there. in the long run it would contribute to make oil more expensive, which is really the only way to stop people from using it.

salaries would rise, making it more costly, but motivating a few people to continue working there

Sure, and they wouldn't be wrong to do so, just like they're not wrong now. We can't admit that on one hand we need something because there is no viable replacement and on the other consider that those that choose to work on that make a morally questionable choice.

well, we wouldn't need it had we focused on cleaner energy earlier. we already predicted climate change half a century ago ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34358759 ). had we acted right then, we would not be depending on oil now. therefore already 50 years ago someone made a morally questionable choice.

So the ends justify the means?

Do soldiers not carry responsibility for their actions while in an active army? What's the difference?

hm soldiers are only expected to follow orders that to the best of their knowledge are lawful, and are held accountable for following unlawful ones. The law actually covers a lot of the cases that are very clearly wrong (i.e. torture or execute prisoners).

That leaves ambiguous situations where for example there is an order saying "get satellite data from that location". In this case, if the data end up used for something unlawful, I think the responsibility doesn't lie with the soldiers at the bottom of the chain, no.

Now for the case that best serves your comparison, generally serving in an army that very clearly wages a war of aggression. In this case yes I think soldiers carry the responsibility to not help in any way (which realistically would mean stop being soldiers). The difference in this case is that we can't compare an army waging an aggressive war, which is as clear an evil as we can imagine and is in fact considered a crime internationally, with a company that analyses data collected by consent, where the question is whether the mechanism for obtaining consent is good enough or not.

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