Hacker News Reader

Comment by DoneWithAllThat | Hacker News Reader

Sundays on HN are a weird thing. It’s the only day of the week when I see the nutty anti-car takes, de-growth takes, climate doomerism, etc. Monday through Saturday, tech news (mostly). Sunday, unhinged nutballism.

View on HN

What about this is "nutballism"?

Reducing dependency on cars and preventing climate disaster are objective goods.

There is no objective proof “global society” will collapse by 2040 as the article claims.

There won't ever be, until it's too late. We're propped up by unsustainable tech, ocean temperatures are on the rise. So we ignore it and continue?

No, we talk about the evidence we do have and use that to convince people.

I’ve talked to a lot of climate deniers (unfortunately). These people may be saying and doing ignorant things but largely they are not stupid. They know when you make unfalsifiable claims, and that becomes part of their justification to ignore you.

People dependent on cars for nearly all their activities, find it very hard to imagine a world where they are not. Many of them have shaped their entire lives around cars. They live in places where the closest grocery store is 20 minutes away by car. Where it’s barely safe to cross the street in front of their house on foot.

Folks in these situations think the idea of not using a car to get around is crazy, because in some ways it is. It’s not the majority of people though. In the US the majority of people, 70%, live within 2 miles of all their basic needs. That’s the distance that more than 25% of people living in Denmark choose to ride a bike for an errand rather than drive.

https://www.visitdenmark.com/press/latest-news/facts-and-fig...

Reply on news.ycombinator.com