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Comment by mikeash | Hacker News Reader

What do you do when "pragmatism" doesn't produce the results you need?

Maybe convincing people to cut their energy consumption in half isn't in the cards. At the same time, maybe that is what is needed. The universe doesn't have to cooperate to give us pragmatic solutions.

If the "impossible" solution is required, and the "pragmatic" solution isn't sufficient... why should climate scientists advocate for the latter over the former?

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Why wouldn't pragmatism produce the results needed? Moving over to Nuclear Power would, without a doubt, solve the climate crisis. Granted, it would introduce other challenges, but we're talking about the lesser of two evils here.

I don't think a rapid wholesale move to nuclear power is any more pragmatic than a rapid move to cut average per capita energy consumption in half.

One solution requires the economy to stall, the other does not. Take your best guess as to which one will have better public support.

Is there a point to ranking impractical solutions?

Impractical, yet exactly what France did..

In a different age, when public opinion on nuclear energy was substantially different.

Well, for one thing, the "impossible" comes with large error bars and thus is difficult to trust, even those trained in the sciences (or, perhaps, ESPECIALLY for those trained in the sciences). At least the pragmatic buys time, if nothing else.

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