772 karma · joined February 29, 2012
Unlikely, yes, but the tale is not certainly apocryphal ;)
Ah yes, the "sniff test", in which things which are untrue are assumed, which make the interlocutor sufficiently confident to pontificate. "Sniff test", as a concept, doesn't pass itself, rhetorically (-- or maybe it's a "code smell").
I think we only have to look at society's response to the pandemic, a worldwide crisis with immediate (rather than delayed) effects directly on individuals with honestly simple, straightfoward solutions (mask up, pay people to stay home and industries to maintain capacity, vaccinate everyone), to realize that humanity is not going to be able to tackle climate change as an existential issue. We just slide into an endless resource war while a few billionaires who could have meaningfully changed the course of human history hide out in New Zealand, or try to leave the planet and die.
It's an interesting statement, given that every example you gave is about a driver of a car about to kill a cyclist. It seems that it's the cars, or rather, the drivers, that are dangerous.