Showing posts with label environmentalism as religion. Show all posts
Showing posts with label environmentalism as religion. Show all posts

Tuesday, May 25, 2021

Don't Let the Crazies Write the Story

How should we think about global warming? 

The video below came to mind as I read this great post from Michael Huemer. From the post:
The insane extremists are winning the debate about global warming. Whatever your view of global warming, you probably agree with me about that. You probably also think the crazy extremists are the people on the opposite side from yourself – the people on the left if you’re on the right, or the people on the right if you’re on the left. 
What I’ve realized is that both the left and the right are dominated by crazy extremists who ignore facts and evidence so they can believe what they want to believe.

He goes on to list four very reasonable points about what to think about global warming. Be sure to read his post.


https://youtu.be/vE8mFDabqD0 

Using the video as a metaphor, I think people of either extreme position think of themselves as the boy, Atreyu, and their opponents as the horse, Artax. They on the left (right) are desperately trying to pull the climate-change deniers (climate alarmists) out of the swamp of sadness and certain global death (economic poverty).


P.S. Interestingly the climate alarmists should have a higher hurdle to overcome in getting support for their extreme view. This is because if they are right, they still have to be right that their extreme measures will actually solve the problem. If they are wrong about climate catastrophe, they will bring about something nearly as bad for humanity. On the other hand if climate-change deniers are right, everything is fine. If they are wrong, they have to also be wrong about there being time to change their minds. I think that is part of the impetus behind the artificial urgency that has recently developed in the environmentalist religion. They need to change the terms so that failing to act now is impending doom.

P.P.S. The horse in the swamp scene very much bothered me as a child—terrified and crushed might be the more accurate terms. The still below is from the movie's ending which was also bothersome in a 'what is infinity?' type of way.



Sunday, February 9, 2020

Psst... I Have a Secret

Every day I burn a dollar bill. You see I’m really worried about inflation and I want to do my part. If everyone would act like me, we could stop inflation for good.

I admit this is a bit of snarky argument by analogy for the purpose of exposing what I see as the absolute ridiculousness of trying to address macro problems with extremely micro actions. I say "actions" so as to avoid dignifying them with the term "solutions".

Put into this category activities like:

  • The bulk of ESG investing. (I don't invest in company XYZ, who does the bad things, or company ABC, who doesn't notice that what they are doing can't last forever, because I want to deny them capital.)
  • The vast majority of consumer-level environmental activism. (Please use my reusable cloth bag when you sack my groceries full of paper drinking straws, boxed water, and non-GMO foods. And please pack it tight so it fits in my backpack--I biked here, obviously.)
  • Voting as a means of changing the course of public policy. (This is the most important election of our lifetimes--once our candidate wins, disaster will be avoided.)
  • Shaming others for not being part of the cause. (You should have rescued a dog from a shelter rather than buying one from a breeder.)
  • Ad hoc donating to random strangers. (Gives $5 to the man with a sign asking for money on the street corner.)

These activities may be virtuous. They may bring you personal joy or satisfaction. But if you think you will change the world through these activities, you are gravely mistaken. Each of these as a solution to their supposed underlying problem suffers from a kind of reverse Kantianism fallacy whereby an individual action is presumed to be sufficient to bring about a desired outcome because if everyone took this action, the outcome would be achieved.