[snowwrestler]

Yes--the Earth's climate does not have an objectively "correct setting" that the universe prefers.

However, we prefer the settings we have now. We like our cities where they are, we like the sea level where it is, we like polar bears and the Great Barrier Reef the way they are.

Selfish? Yes! But it is relevant because we are the ones who are changing the climate right now! So we are entitled to have an opinion about the changes we are causing.

[sageikosa]

There aren't settings, only observable conditions. The drivers are non-linearly correlated. My suggestion there is that even if you managed to return the size of the human population to pre-industrial levels in roughly the same geographic distribution as the 18th century (good luck with the eugenics programs on that) you'd still not get the results of that time frame, and you'd probably have to live with pre-industrial technology (no lithium ion batteries that destroy various foreign countrysides, and no cheap power apart from maybe localized hydro-electric). I believe if more people understood that trying to control climate change by political means is a sure-fire way to yield political control, or gain it, they masses might stop preferring any of it and would let cities on alluvial planes (such as Venice and New Orleans and Galveston) sink locally rather than try and convince India and China to undergo environmental austerity measures.

[snowwrestler]

You're the one who introduced the concept of settings, above.

If you think it's not fair that China and India have to deal with climate change, I agree with you. But life is not fair. As you point out above, there's no greater purpose to the universe, it just is.

If China and India don't want massive civil unrest, they better work on the problem. If you think moving billions of people away from the coast is easier than reducing fossil fuel emissions, fine, we can examine that idea with data. But political control is not a useful yardstick. Government is an important tool no matter what the plan is.

[sageikosa]

I also put the concept of settings on the opposing end of non-teleologic identification.

I have no expressed opinion on whether the attempt to make China or India conform to green western politics is fair or not; but those two nations probably do, and that's what's really relevant. They'll most likely experience bouts of massive civil unrest without regard to local atmospheric quality.