[yojo]

I’d love to see that software too, but most of the issues you describe (plastics, greenhouse gasses) had impacts that were non-obvious at the outset. Then they were controversial, then no longer controversial but heavily lobbied.

At the start of the industrial revolution no one knew about global warming. Then the science came out but was lobbied against. Now the science is (mostly) accepted, but we still don’t know concretely how expensive global warming is per ton of CO2.

I think these are scientific, social, and legislative problems. There may be a role for software around the edges, but the core is going to require research, public acceptance of research, and ultimately legislation.

[Beltalowda]

> At the start of the industrial revolution no one knew about global warming.

This is true, but it's been known since at least medieval times that that air pollution was pretty unhealthy; arguably a better reason to actually do something about things than climate change.

The same can be said about the usage of lead in fuel and paint; people have known it was harmful well before leaded fuel was invented.

The elephant in the room seems to me more that we, as a society, are pretty inept at long-term and "big picture" thinking and have a strong and deep bias that progress is both good and inevitable.

[teknopaul]

Progress (noun) : gradual betterment.

By that definition progress is always good.

[sn9]

Except sometimes things are called "progress" to sell them as ideas, but then it turns out the negative costs outweigh the proposed benefits.

Or maybe there's progress in the short-term but not in the long-term.

For example, the globalization of our supply chains was probably viewed as progress by some, but that very efficiency also involved a trade-off in resiliency that resulted in how brittle we now know them to be from the events of the last two years.

[Beltalowda]

"Better" for who? And many "betterments" come with downsides and trade-offs, too.

It's rarely that simple.

[teknopaul]

My point was just about the ambiguity of the word progess.

I agree that development/forward movement is not always good (or inevitable, and a deep rooted bias)

And that "good" needs context or is a simplification.

I'nt language fun: it's both logically correct and incorrect to say that progress is always progress. ;)

[duped]

I don't know how software can be used to fix any of the "big" problems other than as an avenue for information and manipulation through social media.

Like for example we know that if we want to do anything about climate change we probably need to change our diets. I don't know how we can convince anyone to do that except through questionable means like social media campaigns.

[teknopaul]

Software is good at one thing processing information. Anything you can do to improve information about environmental damage of products helps. For example CO2 emissions of vehicles are published. But not the CO2 cost of making the vehicle. People buying new cars don't know what the CO2 impact of a new car is, at the point of sale. If you can use software to get that information in front of consumers, it helps people make the right choices. If people don't make the right choices with good information, use the information gathered to proportionally tax the products because even selfish consumers can read the price tag.

[tcmart14]

Software may not cause a change in diet, but machine learning and software stacks are being employed to help boast yields on agricultural output. It may not change peoples diets, but if it helps farmers who grow cops know when is best to water, fertilize or know the weather to plan their activities and results in better quality and quantity yields, it is going to have an impact.

[8note]

Plastics at least pretty clearly had waste issues at design time.

Eg. Coke removed it's bottle pickups when they switched from glass to plastic bottles