[bastawhiz]

The GP didn't say not to pay attention to it. Clearly people are.

The point is that it's unactionable. The people who care could all pour their life savings into climate action and commit suicide to cancel all future carbon footprint and it still wouldn't move the needle. Even if the Democrats in the US took over both branches of Congress, the white house, and the supreme court, they wouldn't move the needle. There isn't any practical action any ordinary person could take.

So why are we writing about it for general consumption? Convince billionaires, politicians, oil execs, other scientists, literally anyone with the ability to do anything. If we're at the point the research claims, trying to get people to go vegan or fly less often isn't even shaving off fractions of a percent.

[idiotsecant]

Its perfectly actionable. Its just inconvenient. Imagine if tomorrow we discovered that internal combustion engines produced a gas which immediately killed everyone with 200 feet. What would change?

[senordevnyc]

If it’s perfectly actionable, why haven’t you fixed it yet?

[idiotsecant]

I'm not claiming it's easy, only that it's actionable. Emotional hyperbole does nobody any good.

[senordevnyc]

My point is that it’s theoretically “actionable”, but like all collective action problems (this being perhaps the most challenging example, because the scope is global, the timeline is decades to centuries, and the economic incentives are misaligned with taking action), it’s very difficult for an actual person to take any meaningful action. So pragmatically speaking, it’s not really actionable. Which is why I basically think we’re fucked in the short-term, and will really just be saved by cheap renewables changing the incentives, as they have been. We’re not going to magically solve the most intractable collective action problem of all time.

[idiotsecant]

All collective action problems are impossible to solve until they become impossible not to solve

[Swenrekcah]

What kind of response is this?

Why haven’t you fixed healthcare or all the potholes in your town?

[joquarky]

Those with the ability to do something about it have the means to avoid it long enough to not matter to them.

[grey-area]

I don’t think it’s unactionable, just as one example, sadly investing in Northern Europe on a long time frame is pretty risky as a result of this.

There is and should be pressure to decarbonise at this point - it is still going to help and we can vote to make that happen.

Tyrants like Putin want you to think you are powerless, but you are not.

[bastawhiz]

Writing news articles that desensitize the public has the opposite effect of empowering them. Moreover, it's not an article that's written in a way that changes anyone's mind. If you're a climate denier (of whatever flavor) you're not going to be persuaded by this article or any other like it. In fact, it might make you more staunch.

[grey-area]

The truth has power. Never give up on wanting to know the truth.

As to staunch climate deniers, why should we care what they think? The changing world around them (e.g. Florida flooding) will persuade them even if the majority who do believe in it doesn’t first.