[Telemakhos]

An American and a European sit at a bar drinking. Their Chinese friend, who had been detained by business, comes and joins them. After he's started his drink, the bartender warns them all that it's dangerous to drink and drive. The American and European stop drinking and sit around chatting, hoping to pass enough time to sober up before heading home. The Chinese man, however, reasons that the American and European have cumulatively consumed more distilled pleasure than he has, and so it is his right to keep indulging, despite having been warned about the danger that drunk driving poses to himself and others.

In the face of what is advertised as an existential global threat, the argument that the Chinese should be excused for failing to curb their emissions, on the grounds that others in the past also emitted, contradicts the idea that emissions pose an existential global threat.