'Global Warming's Terrifying New Math'

^if you build a house in a place guaranteed to get hit with a hurricane/flood/tornado/chupacabra attack, you can’t really blame an insurance company for not insuring/charging a lot of money for insurance. i don’t know how this is a surprising concept.

(not directed at you, just generally)

  On 6/18/2024 at 3:57 PM, auxien said:

^if you build a house in a place guaranteed to get hit with a hurricane/flood/tornado/chupacabra attack, you can’t really blame an insurance company for not insuring/charging a lot of money for insurance. i don’t know how this is a surprising concept.

(not directed at you, just generally)

This is still just as relevant today as it was five years ago:

  On 6/18/2024 at 3:57 PM, auxien said:

^if you build a house in a place guaranteed to get hit with a hurricane/flood/tornado/chupacabra attack, you can’t really blame an insurance company for not insuring/charging a lot of money for insurance. i don’t know how this is a surprising concept.

(not directed at you, just generally)

totally.... they've been living on borrowed time for what seems like forever...  it's pure luck a cat 5 hasn't hit dead center miami and put miami beach underwater.  i lived through a handful of hurricanes over there. small ones and one big one. Andrew 1992 was an hour south of where i lived and it still was a nightmare. boarded up 3 houses that day then passed out at my moms.. got woken up at 3am by a big tree falling over on the fence outback. mom didn't get power back for like 13 days or something.  there's so many more people living in south florida now that it would be pretty awful. need for resources, aid, etc the cost is insane. 

also, tangent.. 

  On 6/19/2024 at 5:23 AM, ignatius said:

totally.... they've been living on borrowed time for what seems like forever...  it's pure luck a cat 5 hasn't hit dead center miami and put miami beach underwater.  i lived through a handful of hurricanes over there. small ones and one big one. Andrew 1992 was an hour south of where i lived and it still was a nightmare. boarded up 3 houses that day then passed out at my moms.. got woken up at 3am by a big tree falling over on the fence outback. mom didn't get power back for like 13 days or something.  there's so many more people living in south florida now that it would be pretty awful. need for resources, aid, etc the cost is insane. 

also, tangent.. 

 

Expand  

Andrew made a huge shadow over Louisiana as well... heard about it for years, really until Katrina hit. some of those south Louisiana folks just get hit and hit and hit every few years, i absolutely cannot fathom it...but that resiliency is something the people of these areas have, no doubt. can't blame anyone for wanting to skip out too tho. so many lives and stories...

that video with Gates about the nuclear company push is good in a way...we need it to become more acceptable. there's startups trying to do some small nuclear reactors, very very safe, and very small possibility of issues just due to the sheer size of them even if an actual disaster happened. people are stupid tho, it's our nature. i know that flying in a commercial airplane is one of the safest methods of travel, but i get nervous every time i go up in a plane...seems the same thing as the nuclear hesitancy basically. public sentiment needs to be flipped, somehow.

  On 6/21/2024 at 2:41 AM, Nebraska said:

 

Expand  

there's a documentary about the guy who designed those and the earthships from the 90s that's pretty good. i forget what it's called but probably an easy google search. 

edit: oh here it is

  On 6/17/2024 at 5:50 PM, chenGOD said:

OK I take it back, this is a wild take, especially in a thread about the survival of the human species.

The two aren't mutually exclusive, since there is no realistic way to voluntarily cease all procreation. The sensible goal is simply to encourage fewer or no children since a reduced population will benefit the goal of humanity's survival. 

  On 6/24/2024 at 8:43 AM, chim said:

The two aren't mutually exclusive, since there is no realistic way to voluntarily cease all procreation. The sensible goal is simply to encourage fewer or no children since a reduced population will benefit the goal of humanity's survival. 

i think some places will population boom while others are population crashing.. meanwhile we'll eventually have some mass migrations so large they won't seem "normal" and also some mass death events from climate events and famines.

framing it as a sensible goal or choice is nice and is a more pleasing image to hold on to but i don't think anything about it will be sensible or considered pleasant. it's going to be pure trauma for a lot of people. one big crop failure somewhere is going to be a powder keg.

but also just fewer kids being born in western/industrialized countries for all the reasons.

  On 6/24/2024 at 8:43 AM, chim said:

The sensible goal is simply to encourage fewer or no children since a reduced population will benefit the goal of humanity's survival. 

"sensible" is the tough part for many humans out there. including for this guy, who now has 12 kids - https://www.theverge.com/2024/6/21/24183083/elon-musk-secret-child-shivon-zilis-exec-neuralink

  Quote

He told Carlson “a collapsing birth rate is the biggest danger civilization faces, by far.”

  On 6/24/2024 at 8:43 AM, chim said:

The two aren't mutually exclusive, since there is no realistic way to voluntarily cease all procreation. The sensible goal is simply to encourage fewer or no children since a reduced population will benefit the goal of humanity's survival. 

Go live in a country with a demographic decline and see how that works out. 

  On 6/25/2024 at 6:40 PM, chenGOD said:

Go live in a country with a demographic decline and see how that works out. 

what does that even mean

  On 6/25/2024 at 6:40 PM, chenGOD said:

Go live in a country with a demographic decline and see how that works out. 

Artificial problems in an artificial world. The machine and its proponents need a certain quota and are spilling that BS to you, but that is hardly the ideal or even sustainable in the long term, is it? Population decline-related issues all self-correct over time. Nobody's saying it's supposed to be painless or whatever you're implying, just that it's the solution to mankind's most pressing issues and survival prognosis.

  On 6/24/2024 at 5:04 PM, zero said:

"sensible" is the tough part for many humans out there. including for this guy, who now has 12 kids - https://www.theverge.com/2024/6/21/24183083/elon-musk-secret-child-shivon-zilis-exec-neuralink

 

Musk is crying wolf over population decline because he doesn't want to upset the demographic and societal constituency that made him wildly successful, why would he? Do we really need his fucking cybertrucks in the future? What about the decline of lithium? One of his kids gonna solve that? 

  On 6/25/2024 at 7:42 PM, chim said:

Musk is crying wolf over population decline because he doesn't want to upset the demographic and societal constituency that made him wildly successful, why would he?

i also think he's sort of gaslighting people over it because he wants to feel like he has something figured out that other people don't. he wants to feel smart and special.. like he's the one who really knows what's going on and he's the one who can solve the problems.. "i'm so smart.. listen to me" when really he just gets off and dumping his junk into a bunch of different women and have lot's of offspring for whatever weird reason. 

he's soooo concerned for humanity's future that we have to make a bunch more people so they can continue on mars after earth is all used up... and he thinks there's a star trek future of humans being space going species and exploring the galaxy. all these billionaires w/space dreams are just serving their boyhood fantasies at the expense of everyone else and the planet. bezos is a weird sociopath, musk is an absolute twat. they're playing some weird game that they make up along the way when they think they need to change the rules. 

I'm not well versed enough on this issue (demographic crisis and population decline) to comment intelligently or in a way that is not just a hypothesis, but my understanding is that if you cannot keep those population numbers and birthrates stable then potentially every aspect of a well-functioning society is at stake. One small example in America I believe is with social security. If the rate of the population that can contribute to social security declines then it puts everyone at risk, not to mention that there is an increasingly diminishing amount of people that can contribute, and all of their contributions go toward subsidizing the people in society that are the most elderly and sickly (and who no longer contribute to the economy in an active way). Not saying at all that we shouldn't help people in every possible way who are old now and paid their dues so to speak (especially the generations who lived through World War II). But this means that the younger generations who are currently contributing will most likely be left in the lurch, not only with social security but with footing the bill for the tremendous and astronomical public government debt that America has accumulated since 9/11.

I suspect that this issue is probably even more pressing for countries that are much smaller than America. I often see articles and comments on social media about Japan in particular in this respect:

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jan/24/japan-birthrate-population-pm-solution-already-rejected-by-young

  Quote

Fumio Kishida is not a politician given to dramatic pronouncements. But this week he issued a stark warning to the Japanese people: have more children, or risk dragging their country into the depths of dysfunction.

His shift in persona from bland career politician to doomsayer in chief is a reflection of the demographic crisis facing Japan, one of the fastest-ageing countries on earth.

 

As he pointed out in a 45-minute speech to parliament on Monday, the number of births in Japan is estimated to have sunk below 800,000 last year.

“Japan is on the verge of whether we can continue to function as a society,” he said, adding that addressing the stubbornly low birthrate “cannot wait and cannot be postponed”.

Expand  

One Japanese politician vying for office has apparently proposed polygamy as a solution. This one might be apocryphal, but I secretly hope it's real because dank af

  On 6/25/2024 at 8:15 PM, decibal cooper said:

I'm not well versed enough on this issue (demographic crisis and population decline) to comment intelligently or in a way that is not just a hypothesis, but my understanding is that if you cannot keep those population numbers and birthrates stable then potentially every aspect of a well-functioning society is at stake. One small example in America I believe is with social security. If the rate of the population that can contribute to social security declines then it puts everyone at risk, not to mention that there is an increasingly diminishing amount of people that can contribute, and all of their contributions go toward subsidizing the people in society that are the most elderly and sickly (and who no longer contribute to the economy in an active way). Not saying at all that we shouldn't help people in every possible way who are old now and paid their dues so to speak (especially the generations who lived through World War II). But this means that the younger generations who are currently contributing will most likely be left in the lurch, not only with social security but with footing the bill for the tremendous and astronomical public government debt that America has accumulated since 9/11.

I suspect that this issue is probably even more pressing for countries that are much smaller than America. I often see articles and comments on social media about Japan in particular in this respect:

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jan/24/japan-birthrate-population-pm-solution-already-rejected-by-young

One Japanese politician vying for office has apparently proposed polygamy as a solution. This one might be apocryphal, but I secretly hope it's real because dank af

Expand  

immigration has kept USA w/a strong workforce of a young age. a lot of those people pay into social security they have fake SS numbers, and they don't take out because they are here undocumented. it's something like several million paying into the system who will not benefit from it. a shitty situation. regardless, immigration and open society is what saves american work force.  places w/closed borders and difficult immigration scenarios will have a tough time as fewer native people have babies etc.. japan for example has been aging.. also, china has a "population bomb" of sorts. 

there's some of this info on nate hagens youtube channel in various chats. worth digging into. different people think it will play out in different ways. 

but a lot of people seem to think global population will peak at some point and then fall precipitously.  "toxicity is moving faster than climate change" is what some think.  anyway.. if you go through some episodes you'll find some stuff where people get into the details of population decline etc.. i forget which episodes and there are many but they're indexed

  On 6/25/2024 at 7:42 PM, chim said:

Musk is crying wolf over population decline because he doesn't want to upset the demographic and societal constituency that made him wildly successful, why would he? Do we really need his fucking cybertrucks in the future? What about the decline of lithium? One of his kids gonna solve that? 

Musk is a white supremacist. He is simply dog whistling the great replacement theory and aping the 14 words.

  On 6/25/2024 at 7:19 PM, auxien said:

what does that even mean

A country in a demographic crisis is one that doesn’t hit its replacement birth rate. As a result the population ages rapidly, like in Japan and South Korea. As a result, the country’s youth all ends being in service to old people vs doing actual productive and innovative things.

Smaller cities die off as everyone congregates in places to find like-minded or similar aged people. Services for older people decrease in those cities etc. It’s a vicious cycle.   

  On 6/26/2024 at 2:12 AM, chenGOD said:

A country in a demographic crisis is one that doesn’t hit its replacement birth rate. As a result the population ages rapidly, like in Japan and South Korea. As a result, the country’s youth all ends being in service to old people vs doing actual productive and innovative things.

Smaller cities die off as everyone congregates in places to find like-minded or similar aged people. Services for older people decrease in those cities etc. It’s a vicious cycle.   

Expand  

oh it's just another term for population decline? okay, easy enough. all those problems are very true, of course. really sad for those effected. that'll be difficult for a generation or two to adjust to...luckily, humans are very, very adaptable to changes like that.

a more sad thing is the actual fuckin extinction-level events & potentially irreparable climate change we're causing with our terrible behaviors & need for growth at any cost. learning to deal with a few too many grandparents is much less of an issue than literally destroying thousands upon thousands of species of lifeforms? and less of an issue than triggering possible hundreds/thousands of years of climate effects that could effect more generations of humans/all life than we can even fathom? decimating entire ecosystems so we can keep growing corn so a stock number can go up a little & Jill + Jim can afford to have their 5th kid?

lessening the human population, voluntarily, naturally, will not fix any of these issues, but it will help curb them to some extent. and more important, it will not continue to increase them further & further which is what we're currently doing. the perfect can't be the enemy of the good.

  On 6/26/2024 at 7:37 AM, auxien said:

really sad for those effected

I don’t think you understand that it affects everyone, not just those in countries with the issue. Like the scope of the problem is really like the end of the human race. 
 

we can fix our behaviours (not easily) but if people aren’t reproducing then there will literally be no one left. Japan has been trying to overcome this for decades and their population continues to shrink. 
 

South Korea’s is even worse and faster. Canada is heading that way. So is the US. 

  On 6/26/2024 at 1:10 PM, chenGOD said:

I don’t think you understand that it affects everyone, not just those in countries with the issue. Like the scope of the problem is really like the end of the human race. 

i do understand it. the span of humanity's existence extends far beyond the current generation alive and the next one or two. i'm thinking about the hundreds of generations past the next one or two generations. how many humans do you think there'll be in ~100 generations if we keep breeding and expanding like we have been the last couple hundred years? do the math and you'll see how fucking ridiculous these ideas are, the planet can't handle how we are acting now and it couldn't do it at two, three, or ten times the population. 'demographic decline in country X Y or Z' is absolutely guaranteed, inevitable, & a good thing over the long term.

  On 6/26/2024 at 1:10 PM, chenGOD said:

we can fix our behaviours (not easily) but if people aren’t reproducing then there will literally be no one left. Japan has been trying to overcome this for decades and their population continues to shrink. 

i'm not sure we can fix out behaviors...i've seen little large-scale evidence of this happening. nearly all evidence tends towards quite the opposite.

the 'literally no one left' line it total bullshit and you know it. humanity has extended itself into absolutely every crevice of this planet & fucked other species out of existence (literally and figuratively). we will keep breeding & spreading as long we can, and we should: i'm not anti-humanity, i'm anti-8,000,000,000 humans. we're the most advanced creature that's ever existed in the entirety of the universe, as far as we know, we ain't gonna disappear because a few of us say 'yeah, that's too much' and take it easy.

the stagnated/lightly shrinking Japanese population is not a bad thing, despite what capitalist propaganda tells you. Japan's economy is just starting to do better here lately, they're finally seeing some gains, and not because of an increasing population: their economists have simply learned that what they were doing wasn't working so they needed to adjust tactics. humans are infinitely adaptable, capitalism still wins, be happy i guess?

  On 6/26/2024 at 1:10 PM, chenGOD said:

So is the US. 

US is not heading that way necessarily, immigration is easily going to offset any declining birth rates if sheer population is the concern (and Americans allow it). for fuck's sake, i just looked at Wikipedia, there's been an added 100 million goddamned people in America just in the last 40 years? that's a fucking huge increase in percentage & numbers. all your points are empty, dude.

All the population decline fear mongering boils down to what's essentially the most obvious tautology: a smaller population can't sustain a larger one. We're supposed to treat that as the apocalypse. Ohh dear, productivity is harmed, tax flow is in danger, who cares? These are adjustable goals that need to be proportionate to a sustainable population density, not the canaries of an unhealthy one. 

The falsehood of the claim that the world will end due to a shrinking population (which does not equal a birth rate of 0) is easily proven by the fact that the world didn't end in the 50's, or fifty years before that, etc... 

  On 6/26/2024 at 2:14 PM, auxien said:

i do understand it. the span of humanity's existence extends far beyond the current generation alive and the next one or two. i'm thinking about the hundreds of generations past the next one or two generations. how many humans do you think there'll be in ~100 generations if we keep breeding and expanding like we have been the last couple hundred years? do the math and you'll see how fucking ridiculous these ideas are, the planet can't handle how we are acting now and it couldn't do it at two, three, or ten times the population. 'demographic decline in country X Y or Z' is absolutely guaranteed, inevitable, & a good thing over the long term.

i'm not sure we can fix out behaviors...i've seen little large-scale evidence of this happening. nearly all evidence tends towards quite the opposite.

the 'literally no one left' line it total bullshit and you know it. humanity has extended itself into absolutely every crevice of this planet & fucked other species out of existence (literally and figuratively). we will keep breeding & spreading as long we can, and we should: i'm not anti-humanity, i'm anti-8,000,000,000 humans. we're the most advanced creature that's ever existed in the entirety of the universe, as far as we know, we ain't gonna disappear because a few of us say 'yeah, that's too much' and take it easy.

the stagnated/lightly shrinking Japanese population is not a bad thing, despite what capitalist propaganda tells you. Japan's economy is just starting to do better here lately, they're finally seeing some gains, and not because of an increasing population: their economists have simply learned that what they were doing wasn't working so they needed to adjust tactics. humans are infinitely adaptable, capitalism still wins, be happy i guess?

US is not heading that way necessarily, immigration is easily going to offset any declining birth rates if sheer population is the concern (and Americans allow it). for fuck's sake, i just looked at Wikipedia, there's been an added 100 million goddamned people in America just in the last 40 years? that's a fucking huge increase in percentage & numbers. all your points are empty, dude.

Expand  

First: literally living in Japan and the impact on their population is ridiculous. You blame capitalism and then talk about their economy doing better, when the yen is at an almost historical low? Pick one side bro.  The cities except for Tokyo are massively struggling, and the countryside is like Detroit style despair, except there are no young people to do anything in those places. It’s sad looking at all the empty housing and knowing that nothing and no one is going to resuscitate that. Their population is not “lightly shrinking”, by 2100 its expected to be at 75 million, and that’s even taking expanded immigration into account. Capitalism hasn’t won shit. China is on the same path, and they’re capitalist as fuck  

Second, yeah America’a population is growing because of immigration. When those immigrants start reducing their birth rate, what do you think is going to happen? America does not have a sustainable birth replacement rate. I’m not talking about Jim-bob having 6 kids man, I’m talking about families having 2. It ain’t happening. 

Most population growth happens in developing nations where they have little or no regulations over pollution. Even then, earths population is actually in decline. This is not about missing some grandparents, this is about young people not having families. When young people are devoting their time, energy, and money to taking care of their elders, they have little left to devote to innovation or progress. Governments are much the same, except it’s even worse because money that should be going to progressing a cleaner economy is increasingly going to  care for elder people. 
 

We need to rapidly increase nuclear as a source of power generation, impose significant controls on corporations’ methods of energy production, and ensure that young people have both the resources and facilities to have families while taking care of their older relatives. To pretend otherwise is the height of naïveté. 

  On 6/26/2024 at 7:32 PM, chim said:

productivity is harmed, tax flow is in danger, who cares?

Are you actually serious? You want to build good public transportation in your city, but you can’t because hey guess what, there’s not enough tax revenue, and there aren’t enough young people to build it. 
You want to develop a clean national electricity grid in your city/state/country, but you can’t because there aren’t enough young people working to create tax revenue and all the money the relevant level government is brining in is being spent to ensure the elderly have a good quality of life. 

  On 6/26/2024 at 7:32 PM, chim said:

The falsehood of the claim that the world will end due to a shrinking population (which does not equal a birth rate of 0) is easily proven by the fact that the world didn't end in the 50's, or fifty years before that, etc... 

in those time periods the world’s population was growing, and so was the tax revenue that allowed governments to actually take care of their citizens/residents. Like I get the US government has given up on its citizens,  it just because you live in a shithole doesn’t mean the rest of the world needs to.