We all love the environment, right? I mean who doesn’t like clean air, water, forests, etc? Not to mention animals. There’s a reason why David Attenborough is still making nature documentaries: People just eat them up. So if that’s all true, why is nature so fucked then? In fact, according to some midwits, the world is ending in 12 years. As with most things, the answer is both simple and complex: Most humans love cheap shit more than they love the environment, but the world isn’t ending.
Pollution is a real problem. Pumping crap into the environment we (and animals) live in is a bad idea. Usually polluting is cheaper than not polluting, so the market incentives tend to lead toward pollution. The problem can be tackled two ways: The consumer can demand companies not to pollute and countries can enforce stricter environmental safety. The first option works better since it plays with those same market dynamics which lead to polluting in the first place. People won’t buy your polluting product so you go out of business. Environmental regulations are also generally a positive force, but they introduce new unfortunate game theory into the mix: It’s now beneficial to circumvent regulations and attempt regulatory capture where you get to enforce regulations on your competitors instead of yourself. The whole ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) market is a prime example of good intentions already leading us astray. With so much money on the line, you’ll attract endless amounts of greedy bad actors.
In fact, the argument and the problem with ESG is the same as with communism or socialism. “True communism has never been tried” or “Truly green capitalism has never been tried”.
Why is this a problem? Well, both sentences above imply that essentially the problem is OTHER people but if YOU were in charge, everything would work. How fucking arrogant is that? Everyone can be corrupted, which means every system lead by people can be corrupted. Regulatory capture, remember? And even in the theoretical situation where a truly good person is but on charge, what’s to stop a bad person from shooting the good person in the head and taking their place? Power corrupts and absolute power…
Rules, not rulers
Science, as in the process, is neutral and fair. Science, as in the institutions that we have today, is corrupt as fuck. Everything is endlessly politicized for one simple reason: There’s money to be made or power to be gained. With the logic outlined above and with endless ESG-trillions on the line, how can you truly trust statements such as “97% of climate scientists agree”? Let’s assume the 97% number is correct. Market dynamics and incentives would still suggest that 97% of climate scientists who are looking for government & corporate grants to study climate change agree. Who’s funding the other ones? And at this point if you think it’s more profitable for the fossil fuel industry to fund “anti climate change” -science than to just invest into the ESG market, you might need a wake-up call.
Oh by the way, we used to be able to debate these things. Even in The New York Times. But by this point you’re probably already furious. What am I, a fucking climate change denier? No. Climate is clearly changing and we should prepare accordingly. However, and this a pretty big however, I’m highly skeptical of the people who are shoving the climate change narrative down our throats the hardest. There’s too much money and power on the line and humans are corrupt. How much money has Al Gore made from green investments since ‘An Inconvenient Truth’? In 1999 his net worth was 1.7 million USD. Today it’s over 300M USD. How many of the predictions he made in the movie have come true? Exactly.
The narrative of an imminently ending world is the most powerful propaganda tool ever created. It’s big, it’s scary and it puts the blame on YOU. Even if it’s true, it will be weaponized by sociopaths everywhere.
On energy usage
The current allowed line of thinking goes something along the lines of: All energy usage is bad because CO2 unless it’s ‘renewable energy’, in which case it’s magic and wonderful. There are so many holes in this story that I don’t even know where to start. But let’s give it a try and break the sentence into sections:
A) All energy usage is bad
No. Energy usage is the most accurate predictor of human flourishing and countries who spend the most energy also have the best natural preservation strategies globally. More energy usage leads to higher GDP and higher GDP leads to more natural sustainability.
B) Because CO2
“It is ironic that the very same carbon emissions responsible for harmful changes to climate are also fertilising plant growth, which in turn is somewhat moderating global warming”
Dr. Jarle Bjerke of the Norwegian Institute for Nature Research
The mere fact that this side of the equation is practically never mentioned in the popular media leads to me to be very skeptical of the downsides of increased CO2. The global climate is an extremely large complex system, and modelling complex systems is practically impossible because there are so many balancing forces. That said, let’s not get into a whole CO2-debate. I’m sure increased CO2 in the atmosphere has consequences that need to be studied and we should prepare for different scenarios accordingly.
C) Unless it’s ‘renewable energy’ in which case it’s magic and wonderful
Here’s where the it all falls apart. Renewable energy is generally understood only to represent wind and solar because climate change activists don’t like hydro (or nuclear for that matter). Do you see it already? It’s not always sunny. It’s not always windy. Sometimes you have neither. Some places have lots of one but not both.
Here’s what life is like in the utopia that is purely powered by renewables: The third world is full of massive stripmines because every ounce of lithium has been mined to power an endless amount of batteries which are everywhere in the first world: Buildings have batteries, cars have batteries, your apartment has batteries and every smaller item down the line has a battery. This crazy amount of batteries is needed because the power grid is unstable and unreliable. You are encouraged to charge your house, car, appliances etc at certain times and banned from doing it other times. Everything is regulated: When you move, what you eat, what you do. The reason is simple: Everything consumes energy and preserving energy is now sacred. Energy giveth, lack of energy taketh away. Happen to enjoy actually physically biking? You facist nazi. Don’t you know that an electric bike is more energy-efficient than a barbaric human-powered bike? After all, food is energy and growing food consumes energy.
And so we have arrived to the logical conclusion of the current green hysteria: All energy usage is bad, EXCEPT what they, the sacred greens, shall allow.
How to fight back?
The problem is complicated but the solution is relatively simple: Reject their entire framing. Energy usage is not bad. Renewables are a complementary solution, not the whole picture. Nuclear power is an absolute necessity, along with hydro, to create a reliable & robust energy infrastructure to phase out fossil fuels. Vote with your wallet and only buy products that don’t pollute. Like meat that is raised naturally.
And maybe read Dr Patrick Moore’s book: “In 11 chapters the reader is clearly shown that citizens are being misinformed by many environmental doomsday prophesies, ones they cannot verify for themselves. We are told that nuclear energy is very dangerous when the numbers prove it is one of the safest technologies. We are told polar bears will go extinct soon when their population has been growing steadily for nearly 50 years. We are told that there is something harmful in genetically modified food crops when it is invisible, has no name and no chemical formula. We are told severe forest fires are caused by climate change when they are actually caused by poor management of fuel load (dead wood) in the forest. We are told that all the coral reefs will die by 2100 when in fact the most diverse coral reefs are found in the warmest oceans in the world. And of course, we are told that invisible CO2 from using fossil fuels, accounting for more than 80 percent of our energy supply, will make the Earth too hot for life. All of these scare stories, and many more, are simply not true.”
Yup, pretty inconvenient.
Vaarallisia ideoita 