A Conservative Policy Solution to Slow Down Climate Change?

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7Wannabe5
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Re: A Conservative Policy Solution to Slow Down Climate Change?

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

I know, I know, but ENTP can’t not keep tinkering.

https://youtu.be/Qc9h6FC6QgU

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Alphaville
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Re: A Conservative Policy Solution to Slow Down Climate Change?

Post by Alphaville »

7Wannabe5 wrote:
Tue Nov 10, 2020 12:10 pm
I know, I know, but ENTP can’t not keep tinkering.

https://youtu.be/Qc9h6FC6QgU
:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

as an amusement, most definitely yeah

but wallace is an introvert (gromit more so)

https://youtu.be/2igRcGxlshA

do you ever play strategy games like civilizations and that sort of thing?

7Wannabe5
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Re: A Conservative Policy Solution to Slow Down Climate Change?

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

Lol. Strategy games don’t interest me much. I prefer colored pencils/graph paper and systems design software then jump to real world. I have designed realistic garden landscapes with characters moving through them doing odd things. I also like anything like a dollhouse.

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Alphaville
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Re: A Conservative Policy Solution to Slow Down Climate Change?

Post by Alphaville »

i like the games because they keep my violent tinkering circumscribed to a harmless reality :lol:

if i did those things in the real world... it would be a disaster 🙈

7Wannabe5
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Re: A Conservative Policy Solution to Slow Down Climate Change?

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

Gotcha. I have little desire to dominate more than can be enclosed within a couple acres, except maybe if I could be appointed Librarian General and put in charge of mandatory reading lists.

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Alphaville
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Re: A Conservative Policy Solution to Slow Down Climate Change?

Post by Alphaville »

oh, chief librarian, hook us up with some book recommendations? maybe i’ll bite.

(maybe circumscribe it to “conservative policy solutions to slow down climate change” so as to prevent subject from drifting too far away)

meanwhile, all curious people check this out:

https://quiviracoalition.org/

good soils = good meat!

https://quiviracoalition.org/carbon-ranch-initiative/

7Wannabe5
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Re: A Conservative Policy Solution to Slow Down Climate Change?

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

Can’t promise to stick with “conservative”, but here goes.

Doughnut Economics- Raworth
Living in the Long Emergency-Kunstler
Entropia -Alexander
Prosperity Without Growth - Jackson
This Civilization is Finished -Read
Thinking in Systems-Meadows
Mortgage Free!- Roy
Peak Everything -Heinberg
The Five Stages of Collapse-Orlov
Paradise Lot-Toensmeier
The EcoTechnic Future-Greer
World Made By Hand (series)- Kunstler
Blessing the Hand that Feeds Us-Robin
The Systems View of Life-Capra
Unprocessed-Kimble
The Knowledge-Darnell
Energy and Civilization- Smil
Retrotopia-Greer
Ship Breaker- Bacigalupi
Green Wizardry-Greer
Energy and the Wealth of Nations-Hall
Scale-West
Sustainable Energy-MacKay
How to Invent Everything-North
New York 2140- Robinson
The Overstory-Powers
The Wizard and the Prophet- Mann
A Short History of Progress -Wright
Growing a Sustainable Garden-Conner
The Way Home-Boyle
Landfill-Dee
2052-Randers
Think Like a Commoner-Bollier
The Technology Trap-Frey
Free Innovation-Von Hippel
A Soil Owner’s Manual-Stuka
Nature’s Metropolis-Cronin
The Future is Not What it Used to Be: Friedrichs
An Introduction to General Systems Thinking-Weinberg
Locavore’s Handbook-Meredith
The Kitchen Ecosystem-Bone
The Waste Products of Agriculture-Howard
The Resilient Gardener-Deppe
Surviving the Future-Fleming
Resilience Thinking-Walker
When Trucks Stop Running-Friedemann
Power Density-Smil
The Art of Loading Brush-Berry
Bottleneck-Catton
Learning to Die in the Anthropocene-Scranton
Limits to Growth- Update-Meadows
The Scavenger’s Manifesto- Rufus
Survival + Primer- Smith
The Year Round Solar Greenhouse- Schiller
Bio shelter Market Garden-Frey
200 square feet- D’Agostine
The Holistic Orchard-Phillips
Gaia’s Garden-Hemenway
Food not Lawns-Flores

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Alphaville
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Re: A Conservative Policy Solution to Slow Down Climate Change?

Post by Alphaville »

nice—thanks!

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Alphaville
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Re: A Conservative Policy Solution to Slow Down Climate Change?

Post by Alphaville »

7Wannabe5 wrote:
Tue Nov 10, 2020 2:28 pm
Can’t promise to stick with “conservative”, but here goes.
eta: i forgot to add earlier, since i obviously can’t read them all just to find out what they’re about: any notes, blurbs, adjectives you care to add to any of the titles? ranks/ratings/preferences/significance/anything? top 5 maybe? would be much appreciated.

7Wannabe5
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Re: A Conservative Policy Solution to Slow Down Climate Change?

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

Yeah, the list is just a dump of books I’ve marked as read over the last 5 years that have somehow informed my take on coming collapse(s) and how I might personally deal. However, I didn’t include much in the techno-optimism line, because not everybody likes to knock their brains against opposing walls. I also didn’t list much that is directly related to political policy, because I’m simply not much interested in that realm of action. Seems more like the tail than the horse or the bucket of oats to me.

Many of the books on my list were written by people more directly concerned with peak oil than climate change. So, the reading can get a bit complicated because on some level a peak oil collapse would be a solution for climate change and a low-tech climate change solution could look like the fallout from a peak oil collapse. As of now, I am going with word of Jacob (expert on both) that climate change is more near dire because still too much coal. So, although some of the peak oil writers are my favorites, I would suggest maybe ignoring their suggestions that peak oil is more near dire, especially since some of the books were written more than 10 years ago.

Anyways, there are several different takes on collapse represented. My take on Hristo is that he resembles what I would call a Dear Old Dad Conservative (much like my own dear old dad), so he would be aesthetically (NF) drawn to the books that suggest something like a return to a simpler past of convivial village life as either solution or eventual fallout from collapse to lower energy/human level. He also prefers narrative over math. Therefore, I think he would like Kunstler, Robin, Fleming, Boyle, Berry, and maybe Greer. Fleming would be my number one recommendation for him.

It seems like you (Alphaville) are currently more interested in the math/science energy calculations towards policy. The authors on my list who best address this would be Smil, MacKay, Hall, Meadows, West, and Freidemann.

My personal core 5 books on the list would roughly be “Paradise Lot”, “The Resilient Gardener”, “The Knowledge”, “The EcoTechnic Future”, and “Thinking in Systems.”, because my idealized personal solution is something like 80% low-tech permaculture 20% intelligent novel high green tech city/country mouse mix.

Two additional lines of thought represented in some of the books I’ve listed would be “It’s over. Too late. Humans will be choking on 1000ppm CO2 by the end of century. Deal.” or “It’s over. Let’s wander and observe.”

Also, some of the books focus more on the likelihood of scavenger/garbage picker phase before back to 16th century phase.

Hristo Botev
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Re: A Conservative Policy Solution to Slow Down Climate Change?

Post by Hristo Botev »

7Wannabe5 wrote:
Wed Nov 11, 2020 6:12 am
My take on Hristo is that he resembles what I would call a Dear Old Dad Conservative (much like my own dear old dad), so he would be aesthetically (NF) drawn to the books that suggest something like a return to a simpler past of convivial village life as either solution or eventual fallout from collapse to lower energy/human level. He also prefers narrative over math.
You grok me so much.

On the narrative, I'm about halfway through Kingsnorth's Beast,* and given where I'm currently at in the CC grieving process, it's EXACTLY what the Dr. ordered.

*The book would be an easy one-sitting read, and that's probably how it should be read, I just haven't had more than 30 minutes of uninterrupted reading time in the past few days.

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Alphaville
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Re: A Conservative Policy Solution to Slow Down Climate Change?

Post by Alphaville »

7Wannabe5 wrote:
Wed Nov 11, 2020 6:12 am
yay! thanks for the compass.

i’m not interested in calculations in themselves, as they can be highly inaccurate or misleading, but at the moment i’m interested in policy, yeah. which has to be backed by numbers to an extent.

e.g. the 850MW san juan coal plant in my state (a massive poluter) is getting replaced by a 650MW solar array + storage facility (what kind of storage? i haven’t checked). and i just found out. that’s just one step in what has to be a ten thousand mile walk, but... it’s a step, and a nice one at that. feels like a new dawn or something (but i’m sure there will be problems down the line). regardless: fun!!

“the knowledge” looks interesting too...

much to look at. again thanks for the orientation.

7Wannabe5
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Re: A Conservative Policy Solution to Slow Down Climate Change?

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

Happy to oblige. That’s why I used to make the big bucks (lolol) as a book dealer.

I do see some large scale optimistic things happening in my region also. For instance, state of the art county-level humanure processing plant recently went up without much accompanying fanfare. Also, I have been consistently pleasantly surprised by how forward thinking some agents of government entities such as the Department of Agriculture have become in their writings. For instance, no-till is being heavily promoted.

Hemenway, one of the OGs of permaculture, was very emphatic about how important it was to first observe what is already going on in your community before planning your own project. So, for instance, if you see that your next/door neighbor already has a couple pear trees that aren’t being harvested, you should favor developing a positive relationship of interdependence with that neighbor over planting your own pear trees. The same applies to knowing about the reality of how your county is already processing water and poo before planning your own humanure project, etc. etc. Unfortunately, following this line of thinking myself ended up involving me in a political group dealing with hazardous waste disposal issues and it was too much of a black hole of every possible issue being brought up every meeting for me to deal with. So, I am off that sort of thing for the time being.

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Re: A Conservative Policy Solution to Slow Down Climate Change?

Post by Alphaville »

7Wannabe5 wrote:
Wed Nov 11, 2020 9:16 am
Unfortunately, following this line of thinking myself ended up involving me in a political group dealing with hazardous waste disposal issues and it was too much of a black hole of every possible issue being brought up every meeting for me to deal with. So, I am off that sort of thing for the time being.
hahahahah! that is the curse of “progressive” groups. one issue equals all issues equals no issue in the end. been there done that too! i could tell some stories if they weren’t self-doxxing...

7Wannabe5
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Re: A Conservative Policy Solution to Slow Down Climate Change?

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

Exactly. Plus I have zero ability to keep myself from opening my damn mouth at meetings, so I even ended up on TV looking very fat in a white shirt.

Hristo Botev
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Re: A Conservative Policy Solution to Slow Down Climate Change?

Post by Hristo Botev »

This is long, but I'm going to insert this here because I think it might be helpful for some of you who identify as more progressive, when you're trying to engage with folks who lean more conservative on the topic of CC. This is a distillation from a long back-and-forth conversation I had with another participant from the CC workshop I did this weekend. The person had asked me a series of questions relating to, essentially, why I might object to some sort of nationwide, uniform CC education campaign, whether incorporated into mandatory CC education curriculum, and/or through PSAs, etc. Here's an excerpt from my (very long) answer:

Those are some big questions that require seriously nuanced answers, with lots of assumptions that would need to be made explicit so that we know we are talking about the same things; so forgive me if instead of answering your questions directly, I opt instead to do a bit of a side-step and answer your questions more indirectly.

One of the shared "values" that came out of the workshop was subsidiarity, an organizing principle that social and political concerns/problems ought to be handled by the smallest, lowest, or least centralized competent authority. "Competent" is important here--i.e., organizing a neighborhood militia isn't going to do much to protect our national borders, which is why the most competent authority for our national defense is the federal government. Applied to climate change, while it's laudable that Washington state is trying to (I think?) implement a carbon fee/dividend system, such a system isn't really going to work on a state-wide level, because (for one) Washington can't impose a tariff on goods from, e.g., Idaho (that would be unconstitutional). So, carbon emitting manufacturers, etc., will simply move from Washington to Idaho, and then ship their manufactured goods from Idaho to Washington, and Washington can't do anything about it. So, again, the most competent authority to impose a carbon fee/dividend is the federal government, because the federal government CAN impose (carbon related) tariffs on goods from other countries.

It's important that any "blue" who wants to find common ground with a "red" be cognizant of this principle of subsidiarity, as this is a large part of where the conservative impulse comes from; i.e., "The federal government ain't going to tell me what to do!"--that's subsidiarity.

The necessary corollary to subsidiarity is solidarity, another of our agreed-upon shared "values." Solidarity holds that when a particular social or political concern/problem can be handled competently by a particular authority, that authority is obligated to handle it. So, on an individual and family level, I am competent to feed my kids, and I am therefore obligated to do that. If I don't, and some higher authority has to step in, that higher authority will not be as competent at feeding my kids as I would be had I fulfilled my obligation. And by the higher authority stepping in, they've unburdened me of my obligation to feed my kids--it's now the obligation of that higher authority. That's not ideal, but it of course happens.

Applied to CC, I am competent to control my carbon footprint, by, e.g., ensuring my house is within walking/biking distance of my work, my church, my kids' school, the grocery store, etc. (or, by not living in a house bigger than I need, by not ordering Amazon deliveries multiple times a month, etc.) I therefore have the obligation to control my carbon footprint by living within walking/biking distance of those places where I regularly need to travel to. etc. If some authority above me and my family comes in and tries to dictate where I live and how I get to work (and how I live or consume), that violates the principle of subsidiarity and, consequently, unburdens me of the obligation to control my own carbon footprint. And as I and my family are in the best position to weigh our various (and individually unique) priorities in determining how to best control our own carbon footprint, we are the most competent authorities to do so, and it would be ineffective or even counterproductive for a local/state/federal government authority to take that authority from us.

The subsidiarity/solidarity coupling applies also to your question regarding education. My wife and I are the most competent authorities in deciding how our children are educated. That's why we send our kids to Catholic School and, if that wasn't an option, why we'd homeschool or move somewhere where Catholic School was an option. Authorities "above" my wife and me, and our Catholic Church, are not competent to educate our children (or, at best, they are less competent).

So, the short answer to your questions, I think, is that by imposing some sort of nationwide, uniform education campaign about CC (I've been trying to avoid using the word "propaganda"; lest you fit me for a tin foil hat), you're thereby unburdening individuals and families (and churches, and local and state governments) from having the obligation to educate themselves. And because the federal government is going to be massively incompetent at instituting such an education campaign, it would ultimately be ineffective, at best, and counterproductive, at worst. As but one example (you asked for a downside), I think Green Peace, 350, Al Gore, Mike Bloomberg, and many others who are seen in some ways as being at the forefront of the effort to fight CC, are doing more harm than good in the CC effort, by pushing pie-in-the-sky techno-optimist daydreams that lead Americans to believe that their lives will continue to progress as always, and GDP will continue to grow, if only they consume differently (as opposed to consuming less). So, frankly, Al Gore et al. is the last person I want to be leading "climate reality training" (https://climaterealityproject.org/training).

One final thing on this, you say you know that not everyone accepts the CC science and that certain places wouldn't want to be forced into teaching about it. I think there needs to be a recognition that there's a grieving process involved with something like CC, and "denial" is a stage in that process (as is bargaining). Honestly, many of the CC "deniers" I know are more head-buried-in-the-sand deniers; they know it's out there and that it's to some extent "real," but it's an all-encompassing, life-altering existential threat that they feel powerless to do anything about, and so they ignore it and rely on a handful of comebacks they've picked up in various places when they are confronted with it.

But if we're being honest, I see lots of "blues" who are in as much denial as some "reds" are, it's just a different kind of denial perhaps. So, instead of saying something like, "there's no scientific consensus," or "sure the planet is warming, but there's no evidence that humans are responsible for it"; on the "blue" side I see things like, "we can solve CC if only we clear cut entire forests and replace them with wind and solar farms," and "wind and solar will someday replace 100% of the energy output created by burring fossil fuels." We are going to hit 1.5C, and then we are going to hit 2C. Maybe we can avoid 3C, but it's not going to be because wind and solar farms and electric cars (and electric airplanes!) have entirely replaced the burning of fossil fuels. It's going to be because we all start getting by with a whole lot less; and not because of any sort of top-down public education initiative, but because there's just going to be a lot less in the manner of resources to go around.

So, as a final answer as to why I'm not in favor of any sort of nationally-managed CC education campaign, it's because there's not really any kind of optimistic message we can (truthfully) convey, apart from "if we learn to consume less we might be able to sustain a relatively comfortable life (but less comfortable life than you're currently living) for some fraction of the world's current population." And, unfortunately, that's not going to look very good on the posters. And there's no way our government is going to get behind that message. This is something that we are all just going to have to figure out ourselves, on our own time and in our own way.

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Re: A Conservative Policy Solution to Slow Down Climate Change?

Post by chenda »

Can anyone recommend some resources as to how much cars and the hydrocarbon industry are actually subsidised ? Does the oil industry itself have figures they publish ? People here tend to look at the tax they pay at the petrol pump (about half the cost here) and the idea it's been subsidised sounds bizarre.

Campitor
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Re: A Conservative Policy Solution to Slow Down Climate Change?

Post by Campitor »

chenda wrote:
Wed Nov 11, 2020 12:46 pm
Can anyone recommend some resources as to how much cars and the hydrocarbon industry are actually subsidised ? Does the oil industry itself have figures they publish ? People here tend to look at the tax they pay at the petrol pump (about half the cost here) and the idea it's been subsidised sounds bizarre.
Take a look at this site - it publishes the various subsidies the oil company has received or will receive. It was published in July 2019: https://www.eesi.org/papers/view/fact-s ... etal-costs
Conclusion

In seeking fiscal reforms that have the potential to save taxpayer dollars while simultaneously addressing greenhouse gas emissions, phasing out subsidies for the fossil fuel industry should be a priority for federal policymakers. These subsidies aid an industry that is mature, well-established, and with an abundant private financing stream. Reducing the subsidies fossil fuel stakeholders receive can help correct inefficient economic interventions into energy markets, save billions of taxpayer dollars, and reduce negative social and environmental impacts.

7Wannabe5
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Re: A Conservative Policy Solution to Slow Down Climate Change?

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

@Hristo:

I actually agree with the vast majority of what you posted. Maybe I’m more conservative than I likely vibe.

However, I would like to point out the possible distinction between simple science education vs public science policy indoctrination. True story. I was teaching a 7th grade group at a charter school. The 6th grade teacher who had them the previous year was a very nice woman. Showed me around and helped me out. She was also a devout book literal Christian, and she straight-up told me in the presence of a child who also attended her church that she was only teaching the 6th graders math, not science, during the time allotted for both, because she didn’t believe in the Earth Science curriculum which, for instance, offered currently scientifically accepted age of the planet.

Most people don’t know the basic physical science that applies to climate change. Even me just a few years ago! So, I don’t think most parents could take care of their own kids in terms of providing them with this information themselves. So, maybe it’s okay if the state mandates this sort of basic building blocks education. Actually, it already does, and what the 6th grade teacher was doing was illegal, but I didn’t turn her in even though I was thereby likely breaking the law by neglect. Because I am not a narc.

Hristo Botev
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Re: A Conservative Policy Solution to Slow Down Climate Change?

Post by Hristo Botev »

@7w5: The back story of this was that we all (reds and blues) had to agree on certain shared values, concerns, and policies. This particular blue wanted to know why I'd objected to a policy that was something like "educate and empower adults and kids about CC . . . ." My response was that it wasn't a policy, it was a goal/objective/aspiration (a good one, no doubt), that was missing the "how"; and it's the "how" that's important, and I gave her some examples of some "hows" that I'd find objectionable--e.g., a federally-mandated CC curriculum to be taught in all public schools, with federally-funded incentives to "encourage" non-public schools and other orgs to do the same. The "blue" had a series of questions as to why I'd find these "hows" objectionable, and what I posted above was essentially my answer.

I'm not "competent" to teach my kids about the the physical science behind CC. I'm not competent to teach my kids a whole lot of the stuff they are supposed to learn in school. But I am "competent" to decide how and where I want my kids to get that education. If it's via homeschooling, then I got a lot of work to do to get competent on the subject matters. If I'm going to outsource my kids' education, I get to decide where (private, parochial, government).

But to be clear, I don't have any problem with what you've proposed about state-mandated curricula (ETA: for state/government schools). Federal I'd have a problem with.

Every kid should of course learn the basic physical science that applies to climate change. My concern is that with some sort of federally-mandated CC curriculum, that actually wouldn't happen. The political technocrats always seem to muck these things up, because their loyalties lie elsewhere.

As for the teacher, if you've got some problem teaching the curriculum mandated by your government school, then you shouldn't be teaching there. (And, really, if you're some sort of Bible literarlist/creationist-type, I'd really prefer you not teach anyone; though I'm not going to support some federal law that prohibits you from doing so.)

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