Climate: The Case for Conditional Optimism
March 29, 2019 8:49 AM Subscribe
This exploration of both the case for pessimism, and the case for optimism, in the face of climate change, walks us through both perspectives in a straight forward way. As momentum builds, this case study of ecosystem restoration also lends inspiration on how to approach this massive issue.
Oh, thank you for posting. I can't wait to dig in.
I often think about how quickly an area can recover when it is left alone or given just the smallest reprieve from damaging practices. Maybe that is because I farm in Wisconsin with rich soil and a precipitation-generous climate.
posted by Emmy Rae at 9:22 AM on March 29, 2019 [1 favorite]
I often think about how quickly an area can recover when it is left alone or given just the smallest reprieve from damaging practices. Maybe that is because I farm in Wisconsin with rich soil and a precipitation-generous climate.
posted by Emmy Rae at 9:22 AM on March 29, 2019 [1 favorite]
Ecosystem restoration means nothing long term without a halt to population growth and an ultimate decline in the number of humans on this planet.
posted by fshgrl at 5:06 PM on March 29, 2019 [3 favorites]
posted by fshgrl at 5:06 PM on March 29, 2019 [3 favorites]
Sometimes I feel like the most optimistic I can get about climate change is the thought that it will kill off humanity long before it kills off all life on Earth, and given ten thousand years or so it will be as if we were never here.
I'm glad there are other more optimistic possibilities than that.
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 6:36 PM on March 29, 2019 [5 favorites]
I'm glad there are other more optimistic possibilities than that.
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 6:36 PM on March 29, 2019 [5 favorites]
I feel like Brexit is kind of a foretaste of what's to come. Hopefully the penguins and elephants make it. We're not going to because apparently we are too dumb.
posted by fshgrl at 7:19 PM on March 29, 2019
posted by fshgrl at 7:19 PM on March 29, 2019
my guarded optimism might be direr still: humans will (brutally) survive climate change.
don't mean to diminish the terrible promise of megadeath-scale human and ecological catastrophe, but it is our institutions, lifestyles, our lore and technologies, our cultural works and cultures, our arbitrary associations that are threatened with destruction. so, yay: go team.
posted by 20 year lurk at 7:57 PM on March 29, 2019 [1 favorite]
don't mean to diminish the terrible promise of megadeath-scale human and ecological catastrophe, but it is our institutions, lifestyles, our lore and technologies, our cultural works and cultures, our arbitrary associations that are threatened with destruction. so, yay: go team.
posted by 20 year lurk at 7:57 PM on March 29, 2019 [1 favorite]
Ecosystem restoration means nothing long term without a halt to population growth and an ultimate decline in the number of humans on this planet.
posted by fshgrl at 5:06 PM on March 29 [1 favorite +] [!]
feminism is halting population growth, that one is not so much the issue anymore
posted by eustatic at 9:28 PM on March 29, 2019 [4 favorites]
posted by fshgrl at 5:06 PM on March 29 [1 favorite +] [!]
feminism is halting population growth, that one is not so much the issue anymore
posted by eustatic at 9:28 PM on March 29, 2019 [4 favorites]
Better Technology Isn’t The Solution To Ecological Collapse: We cannot innovate our way out of planetary disaster. We need to ditch our addiction to GDP growth
posted by homunculus at 9:36 AM on April 2, 2019
posted by homunculus at 9:36 AM on April 2, 2019
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posted by The Whelk at 9:17 AM on March 29, 2019 [2 favorites]