The modern environmental movement was born in crisis—their success has been historic, crisis after crisis has been conquered. Why do its champions seldom acknowledge the victories?
I thought of another way to frame the debate, not sure it's entirely fair but it made sense to me. So, when I talk to techno-optimists I often find that I'm asking if they took out the trash and they hand me their report card, all A's of course. While I do remember reading an article once that said there's a high correlation between people who take out the trash and people who get A's on their report cards (didn't vet that, but I can believe it) it's still only a correlation. Not everyone who gets A's on their report card takes out the trash and/or they might forget to do it once in awhile. However, what if the "trash" is really an extinction level danger? Maybe it contains plutonium, although I'm pretty sure you can't put that in your trash as there are no lead-lined trash bags at Costco. Well, if you're generating that much plutonium that you have to throw away (and please don't do that at home kids - unless you live in an authorized nuclear facility) then not taking out the trash even once could have dire consequences. Which is why (among many other reasons) we don't have any "put your excess plutonium on the curb" days. The stakes are too high.
Also, with modelling what happens with the climate and how bad things could get I'd point you towards turbulence modelling. In turbulence modelling the equations change depending on the level of turbulence. Well, not change exactly, but get exponentially more complex. For instance, if you're modelling the turbulence over a little red wagon pulled by a kindergartener you can basically ignore it as a factor because it would be almost unmeasurable. But get in a car or a plane and suddenly you can save a significant fraction of gas or electrons to make it matter. However, get to the level of the sun and all the nuclear explosions happening a few feet from each other and we don't yet have the technology to even attempt to model the turbulence of the entire sun. The tech we do have would take at least centuries (and probably more) to figure out nanoseconds of that kind of turbulence if we trained all of it at that one problem. Then work up to a black hole and because inside the black hole the actual founding assumptions we base the math on break down completely and we also can't measure anything inside and the turbulence (if there even is any) can't be modelled at all. It will forever remain a mystery.
And that's what I think we're up against when I think of the damage we're doing to planet. We've set forces in motion we're just not equipped to handle (and probably won't ever be) and some fiddling around at the margins isn't going to cut it no matter how clever they are. It's the reason people don't stand in front of moving trains and have debates about how putting a nice switch over there would shunt the train in a different direction and then build that switch while the train is hurtling down on them. No, they either build the switch first, then throw it when they see the train or they get out of the way. It becomes messy when they're caught in a tunnel though, no matter how fast they debate and build. Now, if they can see the train far off enough or know it's coming then they might have time to build the switch. I mean, if you know a train will be here in a month then it might be enough time to put the switch in place to give you options, but it would be a quick turn around to build it. It could be done in that time limit though, barely. We have our time limit, it's 2050. That's a short month. It's worse when you consider that Snidely Whiplash and his cronies (I'll let the reader decide who that is) are actively working against you and are willing to sacrifice Nell in order to make a buck.
First, I want to say that if I ever implied or made you feel like I didn't respect or acknowledge your native intelligence I need to apologize for that. It was not intended and you are definitely very intelligent. In fact, most of the people I ever bother to argue with over environmental issues I also consider very intelligent. It's part of the reason why I bother in the first place, if that makes any sense. Anyway, you're not dumb and as far as I can tell you're not MAGA either. Although, some of your positions are more conservative than mine (vice versa too probably).
So, this is the problem I often don't find techno-optimists (I'd put you broadly in that boat, along with say the economists Noah Smith and Paul Krugman - yeah, I know you don't all share quite the same views but for simplicity sake close enough?) they aren't comparing apples to apples exactly.
So the graphs you're looking at broadly show a steep slope that generally shows an upward climb. But in a way you're comparing it to itself. You're looking at the previous years and comparing them. What we'd really be comparing, given a perfect world, is another species and/or eras before history began to be written down. Unfortunately, the only species we know don't share any similar metrics we can compare. Octopi have never (unless Cthulhu is real) had a civilization and have never made any giant advances in food production or energy creation that changed the course of their rise (or demise). We aren't aware of any alien species out there, although there probably are a few. Space, though, is vast, so is time, so we may not even exist at the same points in history and we definitely exist light years apart with no viable way to communicate yet. And, of course, there's very little meaningful data from ages before writing besides what we can glean from archeology.
Why would I want to compare those eras/species/etc.? Well, presumably there was a huge leap when mankind discovered how to make fire, possibly on par with our discovery of steam power or electricity. I mean it changed our diets (we know some of this from archaeology), it probably increased our brain size, it allowed us to move into new ecological niches, etc. I'm guessing, and this is just a guess because of lack of data, that it's was broadly an equivalent type of jump from fire as it was to electricity. Which is really sort of the era we're in. The Anthropocene is basically an era made of electricity and concrete and plastic. Those are the basic items that make nearly everything else possible. I guess you could think of it like the letters of DNA (A,G,C,T - they make everything else). But are there other periods we might have data for that would broadly show us the graph when we make a giant leap? Possibly the discovery of agriculture. Possibly the invention of empire. All of those graphs show would broadly show giant upward climbs, but would those climbs continue straight up forever?
I think no. But we don't have those graphs and also those would be jumps each of one or two magnitudes below where we are now. So it would look smaller on the overall graph even if was huge at the time period. First, with all those main human developments we know we get at least some periods of plateau. Fire alone would have been huge but it didn't solve everything, same with agriculture (which arguably created challenges like wars and greater inequality) and empire (which created all the culture and ugliness that cities can bring). I would expect, for instance, to see human lives be improved immeasurably when the Roman roads were laid down and people could trade and travel long distances. It would have been truly a period of golden age for many (and tragedy for many too). But it didn't last forever. Even with fire, certainly had to be an improvement over whatever cold, damp hell filled with fighting off wild animals that would have been, we still had to get through the ice ages! So there are also periods of trough in some of those graphs, even if they're caused by no fault of own (like ice ages!) or definitely our own doing (like the Middle Ages!). They're just far away and hard to see or we simply don't have the data to make the graph. But my point is: we really have nothing to compare to when we try and guess what the trajectory of human accomplishment *should be* because we don't know what that looks like for anyone/anything else. Also, I'd want more than one point of comparison in an ideal world. I doubt I'm going to get that though.
So, now we come to today's graph. We've all seen the hockey stick graph of global temperature (similar to the one for human progress), and some of us have read the UN climate reports (https://www.un.org/en/climatechange/reports). Some of us have even noted how much progress we've made on those goals (in 2021 countries pledged to reduce methane emissions by 30%, so far they haven't measurably reduced one bit) and how long we have according to climate scientists (2050 to net zero emissions if we're to avoid the worst effects - not just methane though). Right now we're at 1.5°C over, which we hit last year. If it remains at that level it's considered a tipping point where it will be hard to come back from. Each further tipping point we hit is exponentially harder to come back from. Honestly, I wouldn't put so much effort into this except that it seems like it's ultimately an extinction level event. I think that's also why it doesn't sell. It's too big and too scary.
So sure, we have had successes, and I'm very glad of them. We've also had some dismal failures but overall success. I do worry about the "bubble" mentality though. The first "dot bomb" really affected me personally and several people I knew and we all thought it was going to last forever. Sure, even now we have more money for some companies (Amazon) and nothing for others (AOL) like always in a market but this isn't just a market. It's our home and everyone we know, even by reputation only. Can you really blame me for yelling, "Danger Will Robinson?"
I thought of another way to frame the debate, not sure it's entirely fair but it made sense to me. So, when I talk to techno-optimists I often find that I'm asking if they took out the trash and they hand me their report card, all A's of course. While I do remember reading an article once that said there's a high correlation between people who take out the trash and people who get A's on their report cards (didn't vet that, but I can believe it) it's still only a correlation. Not everyone who gets A's on their report card takes out the trash and/or they might forget to do it once in awhile. However, what if the "trash" is really an extinction level danger? Maybe it contains plutonium, although I'm pretty sure you can't put that in your trash as there are no lead-lined trash bags at Costco. Well, if you're generating that much plutonium that you have to throw away (and please don't do that at home kids - unless you live in an authorized nuclear facility) then not taking out the trash even once could have dire consequences. Which is why (among many other reasons) we don't have any "put your excess plutonium on the curb" days. The stakes are too high.
Also, with modelling what happens with the climate and how bad things could get I'd point you towards turbulence modelling. In turbulence modelling the equations change depending on the level of turbulence. Well, not change exactly, but get exponentially more complex. For instance, if you're modelling the turbulence over a little red wagon pulled by a kindergartener you can basically ignore it as a factor because it would be almost unmeasurable. But get in a car or a plane and suddenly you can save a significant fraction of gas or electrons to make it matter. However, get to the level of the sun and all the nuclear explosions happening a few feet from each other and we don't yet have the technology to even attempt to model the turbulence of the entire sun. The tech we do have would take at least centuries (and probably more) to figure out nanoseconds of that kind of turbulence if we trained all of it at that one problem. Then work up to a black hole and because inside the black hole the actual founding assumptions we base the math on break down completely and we also can't measure anything inside and the turbulence (if there even is any) can't be modelled at all. It will forever remain a mystery.
And that's what I think we're up against when I think of the damage we're doing to planet. We've set forces in motion we're just not equipped to handle (and probably won't ever be) and some fiddling around at the margins isn't going to cut it no matter how clever they are. It's the reason people don't stand in front of moving trains and have debates about how putting a nice switch over there would shunt the train in a different direction and then build that switch while the train is hurtling down on them. No, they either build the switch first, then throw it when they see the train or they get out of the way. It becomes messy when they're caught in a tunnel though, no matter how fast they debate and build. Now, if they can see the train far off enough or know it's coming then they might have time to build the switch. I mean, if you know a train will be here in a month then it might be enough time to put the switch in place to give you options, but it would be a quick turn around to build it. It could be done in that time limit though, barely. We have our time limit, it's 2050. That's a short month. It's worse when you consider that Snidely Whiplash and his cronies (I'll let the reader decide who that is) are actively working against you and are willing to sacrifice Nell in order to make a buck.
First, I want to say that if I ever implied or made you feel like I didn't respect or acknowledge your native intelligence I need to apologize for that. It was not intended and you are definitely very intelligent. In fact, most of the people I ever bother to argue with over environmental issues I also consider very intelligent. It's part of the reason why I bother in the first place, if that makes any sense. Anyway, you're not dumb and as far as I can tell you're not MAGA either. Although, some of your positions are more conservative than mine (vice versa too probably).
So, this is the problem I often don't find techno-optimists (I'd put you broadly in that boat, along with say the economists Noah Smith and Paul Krugman - yeah, I know you don't all share quite the same views but for simplicity sake close enough?) they aren't comparing apples to apples exactly.
So the graphs you're looking at broadly show a steep slope that generally shows an upward climb. But in a way you're comparing it to itself. You're looking at the previous years and comparing them. What we'd really be comparing, given a perfect world, is another species and/or eras before history began to be written down. Unfortunately, the only species we know don't share any similar metrics we can compare. Octopi have never (unless Cthulhu is real) had a civilization and have never made any giant advances in food production or energy creation that changed the course of their rise (or demise). We aren't aware of any alien species out there, although there probably are a few. Space, though, is vast, so is time, so we may not even exist at the same points in history and we definitely exist light years apart with no viable way to communicate yet. And, of course, there's very little meaningful data from ages before writing besides what we can glean from archeology.
Why would I want to compare those eras/species/etc.? Well, presumably there was a huge leap when mankind discovered how to make fire, possibly on par with our discovery of steam power or electricity. I mean it changed our diets (we know some of this from archaeology), it probably increased our brain size, it allowed us to move into new ecological niches, etc. I'm guessing, and this is just a guess because of lack of data, that it's was broadly an equivalent type of jump from fire as it was to electricity. Which is really sort of the era we're in. The Anthropocene is basically an era made of electricity and concrete and plastic. Those are the basic items that make nearly everything else possible. I guess you could think of it like the letters of DNA (A,G,C,T - they make everything else). But are there other periods we might have data for that would broadly show us the graph when we make a giant leap? Possibly the discovery of agriculture. Possibly the invention of empire. All of those graphs show would broadly show giant upward climbs, but would those climbs continue straight up forever?
I think no. But we don't have those graphs and also those would be jumps each of one or two magnitudes below where we are now. So it would look smaller on the overall graph even if was huge at the time period. First, with all those main human developments we know we get at least some periods of plateau. Fire alone would have been huge but it didn't solve everything, same with agriculture (which arguably created challenges like wars and greater inequality) and empire (which created all the culture and ugliness that cities can bring). I would expect, for instance, to see human lives be improved immeasurably when the Roman roads were laid down and people could trade and travel long distances. It would have been truly a period of golden age for many (and tragedy for many too). But it didn't last forever. Even with fire, certainly had to be an improvement over whatever cold, damp hell filled with fighting off wild animals that would have been, we still had to get through the ice ages! So there are also periods of trough in some of those graphs, even if they're caused by no fault of own (like ice ages!) or definitely our own doing (like the Middle Ages!). They're just far away and hard to see or we simply don't have the data to make the graph. But my point is: we really have nothing to compare to when we try and guess what the trajectory of human accomplishment *should be* because we don't know what that looks like for anyone/anything else. Also, I'd want more than one point of comparison in an ideal world. I doubt I'm going to get that though.
So, now we come to today's graph. We've all seen the hockey stick graph of global temperature (similar to the one for human progress), and some of us have read the UN climate reports (https://www.un.org/en/climatechange/reports). Some of us have even noted how much progress we've made on those goals (in 2021 countries pledged to reduce methane emissions by 30%, so far they haven't measurably reduced one bit) and how long we have according to climate scientists (2050 to net zero emissions if we're to avoid the worst effects - not just methane though). Right now we're at 1.5°C over, which we hit last year. If it remains at that level it's considered a tipping point where it will be hard to come back from. Each further tipping point we hit is exponentially harder to come back from. Honestly, I wouldn't put so much effort into this except that it seems like it's ultimately an extinction level event. I think that's also why it doesn't sell. It's too big and too scary.
So sure, we have had successes, and I'm very glad of them. We've also had some dismal failures but overall success. I do worry about the "bubble" mentality though. The first "dot bomb" really affected me personally and several people I knew and we all thought it was going to last forever. Sure, even now we have more money for some companies (Amazon) and nothing for others (AOL) like always in a market but this isn't just a market. It's our home and everyone we know, even by reputation only. Can you really blame me for yelling, "Danger Will Robinson?"
Just to be clear, you are not among the folks I was thinking of in this essay.
As always. Thank you for the thoughtful notes... and for putting me in such esteemed. company.
I accidentally posted before I'd finished. You may want to re-read the newer edit. But you're welcome.