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‘Change course now’: humanity has missed 1.5C climate target, says UN head
(www.theguardian.com)
this post was submitted on 28 Oct 2025
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It's no use going for collective blame and doomerism.
"We have nobody but ourselves to blame..." yeah, except that guy over there burning coal and guzzling fuel like there's no tomorrow. "The only way is to wipe humanity" ...or do something about it for once.
As long as we're here, no matter how bad it is, we have to step against it in the ways we can. It's not us who makes it so. We don't want that. And it's essential to make it a very clear and loud statement one can not turn away from.
Look up your local climate activist groups. See what can be done. Participate in protests. Do it.
Honestly, I think we could have done with a lot more doomerism. thisisfine.jpg-ism is the biggest reason why a political solution is impossible.
You mean the thing that allowed us to reach 8 billion and growing? There's no way you're getting from the 19th century to today without fossil fuels. You are here because of them. It's got nothing to do with "that guy" over there.
Unless you are in a log cabin you hewed yourself by hand, raise chickens with no feedstock that came from fossil-fuel powered agriculture, wear nothing but natural fibers and leather you tanned yourself with oak tannins, etc
Except we live in 2025, and we have modern green technology enabling us to do a lot of things differently.
We can get our power from renewables, and newest sodium battery/pumped hydro/thermal storage techniques are brilliant and more eco-friendly than ever. We now have modern green fabrics, hydrogen steel, etc. etc. We now have greener agriculture technologies, as well as efficient biogas collection and utilization. You can even make some polymers, like polyethylene, out of that alone!
We have what it takes to reverse course. But following that path means upsetting fossil giants, while also investing heavily into the infractructure. And right now, it is easier for politicians to ignore the passive crowd than it is to ignore their sponsors. We need to tilt that balance.
Technology without energy is a sculpture.
Long term, 50 years, we are looking at a terminal decline in what humanity will be able to do as a species. Going from kites to Apollo 11 in 50 years, for example, will never, ever happen again. And it wasn't the guidance computer that got you to the Moon, it was 1000 tons of kerosene in a tube that did it.
You, like many, simply look at electrical power and think everything's solved.
We certainly can run our affairs on renewable (sun, wind, water, maybe geothermal, tidal) sources, but that society will look nothing at all like ours. Think wooden windmills, not skyscrapers.
Probably for the best too, but the assumptions built-in to the necessary changes simply mean endless strife and pain in the meantime.
What do you mean I can't have a car? What do you mean I can only travel on a jet 4 times in my entire lifetime? What do you mean we have far fewer citrus fruits in the grocery store in winter? Doesn't food, like, grow all the time, like in the dirt? What do you mean we need fossil fertilizers and synthetic pesticides and endless machinery and irrigation to get me my smokehouse almonds? What do you mean I have to repair and keep my 10 year old washing machine for 20 more years? What do you mean I have to wear the same clothes? What do you mean I have to live in a box when my parents had a home with a front and backyard?
It's going to get ugly, and the fact that the richest few, and I don't mean Elon, I mean you and me chatting on a workday afternoon, have shiny toys means all that much.
Electricity runs the appliances that fossil fuels allow us to build.
Electrical power + water = rocket fuel. You don't have to use kerosene to launch to space - not that it's the highest priority anyway.
Why do you equate renewables with primitivism? What exactly stops you from building a skyscraper in a renewable-powered world? We do have green steel, concrete and glass. Besides, most use cases do not require skyscrapers in the first place, and they are seen as undesirable by many urbanists.
Now, yes, switching to sustainable lifestyles is not without compromise here and there, especially on the first stages of green transition. We have to put our effort into this, and there's no way around this. But with rational organizing, we can end up making something so much better!
In this age of sustainability, there's no issue in having a smartphone, or laptop, or whatever you write this on. In fact, right now there are tech brands oriented at sustainability, long-term support, user repairability and more. Fairphone, Framework, you name it!
We can build our tools, appliances and toys in a post-fossil fuel world. And we can make use of the materials we've already extracted to make it even greener.
That’s a great response for the 1970s but since then we’ve been developing awareness of the magnitude of the crisis and developing solutions. It’s been time to move on from the nineteenth century
We all should have been making better choices for half a century now. If you’re not at least making better choices today, you can’t blame lack of knowledge or lack of technology
You forget to mention the flipside: we can't sustain 8, let alone 10, billion with sustainable energy. The carrying capacity of the planet with sustainable energy is called the 18th century.
Sure, we can do it, who is ready for the consequences?
literaly ceasing to throw 1/3rd of all food into dumpsters and shutting off data centers for AI enables all that budget
In the 18th century, we had the technology of 18th century. We did not have photovoltaics, electrical wind and hydro, batteries. We do have them now, and as things stand, renewables are already cheaper than the alternatives.
Energy-wise, we can sustain much, much more people.
And even agriculture can accomodate for more people than we have now. With modern green agricultural technologies improving the efficiency of green farming, as well as wider accomodation of vegetarian diets and alternative protein sources, we can provide food for much more people with much less fossils.
Besides, better logistics and organizational measures can lead to less food perishing before it reaches the consumer, and less of the perfectly good food being thrown away.
Yes, and without the discovery of cubic miles of oil, we wouldn't have had the energy and power to get to the point we are now.
You are looking only at electrical energy, and we certainly DO NOT have the capacity to keep our little planetary civilization going without fossil fuels.
Think of it like this: Even if you could travel back in time to 1850 with the knowledge of GaNFETs, 30%+ efficient solar panels, and lithium batteries, how would you be able to do anything about it?
How would you mine the enormous amounts of copper and other materials needed with the infrastructure of 1850: wooden carts, horses, and a few steam shovels as advanced and precious as a modern-day aircraft carrier?
How would you feed the people that are now no longer working in the agricultural domain without inputs of synthetic fertilizers and pesticides?
The reason is that knowledge without energy is an abstract idea.
So, yes, short term, all the rich parts of world will be able to pat themselves on the back about solar energy, but as your everyday household appliances degrade, where and how will you get the materials and resources to say, make a new washing machine?
Please don't tell me you think we got to 8 billion people because of vaccines? Or that we shouldn't worry and just keep adding endless mouths on this planet?
The thing is, there's no need to rebuild the world from the 1850s.
We already have the required machinery and energy. We can make use of what we have, even fossil-powered, to speed up the green transition. Our only goal is to keep it going at a growing pace.
As per agriculture, there are sustainable solutions that I addressed in my other response to you. There are green fertilizers, and there are also genetically modified plants able to produce their own pesticides. There are also innovations in logistics and food sharing initiatives to make less food rot without use.
We have the knowledge, we have the energy. What we lack is the political will to shut down those standing in the way for their own gain over our collective future.
"pay respect to your abusive overlord, serf! you were bred in that pigsty and you would be nothing without it! do not try to change the world for others that would be born in pigstys..."