Discussion Is the human race cooked ?

[Ichigo]

Im not sure if im 100% right,but..Indifference seems to be the norm. Am I correct or is this wrong? Maybe im just a bit of a pessimist.



I know that is impossible to really say how many people actually do care, but from what I observed, most people are at best apathetic towards a situation that does not pertain to any of them or their close ones and at worse excuse it.



I know there's probably a biological reason for this so im probably just fighting against something that cant be fought.



It definitely explains why change is so hard though. for every 1 person who is out there trying to create change, theres probably 10 other people who are content with the way things are and will fight to make it stay that way too.



Climate change has been a issue for a hot minute and yet even with all the evidence that shows it is a real phenomenon there's hasn't been much progress on fixing the issue. First of all, there's so many different opinions on it.



There's people who refuse to believe it at all, or say its a hoax by the government.



There's people who have chosen to stick their head in the sands; either they try to ignore it for the sake of their own sanity or they just see it as being a faraway issue.



There's those who know it is real but have given up on making any kind of change because they feel like they have no power to make any change to the situation.



There's people who do everything they can to reverse the effects of climate change but i heard that even with all their collective effort it only makes a dent in the problem.



and finally the group that arguably have the biggest effect on climate change are the ones who are the most wealthy, yet they seem to not care at all, and in fact are just making it even worse with the jets and the overconsumption.

 

[avoid]

Indifference seems to be the norm. [ . . . ] most people are at best apathetic towards a situation that does not pertain to any of them or their close ones and at worse excuse it.

I agree with you, but I think there's more to it. Climate change is an "invisible problem" and as such, I think people have trouble with believing in it and its impact on their lifes because they cannot perceive or verify the problem for themselves. For example, you'll be rushed to the hospital if your arm has a second 90° angle, but not if you have a serious mental disorder without telltale signs. And even with a broken arm, you'll think twice about visiting the hospital if your arm appears normal. Yes, there's pain, but you would probably wait until it starts to swell.

The same applies to climate change. The crawling speed at which the climate changes is hardly noticeable without the use of climate data, models and graphs. And the amount of misinformation and misinterpretations on the internet doesn't make it any easier for individuals to understand the severity of a changing climate and the impact it has on their life, the human race, and the world in general.

There's also something to be said about how selfish humans are. Why would someone care about climate change, or anything really, if they think it won't impact their life now or in the future. There's a reason people advocate for marginally better rights and living conditions in their own first-world country instead of traveling to a third-world country to help the truly needed people. It's because people generally wants to benefit from any positive changes themselves. And even selfless acts are arguably based in selfishness for wanting to feel good about themselves, or be seen as a "good person", as the primary motive. I understand that they still put others' needs above their own, so it's still a noble deed regardless of any ulterior motives. But it's something to think about…

Climate change has been a issue for a hot minute and yet even with all the evidence that shows it is a real phenomenon there's hasn't been much progress on fixing the issue. First of all, there's so many different opinions on it.

There's an overwhelming amount of evidence that the climate is changing for the worse. Oceans and temperatures will rise, weather becomes less predictable and extremer, the AMOC may collapse, and climates will shift. But weather and climate models are constantly adjusted, and no one is certain about how much and how fast the climate will change. This uncertainty is why people find it hard to decide how much resources they should pour in the fight for maintaining a healthy (weather) climate. Especially, as previously mentioned, if you have trouble seeing the invisible problem, and after investing in green solutions, the "invisible results."

We have no idea if or when the invisible results will be measurable, and whether they were worth the investment. For example, how many years do we have to wait for scientists to be able to measure the effect that cold turkey stopping all oil consumption has on the climate? Side note, people who claim we can keep the world running without oil in the present day or near future have no idea how the world (economy) works. Looking at already averted crises shows us that the (invisible) results are often difficult to measure.

• Did we overestimate the Y2K problem or did we avert a crisis by spending hundreds of billions of Dollars on addressing the problem?
• How many deaths did the safety measures against Covid-19 prevent and was this worth the multi-trillion Dollar economic loss?
• Did we overestimate certain health crises such as the Ebola Outbreak or the H1N1 Influenza [swine flu], or did we prevent severe global pandemics with mass vaccination campaigns, the creation of treatment centers, and deployment of medical teams to the affected areas?

Even people who acknowledge that climate change is a serious problem don't always know how much we should change about the way we live and the way the world functions in order to avert the most serious consequences that the everchanging climate will have on our future life and world economy. Especially when invisible results in the distant future are weigh against readily apparent results that impact the lifes today. For example, losing your current way of life with all its comforts, or the monetary cost of cutting back on (government) services to afford green solutions that may or may not be worth the investment.

Is the human race cooked ?

I may went a bit off topic. To give a short answer, yes. The human race is cooked in terms of the hardships the current newest generation will face. But by no means will climate change be the cause of our extinction. I expect no apocalypses either. Just a lot of struggles, at which point the invisible problem becomes visible, and people become motivated to prevent further climate disasters.