/sci/ - Science & Math

>implying evil warlords won't just hoard all the food in military bunkers and use that device to completely block the sun until everyone else dies

Yeah real smart OP, just like Al Gore

I really don't have a problem with living underground. Just plug me in.

>implying the ice caps and Canadian glaciers don't melt, cooling the gulf stream and launching us into another ice age

>>5754668
First off evil warlords have been trying to get a hold of a nuke since 1945 and so far so good. What makes you think this would be easier to take control of?

Second, why would anyone (besides your evil warlords) even build a system to completely block the sun? Each square mile of shade would cost millions.

>>5754665
Fuck Al Gore and his manbearpig nonsese. The Earth has been Far far hotter than it is today, and far far colder.. Climates change..

if that means we die off so be it, survival of the fittest.

>>5754681
That's why it's gotta be adjustable. so we can fine tune it and avoid that ice age.

>We will be the last species on earth living underground eating synthetic protein before long if we don't do something drastic.

Sounds good. It means all the suffering of all the other animals goes away.

It is, however, very unrealistic. ;)

>>5754697
pretty much, the Earth heats up to kill off the virus that humans are.

Are we not the only animal that takes, destroys, suffocates, and gives nothing back to the planet?

>>5754693

>Throw your hands up in the air and let the wild free market crash you into the sun

capitlaist logic

>>5754693
The thread is addressing people who have regard for human life.

How about killing off 90% of the world's population.

That would solve 'climate change', or whatever it's being called these days.

I'm serious

>>5754710

I do have regard for human life.
I do not believe climate change has anything to do with carbon emissions.

If the planet(s), plural because more than one are, heating up there is little we humans could do about it. If anything we could try and move farther away form the sun but that does not seem a viable option at this time.

>>5754705
>>5754705
>Are we not the only animal that takes, destroys, suffocates, and gives nothing back to the planet?

No, that's what every predator does. We're just the best at it.

>>5754715
The sun isn't getting hotter at any noticeable rate for us - that's bullshit. Climate change (in terms of rising temperatures) is certainly being accelerated by carbon emissions, there's no doubt about that.

Humanity can relocate, but not to fucking space stations or other planets. That's a ridiculous idea.

We can move to places like New Zealand and Ireland, and eventually to Antartica and greenland

>>5754717
every predator?
could you be more spacefic becuase i meant we take resources that connot be returned, we destroys forest that have been around far longer than we have, we suffocate the earth with billions of tons of concrete and cement. and yet we still do not let ourselves be eaten by other predators, we do not let our bodies decompose back into the environment.

I don't think there has ever been a predator quite like us.

>>5754717
This. People underestimate the (relatively) amoral state of nature itself.

>>5754714
>How about killing off 90% of the world's population.
People have this habit of not wanting to be killed off. They have nukes aimed at your city right now.

>>5754721
>no doubt about that

there have been times were the temperature has been way hotter with less carbon it the atmosphere. do some research please.

>>5754721
you realize decaying plant and animal matter releases more carbon than humans do, don't do?

>>5754714
>>5754724
I agree with the underlying idea. There needs to be less people on Earth.

It may be possible to refine our technology well enough such that everyone on Earth can live a healthy long life (even with various luxuries), but that is never going to happen with the amount of people we have, especially if that number keeps growing.

We are not in a position to have limitless growth right now, the only way we can do that is if we take to the stars. As it stands we absolutely must limit population growth or we will run out of resources.

>>5754725
I never claimed otherwise. I'm saying the rate of temperature change is accelerating drastically due to carbon emissions, this is true. Look at a graph correlating CO2 emissions, temperature and time.

Back before the industrial revolution and population booms in Asia and Africa, it would take a far far longer time for temperatures to change - even by 1 degree celcius

>>5754734
well than this graph must also be true, please take a look.

>>5754731
>the only way we can do that is if we take to the stars
It's a nice idea but I agree and disagree with you. There's more than enough room on the planet for everyone, there's probably enough room for more than 100 billion people and even more if we could live in Antartica or Greenland.

Keep in mind it would be far less expensive and more practical to "terraform" a place like Greenland than mars

>>5754734
how about this one that shows the temperature swings

>>5754729


you do realize measuring the changed carbon doxide isotopes in the atmosphere identifies all added atmopheric carbon as originatinf from human emmisions dont you?

>>5754746
and I know that change is drastically insignificant.

im not saying we dont fuck shit up becuase we do, im saying blaming it on carbon emissions is not the right thing to do, it is human ideals as a whole.

>we drain the earth of its oil to put in machines, yet we have no idea what might happen if the earth were to be void of oil and other resources.

>>5754731
>It may be possible to refine our technology well enough such that everyone on Earth can live a healthy long life... As it stands we absolutely must limit population growth or we will run out of resources.

I don't see a long and healthy life as a priority, just a good one (more pleasure than pain). We could have a lower life expectancy and less consumer goods, but better drugs, painkillers, mood enhancers, more liberal sex laws etc. to make it worthwhile.

I think resources aren't an issue; we're not even close to using them optimally to support happy humans.

Voluntary euthanasia should also be legal so resources are used only by those who really like living.

>>5754742
wow....
you honestly think that the only factor involved is "room"?
Ya sure there's fucking room for lots of people, but what about water? what about food?

There is already an impeding water shortage... we are already going to face that with our current population, I don't even know what the fuck we are going to do with a growing one.

Look at how many people around the world are already starving, sure in the case of food it's mostly politics that get in the way, but do you think that's going to change soon?

Look at how polluted the Earth is already, do you think it's going to get cleaner if our population doubles?

We are a viurus that consumes everything in its path and give nothing back.

>>5754765
We give something back: We are earth's best chance to prevent catastrophic asteroid impacts.

>>5754764
If politics is getting in the way of better food security, you should address those instead of trying to get people killed on purpose.

>>5754768
I wasn't the guy who said to kill people. I said that our population needs to stop growing.

I honestly don't see why it's growing anyway, EVERYONE on Earth can have 2 kids and no more and the population would remain static (it would probably go down even, due to accidental death)
How is that unreasonable? It would fix so much

It's all the stupid uneducated people who just fuck and multiply like rabbits that are causing the problems.

>>5754771
>I wasn't the guy who said to kill people. I said that our population needs to stop growing.
Ah. I see that roughly as equivalent because a painless death and not being born are very similar imo.

Maybe it would help to create more efficient food, i.e. vegan alternatives that taste and feel like meat but need only few resources.

I would also allow euthanasia for those who want it and the death penalty for violent criminals. It really makes no sense to keep people around against their will or in prison forever if you want to lower population anyway.

>>5754764
>food
Kill 90% of the Earth's population and eat them.

People farms. Seriously. Human meat is similar to pork

>>5754777
>> I see that roughly as equivalent because a painless death and not being born are very similar imo.
ok, so I think I have discovered the problem. You are an idiot

You could fuck your mother and have a child, but you didn't do that did you? By your logic that's just as bad as having the child and then killing it.
You must either accept what I just said, or admit that you are wrong. Killing a living person is not the same as just deciding to only have 2 children instead of 5.

I honestly find it hard to believe that anyone is this stupid.
It is FAR more cruel to give birth to a child in an environment that can not support it than to simply not have the child to begin with (I'm not even talking about abortion, just not even getting the bitch pregnant in the first place)

>>5754795
Your insults are not convincing. Your intuition about birthing children into bad circumstances being cruel come from the expectation that their lives are filled mostly with suffering.

However, not allowing the suicide or mercy killing of a suffering person who wishes to die is also cruel. You cannot derive a fundamental difference between killing and omitting birth from cruelty alone.

There is one difference, which is consent: It has value for a society to punish non-consensual murder, but not punish omission of reproduction in the same way, or else you must fear that people murder you on sight.

However, you could birth children into mediocre circumstances and then offer them painless death whenever they want it. So they can decide for themselves how much they want to take in exchange for having the life.

Listen up faggots, we hire evil warlords to kill 90% of the human population and then we use the remaining people as slave labor for building the giant sun blocker. If you want, we can call it The Dr. Frankenstein Solution.

>>5754815
I couldn't help but notice you avoided this:
>>You could fuck your mother and have a child, but you didn't do that did you? By your logic that's just as bad as having the child and then killing it.
>>You must either accept what I just said, or admit that you are wrong. Killing a living person is not the same as just deciding to only have 2 children instead of 5.
That wasn't an insult. I'm just using your logic.

You somehow look at the people who exist NOW and consider an alternative reality in which they weren't born. That's why it seems like killing them to you because now they aren't there.

But that reasoning is flawed, we are talking about people who have never existed. There is more possible living creatures that could have been born that weren't than you can ever imagine. Do you consider that as if we killed them all?

If so, then stopping population growth would only be throwing a twig on top of an endless pile of "birth denials".

I like the two kids per couple idea.
Population would decrease slowly due to death as mentioned and also due to those who elect not to have kids, homosexuals and infertility.
If we get back under like 0.5 billion we created a "eugenics board" to bestow the right of a third child to people who have proven superior genes.

>>5754851
>There is more possible living creatures that could have been born that weren't than you can ever imagine.
This doesn't really matter because there are only so many resources to create people. (As an aside, if any of the multiverse theories are true, these people are all born somewhere, but let's ignore that)

>You could fuck your mother and have a child, but you didn't do that did you? By your logic that's just as bad as having the child and then killing it.
I could have done without the needless incest reference.

There are differences between omitting reproduction and killing people: First, the child and mother have to go through the whole pregnancy and death processes. This is unpleasant business, so it counts.

Secondly, live people often have education or experience, which would be lost if they were killed. And society only functions if people can trust each other somewhat, which doesn't work if everybody can kill everybody else.

Aside from these differences, on a large scale, omitting reproduction looks much like (painless) genocide to me. If we burn the resouces that could have sustained 1 billion happy people, that is just as bad as (painlessly) killing roughly 1 billion existing people (ignoring mass destruction from nuclear retaliation and some such).

>>5754876
>If we get back under like 0.5 billion
That would all but obliterate the world economy...

If we put the reflector closer to the sun, inside the orbit of Mercury even, we could have a much smaller one and it would be easier to adjust.

>>5754878
>If we burn the resouces that could have sustained 1 billion happy people, that is just as bad as (painlessly) killing
but now you're changing the point of the argument!

This has nothing to do with giving birth to people in a good environments.

Your position is that bringing a child into an environment that cannot support it is better than not having the child, and that if I decided not to have the child because I don't want to bring it into a world that can't support it you would say that I am just as bad as a murderer.

and I am just trying to refute your position.
keep it straight.

>>5754885
Since it would take hundreds of years the economy would adjust slowly.
Besides, automation and other technological advancements will give us a whole new economy long before then. Not that I would dare guess how that will work.

>>5754885
local economies would become the center of attention again, so what?

>>5754902
>Your position is that bringing a child into an environment that cannot support it is better than not having the child
No. I never agreed that the world cannot support the amount of people, and more, that it now has. In fact, I have pointed out we waste a lot of resources, as well as a lot of potential for preventing suffering and increasing happiness.

I *do* hold the controversial position that more children should be born into mediocre (not completely hopeless or cruel) situations, such as relative povery or maybe child labor, *if* they also get the right to voluntary euthanasia as soon as they can understand the concept. It is better to have more people, even if they are relatively poor, as long as their lives are voluntary (this does not work for very small children, so there needs to be a minimum standard).

>>5754909
>Since it would take hundreds of years the economy would adjust slowly.
This ignores the brute facts of scale economies.
>Besides, automation and other technological advancements will give us a whole new economy long before then.
Automation just replaces people with robots. How is that even a good thing?

FUGGIN TREE HUGGIN HIPPIE FAGGOTS LIKE OP WANNA KILL THE HUMANS AND FUCK THE TREES. FAGGOTS. YOU WANT THERE TO BE LESS PEOPLE, THEN KILL YOURSELVES AND THERE WILL BE LESS PEOPLE. FUCKIN' PLANET IS FINE AND ITS NATURAL SWINGS. YOU JUST WANT MY MONEY AND YOU AINT GETTIN NONE OF IT FUGGIN HIPPIE QUEER ASSLOVERS SUCKIN EACH OTHERS COCKS AND TRYING TO MAKE A SCHEME TO STEAL MONEY!

Why care? When the solution is so simple.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_fertilization

If you're really smart about it you'll realize with the right investments doing nothing about global warming can be very lucrative. A lot of it being funding to research which drives scientific advancement. And speaking of that, we'll get to observe which model was most accurate. So this is not just for the capital but for science.

Anyway I really aught to get me one of these to get us where we're going sooner. It might break the bank now but it'll pay off in the end.

>>5754911
>It is better to have more people, even if they are relatively poor, as long as their lives are voluntary

This honestly is not an insult, but I really, really, wish that everyone who was as terrible at rational thought as you were never born.

There are so many terrible things in this world that are entirely unnecessary and they exist because of people like you.

You cannot be reasoned with, so there's no point continuing this conversation. I'm done.

>>5754723
Lots of animals have eaten through large spans of forests. When Australia was temporarily connected by a landbridge with Asia it caused a lot of species to go extinct. That sort of thing happens all the time. Most animals will keep reproducing and eating whatever they can to survive.

>>5754995
>There are so many terrible things in this world that are entirely unnecessary and they exist because of people like you.
Oh, what a very specific criticism! Oh, wait.

>You cannot be reasoned with, so there's no point continuing this conversation.
That's funny, I didn't even see you try.

>>5754914

>This ignores the brute facts of scale economies.
I admit I don't know much about economics but I do know that it will be changed beyond recognition by the advancements we have made recently. Good or bad, it's already happening.

>Automation just replaces people with robots. How is that even a good thing?
When the textile industry was largely automated virtually entire nations were thrown out of work.
Before that a simple shirt required weeks of skilled labor to harvest fibers, separate them, spin, weave and sew together. So one shirt cost two weeks pay. Now, everyone is much richer and we all have lots of nice clothes.
Of course the readjustment sucks but without moving forward we would still be plowing and weaving, everything by hand.
And we would all have like two shirts.

>>5755100
I agree that automation can increase the efficiency. But I don't agree that reducing the population to 500 million is sane. They literally want to replace people with robots. Not just boring jobs, but actual humans living on the planet.

>>5755107
500 million is pretty low but a modest population allows more resources per person.
A half billion would be enough for big projects like interstellar colonization or terraforming but allows each person twice the resources consumed by the average American today. Assuming technical advances make better use of those resources the general standard of living would be pretty good.
Two billion closer to your liking?
Admittedly, larger numbers allow for faster human evolution.

>>5755188
>Two billion closer to your liking?
More like 8-10 billion. More if technology allows.

>Admittedly, larger numbers allow for faster human evolution.
Evolution is not a goal, it is a process. But that aside, we can use technology to enhance humans without killing a lot of them.

>allows each person twice the resources consumed by the average American today
Which is at least 4 times more than what an efficient high-tech society would need to sustain a happy human. A lot more if technology improves much more. We could really improve on happiness-per-joule or happiness-per-space etc. if we pushed the limits using the scientific method.

I really resent that people wish for others to not exist rather than to live without luxury, even if those others would wish to exist.

itt pretentious bullshit newfriends.

Just a friendly reminder that tinkering with the climate (intentionally or otherwise) can have unexpected effects.

For example, it's basically a matter of pure luck that led us to use CFCs instead of bromine-based equivalents. If we'd used bromine instead, the ozone hole would have covered the entire planet in the 1970's.

http://books.google.com/books?id=la-jRvBf74sC&pg=PA466&lpg=PA466

>>5755203
>happiness-per-joule
Quote worthy.

>>5754740

No one is saying it isn't?

>>5754665
See op, your first problem is that you said its all over news

>>5755384
Google news "climate change" to see what he's talking about.
Apparently some respected or journal published a paper predicting a scary high number of extinctions in the next 60 years.

>>5755278
>bromofluorocarbons
oh sweet baby jesus can you imagine

it's a thing, but i don;t see it getting particularly bad until the 2050s or so
based on how things are going, we'll probably have some really solid fission baseload electricity solution by then that beats the pants off anything else in cost, and electric cars will dominate the market. both of those things obliterates co2 output

getting china to pick it up won't be difficult if it's market competitive

>>5754744
everytime it gets hot a civilization dies

what's causing it? more dangerous microbes? loss of fertile land? maybe heat just makes people angry and want to fight?

>>5755864
You do know how the temperature changes lag behind CO2?
And how it will take centuries for even the current levels of CO2 to be re-absorbed?

Even with a nuclear future (which I am for), it's not going to be a picnic.

Being obsessed with meat is an issue in terms of overpopulation. Livestock takes up something like 80% of all agricultural land but only makes up 10% of the actual food (107% accurate percentages)
If we just relegated meat to a luxury food item and cultivated better crops that provide complete proteins this would help sustain a large population, or alternatively sustain a smaller population while providing plenty of land for nature.

Urbanisation is increasing and with it the practicality of public transport increases as well. So CO2 increases may not be as horrifying as predicted.

I would prefer if we didn't kill off 9/10ths of the world population, as a larger population makes more cool stuff. But maybe we could just dump billions of land mines in asia and africa to prevent them from developing further.

>>5754665
>>5755460
While the loss of species is regrettable, life on Earth is scarcely threatened.
Over time, the worst catastrophes leave nary a trace.

What we should be worried is the continuation of human life. We are very much dependent on the current environment, no matter what some people like to tell themselves.

>>5755203
>I really resent that people wish for others to not exist rather than to live without luxury, even if those others would wish to exist.
Your moral intuitions conflict with mine. If we start giving moral weight to potential-existers, mightn't we be obliged to tile the universe with (computers simulating) entities that meet the minimum criteria for 'human' and no more?

Either way, I'd hope we agree that neither avoiding nor embracing the Repugnant Conclusion leads to a moral imperative to have lots of children now, in the present. There are simply too many externalities associated with resource allocation.

It's made out of people

>>5756116
>If we start giving moral weight to potential-existers, mightn't we be obliged to tile the universe with (computers simulating) entities that meet the minimum criteria for 'human' and no more?
1) This conclusion depends on the assumption that we have the power to do that.
2) Why only 'human'? Maybe the minimum criteria are something else, such as 'happy being' or 'autonomous person' (even though some use 'human' as a short-hand for the latter).
3) You also have to consider externalities, such as suffering caused.

Other than that, it gets really weird if you ignore potentially-existing beings. It would imply we would be okay with a project that creates trillions of babies in a state of horrible torture, if it gives us a cookie. (Or that prevents the creation of trillions of very happy people, for a cookie).

>>5756153
All your food is indirectly made out of people. It is normal to recycle the biomass of human bodies one way or another.

Cut down all the forests, but leave seed trees so that they'll regrow in a few decades, or replant faster-growing fauna such as bamboo.

Throw all the organic material you cut down in a subaquatic hole, preferably at a depth conducive to kerogen formation. Most of that carbon is now fixed again, and the regrowing forests are fixing even more of it.

My solution.

>>5754665
seeing smart fags talk like this is scary. ;_;

build a shade? lel. there has to be some sort of
gas that we could introduce into the high atmosphere that could act as a shade. flip a switch and it blocks light. flip another one and it doesnt. freaking transitions lenses for the earth - like my grandma.

>>5756349
It wouldn't be impossible, but the more you add to the atmosphere the further away we are from Earth's natural, habitable state.

i hate to dig up an old thread but this one worries me. if smartfags know that 1/3 of plants and 2/3 of animals will be extinct by 2080 because of human imposed warming wouldnt it be irresponsible not to murder billions of people to preserve the human race? i am the polar opposite of a tinfoil hat but this kind of news makes me think loons like alex jones might be right about that whole fema camp black helicopter bullshit.

is 4chan turning me into a crazy person?

>>5754818
pshaw. You use ALL the human population to build the sun shield, the weakest 90% die off in the process. two birds with one stone, AND you strengthen the gene pool!

geez, it's like you've never been an evil overlord before!

>>5756548
lel seriously tho - that sounds far more logical than alex jones theory. anon you would make an admirable evil dictator.

>>5754665
can you imagine that something might go wrong and all the refracted light ends up focusing on the surface of earth?
this is not a solution at all

>>5756489
No, you're just an idiot.

>1/3 of plants and 2/3 of animals will be extinct by 2080
No one needs them.

>wouldnt it be irresponsible not to murder billions of people to preserve the human race
Global warming won't kill the human race off, but idiots like you just might.