Item — HN Reader

There is a huge amount of cynicism here in the comments. And that is perhaps appropriate for people alive today - as long as the human population grows such problems will as well. We live in a closed system.

But, while the armchair activists bring nothing but despair to this discussion there are others who have worked diligently and with optimism to make a difference for many, many years[1]. So far, they’ve failed. But isn’t it a great YC truism that failure is learning? Those admirable folks (including my grandfather, a secretary of the IWC) will keep rising and trying, and someday may just win.

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Convention_for...

6 comments

There are environmental engineers, who have worked for the last thirty years, scientifically developing guidelines and regulations, that are science based, for the many factors affecting our environment. From water, soil and air pollution, to the toxicology of the chemicals we use, on the present day harm, and long term harm, of almost every industry in use today. With this data, political decisions could and should be made, on the use, of our environment, our impact on it, and the allowable levels of future disturbances. Here in lies the rub. Policy, decided by politics, over rides science almost every day. But, there is hope. There are numbers to work with, there are regulatory regimes, there is a chance for hope. We just have to create global agreement systems, and possibly global enforcement systems. Obviously, is not easy. But, there is hope!

IWC’s mission: “provide for the proper conservation of whale stocks and thus make possible the orderly development of the whaling industry” — what it actually should be - “do not impact whales in any form”

Love YC, might be wrong, but top 20 founders of the almost 10,000 that have gone through YC created majority on YC’s returns; this count doesn’t even include the 100s of thousands of applicants that never got in. And now have ever to my knowledge come close to changing way 8 billion people behave on a daily basis.

Least for me, I am not an arm chair activist, though unlike most activists, I (now) see activism largely as a waste of time. Not because it randomly makes progress, but because the progress made normally has nothing to do with actual changes to way people reason about the world, and everything about how the feel about the world.

To me, without changing way people reason, everything else feels like it’s not addressing the fundamental problem.

There's cynicism and then there is naive optimism.

The time for the ruling class to be given a pass for their failures is at an end. Funny thing is they are the ones calling for and end to complacency, but strangely enough that does not extend to complacency toward their corruption, incompetence, and greed

There is cynicism, naive optimism, and those who celebrate wins when we get them without declaring the job over.

The point of the person you're replying to is that celebrating this pretty much falls into the naive optimism category. The Paris accord of 2015 comes to mind: the largest emitter by capita withdrawed within a few years (amongst other things, since few did really follow it fully) and nearly a decade later all predictions look pretty depressing. It was celebrated out of hope, but perhaps people need more concrete results before being happy now.

Right. In 2015, peak coal was behind us. The naive optimists thought "it's all down hill from here". A "global accord" has been reached, so all that's left to do is slap together a few windmills, some solar panels, stop mining coal or drilling oil and gas, and problem solved.

Today, somehow, peak coal is in front of us again and emissions promises have been revealed as flimsy half-truths that are gamed and lied about as part of domestic and international power struggles and political maneuvering, to the absolute shock and surprise of nobody who has paid the slightest attention to the behavior and trustworthiness of politicians and bureaucrats and their corporate masters at any time in the past 50+ years.

> The Paris accord of 2015 comes to mind: the largest emitter by capita withdrawed within a few years

Which emitter would that be?

Because if you're talking about the US, it withdrew for ~3 months (11/04/2020 - 1/20/2021).

If agreements are negotiated to be that resistant to national politics, that seems like a design win.

Humans are very good at manipulating a general win to serve their private gains and abuse it to the maximum possible extent.

Yes and? Absolutely any positive progress be it complete or partial will be exploited for personal gain by someone. That's human nature and it's impossible to stop.

"Nations reach accord" is not a win for commoners or for the environment.

Japan is still whaling for 'scientific research' which is a loophole they put into the law. "Fool me twice, shame on me" is not cynicism, it's experience.

“Show me the money” (evidence of improved sea ecology)

I just don’t care about the latest agreement, good intention, or promise. I don’t care to find out where the loopholes are to make the just a showpiece.

I’m not going to celebrate politicians demonstrating some plan for how things are going to be, I’ll celebrate victories.

Too much these days is just celebrating and condemning appearances instead of actual results.

Someday they will win. The question is how many of us will be around to celebrate the win and in what conditions they will be living. That's the thing we can still influence.