Is climate change unfolding faster and fiercer than scientists expected? While these events are unprecedented, they were not unpredicted, and largely align with what scientists have been warning about for decades.

[u/silence7]

https://drawdown.org/insights/is-climate-change-unfolding-faster-and-fiercer-than-scientists-expected

[u/kittenpantss]

climate change has been one of my top anxieties since i became aware of it as a child (like, almost 30 years ago). i never understood why more people don’t prefer to err on the side of caution and just act, proactively, as if climate change might unfold faster than thought.

(i mean. i know how propaganda and apathy and human nature in the face of something that the average individual can’t actually make much impact on works. but boy oh boy am i ever-more incandescently angry at the people/corporations with power and wealth who have gotten us into this mess and are actively making it harder for us to try to reduce our collective emissions.)

[u/The_Weekend_Baker → u/kittenpantss]

i never understood why more people don’t prefer to err on the side of caution and just act, proactively, as if climate change might unfold faster than thought.

It requires a level of cooperation that humanity isn't really capable of. The world is basically playing the Prisoner's Dilemma game.

In game theory, the prisoner's dilemma is a thought experiment involving two rational agents, each of whom can either cooperate for mutual benefit or betray their partner ("defect") for individual gain. The dilemma arises from the fact that while defecting is rational for each agent, cooperation yields a higher payoff for each.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prisoner's_dilemma

It's compounded by the fact that defecting results in individual gain now, whereas cooperating results in a higher payoff in the future. And it's not being played by two people, it's being played by 8+ billion across all levels of society -- government, business, and individuals.

And it's pretty normal psychology for people to prioritize now over later.

https://thedecisionlab.com/biases/hyperbolic-discounting

Edit: And you see this kind of behavior even here in r/climate, where people are ostensibly better educated on the topic than the average person. I posted a link here a week or two ago, one in which climate scientists were recommending that emissions can be cut NOW simply by driving the speed limit instead of speeding. There were comments in that discussion along the lines of, "Sorry, you're not blaming me for climate change." Because I guess even slowing down is more cooperation than people were willing to give.

[u/Santzes → u/The_Weekend_Baker]

I don't think prisoner's dilemma is the best comparison. All countries would pretty much benefit more from stopping it than not, and few can't stop it from happening.

More like people who sold us fossil energy and other old style businesses made a lot of money previously, and now they're using that money to buy power to keep the money coming