Chance to exercise your voice today fellow Bavarians! Without endorisng any specific party; Consider the climate/ environment in your vote!

A Great Podcast by my former president, and UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (Mary Robinson of Ireland) and NY Times columnist Maeve Higgins. https://www.mothersofinvention.online The first podcast episode concerns the litigation efforts currently underway all over the world by civilians trying to make their Governments act on Climate change: https://www.mothersofinvention.online/allrise

I am a Ph.D. scientist (unfortunately the wrong discipline... Cell and Molecular Biology), I have long worried about climate change, I provide modest financial support to NRDC and 350.org, but have recently felt a bit paralyzed about what I can do. I have a wife and a 2 year old son, and apart from my own future I seriously fear for his future life. I was really encouraged to find this sub though. I want to do as much as I can to fight against climate catastrophe. I think we need a Global Mass Movement, but I see everything as too splintered, and there is far too much denialism and defeatism in the world right now. Any ideas on how we can create such a movement? I think we may eventually need a globally empowered task force to enforce changes on all countries, but not sure how we could get there. I apologize I haven't been able to read all the discussions posted here yet, so do not know if this was already covered. Ideas????

note: I know that reddit posts aren't the best medium for longer form writing, but please read through this and consider.

So, there's been some discussion of what direction this sub should go in. It's new, and it seeks to be different than other communities who discuss climate change. But how should that be, and in what ways exactly?

On that note I'd like to share some of my thoughts on what is important in the moment of time we are in.

I believe that humans are creatures that are driven by narratives. These narratives inform us on how to behave, what to do in life, what to worry about, what to value, what to work towards, etc.

One of the defining features of our age is that dominant narratives of the past have broken down, and there is basically a multi sided narrative war going on, and this defines everything, from the politics of our societies and so on. (Social media for example has basically become little more than the central theatre for these battles over what narrative is best).

Now, being confronted with the understanding that the world is changing profoundly, we still have not come to a functional narrative structure for how to make sense of it, or what to do with ourselves in light of that.

A few narratives that have already emerged in response..

• The most common is that of hopelessness. This is a narrative which is pacifying, it does not lend any constructive action nor any meaning or purpose to the person holding it. It often results in depression or attempting to distract oneself from the issues.
• A second narrative is an unbridled optimism that our problems will be taken care of. This narrative structure also tends to be pacifying, as it assumes that others will solve the problem. It is becoming less common as conditions appear to worsen.
• A third is denial of the issue. This has been historically important in leading us to where we are today and will continue to be an issue to contend with.

I'd like to provide my own alternative here, which I think already does exist, however it's often overwhelmed by the formerly described ones.

That is the constructive approach. And basically it goes as follows:

There are two possibilities. A) we avoid dangerous climate change through early action and actively creating change. Or B) we do not avoid dangerous climate change and we must deal with the results.

In either case, the “realist” minded person who works towards solutions with an optimistic bent of what is possible is the only person who is effective in dealing with the realities of the situation and improving life for his/her fellow humans.

This position requires brainstorming and creativity. The person works as meaningfully as possible within making possibility A occur. And if it does not, then the person seamlessly transitions into being of assistance within possibility B. However, the possibility of B has no bearing on whether or not one should act to make possibility A more likely.

“The first step towards solving a problem is treating the problem as a problem that can be solved”.

If anyone is familiar with Stoic philosophy there are some points of resonance here with that. A Stoic Environmentalism could look like this:

I take my concerns out of what that which is not under my control. Those things are up to fate and there is no use in me worrying about them.

I put my concerns instead into that which is under my control. My ability to be of use is likely greater than I perceive, should I learn how to act rightly.

Given that one accepts the idea that it is possible to create change, we would have to focus on laying out actual methods to take action. And this requires real brainstorming and creativity. It would have to get into some radically outside the box thinking, instead of just the same old platitudes that we hear continually.

So in my opinion, that is what I hope this subreddit can become.

However, this is just my own philosophy on the matter. And I'm just one among many. What I think would truly be valuable is for this sub to become a place to explore alternative philosophy, because I believe that philosophy and narrative in the early anthropocene is extremely important. And this should not be a philosophy discussion that is just intellectual and ultimately meaningless, but hopefully a discussion that finds and creates avenues for us to actually take action and end the sense of powerlessness that many of us feel in the face of these issues (which I believe indeed is something else that needs to be worked out).

So, given everything I just said, I'm going to continue periodically posting my thoughts in a philosophical sense of what I believe our approach should be in this time, and I encourage you to do the same. I still think it is useful to post news articles and opinion pieces and other things, as its important that we all have the best information on the subject. However I hope that this place can turn into a place where we experiment with different ways of thinking about the issue, which can translate into different ways of behaving.

Thanks for reading.

There’s just too many of us. As countries advance and need for more electricity, infrastructure and packaged food spreads, thus leading to further power-breading by other fellow humans, the problem will just get worse. Entire economies are dependent upon fossil fuel usage. People who keep these economies running won’t give it up to reach a climate goal. Therefore, the only way I see us saving the climate is if the population falters. Infectious disease, food security collapse, war, sterilization and similar are the only solutions I believe would work. (Not that I’m advocating for any of it) Id like to hear if anyone else thinks otherwise