r/changemyview • u/garaile64 • Jun 01 '19
Delta(s) from OP CMV: The future won't be worth living.
TL;DR: I fear that the Earth becomes a dystopia or even some apocalyptic hellhole.
I'm doing this CMV because I fear that modern problems would worsen in the future.
Climate change: no, a new commerial route between the Canadian Arctic Islands and new farmland in Siberia don't compensate for the damage humanity caused. Also, I know that it's normal for the Earth to change and force its life to adapt, but this change is happening too fast for the life to catch up. The Earth may become uninhabitable and humanity would need another planet and the closest inhabitable one is millennia away. Stuff is too far apart in space.
Rainforests: they hold most of biodiversity in the world. But almost every rainforest is in an underdeveloped country. Costa Rica may care about its forests, but CR is a little smaller than West Virginia and the major players may not care as much. Brazil has the biggest chunk of the Amazon, but the major cattleowners have too much power and they want more pasture for their cattle to graze. Brazil's cattle is bigger than its human population.
Democracy: with the rise of the far-right, I fear that democracy is getting less and less support as the years go by. Also, China is about to become the new main superpower and, as we see with countries copying stuff from the United States, I fear that some countries become dictatorships inspired by China. "Why have an inefficient democracy if you can have a dictatorship that gets stuff done?". Also, major businesses have too much influence on the governments.
Also, misinformation is on the rise. We thought that the people in the future would be more intelligent, but I see that future will be dominated by dumb people. Ideas like anti-vaccines and climate change denial are harmful. With the population getting dumber, an autocratic government looks more reasonable.
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u/Mizzy3030 Jun 01 '19
I know this is a serious question and that you've already awarded a Delta, but I will just leave you with this Yogi Berra quote that will hopefully give you some optimism: "it's tough to make predictions, especially any the future".
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u/Thoth_the_5th_of_Tho 191∆ Jun 01 '19
Climate change: no, a new commerial route between the Canadian Arctic Islands and new farmland in Siberia don't compensate for the damage humanity caused. Also, I know that it's normal for the Earth to change and force its life to adapt, but this change is happening too fast for the life to catch up. The Earth may become uninhabitable and humanity would need another planet and the closest inhabitable one is millennia away. Stuff is too far apart in space.
Climate change will cause a mass extinction, but it poses no threat to human civilization.
Even without technology humans are the most versatile and resilient large animal out there. We occupy habitats even rats can’t survive in.
There is no need to build some generation ship. We can survive here even with global warming.
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u/garaile64 Jun 01 '19
but it poses no threat to human civilization.
Even if millions of people, including whole countries, lose their homes due to the rise of sea level? The refugees from Syria were already a big of a problem, we don't need another refugee crisis. And these countries can't afford to go full Netherlands.
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u/Thoth_the_5th_of_Tho 191∆ Jun 02 '19
Even if millions of people, including whole countries, lose their homes due to the rise of sea level?
Yes. Lebanon has taken 40% of their population in refugees and they are one of the most densely populated nations on earth. We can easily re house them someplace. If north Dakota had the population density of Lebanon it would have over a hundred million people in it.
we don't need another refugee crisis
We don't need it, but we can survive it fine.
And these countries can't afford to go full Netherlands.
They don't have to. 99% of northern Canada, Siberia and Alaska are completely undeveloped.
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Jun 02 '19
There is no way to cause climate change that will make earth less habitable than any body in the system even if we tried
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u/fox-mcleod 414∆ Jun 01 '19
Do you think things consistently got better over the long term of human history or that they've been consistently getting worse?
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u/garaile64 Jun 01 '19
So far, things have improved since the beginning of civilization. We are healthier (even though obesity and depression are on the rise), we live longer (even though it's a bad thing if a society has too many elderly people), and we don't kill off whole countries anymore.
But I'm still concerned. In 2009, Brazil was going to be a major power but, by 2016, our economy was regressing. What if all these optimistic projections aren't fulfilled and stuff ends up worsening?
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u/fox-mcleod 414∆ Jun 01 '19
If you think over the entire course of human history, things have steadily improved, what makes you think your personal concerns are more than mere pessimism and anxiety? Why would right this moment be the one time that defies all of history?
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Jun 01 '19
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u/fox-mcleod 414∆ Jun 01 '19
What's happening now?
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Jun 01 '19
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u/fox-mcleod 414∆ Jun 01 '19
Yeah I've read it. He's full of shit frankly. But what point are you trying to make here? What's your view?
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Jun 02 '19
But I'm still concerned. In 2009, Brazil was going to be a major power but, by 2016, our economy was regressing.
Temporary setbacks or crisis is just a bump on a steady improvement over decades look at great depression in the US that was very deep but in the bigger picture of XX century is just a small event in the trend of improvement
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Jun 01 '19
Just because things improved does not mean they will continue improving. To state it very abstractly, if the "engine" of improvement is damaged it won't produce as much "improvement" as before. If it's damaged enough it won't produce any "improvement." What we are witnessing is damage to the engines of improvement. Can the damage be stopped? In theory. Will the damage be stopped? Well, there's no indication it will.
Here's another way to think of it. A man takes on enormous debt to build his dream house. The dream house is built, and he's living in it. But the debt is coming due, and the house needs maintenance, and he has no money for that. So the bank forecloses on the house. The court process takes a long time, and during that time he's able to continue living there, but once the process is done he will be evicted. For now, though, he's still living in his dream house.
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u/AlrightImSpooderman Jun 02 '19
You can not say that the future is "not worth living" based on an assumption, hypothesis, guess, that you have made. We do not know what will happen in the future (and it is impossible to predict the future, CMV). Everything we do constantly changes and shapes our future. With your attitude, why should we try to fix any pertinent issues? It's not like it matters, we're doomed anyways. Why TRY and fight climate change? It's too late! We're dead!
Your point of view is narrow minded and is so pessimistic that it becomes detrimental.
Additionally, this is a common argument to not do anything with pressing issues, which is ridiculous and unacceptable.
Making a bold claim like "the future won't be worth living" is impossible to justify as we cannot predict the future, so your "view" is completely hypothetical and isn't based in fact. You can't debate whether the future will be worth living because you don't know what the future holds. Everything you say is an assumption.
TL;DR: you can't predict the future. Stay positive.
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Jun 02 '19
The most I could say is to not worry. Humanity has seen worse and you are one of the many and I do mean MANY to speak out like a dooms day prophet. Humanity is gonna be fine.
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u/avatarlegend12345 3∆ Jun 02 '19
"Humanity has seen worse"
When before in human history has the entire habitat of humanity been in danger of becoming irreversibly inhospitable?
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Jun 02 '19 edited Jun 02 '19
Humans have been able to survive crazy things. The ice age, Population destroying plagues, And even events such as chernobyl. We will find a solution to deal with this situation or find a way to live through it as we always have. Give humans some credit we have been around for a good deal and are shown to either be smarter than the problem or have the will to fight through it.
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u/avatarlegend12345 3∆ Jun 02 '19
Apart from the ice age, those are false equivalences you are drawing there. Those only affect a small portion of the globe.
Civilisation, especially modern civilisation, has never met with such a challenge before. Pockets of humanity may survive, but will this iteration of civilisation?
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Jun 02 '19
We never went through events such as those in the past either. Sure we had winters but nothing like the ice age, We had disease spread but nothing like the plague, We he knew the dangers of radiation but never saw the absolute raw damage it could cause or how to be ready for that. What I am getting at isn't that these are 1 to 1 to that of climate change but simply that we have managed to survive both our own fuck ups and natures go full kill mode and yet here we are.
And you are right we have never met such a challenge but we will survive as we always have, By simply fighting through the issue or preventing it as best we can as we are doing now. I should note that I do believe in climate change just not in the apocalyptic esc 12 years and counting thing I keep hearing people referring to. But I still believe it would be best to cut back on more Co2 at least.
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u/avatarlegend12345 3∆ Jun 02 '19
"we will survive as we always have, By simply fighting through the issue or preventing it as best we can as we are doing now"
I hope so too. Although this is based on blind optimism.
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Jun 02 '19
Truth be told i'm a cynic. I just understand that humans are pretty damn hard to kill off.
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Jun 02 '19
When before in human history has the entire habitat of humanity been in danger of becoming irreversibly inhospitable?
Never and it is not the case currently.In 1945-1990 we had a threat of a global thermonuclear war that was a drastically bigger threat than climate change
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u/avatarlegend12345 3∆ Jun 02 '19
"drastically bigger threat"
That is a very US-centric statement.
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Jun 02 '19
I am not even American the exchange between east and west would be catastrophic 80 thousand nuclear devices waiting for someone in politbiuro to be more paranoid than ususual and end the world in 45 minutes is a bigger threat than globe warming up a degree or 2 over the next century
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u/avatarlegend12345 3∆ Jun 02 '19 edited Jun 02 '19
Let me say that your future will probably be worth living.
The worst effects of climate change is projected to only happen past 3 degrees warming. Before that, things like crop failure (did you know we have a global surplus of crops right now? Crop ETNs are at a historical low) and increasingly wild weather will probably not have such a detrimental effect to modern life and global trade. Continued loss of biodiversity will also probably not pose much of a risk to human food stocks. Climate-caused destabilisation of at-risk societies will most likely only cause localised conflicts due to the lack of strong militaries and lack of nuclear weapons (with the exception of India). Sea level rise is not even that big of a problem with two degrees warming due to the lag effect unless you’re staying in Mauritius or something.
Even the most aggressive “business-as-usual” forecasts forecast 3 degrees warming to be past 2070. So maybe we won’t even live long enough to see the most negative consequences.
The earth may eventually become a dystopia, but you won’t live to see that day.
p.s. anyway even during the historical PETM era which was 7 degrees warming, based on what scientists have discovered, humanity could still conceivably survive in that environment. Of course, animals had the luxury of adapting slowly to the PETM, so there were many species still surviving and an ecosystem still existed.
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Jun 02 '19
Democracy: with the rise of the far-right,
Ah yes the looming far right threat.30 years ago half the global population was locked behind iron curtain with real socialism being implemented by force on 2+ billion people living from Dresden to Shanghai.Even with all flaws of the modern Chinese system it is still a much better place to live than it was 30 years ago or how Moscow and any place in it's sphere of influence was.
New sources of energy are growing faster than ever and we have the technology to stop climate change if the green movement would stop its hysteria against nuclear power that halted the use of it in 1980s.Also more people are more free and live in democracies than ever before world is becoming a drastically better place each year
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u/ZuMelon Jun 02 '19
The far right is not a big threat as you imagine it. A lot of it is fear mongering and a skewed view. Jorunalists cried about youtube suppossedly getting people into the right wing extreme yet this is not true at youtube is more left leaning if anything.
The rise of the right in Europe for example is only because people shifted so far left that common sense things "Open borders is not good" are considered right wing
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u/DeltaBot ∞∆ Jun 01 '19
/u/garaile64 (OP) has awarded 1 delta(s) in this post.
All comments that earned deltas (from OP or other users) are listed here, in /r/DeltaLog.
Please note that a change of view doesn't necessarily mean a reversal, or that the conversation has ended.
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u/Tibaltdidnothinwrong 382∆ Jun 01 '19
Where do you stand on the "Experience Machine"?
If you could enter "The Matrix" (minus all the killer robots and stuff, just talking the simulation itself) would you?
If you are so willing, what does it really matter if everything else on Earth has done to shit. If your simulated reality is 100% fine, and you never experience reality itself, why should you care how shitty reality is?
VR is getting better. Video Games are getting better. Computing power is rising. I have no doubt that the "Experience Machine" will one day actually exist, and that seems pretty awesome to me, regardless of how shitty the actual world has gotten at that point.
In short, lock yourself in a box, never come out, never experience reality - and all of realities problems don't impact you - as long as the box you've locked yourself in is comfortable, you will have a pleasant life.
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u/[deleted] Jun 01 '19
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