Why should you care?

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AverageBozo
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Re: Why should you care?

Post by AverageBozo »

GE—

Mea culpa. I apparently misunderstood your claims about Exxon et al were about blaming those entities for the outcomes they produce.

I am not creative enough to answer your previous charge.
GE Morton
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Re: Why should you care?

Post by GE Morton »

Sy Borg wrote: November 10th, 2021, 3:40 pm GE, you are lost in ideology and theory, completely out of touch with realpolitick and, well, physical reality.
Ad hominems do nothing to bolster your argument, Sy.
Your claim that Pacific Islanders are not facing an existential threat is naive. The Marshall islands are sinking. Duh.
I said they're not facing an existential threat in the near term. They certainly are facing one in the long term, and would have even if there had been no increase in CO2 emissions since 1900. Go back to the sea level trend line I previously posted. Here's another sea level (NOAA) chart specifically for the Marshall Islands:
marshallsealevel.jpg
Sea levels there are rising ~ 2mm/year, or 0.65ft/century, continuing the trend underway as long as tide gauge records have been kept. They have time to take counter-measures, if that is deemed to be cost-effective. Regular flooding, storm surges, king tides, etc., are nothing new for those atolls.
Your claim that fossil fuel companies are not manipulating the polity with lobbyists and media bias is even more naive.
Fossil fuel companies lobby for their interests, as does every other interest group. Would you expect them to do otherwise? Do all attempts to influence public policy constitute "manipulating," or only those by such "bad guys" as corporations and "the rich"?

And, yes, all media organizations have biases. That means you have to take anything they report with a grain of salt, until you can confirm it with original sources.

https://www.allsides.com/media-bias/media-bias-ratings
As for fossil fuel subsidies, they are powering forward:
In 2020-21, Australian Federal and state governments provided a total of $10.3 billion worth of spending and tax breaks to assist fossil fuel
industries. The $7.8 billion cost of the fuel tax rebate alone is more than the budget of the Australian Army. Over the longer term, $8.3 billion is committed to subsidising gas extraction, coal-fired power, coal railways, ports, carbon capture and storage, and other measures.
(Australia Institute report)
Without knowing details of the "subsidies" given by the Australian government, I can't comment. In the US, those "subsidies" are largely tax deductions of various kinds, which are granted to many other industries as well. Governments subsidize any interest group whose votes some politician covets.
It must be the masses, right? After all, fossil fuel companies, their lobbyists, their investment banks, their funded media and funded politicians carry no special responsibility, according to you.
Yes indeed, it is the masses who are consuming that fuel and releasing those emissions. I should think that glaringly obvious. And no, the fuel companies banks, etc., have no "special" responsibility for it, any more than pharmaceutical companies have a "special" responsibility for opioid overdoses, or MacDonald's has a "special" responsibility for obesity.
You no doubt see it as the masses' fault that car manufacturers and the oil industry worked so hard last century to limit the development and adoption of electric / hydrogen cars.
Auto manufacturers have no power to limit development of hydrogen-fueled or electric cars. They can only argue for the superiority of their own products. The market --- consumers --- will decide which product best meets their needs.
In your weird Republican schema, the masses are responsible because they kept on buying fossil fuel cars (endorsement!), so manufacturers had no reason to rethink.
Er, yes, the market decides. That is an economic fact, not a "Republican schema." There are excellent, perfectly rational reasons why most people prefer gasoline-powered vehicles to electric ones, or to public transit and other "greenie" alternatives.
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Sy Borg
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Re: Why should you care?

Post by Sy Borg »

Forget it, there is no reasoning with you.

It should not be controversial to point out that major corporations, especially fossil fuel corporations and their billionaire owners contribute a lion's share to global emissions and that fossil fuel companies have been manipulating the public to act against their own interests. https://www.politico.com/story/2019/09/ ... ar-1729429

It's like saying that the Earth is round or dogs have fur. It's utterly obvious - at least to those not wearing ideological blinders.

Like I say, I'm done. Your attitudes are not reasonable and you ware wasting my time.
GE Morton
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Re: Why should you care?

Post by GE Morton »

Sy Borg wrote: November 10th, 2021, 10:08 pm
It should not be controversial to point out that major corporations, especially fossil fuel corporations and their billionaire owners contribute a lion's share to global emissions . . .
I think we've established that to be false. The emissions are produced by those burning the fuel, not those who produce it. You're apparently determined to dismiss or deny that obvious fact.
Like I say, I'm done.
You tend to do that when you run out of arguments.
Your attitudes are not reasonable and you ware wasting my time.
Well, on a philosophy forum the coin of the realm is arguments, not attitudes.
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Sy Borg
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Re: Why should you care?

Post by Sy Borg »

GE Morton wrote: November 10th, 2021, 10:19 pmYou tend to do that when you run out of arguments.
It's boredom. I don't come to the philosophy forum to defend the obvious against the biased.
Tegularius
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Re: Why should you care?

Post by Tegularius »

GE Morton wrote: November 10th, 2021, 10:19 pm
Sy Borg wrote: November 10th, 2021, 10:08 pm
It should not be controversial to point out that major corporations, especially fossil fuel corporations and their billionaire owners contribute a lion's share to global emissions . . .
I think we've established that to be false. The emissions are produced by those burning the fuel, not those who produce it. You're apparently determined to dismiss or deny that obvious fact.
Like I say, I'm done.
You tend to do that when you run out of arguments.
Your attitudes are not reasonable and you ware wasting my time.
Well, on a philosophy forum the coin of the realm is arguments, not attitudes.
Strange statement! Who are they producing it for? What is a fuel for if not to be burnt?
The earth has a skin and that skin has diseases; one of its diseases is called man ... Nietzsche
GE Morton
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Re: Why should you care?

Post by GE Morton »

Tegularius wrote: November 12th, 2021, 7:43 pm
Strange statement! Who are they producing it for?
Their customers (you and me).
What is a fuel for if not to be burnt?
Of course it is to be burned, by you and me, in order to travel, heat our homes and businesses, operate our our refrigerators, teevees, PCs, etc.

What is strange about that statement?
Tegularius
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Re: Why should you care?

Post by Tegularius »

GE Morton wrote: November 12th, 2021, 7:59 pm
Tegularius wrote: November 12th, 2021, 7:43 pm
Strange statement! Who are they producing it for?
Their customers (you and me).
What is a fuel for if not to be burnt?
Of course it is to be burned, by you and me, in order to travel, heat our homes and businesses, operate our our refrigerators, teevees, PCs, etc.

What is strange about that statement?
Does it really need to be pointed out! It's produced to be consumed, which in turn creates the greenhouse gases. In your response to SyB you separated the two as having no connection.
The earth has a skin and that skin has diseases; one of its diseases is called man ... Nietzsche
GE Morton
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Re: Why should you care?

Post by GE Morton »

Tegularius wrote: November 12th, 2021, 8:14 pm
Does it really need to be pointed out! It's produced to be consumed, which in turn creates the greenhouse gases. In your response to SyB you separated the two as having no connection.
Now, now. I never said there was no connection. The question (at that point) was, Who is responsible for CO2 emissions? The (obvious) answer is, those who burn carbon-containing fuels. That someone or something else is responsible for producing the fuels is irrelevant. Is Mother Nature responsible for the CO2 emitted from woodstoves and campfires, since she produced the fuel?
Tegularius
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Re: Why should you care?

Post by Tegularius »

GE Morton wrote: November 12th, 2021, 8:23 pm Now, now. I never said there was no connection. The question (at that point) was, Who is responsible for CO2 emissions? The (obvious) answer is, those who burn carbon-containing fuels. That someone or something else is responsible for producing the fuels is irrelevant.
You're only considering half of the question which cannot supply a complete answer. If consumers weren't dependent on it (whether or not they want to) producers wouldn't produce and spend the many billions required as infrastructure if that investment weren't returned with profit by consumers. Logic, such as yours, which has only ONE condition, is useless in forming a conclusion when more is involved than one factor. Producing without consuming is thoroughly illogical, and yet you divide the two as if both were independent! Separating events in collusion never once yielded a viable conclusion.
GE Morton wrote: November 12th, 2021, 8:23 pm Is Mother Nature responsible for the CO2 emitted from woodstoves and campfires, since she produced the fuel?
She may have produced it through hundreds of millions of years, but she wasn't the one who purposely extracted it to burn its vast accumulations as fuel within a period of around 150 years. Also, what is emitted from wood stoves and campfires would not amount, even by a minuscule, to the globalization of using oil and natural gas as energy. Nature has been burning forests for many millions of years concomitant with green-house gas emissions while places like the Amazon kept expanding creating its own self-sufficient environment. That's what I call BALANCE!
The earth has a skin and that skin has diseases; one of its diseases is called man ... Nietzsche
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Sy Borg
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Re: Why should you care?

Post by Sy Borg »

Consumers are often captive to the availability of services thanks to the lobbying of fossil fuel companies. Then consumption of their products is presented as endorsement.
GE Morton
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Re: Why should you care?

Post by GE Morton »

Tegularius wrote: November 12th, 2021, 9:53 pm
You're only considering half of the question which cannot supply a complete answer.
The question --- "Who is responsible for CO2 emissions"? --- does not have two parts; there is no "half" of the question. The answer is, "Those who burn carbon-containing fuels." That is a complete answer to the question.
If consumers weren't dependent on it (whether or not they want to) producers wouldn't produce and spend the many billions required as infrastructure if that investment weren't returned with profit by consumers.
That is perfectly true. Consumer demand drives production. The causal chain between supply and demand is (demand ---> supply). Alfie, in 1908, buys a Ford Model T. He is the first on his block to own one. He thus creates a demand for gasoline. Some oil refiner responds, produces the fuel. His neighbor, Bruno, envious, then also buys a Model T. Demand for fuel doubles, and supply follows. There is no supply until there is a demand, and there are no emissions until Alfie and Bruno start the engines of those Model Ts.
Logic, such as yours, which has only ONE condition, is useless in forming a conclusion when more is involved than one factor.
You seem to be considering the mere availability of fuel as a "factor" in CO2 emissions. It is a necessary condition, of course, but it is not the cause of the emissions, just as the cause of a forest fire is the careless camper who failed to douse his campfire, not Mother Nature who provided the trees.

Ideologues on the Left constant seek to foist blame for every social ill on their favorite whipping boys, corporations and "the rich." In this case, to find the real culprits they need only look in the mirror.
GE Morton
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Re: Why should you care?

Post by GE Morton »

Sy Borg wrote: November 12th, 2021, 10:03 pm Consumers are often captive to the availability of services thanks to the lobbying of fossil fuel companies. Then consumption of their products is presented as endorsement.
Oh, please. Do you really imagine that people buy cars, furnaces, electric lights and appliances, fly on airplanes, etc., because they've been mesmerized by oil company lobbyists?

Really?
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Sy Borg
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Re: Why should you care?

Post by Sy Borg »

GE Morton wrote: November 12th, 2021, 11:44 pm
Sy Borg wrote: November 12th, 2021, 10:03 pm Consumers are often captive to the availability of services thanks to the lobbying of fossil fuel companies. Then consumption of their products is presented as endorsement.
Oh, please. Do you really imagine that people buy cars, furnaces, electric lights and appliances, fly on airplanes, etc., because they've been mesmerized by oil company lobbyists?

Really?
Australian fossil fuel subsidies hit $10.3 billion in 2020-21
https://australiainstitute.org.au/post/ ... n-2020-21/

Oil And Gas Giants Spend Millions Lobbying To Block Climate Change Policies
https://www.forbes.com/sites/niallmccar ... 5b9e17c4fb

COP26: Lobbying threat to global climate action
- Lobbyists are pushing the climate to dangerous extremes by blocking or diluting policies that would reduce the burning of fossil fuels.
https://www.dw.com/en/cop26-lobbying-th ... a-59726541

EGEB: Oil and gas lobbyists are trying to stop clean energy with Facebook ads
https://electrek.co/2021/09/30/egeb-oil ... ebook-ads/

Lobbying: Climate change - Beware hot air
“Energy companies relying on fossil fuels aggressively lobby against climate change legislation they perceive as threatening their corporate interests,” says Thomas Holyoke, a professor at California State University at Fresno and author of The Ethical Lobbyist. “This is hardly unexpected, since meaningful climate change legislation has to be detrimental [to them].”
https://www.reutersevents.com/sustainab ... re-hot-air

Fossil Fuel Lobbyists Are Dominating Climate Policy Battles During COVID-19
https://influencemap.org/site/data/000/ ... _FINAL.pdf

How a powerful US lobby group helps big oil to block climate action
- The American Petroleum Institute receives millions from oil companies – and works behinds the scenes to stall or weaken legislation
https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... -group-api
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Pattern-chaser
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Re: Why should you care?

Post by Pattern-chaser »

Sy Borg wrote: November 12th, 2021, 10:03 pm Consumers are often captive to the availability of services thanks to the lobbying of fossil fuel companies.
GE Morton wrote: November 12th, 2021, 11:44 pm Do you really imagine that people buy cars, furnaces, electric lights and appliances, fly on airplanes, etc., because they've been mesmerized by oil company lobbyists?
Not just oil company lobbyists. We in 'the West' are raised in a Capitalist system, and given a Capitalist education. E.g. shopping, for its own sake, is seen as an admirable and enjoyable pastime, when (in the light of environmental issues) it should be seen on a par with paedophilia, or something equally unpleasant. Capitalism as a more-or-less-global system acts to maintain itself, and grow. Profit is the aim, and consumption is the thing that delivers it. So we are all unconsciously 'programmed' to consume, from the cradle to the grave.

The lobbyists come from every Capitalist corner of our commercially-controlled societies, not just from fossil fuel companies.
Pattern-chaser

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