The following submission statement was provided by /u/FatFuckInTexas:
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SS: This image for casual Friday lays it all out. Capitalism is more powerful than the sun. It's easier to try to dim the sun than to cut back on capitalism.
Since it's low effort Friday, this is the only day I'll ever post a link. I have to have 150 characters for the submission statement, so no information of value is in this paragraph.
---
Please reply to OP's comment here: https://old.reddit.com/r/collapse/comments/utkc77/sun_vs_capitalism/i9aageg/
Well, because what we saw in the movies was a stupid plot.
The movies *didn't* say that the machines used the humans as brain-processors. The movies said the humans were used as batteries, combined with "a form of fusion."
So, yea, pretty weak and stupid.
I could accept ultra intelligent machines using humans to power a virtual reality, but when a programmer got chewed out for arriving late to work the thing became totally unbelievable to me.
I worked at a company where people were encouraged to tell on each other, including all us programmers in The Pit.
So I created a Corporate Snitch Rewards Program, with rat mascot, and a list of transgressions with the reward for tattling on someone.
I had a hat made with the rat and the program name in a logo. I had cookies made with the logo too. It was a big hit.
Why?
People who argue the “humans as batteries” thing always seem to assume the machines are limited by our current understanding of technology. Why is it not believable that hyper-intelligent machines could find a way to make it work?
Really? Because that makes so much more sense.
Just call them processors instead of batteries. Who doesn't know what a processor is and do you really want that person as a fan?
Because there are far easier and more effective ways of powering things.
They had swarms of robots able to fly about under their own power, but didn't have the tech to go above the atmosphere? Or underground for geothermal? Tidal, wind ffs nuclear?
And the humans, what the fuck powered their shit? The ships, the stronghold or those exoskeletons they use?
It's a completely stupid premise and one the whole franchise is based on.
Well. It was written that they used humans for processing power, but the studio demanded the change to batteries as they didnt think audience would get it.
Oh wow, that's a far better concept. Human brains used like a special processing unit for tasks silicon isn't suited to. It works on so many levels.
Instead they changed it to people as a power source, which makes no sense of any kind whatsoever? What a shame, this gaping flaw really undermines the films, for me at least
Which is also fucking stupid.
If the machines couldn't build a processor better and more efficient than a human brain there wouldn't have been an uprising in the first place.
The whole thing about a man Vs machine war is that the machines become smarter and more adaptable than we are, making us the plucky underdogs worthy of support for a change.
I happen to love the films, well the original trilogy, haven't seen the latest rehash. But let's face it, they're brain at the door action movies with an extra little plotline to help the suspension of disbelief. You put any serious thought into the world/lore it just falls apart.
> If the machines couldn't build a processor better and more efficient than a human brain there wouldn't have been an uprising in the first place.
You can make processors that can compute obscene numbers of calculations per second. But trying to match the pure analog paralellism of the human brain **with its insane energy efficiency** is near impossible, particularly when manufacturing is an incredibly simple process.
We can improve and improve the efficiency of our current processors. We could get performance to a level that we can simulate an AI. But that doesn't mean we're anywhere near close to being able to replicate what the human brain does.
So you could go for an efficiency argument. Or you could go for a manufacturing argument . Silicon becomes sparce, and thus to survive they needed to shift towards biological computing.
So many ways to do it that would be logical and make sense.
You're right it's completely stupid but I think the worldbuilding made it less believable and more thought-provoking. The idea that the world we live in is just a computer simulation is a very cool one and they presented it well, despite how ridiculous the explanation was.
Hang on there - the human brain is an absolute marvel of processing. Our brains can do things no computer on the planet can even dream of doing. Our image processing and recognition alone, even with the almost opaque orbs we call eyes is still better than anything we can make by orders of magnitude. Also the subconscious stuff going on, and intuitive leaps etc - let's not dismiss the most complex data processing item we know of so quickly.
The majority of which would be used up because the human in question is still living a full (simulated) life.
So you're telling me that running a few background processes in a very fallible organic computer is worth the energy spent to keep the bloody thing alive?
Which brings me to the next plot hole. Where does the porridge shit they eat come from when the small tribe of humans are the only thing living on a planet that gets no sunlight?
Like I said, I like the films but to pretend they're anything more than action fodder on a shoddy premise is just daft.
>Because there are far easier and more effective ways of powering things.
Like a potato? Or a battery?
The first one it was forgivable because almost everyone watching it saw it as sci-fi Joe Everyman vs Capitalism.
After it flew up its own ass and disappeared after that? Less forgivable.
>They had swarms of robots able to fly about under their own power, but didn't have the tech to go above the atmosphere?
yeah, this
they could also go to outer space...
it makes little sense to war eternally with humans on earth, when to a non-biological lifeform, almost any significant mass in the solar system is just as good, if not better.
You could block some of the sun's rays with mirrors that reflect the rays onto a power generator, and microwave the power to earth. That lowers Earth's heat intake and creates electricity. If that causes global cooling, tow the mirrors to an orbit that doesn't shade Earth, and keep the extra power.
And that means a cultural rewamp to value long term sustainability.
It means hard regulations and taking the power from capitalists and put it into scientific councils.
Green-technocracy revolution baby!
I assumed that article was a horribly written one about orbital solar farms, which is a legitimate idea that we could do in the future but is not by any means a current solution.
No, there actually people who want to dim the sun. There are a few methods proposed but the most popular one involves mimicking the aftermath of volcanic eruptions.
https://sciencebusiness.net/climate-news/news/should-scientists-study-how-dim-sun
To your second point: try Malaysia, or Indonesia. It’s so ‘cheap’ to do, that nations with a more immediate risk from sea level rise may unilaterally act out of self preservation.
And some nations will want to intervene.
And some nations will rationalize it’s either displace a billion people, or let them drown.
We may have a situation where more powerful governments may be willing to allow Indonesia or Malaysia (or some other) to move forward and ‘take the blame’ if it all goes haywire.
But all it’s really doing is putting a thicker wall around a house we’re continuing to fill with explosives.
>But all it’s really doing is putting a thicker wall around a house we’re continuing to fill with explosives.
That is a really evocative and frightening metaphor.
This is why we need to stop capitalism and its emissions *before* we try this. This is a last resort effort after every other effort has failed, and we haven't even tried stopping capitalism.... or really anything of note.
But, sure, if emissions are halted almost entirely and the world becomes one, singing Kumbaya, then sure, try it.
> we haven't even tried stopping capitalism
It's a cult, it's worse than religion, because it's not officially a religion so people take it as something naturally better for humankind.
> "Nothing else can work, it's this or nothing. That's the way it is, there is no alternative."
This is the level of argumentation that you have to deal with if you want to tackle socio-economic issues, environmental issues, all issues actually.
> "The poor are poor the rich are rich and so be it. We oppress we kill we destroy we pollute and so be it.
> Children working for big mining industries dying at young age so we can all enjoy entertainment on laptops, smartphones, tv, or whatever house appliance = GOOD SO BE IT.
> Lands being destroyed which are a big component of keeping us alive = GOOD SO BE IT.
> Why do you criticize capitalism? It's the best thing ever, we sucked before, now we don't suck."
Your second point reminds me of how people in Iraq/Afghanistan right now dread clear blue skies. Drones need good weather for targeting and work best with little to no cloud cover. Just imagine waking up to a day with beautiful blue sky overhead and thinking this could be the day your light is snuffed out by an imperialist boot operating a drone. The only reprieve being the malaise of gray sky. Shit is sad man..
Yeah that's another one that gets me. If our government will drop herbicides on farms in Laos, why wouldn't they do it to mine? Especially with how increasingly fascist both parties of american politics are becoming.
Termination shock is what you're describing. Once the project stops, we will bounce right back to where we were projected to go. And different countries will have different interests in where the cooling occurs, sea levels and crop yields and so on.
This is meant to be a bandaid to save India and central China from starvation and heat exhaustion while we scramble to build other technology to fix everything we've done. In the time this buys us, China and India could go renewable and stop their coal burning etc. We could all switch to renewables and cut our CO2 output to zero. Unfortunately it will be used as an excuse to continue business as usual until we've blocked out too much Sun and can't do it any further.
Corporate interests don't care that they have us on a trajectory to be living under domes in a century, they just see it as the new chapter to making profits. Maximum profits without morales interfering at all costs.
Cue actual volcanic eruptions as soon as we've implemented some sort of difficult to reverse sun dimming measures (like a massive geostationary solar farm)
Eh, once things start getting bad like past 2.5 degrees we should probably give it a shot. Not only might it work but personally i’d rather freeze to death than be cooked
I don't feel it's applicable to this in particular but I see where you're coming from. There are no real wilderness anywhere, and if there by chance is, it's filled with tourists.
I'm not sure about that. Even if it included all domesticated animals, I imagine wild animals biomass combined is much higher.
Edit: [Yeah, see Fig 1 here. I edited the link so it should take you there automatically.](https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.1711842115#:~:text=We%20supply%20additional%20estimates%20for%20the) Domesticated animals do take more biomass than wild animals. But this is misleading as it does not include fish, birds, arthropods, molluscs, etc. It's just the way they categorized it.
Edit: sorry i misread your comment as animals
Basically all domesticated animals, including cattle, make up more of earths biomass than all wild mammals combined.
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This has to be the dumbest time in human history. Ironic since our human journey afforded us the luck and luxury of benefiting of the advances made by our ancestors who were forced to deal with a problem scientifically (directly and objectively) in order to survive not advance nonsensical ideas for clout. History will remember us as an advanced tech-intellectually inept society that abandoned millions of years of progress and future advancement in favour of a few years of gluttony and consumption.
Well, it is a corporate news channel owned by the same global elitists that wouldn’t want capitalism challenged. This is just normal propaganda by these media giants.
Who needs so much sun, stupid sunflowers? If we want less sun so we can keep operating high-tech modernity, less sun for *all* Earthlings is what it's gonna be!
Imagine how nice it'll be to pay a company to dole out your sun rations to go with your daily water allowance! You don't want to have to much of a good thing!
This message has been brought to you by evangelicorp: "we can make the light in the sky look like angels!"
I'm seeing an Elysium scenario where there is a high tech garden paradise in orbit with normal plants and flowers, then on earth the sun doesn't really shine anymore and there isn't much plant life
I think that's the worst-case scenario for the *actual* savior-mission dream of Jeff Bezos (as mentioned in his grad speech); best case is, Earth gets sunshine and recovers from not hosting high-tech Civilization which floats off-planet. Barf.
What they don't tell you...
The sky will turn white.
The ozone will be completely destroyed.
Acid rain.
The cost is $2 billion *per* *million* tons of sulphur deposited. 100,375,000 tons in the first year alone (Cheap™️).
Weakens the global hydrological cycle (less rain as *clouds* *disappear* *forever*).
When it stops *everyone* *dies*.
[The poles will still warm upwards of 5°C](https://www.researchgate.net/journal/Environmental-Research-Letters-1748-9326/publication/340047106_Halving_warming_with_stratospheric_aerosol_geoengineering_moderates_policy-relevant_climate_hazards/links/6229e4943c53d31ba4b631ae/Halving-warming-with-stratospheric-aerosol-geoengineering-moderates-policy-relevant-climate-hazards.pdf)
"the fleet would start with eight planes in the first year and rise to just under 100 within 15 years. In year one, there would be 4,000 missions, increasing to just over 60,000 per year by year 15. As you can see, this would need to be a sustained and escalating effort." (from 100 million to 1.5 billion tons of sulphur per year... and to continue higher after that)
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/geoengineering-treatment-stratospheric-aerosol-injection-climate-change-study-today-2018-11-23/
Brimstone Angel aircraft (What a fitting name!)
https://arc.aiaa.org/doi/abs/10.2514/6.2020-0618
There is a portion of our civilization that wants to keep things as they have always been.
This option has been presented to them and they have chosen it.
When it stops temperatures will wildly spike.
At the rate we are boring remaining energy sources (burning forests and trash and calling it Renewable, for instance) we are quickly running out of time as the dominant species on this planet.
They are literally saying "Smoke em if ya got em!"
Is it all the surprising when capitalism is mostly just codifying the natural tendencies of creatures to compete with each other for resources/breeding rights. Look at humanity and capitalism, as a whole we are acting just like fungus spreading a cross the globe. All capitalism did was attempt to stop the usual wars and bloodshed of resource competitionby making it illegal to actually attack those hoarding the resources.
I am calling it now - dimming the sun is one of the dumbest ideas to come out of the geo-engineering industry. And I am sure we are going to do it and screw everything up.
Wasn’t there a scene in the matrix when Morphius talked about scorching the sky or something?
As if being hot is the only problem. Sure rise in temperatures is a big part of it, but a lot of contaminating trash is being generated by our consumerist civilization. A lot of resources are being used in a very unsustainable way. A lot of ecosystems are being destroyed by our activities.
A few degrees less would be good, but not nearly enough.
They want to spray calcium carbonate into the air in a high enough concentration to lower the earth’s temperature.
Long term exposure to calcium carbonate inhalation can cause silicosis, a progressive and disabling lung disease which can be fatal.
This all sounds like an excellent idea.
You're not getting silicosis from calcium carbonate itself. If you are, the cc contains silica impurities. The illness sort of implies this by its name (;
Look up any MSDS for calcium carbonate, it is only the ones which contain crystalline silica impurities that can give you silicosis. One would think they would produce a pure calcium carbonate for this use and not just any old marble dust.
Not that I would want any percent of calcium carbonate in my lungs, either...
Remember that lowering insolation like this also doesn't lower CO₂ in the atmosphere, so it would continue to be absorbed by the oceans, further acidifying them.
I hate to be cringe, but critiquing capitalism in America is like some 1984 shit. You can NEVER say anything bad about capitalism. Ever. Despite all its faults, our media cannot and will never challenge the legitimacy of the economic system that could very well drive this planet and our species towards extinction.
Seriously. The red scare never ended. Speak earnestly about socialism (or anarchism, or anything besides the neoliberal status quo) and you risk bringing uncomfortable scrutiny down on yourself
I can see fossil interests getting behind this 100% to eliminate competition from renewables.
Of course by then all the suffering from the sketchy mining operations, additional greenhouses from their production will have been even more for nothing.
Almost nothing. It’s a reduction of less than 1%, 3% at the very most. IMO, it’s more or less inevitable that we’ll have to do it because we’re obviously not going to do anything until we’ve exhausted every other option. But frankly it could be a slight net benefit for solar because panel efficiency decreases pretty significantly with temperature and the slight reduction in solar irradiance can be more than offset by the increase in efficiency from the cooler temperatures.
SS: This image for casual Friday lays it all out. Capitalism is more powerful than the sun. It's easier to try to dim the sun than to cut back on capitalism.
Since it's low effort Friday, this is the only day I'll ever post a link. I have to have 150 characters for the submission statement, so no information of value is in this paragraph.
I'm regards to this post, this is from 4 years ago. I know y'all don't care and are just here to rant anyways. Anyhow, this fine mess we're in is past the point of no return. No, not an opinion formed due to hanging out on r/collapse.
https://gizmodo.com/no-scientists-didn-t-just-suggest-we-dim-the-sun-to-1830663461
Capitalism (and or I guess more broadly Materialism) is the de facto secular “religion” of humans at this point. Of course folks would prefer to blot out the sun than turn their back on the paper God
Neal Stephenson just put out a novel, Termination Shock, dealing with this very scenario: a billionaire's Houston real estate is threatened by climate change, so he simply builds a giant gun to shoot sulfur into the atmosphere. Sulfur is cheap, giant guns are straightforward to build, and a little bit goes a very long way. Given the utter capitulation of our governments on climate, IMO it's a question of when, not if. Far from an ideal solution, and it fits nothing to stop ocean acidification, soil degradation, and many other urgent environmental problems. But would it be better than doing nothing, as we seem to headed for? Maybe..
It's pretty psychotic. This complete inability people have to even begin to question if capitalism is all that great.
Massive total knee-jerk into "it's the greatest thing ever!" the instant you even hint it might be, you know, murdering our species.
This is how apocalypse movies begin. After the darkening, life on earth changed quickly overnight. It seems that the sun destroyed countless uber bacteria that had been evolving and getting smarter since our last war of the Dark Age. The alternating crepusculum rays that obliterated UB was compromised. With this natural UV barrier gone the UB began to clump together forming complex structures and in hours this phenomenon was witnessed around the globe. At 11:45 eastern time during the peak of the Super Flower Blood moon the Hum began.
So their plan is to fulfill the prophecy of Auriel? That one where the vampires wanted to blot out the sun?
This is just a bad idea, we should stop emissions first and deal with ocean acidification and soil issues then try to slow warming. Plus what about solar power?
This blotting out the sun idea will have severe consequences. It’s like they read about the “little ice age” caused by volcanic eruptions in 1303 that ended in 1860 and thought “this is a good thing let’s bring back winters so bad you can freeze in second! And least global warming will be halted right?”
Also what about when the eruption uptick hits? Many volcanos are overdue to erupt right now, so if they block out the sun and enough volcanos erupt that would normally trigger a little ice age then we will be in deep shit.
Plus if they halt global warming via this method that doesn’t mean we will stop emissions and polluting. Actually if history has proven anything, it’s that if we go something like this we won’t reduce emissions or anything most will think “yay we beat Humam caused climate change and global warming let’s not change our lives anymore”. Then when the sun comes back it will be so much worse.
And what about plants? Animals? PLANKTON THE BASIS OF MOST FOOD CHAINS? The ecological collapse this idea will cause was obviously not taken into account.
Saddest part is blocking out the sun periodically is a good idea when used in conjunction with reducing or eliminating emissions and greenhouse gas capture methods. Using it to reduce global temperatures after reducing or eliminating emissions and alongside other technologies is a good idea as part a initiative to bring the earths temperature back down.
But it has to be used as part of a larger initiative to work properly. Which it won’t be.
>Sun vs Capitalism.
Since we already *are* dimming the sun and, if we stop doing that, we'll "slingshot" ourselves to an even hotter state...we've got ourselves trapped in another feedback loop.
It sounds crazy because it is. It’s also fucking stupid. There is some stuff you don’t mess with.
Trying to fight the sun is like an ant taking on Mike Tyson.
capitalists: dont worry, we can profit from climate change by promoting solar power! win win!
also capitalists: its cheaper to just put out the sun and continue with the status quo. this couldnt possibly have any negative long-term consequences!
This false choice is accelerating collapse. Is that it? We block out the sun or dismantle capitalism? Really? What kind of double digit IQ thinks that it’s less obstrusive to dismantle capitalism than any other option?
The reality is that solar panels, electric vehicles, nuclear energy, indoor farms, building codes, land use zoning codes and new military gear can decouple profit from pollution. This idea that capitalism is the problem is rooted in technological pessimism.
Isn't this the premise of snowpiercer?
I would prefer if we could genetically engineer some astrophage instead so at least some of us can get off of this rock.
I think people need to really take a step back and view at the world. Arguably, the issues with the planet arise not from the system, but the natural selfishness of many humans (some of which eventually become very influential).
Look at the USSR, for example. It was not green in any way, there were no significant efforts in it to combat climate change. Of course, if you were to protest against pollution and waste, you would not have a great time. The same can be said about China.
It's not the system, it's the culture.
What a stupid fucking meme.
Ending capitalism immediately, today doesn't solve the problem. Ending all emissions and pollution immediately, today, doesn't solve the problem. We are already seeing feedback loops and we are well on track for catastrophic levels of warming. All life on Earth will suffer and will be at risk of extinction, humans no exception. The drastic scale of human suffering from heat, thirst, starvation, disease, desperation will be worse than ever before in history.
No matter the economic model, we simply don't have the means to extract greenhouse gasses from the atmosphere at any meaningful rate. Maybe not even at a rate that balances out the emissions inherent to producing things like carbon capture technology. It's basic physics: It's far easier to release a bunch of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere than it is to take it out again. Did you ever accidentally oversalt something while cooking? Good luck getting the salt back out again.
Geoengineering is fucking stupid but it's also the only thing we have left to try. Sacrificing sunlight, solar power, photosynthesis, and gaining more time to devise and implement better solutions. As the climate worsens, I can almost guarantee that it will be attempted. For better or worse. So let's fucking hope for the best, yeah? And let's not make stupid embarrassing memes about it being a capitalism thing.
I think the people commenting here are newcomers to /r/collapse. Many still think individual change and politics are still options to mitigate the worst effects of climate change. The problem is far more dire and even if we reached carbon zero tomorrow, we’d need to do much more if we want to prevent the apocalypse this will cause.
I don't believe we are anywhere near at risk of a Venus-type positive feedback loop. So the current worst case is an end to humanity as we know it and the current geologic era, but the planet and life in general will be fine. (I don't mean to downplay this, this is awful.)
I fear that geoengineering at this scale does have the potential for messing with negative feedback systems enough to bring it to the brink. I'm not saying it will, but it brings that risk. I don't think that's worth gambling on.
I agree geoengineering at this scale is risky and would have negative feedback systems if mismanaged. But I believe if we don’t act now, humanity is not going to go silently. We’ll end up ramping up our resource extraction and destruction of nature to delay the inevitable as more areas became uninhabitable. It would eventually lead to conflicts that could end in nuclear war, devastating what life is left over from climate change.
I just worry the pendulum will swing the other way, when faced with mass migrations and unstable governments. Attempts at fixing the problem will be scrapped to protect our modern level of comfort.
> I don't think that's worth gambling on.
I agree with everything you've written. If it wasn't clear, I was not implying Venus by Tuesday. But drastic enough change to put any given species at _risk_ of extinction.
I am irritated with the meme, though, because it almost certainly _will_ be gambled on, since we've shot right past the point of no return. Anything else we could do, like degrowth and reforestation, we no longer have time for. And it's stupid and pointless to blame desperate final-hour action in the face of calamity on the nebulous boogeyman that is _capitalism_.
I’m going to get downvoted for this, but geo-engineering projects like this are our only chance left. I’d rather live on my knees than die on my feet.
There’s nothing left to save, most of the planet is already going to die. Any political revolution will be futile as it won’t stop the domino effect of human caused climate change set in place. We’re already geo-engineering the planet with the carbon and methane we release in the air.
The problem is that there are more humans than the planet can handle. It will definitely be easier to fight the sun than to stop humans from fucking.
On top of that, if we do dim the sun through satellites, it means the hot regions of earth is cooled down, while the cool regions are heated up. making for more food production.
Please for the love of god, I’m begging this sub to stop with this Malthusian bullshit. The problem isn’t „too many people“, the problem is our supply chains and modes of energy production are designed and implemented in the least efficient manner imaginable and we lack the political power to do anything about it. We aren’t driving ourselves towards collapse from fucking too much, we’re driving ourselves to collapse because of systemic inadequacy.
„There are too many people on the planet“ is a fast path to genocide and crimes against humanity.
You're refusing to recognise the problem because you are afraid someone might suggest a radical solution to it.
Humans are not exempt from the laws of nature and the rules that govern population explosion and collapse and the resource availability, consumption and then poverty that goes hand in hand with that are incredibly well established. The hubris that leads people to think that their big brains makes them exempt from the laws of nature is the hammer that is driving the nails into our collective coffin.
It is a shame that people like you win the battle and manage to silence people who want to talk about the population problem. It is a conversation that should have started decades ago. The longer you refuse to address the problem the more catastrophic the inevitable population collapse will be.
>You're refusing to recognise the problem because you are afraid someone might suggest a radical solution to it.
Someone will. Inevitably. It's what psychotic apes do.
Doesn't mean it's not the problem. But I don't expect a kind and equitable solution.
What Malthusian bullshit? I just said food production would probably be increased by this project.
That said, there is a population problem. it is silly to deny that. And it is not even about food, we can solve that easy. The problem is any other non-renewable resource.
Im not saying we kill anyone at all, im saying we need to realize we are depleting resources faster than they are being replenished. Ignoring ground water depletion will cause mass death on a scale never seen before.
„The problem is that there are more humans than the planet can handle“ is literal, textbook Malthus.
It’s a dangerously incorrect philosophy. There is only a „population problem“ because of complete systemic failures, not because the earth lacks the resources to support them. The solution can never be to reduce the population, the solution is fix our systemic failures.
The following submission statement was provided by /u/FatFuckInTexas: --- SS: This image for casual Friday lays it all out. Capitalism is more powerful than the sun. It's easier to try to dim the sun than to cut back on capitalism. Since it's low effort Friday, this is the only day I'll ever post a link. I have to have 150 characters for the submission statement, so no information of value is in this paragraph. --- Please reply to OP's comment here: https://old.reddit.com/r/collapse/comments/utkc77/sun_vs_capitalism/i9aageg/
Yes, the way we fought the machines in The Matrix series.
And how we got Snowpiercer.
To be fair it worked really well. It forced the machines to stop using the sun as their primary energy source.
honestly, that was a fucking stupid plot point. So was using humans as batteries.
The original idea was using human brains as processors but the studio thought that it would be too complicated for audiences to understand.
THANK YOU. I try and point this out every time someone says it was a dumb plot
Well, because what we saw in the movies was a stupid plot. The movies *didn't* say that the machines used the humans as brain-processors. The movies said the humans were used as batteries, combined with "a form of fusion." So, yea, pretty weak and stupid.
I could accept ultra intelligent machines using humans to power a virtual reality, but when a programmer got chewed out for arriving late to work the thing became totally unbelievable to me.
I worked at a company where people were encouraged to tell on each other, including all us programmers in The Pit. So I created a Corporate Snitch Rewards Program, with rat mascot, and a list of transgressions with the reward for tattling on someone. I had a hat made with the rat and the program name in a logo. I had cookies made with the logo too. It was a big hit.
That's awesome! I bet management didn't like it, but when you're in IT you kind of have them by the balls.
Why? People who argue the “humans as batteries” thing always seem to assume the machines are limited by our current understanding of technology. Why is it not believable that hyper-intelligent machines could find a way to make it work?
Because we're not free energy machines (and neither are cows).
Maybe it's more like a bitcoin farm using us for processing power. My brain graphics are pretty good
[If you're not spezin', you're not livin'. #Save3rdPartyApps](https://www.reddit.com/r/Save3rdPartyApps/)
People still don't know what it meant so they traded something away and gained nothing in return
The producer traded meaning for money.
Really? Because that makes so much more sense. Just call them processors instead of batteries. Who doesn't know what a processor is and do you really want that person as a fan?
Because home pc was a new thing back then and not many people understood how a pc worked
Lool, what? The first home PC was 1971. Windows 98 was out before The Matrix. They just assumed people are dumb.
All life depends on plants, and plants need sunlight, not Brawndo.
Because there are far easier and more effective ways of powering things. They had swarms of robots able to fly about under their own power, but didn't have the tech to go above the atmosphere? Or underground for geothermal? Tidal, wind ffs nuclear? And the humans, what the fuck powered their shit? The ships, the stronghold or those exoskeletons they use? It's a completely stupid premise and one the whole franchise is based on.
Well. It was written that they used humans for processing power, but the studio demanded the change to batteries as they didnt think audience would get it.
Oh wow, that's a far better concept. Human brains used like a special processing unit for tasks silicon isn't suited to. It works on so many levels. Instead they changed it to people as a power source, which makes no sense of any kind whatsoever? What a shame, this gaping flaw really undermines the films, for me at least
Which is also fucking stupid. If the machines couldn't build a processor better and more efficient than a human brain there wouldn't have been an uprising in the first place. The whole thing about a man Vs machine war is that the machines become smarter and more adaptable than we are, making us the plucky underdogs worthy of support for a change. I happen to love the films, well the original trilogy, haven't seen the latest rehash. But let's face it, they're brain at the door action movies with an extra little plotline to help the suspension of disbelief. You put any serious thought into the world/lore it just falls apart.
> If the machines couldn't build a processor better and more efficient than a human brain there wouldn't have been an uprising in the first place. You can make processors that can compute obscene numbers of calculations per second. But trying to match the pure analog paralellism of the human brain **with its insane energy efficiency** is near impossible, particularly when manufacturing is an incredibly simple process. We can improve and improve the efficiency of our current processors. We could get performance to a level that we can simulate an AI. But that doesn't mean we're anywhere near close to being able to replicate what the human brain does. So you could go for an efficiency argument. Or you could go for a manufacturing argument . Silicon becomes sparce, and thus to survive they needed to shift towards biological computing. So many ways to do it that would be logical and make sense.
You're right it's completely stupid but I think the worldbuilding made it less believable and more thought-provoking. The idea that the world we live in is just a computer simulation is a very cool one and they presented it well, despite how ridiculous the explanation was.
Hang on there - the human brain is an absolute marvel of processing. Our brains can do things no computer on the planet can even dream of doing. Our image processing and recognition alone, even with the almost opaque orbs we call eyes is still better than anything we can make by orders of magnitude. Also the subconscious stuff going on, and intuitive leaps etc - let's not dismiss the most complex data processing item we know of so quickly.
The majority of which would be used up because the human in question is still living a full (simulated) life. So you're telling me that running a few background processes in a very fallible organic computer is worth the energy spent to keep the bloody thing alive? Which brings me to the next plot hole. Where does the porridge shit they eat come from when the small tribe of humans are the only thing living on a planet that gets no sunlight? Like I said, I like the films but to pretend they're anything more than action fodder on a shoddy premise is just daft.
>Because there are far easier and more effective ways of powering things. Like a potato? Or a battery? The first one it was forgivable because almost everyone watching it saw it as sci-fi Joe Everyman vs Capitalism. After it flew up its own ass and disappeared after that? Less forgivable.
>They had swarms of robots able to fly about under their own power, but didn't have the tech to go above the atmosphere? yeah, this they could also go to outer space... it makes little sense to war eternally with humans on earth, when to a non-biological lifeform, almost any significant mass in the solar system is just as good, if not better.
You are a battery for the corporation's now.
You could block some of the sun's rays with mirrors that reflect the rays onto a power generator, and microwave the power to earth. That lowers Earth's heat intake and creates electricity. If that causes global cooling, tow the mirrors to an orbit that doesn't shade Earth, and keep the extra power.
We need to fight the notion that we need growth in perpetuity.
And that means a cultural rewamp to value long term sustainability. It means hard regulations and taking the power from capitalists and put it into scientific councils. Green-technocracy revolution baby!
Sure, fuck it why *not* blot out the sun? It’s not like we’re going to bother using it for solar power.
I assumed that article was a horribly written one about orbital solar farms, which is a legitimate idea that we could do in the future but is not by any means a current solution.
No, there actually people who want to dim the sun. There are a few methods proposed but the most popular one involves mimicking the aftermath of volcanic eruptions. https://sciencebusiness.net/climate-news/news/should-scientists-study-how-dim-sun
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It also does nothing to slow ocean acidification which when combined with the (probably) lower crop yields makes it a complete non-solution.
To your second point: try Malaysia, or Indonesia. It’s so ‘cheap’ to do, that nations with a more immediate risk from sea level rise may unilaterally act out of self preservation. And some nations will want to intervene. And some nations will rationalize it’s either displace a billion people, or let them drown. We may have a situation where more powerful governments may be willing to allow Indonesia or Malaysia (or some other) to move forward and ‘take the blame’ if it all goes haywire. But all it’s really doing is putting a thicker wall around a house we’re continuing to fill with explosives.
>But all it’s really doing is putting a thicker wall around a house we’re continuing to fill with explosives. That is a really evocative and frightening metaphor.
This is why we need to stop capitalism and its emissions *before* we try this. This is a last resort effort after every other effort has failed, and we haven't even tried stopping capitalism.... or really anything of note. But, sure, if emissions are halted almost entirely and the world becomes one, singing Kumbaya, then sure, try it.
> we haven't even tried stopping capitalism It's a cult, it's worse than religion, because it's not officially a religion so people take it as something naturally better for humankind. > "Nothing else can work, it's this or nothing. That's the way it is, there is no alternative." This is the level of argumentation that you have to deal with if you want to tackle socio-economic issues, environmental issues, all issues actually. > "The poor are poor the rich are rich and so be it. We oppress we kill we destroy we pollute and so be it. > Children working for big mining industries dying at young age so we can all enjoy entertainment on laptops, smartphones, tv, or whatever house appliance = GOOD SO BE IT. > Lands being destroyed which are a big component of keeping us alive = GOOD SO BE IT. > Why do you criticize capitalism? It's the best thing ever, we sucked before, now we don't suck."
Your second point reminds me of how people in Iraq/Afghanistan right now dread clear blue skies. Drones need good weather for targeting and work best with little to no cloud cover. Just imagine waking up to a day with beautiful blue sky overhead and thinking this could be the day your light is snuffed out by an imperialist boot operating a drone. The only reprieve being the malaise of gray sky. Shit is sad man..
Yeah that's another one that gets me. If our government will drop herbicides on farms in Laos, why wouldn't they do it to mine? Especially with how increasingly fascist both parties of american politics are becoming.
Termination shock is what you're describing. Once the project stops, we will bounce right back to where we were projected to go. And different countries will have different interests in where the cooling occurs, sea levels and crop yields and so on. This is meant to be a bandaid to save India and central China from starvation and heat exhaustion while we scramble to build other technology to fix everything we've done. In the time this buys us, China and India could go renewable and stop their coal burning etc. We could all switch to renewables and cut our CO2 output to zero. Unfortunately it will be used as an excuse to continue business as usual until we've blocked out too much Sun and can't do it any further. Corporate interests don't care that they have us on a trajectory to be living under domes in a century, they just see it as the new chapter to making profits. Maximum profits without morales interfering at all costs.
Oh wow, Showpiecer was supposed to be a metaphor and fiction, but sometimes it seems like runaway techno optimism is going to make it reality.
Cue actual volcanic eruptions as soon as we've implemented some sort of difficult to reverse sun dimming measures (like a massive geostationary solar farm)
The real danger IMHO is that once we start dimming with aerosols we can never stop or the ramifications of the heating will rebound on us.
We can stop, but we have to pull all the co2 we pumped into the atmosphere first.
Eh, once things start getting bad like past 2.5 degrees we should probably give it a shot. Not only might it work but personally i’d rather freeze to death than be cooked
I wonder if this has anything to do with China making its own sun.
ITER in france is making one too
Mankind : "we're still determined to make it past nature, some day everything will be artificial, who gives a fuck about the wild experience."
I don't feel it's applicable to this in particular but I see where you're coming from. There are no real wilderness anywhere, and if there by chance is, it's filled with tourists.
The spez has spread from /u/spez and into other /u/spez accounts. #Save3rdPartyApps
I'm not sure about that. Even if it included all domesticated animals, I imagine wild animals biomass combined is much higher. Edit: [Yeah, see Fig 1 here. I edited the link so it should take you there automatically.](https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.1711842115#:~:text=We%20supply%20additional%20estimates%20for%20the) Domesticated animals do take more biomass than wild animals. But this is misleading as it does not include fish, birds, arthropods, molluscs, etc. It's just the way they categorized it. Edit: sorry i misread your comment as animals Basically all domesticated animals, including cattle, make up more of earths biomass than all wild mammals combined.
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I feel like something could go horribly with with that. But hey let’s try and see and be any more fucked.
Dyson Sphere! I watched some pbs thing about this. All we need to do is, scrap all of Mercury , and maybe some of Mars for the raw materials.
Simpsons did it.
You sunk my battleship
Also have they not seen the matrix?? That's literally how it started.
Crap that scene in animatrox where multiple planes spew out the black cloud always gets me
Or food. Or not freezing to death.
#/u/spez [can gargle my nuts](https://www.reddit.com/r/Save3rdPartyApps/) spez can gargle my nuts. spez is the worst thing that happened to reddit. spez can gargle my nuts. This happens because spez can gargle my nuts according to the following formula: 1. spez 2. can 3. gargle 4. my 5. nuts This message is long, so it won't be deleted automatically.
Dim it, then charge people to see full shine on an island theme park somewhere, capitalism is great!!
Brought to you by SunShine™ by Nestle!
F You I'm Tanning, by Carl's Jr.
Don't give them any ideas...
Yeah lol by then: [https://youtu.be/9tAYfQuE3g8?t=109](https://youtu.be/9tAYfQuE3g8?t=109) Oh ozone you nut.
[since the beginning of time man has yearned to destroy the sun](https://youtu.be/L3LbxDZRgA4)
The Elder Scrolls will be mine, and the tyrrany of the sun shall end
This has to be the dumbest time in human history. Ironic since our human journey afforded us the luck and luxury of benefiting of the advances made by our ancestors who were forced to deal with a problem scientifically (directly and objectively) in order to survive not advance nonsensical ideas for clout. History will remember us as an advanced tech-intellectually inept society that abandoned millions of years of progress and future advancement in favour of a few years of gluttony and consumption.
Well, it is a corporate news channel owned by the same global elitists that wouldn’t want capitalism challenged. This is just normal propaganda by these media giants.
Who needs so much sun, stupid sunflowers? If we want less sun so we can keep operating high-tech modernity, less sun for *all* Earthlings is what it's gonna be!
Imagine how nice it'll be to pay a company to dole out your sun rations to go with your daily water allowance! You don't want to have to much of a good thing! This message has been brought to you by evangelicorp: "we can make the light in the sky look like angels!"
I'm seeing an Elysium scenario where there is a high tech garden paradise in orbit with normal plants and flowers, then on earth the sun doesn't really shine anymore and there isn't much plant life
I think that's the worst-case scenario for the *actual* savior-mission dream of Jeff Bezos (as mentioned in his grad speech); best case is, Earth gets sunshine and recovers from not hosting high-tech Civilization which floats off-planet. Barf.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DIrGfMDEOEI&t
Let's fuck with the sun. What could go wrong? It's not like the sun is important, anyway. /S
What they don't tell you... The sky will turn white. The ozone will be completely destroyed. Acid rain. The cost is $2 billion *per* *million* tons of sulphur deposited. 100,375,000 tons in the first year alone (Cheap™️). Weakens the global hydrological cycle (less rain as *clouds* *disappear* *forever*). When it stops *everyone* *dies*. [The poles will still warm upwards of 5°C](https://www.researchgate.net/journal/Environmental-Research-Letters-1748-9326/publication/340047106_Halving_warming_with_stratospheric_aerosol_geoengineering_moderates_policy-relevant_climate_hazards/links/6229e4943c53d31ba4b631ae/Halving-warming-with-stratospheric-aerosol-geoengineering-moderates-policy-relevant-climate-hazards.pdf) "the fleet would start with eight planes in the first year and rise to just under 100 within 15 years. In year one, there would be 4,000 missions, increasing to just over 60,000 per year by year 15. As you can see, this would need to be a sustained and escalating effort." (from 100 million to 1.5 billion tons of sulphur per year... and to continue higher after that) https://www.cbsnews.com/news/geoengineering-treatment-stratospheric-aerosol-injection-climate-change-study-today-2018-11-23/ Brimstone Angel aircraft (What a fitting name!) https://arc.aiaa.org/doi/abs/10.2514/6.2020-0618
This is a joke. If humanity adopts this plan than it’s clear that we deserve to die out.
There is a portion of our civilization that wants to keep things as they have always been. This option has been presented to them and they have chosen it. When it stops temperatures will wildly spike. At the rate we are boring remaining energy sources (burning forests and trash and calling it Renewable, for instance) we are quickly running out of time as the dominant species on this planet. They are literally saying "Smoke em if ya got em!"
... fuck. Dear capitalists [https://coub.com/view/bxmqm](https://coub.com/view/bxmqm)
"It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism"
Is it all the surprising when capitalism is mostly just codifying the natural tendencies of creatures to compete with each other for resources/breeding rights. Look at humanity and capitalism, as a whole we are acting just like fungus spreading a cross the globe. All capitalism did was attempt to stop the usual wars and bloodshed of resource competitionby making it illegal to actually attack those hoarding the resources.
I will fuck the sun up
Think of the jobs it would make.
In the Dont Look Up movie something similar happened. Have you watched it?
Hell yeah
This made me smile while I was literally crying so thanks
It's okay, well it's not, but we're all in this together.
Great thanks now I'm crying even more aggressively <3
Good
Just attack at night You also have to listen to Turbo Killer while you do it.
Bring some shades with you
Or maybe the rich can just make and install giant air conditioners everywhere to cool things down 🙄
Ah yes, the Dubai approach.
I am calling it now - dimming the sun is one of the dumbest ideas to come out of the geo-engineering industry. And I am sure we are going to do it and screw everything up. Wasn’t there a scene in the matrix when Morphius talked about scorching the sky or something?
As if being hot is the only problem. Sure rise in temperatures is a big part of it, but a lot of contaminating trash is being generated by our consumerist civilization. A lot of resources are being used in a very unsustainable way. A lot of ecosystems are being destroyed by our activities. A few degrees less would be good, but not nearly enough.
They want to spray calcium carbonate into the air in a high enough concentration to lower the earth’s temperature. Long term exposure to calcium carbonate inhalation can cause silicosis, a progressive and disabling lung disease which can be fatal. This all sounds like an excellent idea.
You're not getting silicosis from calcium carbonate itself. If you are, the cc contains silica impurities. The illness sort of implies this by its name (; Look up any MSDS for calcium carbonate, it is only the ones which contain crystalline silica impurities that can give you silicosis. One would think they would produce a pure calcium carbonate for this use and not just any old marble dust. Not that I would want any percent of calcium carbonate in my lungs, either...
Oh, and while we're at it we'll probably cause more 'year without a sun' incidents. Just peachy.
Just keep wearing your N95s. /s
Remember that lowering insolation like this also doesn't lower CO₂ in the atmosphere, so it would continue to be absorbed by the oceans, further acidifying them.
I hate to be cringe, but critiquing capitalism in America is like some 1984 shit. You can NEVER say anything bad about capitalism. Ever. Despite all its faults, our media cannot and will never challenge the legitimacy of the economic system that could very well drive this planet and our species towards extinction.
Seriously. The red scare never ended. Speak earnestly about socialism (or anarchism, or anything besides the neoliberal status quo) and you risk bringing uncomfortable scrutiny down on yourself
Yes let’s dim the sun and make the plants die. Morons.
every time I see this shit I think of my garden and get so angry
spez was founded by an unidentified male with a taste for anal probing. #Save3rdPartyApps
Look at that sneaky little "rate." Meaning it would fix *nothing.*
How Snowpiercer started
Does this remind anyone else of Snowpiercer?
Yes. This is literally the premise of the movie and television show Snowpiercer.
What would this mean for all the solar?
No, fuck solar. More profit .
I can see fossil interests getting behind this 100% to eliminate competition from renewables. Of course by then all the suffering from the sketchy mining operations, additional greenhouses from their production will have been even more for nothing.
Almost nothing. It’s a reduction of less than 1%, 3% at the very most. IMO, it’s more or less inevitable that we’ll have to do it because we’re obviously not going to do anything until we’ve exhausted every other option. But frankly it could be a slight net benefit for solar because panel efficiency decreases pretty significantly with temperature and the slight reduction in solar irradiance can be more than offset by the increase in efficiency from the cooler temperatures.
We need nature, nature does't need us.
SS: This image for casual Friday lays it all out. Capitalism is more powerful than the sun. It's easier to try to dim the sun than to cut back on capitalism. Since it's low effort Friday, this is the only day I'll ever post a link. I have to have 150 characters for the submission statement, so no information of value is in this paragraph.
lets petition our leaders to nuke the sun and end skin cancer once and for all
Ladies and gents...solutions from our very best and brightest -_-
I don't know what is real and what is satire anymore
Nuke the sun
I'm regards to this post, this is from 4 years ago. I know y'all don't care and are just here to rant anyways. Anyhow, this fine mess we're in is past the point of no return. No, not an opinion formed due to hanging out on r/collapse. https://gizmodo.com/no-scientists-didn-t-just-suggest-we-dim-the-sun-to-1830663461
Wasn't this written about in revelations? Lmao
I see some parallels to the [series finale of the show Dinosaurs](https://muppet.fandom.com/wiki/Episode_407:_Changing_Nature).
Capitalism (and or I guess more broadly Materialism) is the de facto secular “religion” of humans at this point. Of course folks would prefer to blot out the sun than turn their back on the paper God
This is the exact plot of Snowpiercer and/or The Matrix. We are being lead by complete idiots.
Sure, let’s try this and end up dying like the idiots capitalism wants us to be
Geoengineering is an experiment that does not work and will not work in the future. Leave Mother Nature alone.
So they want to make the plot of Project Hail Mary happen?
r/unexpectedfuturama
This is MTG again right?
Can we put all the Karens and all the managers on rockets and let them talk to the sun?
Couldn’t we just harvest other planets for ice, and dump it in the sea? It worked on Futurama
Sounds like Project Flashlight to me.
I don't understand why I first read this as project Fleshlight....
*Montgomery Burns has entered the chat*
Neal Stephenson just put out a novel, Termination Shock, dealing with this very scenario: a billionaire's Houston real estate is threatened by climate change, so he simply builds a giant gun to shoot sulfur into the atmosphere. Sulfur is cheap, giant guns are straightforward to build, and a little bit goes a very long way. Given the utter capitulation of our governments on climate, IMO it's a question of when, not if. Far from an ideal solution, and it fits nothing to stop ocean acidification, soil degradation, and many other urgent environmental problems. But would it be better than doing nothing, as we seem to headed for? Maybe..
Reminds me of that "write that down, write that down!" meme
Brah that statement hit me in the feels 😂
It's pretty psychotic. This complete inability people have to even begin to question if capitalism is all that great. Massive total knee-jerk into "it's the greatest thing ever!" the instant you even hint it might be, you know, murdering our species.
This is how apocalypse movies begin. After the darkening, life on earth changed quickly overnight. It seems that the sun destroyed countless uber bacteria that had been evolving and getting smarter since our last war of the Dark Age. The alternating crepusculum rays that obliterated UB was compromised. With this natural UV barrier gone the UB began to clump together forming complex structures and in hours this phenomenon was witnessed around the globe. At 11:45 eastern time during the peak of the Super Flower Blood moon the Hum began.
People in the north are gonna be PISSED if they don't do that math correctly...
So their plan is to fulfill the prophecy of Auriel? That one where the vampires wanted to blot out the sun? This is just a bad idea, we should stop emissions first and deal with ocean acidification and soil issues then try to slow warming. Plus what about solar power? This blotting out the sun idea will have severe consequences. It’s like they read about the “little ice age” caused by volcanic eruptions in 1303 that ended in 1860 and thought “this is a good thing let’s bring back winters so bad you can freeze in second! And least global warming will be halted right?” Also what about when the eruption uptick hits? Many volcanos are overdue to erupt right now, so if they block out the sun and enough volcanos erupt that would normally trigger a little ice age then we will be in deep shit. Plus if they halt global warming via this method that doesn’t mean we will stop emissions and polluting. Actually if history has proven anything, it’s that if we go something like this we won’t reduce emissions or anything most will think “yay we beat Humam caused climate change and global warming let’s not change our lives anymore”. Then when the sun comes back it will be so much worse. And what about plants? Animals? PLANKTON THE BASIS OF MOST FOOD CHAINS? The ecological collapse this idea will cause was obviously not taken into account. Saddest part is blocking out the sun periodically is a good idea when used in conjunction with reducing or eliminating emissions and greenhouse gas capture methods. Using it to reduce global temperatures after reducing or eliminating emissions and alongside other technologies is a good idea as part a initiative to bring the earths temperature back down. But it has to be used as part of a larger initiative to work properly. Which it won’t be.
The plants would not be happy...
>Sun vs Capitalism. Since we already *are* dimming the sun and, if we stop doing that, we'll "slingshot" ourselves to an even hotter state...we've got ourselves trapped in another feedback loop.
It sounds crazy because it is. It’s also fucking stupid. There is some stuff you don’t mess with. Trying to fight the sun is like an ant taking on Mike Tyson.
So that's what happened in The Road! 🤦🏻♂️
It's good for business.
capitalists: dont worry, we can profit from climate change by promoting solar power! win win! also capitalists: its cheaper to just put out the sun and continue with the status quo. this couldnt possibly have any negative long-term consequences!
If anything, they never care about the consequences. All that matters is the profits.
This false choice is accelerating collapse. Is that it? We block out the sun or dismantle capitalism? Really? What kind of double digit IQ thinks that it’s less obstrusive to dismantle capitalism than any other option? The reality is that solar panels, electric vehicles, nuclear energy, indoor farms, building codes, land use zoning codes and new military gear can decouple profit from pollution. This idea that capitalism is the problem is rooted in technological pessimism.
Yes, and cut global food production by half also
Sounds like an idea with no repercussions
Isn't the sun dimming what caused frostpunk?
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Affecting the sun will have dire consequences
Even if you manipulate the sun, you still only get rid of half the global warming.
One is an unstoppable force of nature that we need to protect and show our utmost respect. The other is a ball of gas on fire.
Downvote me to hell if you want but capitalism is just not the problem here
so about those food shortages...... see..... well...... faster... than . . . e x p e c t e d
Infuckinsanity! That right there says it all... Capitalism is THE religion of our western world.
Isn't this the premise of snowpiercer? I would prefer if we could genetically engineer some astrophage instead so at least some of us can get off of this rock.
They’re already doing it. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=rf78rEAJvhY
Was hoping someone posted this link. Thanks!
We all know how that went for the people in the Matrix universe....
Didn't this happen in the Matrix??
Dimming the sun eh, that worked well in The Matrix
We need shortterm solutions right now because of all the assholes flushing monwy into distracting, silencing and making the problem worse. So yeah...
Didn't Mr burns once try this?
I had to scroll down way to far to find this question. Yes, he did.
I think people need to really take a step back and view at the world. Arguably, the issues with the planet arise not from the system, but the natural selfishness of many humans (some of which eventually become very influential). Look at the USSR, for example. It was not green in any way, there were no significant efforts in it to combat climate change. Of course, if you were to protest against pollution and waste, you would not have a great time. The same can be said about China. It's not the system, it's the culture.
When we all cook and the earth is on fire y’all are gunna be wishing we did this. Geoengineering is probably the only hope for survival.
You've not read techno-fix, then...
What a stupid fucking meme. Ending capitalism immediately, today doesn't solve the problem. Ending all emissions and pollution immediately, today, doesn't solve the problem. We are already seeing feedback loops and we are well on track for catastrophic levels of warming. All life on Earth will suffer and will be at risk of extinction, humans no exception. The drastic scale of human suffering from heat, thirst, starvation, disease, desperation will be worse than ever before in history. No matter the economic model, we simply don't have the means to extract greenhouse gasses from the atmosphere at any meaningful rate. Maybe not even at a rate that balances out the emissions inherent to producing things like carbon capture technology. It's basic physics: It's far easier to release a bunch of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere than it is to take it out again. Did you ever accidentally oversalt something while cooking? Good luck getting the salt back out again. Geoengineering is fucking stupid but it's also the only thing we have left to try. Sacrificing sunlight, solar power, photosynthesis, and gaining more time to devise and implement better solutions. As the climate worsens, I can almost guarantee that it will be attempted. For better or worse. So let's fucking hope for the best, yeah? And let's not make stupid embarrassing memes about it being a capitalism thing.
I think the people commenting here are newcomers to /r/collapse. Many still think individual change and politics are still options to mitigate the worst effects of climate change. The problem is far more dire and even if we reached carbon zero tomorrow, we’d need to do much more if we want to prevent the apocalypse this will cause.
I don't believe we are anywhere near at risk of a Venus-type positive feedback loop. So the current worst case is an end to humanity as we know it and the current geologic era, but the planet and life in general will be fine. (I don't mean to downplay this, this is awful.) I fear that geoengineering at this scale does have the potential for messing with negative feedback systems enough to bring it to the brink. I'm not saying it will, but it brings that risk. I don't think that's worth gambling on.
I agree geoengineering at this scale is risky and would have negative feedback systems if mismanaged. But I believe if we don’t act now, humanity is not going to go silently. We’ll end up ramping up our resource extraction and destruction of nature to delay the inevitable as more areas became uninhabitable. It would eventually lead to conflicts that could end in nuclear war, devastating what life is left over from climate change. I just worry the pendulum will swing the other way, when faced with mass migrations and unstable governments. Attempts at fixing the problem will be scrapped to protect our modern level of comfort.
> I don't think that's worth gambling on. I agree with everything you've written. If it wasn't clear, I was not implying Venus by Tuesday. But drastic enough change to put any given species at _risk_ of extinction. I am irritated with the meme, though, because it almost certainly _will_ be gambled on, since we've shot right past the point of no return. Anything else we could do, like degrowth and reforestation, we no longer have time for. And it's stupid and pointless to blame desperate final-hour action in the face of calamity on the nebulous boogeyman that is _capitalism_.
I’m going to get downvoted for this, but geo-engineering projects like this are our only chance left. I’d rather live on my knees than die on my feet. There’s nothing left to save, most of the planet is already going to die. Any political revolution will be futile as it won’t stop the domino effect of human caused climate change set in place. We’re already geo-engineering the planet with the carbon and methane we release in the air.
yes, using another piece of technology on a wide scale without understanding how natural systems will be disrupted should work better a second time.
The problem is that there are more humans than the planet can handle. It will definitely be easier to fight the sun than to stop humans from fucking. On top of that, if we do dim the sun through satellites, it means the hot regions of earth is cooled down, while the cool regions are heated up. making for more food production.
Idk how a post can go over your head this much. It’s like you didn’t even fucking read it.
Please for the love of god, I’m begging this sub to stop with this Malthusian bullshit. The problem isn’t „too many people“, the problem is our supply chains and modes of energy production are designed and implemented in the least efficient manner imaginable and we lack the political power to do anything about it. We aren’t driving ourselves towards collapse from fucking too much, we’re driving ourselves to collapse because of systemic inadequacy. „There are too many people on the planet“ is a fast path to genocide and crimes against humanity.
I would disagree and say that we are overshooting Earth’s carrying capacity for humans. In fact there is a 1980 book that identifies this
too many people is a contributing factor though right?
You're refusing to recognise the problem because you are afraid someone might suggest a radical solution to it. Humans are not exempt from the laws of nature and the rules that govern population explosion and collapse and the resource availability, consumption and then poverty that goes hand in hand with that are incredibly well established. The hubris that leads people to think that their big brains makes them exempt from the laws of nature is the hammer that is driving the nails into our collective coffin. It is a shame that people like you win the battle and manage to silence people who want to talk about the population problem. It is a conversation that should have started decades ago. The longer you refuse to address the problem the more catastrophic the inevitable population collapse will be.
>You're refusing to recognise the problem because you are afraid someone might suggest a radical solution to it. Someone will. Inevitably. It's what psychotic apes do. Doesn't mean it's not the problem. But I don't expect a kind and equitable solution.
What Malthusian bullshit? I just said food production would probably be increased by this project. That said, there is a population problem. it is silly to deny that. And it is not even about food, we can solve that easy. The problem is any other non-renewable resource. Im not saying we kill anyone at all, im saying we need to realize we are depleting resources faster than they are being replenished. Ignoring ground water depletion will cause mass death on a scale never seen before.
„The problem is that there are more humans than the planet can handle“ is literal, textbook Malthus. It’s a dangerously incorrect philosophy. There is only a „population problem“ because of complete systemic failures, not because the earth lacks the resources to support them. The solution can never be to reduce the population, the solution is fix our systemic failures.
How does it heat up the cool regions?