Quote Originally Posted by wufwugy View Post
The issue of environmental hazards might just be the most complicated one there is. Nobody wants to hear the truth. That includes people who want to save the environment. So far, economics has shitty explanations for how to deal with the problem, but so does everything else.

Probably what's really going on in civilization is a race between ecological destruction and technological advancement. There is no feasible way whatsoever for people to live the kind of lives they want without destroying the environment, but at a certain point, this will become our own destruction. That's when technology comes in. At some point in the future, we should be able to live rather lush lives that don't depend on ecological deterioration, but that time could only come with enough technological advancement, and the only way we know of that improves tech advancement is through capitalism. It's in the name "capitalism" even i.e. using resources to make more resources.

We are likely stuck in a situation where we have to destroy the environment in order to save the species, because the only long-lasting conservation will come at the hands of technology, and the creation of that technology depends on use of environmental resources. A similar analogy could be how we have to experiment on animals in order to significantly advance medicine

I've been taking notes, trying to avoid grunching, and I almost made it, when I got half way through this post and this idea popped into my head:

So, I think drug prohibitions are the most futile waste of energy. Instead, I'd like to see honest and to the point education on drugs and treatment for those in need. And the idea of merging this concept with environmental destruction came to me-- what if instead of having carbon taxes, regulations, etc, we simply had honest awareness programs which critiqued our bad habits, as well as environmentally damaging business practices? I mean, a big part of the problem is that everyone wants to drive their own car, own half a dozen flat screen TVs, live in an energy inefficient McMansion, and so on.

I have no clue how this would be implemented, but after popping into my head it seemed like an interesting enough idea for me to grunch-vomit it in this premature iteration into this thread.