Greta Thunberg - brave campaigner or deeply disturbed?

[catsmate]

We are already doomed to.die.

But not all of us are doomed to spout nonsense; that is a choice.

 

[theprestige]

I hereby call upon everyone here at the ISF and across the internet, to apologize, unreservedly, to Greta Thunberg for any damage that their hateful, hurtful, comments may have caused and to furthermore, pledge fealty to her (Greta Thunberg) by tomorrow 12:00 GMT. That is all.

I think any damage I've caused is negligible, compared to the harm Trump caused by tweeting that she seemed hopeful and happy.

I cannot only imagine how brave she must be, to continue after that literal terrorism by a head of state. I'll apologize, but I doubt it is mean much, next to that.

 

[theprestige]

She's a 16 year old girl with the right to be heard on an issue that is central to her future. She had a right to be respected.

Nobody has a right to be respected.

 

[ServiceSoon]

Climate change sensationalism has become synonymous with religious end-time prophesy. The history of extreme and dire warnings exist in the public domain. Most of those predictions have been proven incorrect by Father Time. These false claims only embolden claims of skepticism. Climate change is occurring, and no doubt that human activity contributes to it. The first step is to put chicken little back into the cage so the adults can have a rational discussion.

 

[newyorkguy]

I read an interesting interview recently with a scientist. Very sobering. I don't have a link but I'll look. This wasn't a climate scientist, but a geologist, I think. And not a prominent or well-known one. That was one of the things I found so scary about their comments.

The gist of it was: We probably are doomed. People who doubt climate change and the dire consequences always cite previous extreme weather events and ask, "What's unusual?" They never cite previous mass extinctions and ask, "Why not us?"

The scientist is pessimistic, too much time is being wasted, time we don't have. It's probably already too late. Their idea is, the rise of humankind as an evolutionary experiment, one that didn't work out. Alone among living things, only humans have conscious thought and the ability to change the way we live. Human society today is vastly different than it was 1,000 years ago. Crickets, trout and chimpanzees all exist pretty much as they always have. Their diet, their way of life, is programmed into their DNA. Monkeys don't question, 'Why do we live in trees?,' 'Why do we only eat bananas (or nuts or whatever)?" They just do.

Humans created a society that doesn't really work on a grand evolutionary scale. Too much pollution. Our species will gradually become extinct. The planet doesn't care. Life will go on, just without us. In 10,000 years there will probably be little trace left of human existence.

Most scientists find this scenario quite possible. Right wingers writing internet blogs don't buy it. Who you going to believe?

Seen a Brontosaurus lately?

 

[lionking]

I read an interesting interview recently with a scientist. Very sobering. I don't have a link but I'll look. This wasn't a climate scientist, but a geologist, I think. And not a prominent or well-known one. That was one of the things I found so scary about their comments.

The gist of it was: We probably are doomed. People who doubt climate change and the dire consequences always cite previous extreme weather events and ask, "What's unusual?" They never cite previous mass extinctions and ask, "Why not us?"

The scientist is pessimistic, too much time is being wasted, time we don't have. It's probably already too late. Their idea is, the rise of humankind as an evolutionary experiment, one that didn't work out. Alone among living things, only humans have conscious thought and the ability to change the way we live. Human society today is vastly different than it was 1,000 years ago. Crickets, trout and chimpanzees all exist pretty much as they always have. Their diet, their way of life, is programmed into their DNA. Monkeys don't question, 'Why do we live in trees?,' 'Why do we only eat bananas (or nuts or whatever)?" They just do.

Humans created a society that doesn't really work on a grand evolutionary scale. Too much pollution. Our species will gradually become extinct. The planet doesn't care. Life will go on, just without us. In 10,000 years there will probably be little trace left of human existence.

Most scientists find this scenario quite possible. Right wingers writing internet blogs don't buy it. Who you going to believe?

Seen a Brontosaurus lately?

I’m not that pessimistic. We have created this situation in less than 100 years. We have the capacity to not prevent climate change, but to ameliorate it and allow future generations to survive.

The problem with this “we are doomed anyway” attitude is that it plays into right wingers hands. Don’t give up is the best message.

 

[Myriad]

I read an interesting interview recently with a scientist. Very sobering. I don't have a link but I'll look. This wasn't a climate scientist, but a geologist, I think. And not a prominent or well-known one. That was one of the things I found so scary about their comments.

The gist of it was: We probably are doomed. People who doubt climate change and the dire consequences always cite previous extreme weather events and ask, "What's unusual?" They never cite previous mass extinctions and ask, "Why not us?"

The scientist is pessimistic, too much time is being wasted, time we don't have. It's probably already too late. Their idea is, the rise of humankind as an evolutionary experiment, one that didn't work out. Alone among living things, only humans have conscious thought and the ability to change the way we live. Human society today is vastly different than it was 1,000 years ago. Crickets, trout and chimpanzees all exist pretty much as they always have. Their diet, their way of life, is programmed into their DNA. Monkeys don't question, 'Why do we live in trees?,' 'Why do we only eat bananas (or nuts or whatever)?" They just do.

Humans created a society that doesn't really work on a grand evolutionary scale. Too much pollution. Our species will gradually become extinct. The planet doesn't care. Life will go on, just without us. In 10,000 years there will probably be little trace left of human existence.

Most scientists find this scenario quite possible. Right wingers writing internet blogs don't buy it. Who you going to believe?

Seen a Brontosaurus lately?

It's a plausible scenario, but omits the fact that humans, of which Greta Thunberg is one example, are extremely adaptable. What's likely to go extinct is not our species, but our current iteration (the latest of many, historically) of civilization and culture, which of course Greta Thunberg has been highly critical of.

Like you said, we're the first species to operate this way. Hence, it stands to reason that we suck at it. The first species to crawl on land probably didn't stride lithely across the landscape. The first species to fly probably didn't maneuver like a swift or glide like a hawk. Some people say Greta Thunberg sucks at some things too.

What we and Greta Thunberg don't suck at is surviving and adapting even in rapidly changing environments.

Greta Thunberg, whom this thread and therefore this post is all about, might have also said something like this to somebody. Or maybe she didn't, but should have.

Let me conclude by saying, Greta Thunberg.

 

[theprestige]

I read an interesting interview recently with a scientist. Very sobering. I don't have a link but I'll look. This wasn't a climate scientist, but a geologist, I think. And not a prominent or well-known one. That was one of the things I found so scary about their comments.

The gist of it was: We probably are doomed. People who doubt climate change and the dire consequences always cite previous extreme weather events and ask, "What's unusual?" They never cite previous mass extinctions and ask, "Why not us?"

The scientist is pessimistic, too much time is being wasted, time we don't have. It's probably already too late. Their idea is, the rise of humankind as an evolutionary experiment, one that didn't work out. Alone among living things, only humans have conscious thought and the ability to change the way we live. Human society today is vastly different than it was 1,000 years ago. Crickets, trout and chimpanzees all exist pretty much as they always have. Their diet, their way of life, is programmed into their DNA. Monkeys don't question, 'Why do we live in trees?,' 'Why do we only eat bananas (or nuts or whatever)?" They just do.

Humans created a society that doesn't really work on a grand evolutionary scale. Too much pollution. Our species will gradually become extinct. The planet doesn't care. Life will go on, just without us. In 10,000 years there will probably be little trace left of human existence.

Most scientists find this scenario quite possible. Right wingers writing internet blogs don't buy it. Who you going to believe?

Seen a Brontosaurus lately? ; )

"Humans are different from all other animals! That's why we're going to suffer exactly the same fate as some other animal!"

 

[newyorkguy]

As the great Alfred E. Neuman once asked-

.

 

[Stout]

She has a "government-will-save-you" message?

Are we talking about the same person?

Yes she does and yes we are. I'm presuming your referring to the Thunberg with the long hair and interesting facial expressions who was up on stage wagging her finger while complaining about her stolen childhood.

You want "stolen childhood" here's some real stolen childhood. See, Greta, there's a crapload of children working in Cobalt mines to get that precious mineral just so you can have a battery in your wireless device and drive around in that Tesla that Arnie loaned you.

There's some real stolen childhood for you.

So....write those letters, send those emails, cast those votes and go to those protests and raise your fists in the air but don't forget, Christmas is coming and there's some excellent package deals available for Cancun.

Book now, rooms are selling out fast and even if you have to pay a carbon tax, you still can't beat those deals.

 

[Stout]

I know this has become a meme

But you do realise doomed to die in 11 years means after 11 years we are doomed to die no matter what?

Hence the word doomed and not dead

Thunberg tells up people already are dying.

I don't know where, maybe in those island nations Jason Moma was going on about. Island nations like Kiribati. That's a Deutsche Welle link, they don't mess around.

 

[newyorkguy]

...Alone among living things, only humans have conscious thought and the ability to change the way we live. Human society today is vastly different than it was 1,000 years ago...

...The problem with this “we are doomed anyway” attitude is that it plays into right wingers hands. Don’t give up is the best message.

It's not really 'giving up.' The interview I read wasn't about climate change, the climate change comments were kind of a brief 'Oh by the way' sidetrack. But I got the feeling reading them, and other similar comments by scientific people, there is a growing concern it really may be too late. The underlying problem is diversity and lack of consensus. That it will take so long to get a clear majority on the same page, by then there won't be enough time left. There is a feeling that the human experiment just didn't work, we have had way too much impact on the environment. That what we are seeing is Mother Nature's way of correcting the problem.

My hope is the fact that attitudes towards the problem change drastically by age group. This is from a recent Gallup poll:

Public concern about global warming is evident across all age groups in the U.S., with majorities of younger and older Americans saying they worry about the problem a great deal or fair amount. However, the extent to which Americans take global warming seriously and worry about it differs markedly by age, with adults under age 35 typically much more engaged with the problem than those 55 and older. Link

Polling found 51% of people aged 18-34 think global warming will pose a serious threat during their lifetime versus 47% of people aged 35 to 54 and only 29% of people 55 and older. Serious threat are strong words. This isn't about having to run the AC X number of additional hours per summer. This is about survival of the species.

 

[newyorkguy]

One other very positive sign. Not only do attitudes toward the issue of climate change themselves change by age group, there is apparently not a whole lot of difference between the way young Republicans view the issue and the way young Democrats do.

It’s no secret that Republicans and Democrats aren’t on the same page when it comes to human-caused global warming. But a new poll suggests that Republicans and Democrats between 18 and 38 might as well be in the same party. Any red-vs-blue difference between them “virtually disappears,” according to the survey from Ipsos and Newsy. (It only asked about climate change, not the many other topics that split the two parties.) Link

Hope springs eternal.

 

[theprestige]

She's a 16 year old girl with the right to be heard

Nobody has a right to be heard. A right to speak, yes. A right to compel an audience to listen to her, no. A right to speak in any venue of her choice, no. A right to actually be heard, no.

But a right to speak, absolutely yes. She should definitely be allowed to speak in any public or private venue to which she has a legitimate claim.

 

[Skeptical Greg]

In 10,000 years there will probably be little trace left of human existence.

That's quite a reach, since their is plenty of evidence of our existence over 200,000 years ago..

 

[newyorkguy]

There are many reasons to be pessimistic. Consider:

Deforestation is the permanent destruction of forests in order to make the land available for other uses. An estimated 18 million acres (7.3 million hectares) of forest, which is roughly the size of the country of Panama, are lost each year, according to the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO)...Deforestation is considered to be one of the contributing factors to global climate change. According to Michael Daley, an associate professor of environmental science at Lasell College in Newton, Massachusetts, the No. 1 problem caused by deforestation is the impact on the global carbon cycle. Link

 

[cullennz]

It's a plausible scenario, but omits the fact that humans, of which Greta Thunberg is one example, are extremely adaptable. What's likely to go extinct is not our species, but our current iteration (the latest of many, historically) of civilization and culture, which of course Greta Thunberg has been highly critical of.

Like you said, we're the first species to operate this way. Hence, it stands to reason that we suck at it. The first species to crawl on land probably didn't stride lithely across the landscape. The first species to fly probably didn't maneuver like a swift or glide like a hawk. Some people say Greta Thunberg sucks at some things too.

What we and Greta Thunberg don't suck at is surviving and adapting even in rapidly changing environments.

Greta Thunberg, whom this thread and therefore this post is all about, might have also said something like this to somebody. Or maybe she didn't, but should have.

Let me conclude by saying, Greta Thunberg.

Lol

Like the just in case

 

[cullennz]

I read an interesting interview recently with a scientist. Very sobering. I don't have a link but I'll look. This wasn't a climate scientist, but a geologist, I think. And not a prominent or well-known one. That was one of the things I found so scary about their comments.

The gist of it was: We probably are doomed. People who doubt climate change and the dire consequences always cite previous extreme weather events and ask, "What's unusual?" They never cite previous mass extinctions and ask, "Why not us?"

The scientist is pessimistic, too much time is being wasted, time we don't have. It's probably already too late. Their idea is, the rise of humankind as an evolutionary experiment, one that didn't work out. Alone among living things, only humans have conscious thought and the ability to change the way we live. Human society today is vastly different than it was 1,000 years ago. Crickets, trout and chimpanzees all exist pretty much as they always have. Their diet, their way of life, is programmed into their DNA. Monkeys don't question, 'Why do we live in trees?,' 'Why do we only eat bananas (or nuts or whatever)?" They just do.

Humans created a society that doesn't really work on a grand evolutionary scale. Too much pollution. Our species will gradually become extinct. The planet doesn't care. Life will go on, just without us. In 10,000 years there will probably be little trace left of human existence.
Most scientists find this scenario quite possible. Right wingers writing internet blogs don't buy it. Who you going to believe?

Seen a Brontosaurus lately?

I bet you a Greta a million dollars this is not true

We might be one of the only species left, but we will be the last to go.

Greta Thunberg and your ancestors will still be around.

 

[Steve]

I bet you a Greta a million dollars this is not true

We might be one of the only species left, but we will be the last to go.

Greta Thunberg and your ancestors will still be around.

Insects will be around long after the last humans. One of their jobs will be to feast on all the dead bodies of mammals.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Climate change sensationalism has become synonymous with religious end-time prophesy. The history of extreme and dire warnings exist in the public domain. Most of those predictions have been proven incorrect by Father Time. These false claims only embolden claims of skepticism. Climate change is occurring, and no doubt that human activity contributes to it. The first step is to put chicken little back into the cage so the adults can have a rational discussion.

Greta has, rightly so, looked at the science of risks runaway climate change poses. Perhaps you should do her the courtesy of looking at what the scientists are saying.