The 'tragedy of the commons' is very much exaggerated and misunderstood. It is 100% possible to collectively govern commons without a tragedy situation, and there are plenty of examples of it happening in real life. The economist Elinor Ostrom actually won a Nobe Prize in Economics for demonstrating this.

https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/lsereviewofbooks/2012/06/17/elinor-ostroms-work-on-governing-the-commons-an-appreciation/ https://aeon.co/essays/the-tragedy-of-the-commons-is-a-false-and-dangerous-myth

Consider this: modern capitalism was pretty much inconceivable to people living in the feudal era. In the same way, it is possible that the system we need is inconceivable to us at the moment. Critiquing capitalism and advocating for a move away from it is still useful.

There are plenty of things that haven't been tried aside from small-scale examples:

• An economy based on worker cooperatives
• Universal Basic Income
• Universal Basic Capital
• 'Library economics' or 'Library Socialism'

Guide on what it means here: https://yewtu.be/watch?v=SSd7KnWN9CM

Note the red pixels are just a representation, doesn't mean the whole red area is on fire. See 1:08 to 2:10 for explanation.

If anyone wants to see the actual situation here's NASA's live map: https://firms.modaps.eosdis.nasa.gov/map/

and a guide on how to use it, what all the symbols mean etc: https://yewtu.be/watch?v=SSd7KnWN9CM

Yes, I see that. It's an investment blog written by the account manager of a major finance company. I'm sure he has no vested interests whatsoever and is just trying to be as factually accurate as possible.

If you don't want to read other people's thoughts on things, don't post yours on an internet forum lol.

Am happy to end the conversation on a friendly note though. If we were having this chat in person, i'd say 'fuck it, let's grab a beer and chill'. See ya.

More on the data: global investment in the energy transition in 2021 = $755 billion total investment in energy in 2021 = $1.9 trillion (source)

Also I'll just leave this here:

source

Lmaooo "Greenablers". What a joke. That's literally a corporate PR puff piece. How is corporate greenwashing PR supposed to convince me that Capitalism drives innovation (or is good for the climate?) when countless studies of data prove it wrong? The only piece of data he cites is about the billions being spent on the 'energy transition'. I checked out his source. A good chunk of that is just government investment. Another big chunk of that is electric cars - a really stupid thing to invest in as they'll compete with renewable energy for rare earth minerals etc. Not to mention all the emissions they'll cause in production, and the fact that they'll still need half the world to be paved over in asphalt for roads and parking. Better than petrol or diesel sure, but hardly efficient.

Dense cities yes. End single-family zoning yes (doesn't really exist where I live, the US is an insane place).

Energy deregulation no. I'm sure it will be great for opening new coal plants, not a chance in hell will it lead to more nuclear power or anything useful.

Ah the innovation argument, so original. "Capitalism creates innovation". Everyone says it all the time so it must be true right? Well it isn't. Data doesn't support this argument.

Pretty much every major innovation of the past century has come from publicly funded and/or not-for-profit research and development. Capitalists only step in once the difficult part is done and the 'innovation' can be repackaged into something profitable in the short term.

See the following: https://academic.oup.com/ser/article/7/3/459/1693191

https://demos.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/files/Entrepreneurial_State_-_web.pdf

Capitalism definitely creates barriers to certain types of innovation. Mainly innovation that isn't profitable - see 'planned obsolesence'. It also creates barriers to profitable innovation sometimes; just look up 'patent trolls'.

But I was never even talking about innovation. You just jumped to it because that is the classic buzzword talking point that is constantly repeated everywhere. 'Develop better alternatives' doesn't have to be 'innovation'. We have the technology already, we've had it for decades. Trains and cycle lanes = better alternatives to cars. Nuclear energy = better alternative to fossil fuels.

Market capture exists everywhere, in every economic system.

Sure, this might be the case for every existing economic system. I believe we need to develop something new. Just like modern Capitalism was inconceivable to someone living in the Feudal era, a new system might be inconceivable for us right now. But it is imperative we try.

Nah. To my knowledge we have the second highest tax on energy worldwide. Has always been this way. It’s a tax thing.

Idk about the tax rates but Germany also decided to become dependent on Russian gas, which is a major factor tax or no tax.

The article is written by a left leaning press. So if you allow yourself to suggest non-neutrality, then they should be in favour of your argument.

1. I'm not 'left-leaning', that term is too broad to mean anything at this point.
2. I looked up the author and all his books are titled something along the lines of 'In Defence of Capitalism' so idk man

That dude is actively trying to shape the opinion of people for his own interest. I am confident that this is work to him. He already did this with crypto or with the Tesla stock price. It’s marketing and marketing is work as well. All the political left are already supporting the idea of electric vehicles. Now it’s time for the conservatives. And musk is luring them towards his company.

If you want to believe his shitposting and constant man-child meltdowns are part of a galaxy-brained plan to convince conservatives to buy electric cars, have fun with that. In reality, he's just a self-obsessed guy seeking more and more attention and that's plainly obvious.

So I guess you are not building something yourself? You just work a well paying job? I can’t rly believe that.

You've never heard of self-employed contractors? If you have a valuable enough skill, people pay quite well for specific projects. Once the project (or your part in it) is done, you can just chill with your money, or accept a new one. It's pretty straightforward. Won't earn me billions but is good enough to have a chill life.

An ideal system does not exist. The one we have is fairly reactive.

Who said anything about an ideal system? I want a better one. Mainly one that doesn't burn down the planet I live on. We need to be working on developing new systems, but that won't happpen if we keep chanting 'Capitalism good, Communism bad'.

there is no system resilient against fraud Yet.

Resilience is not a binary. We could make a system that's relatively more resilient against fraud and/or short-term thinking.

I'm sure it's within the capacity of humanity to improve upon Capitalism. The only question is: will we do it in time to survive the 21st Century?

I swear we need to retire the term 'Capitalism' entirely because it seems like it's impossible to discuss its flaws without someone just assuming it's a statement in favour of resurrecting Stalin. This has nothing to do with communists.

Electricity can be produced in many different ways - it's just that some are more profitable than others.

Capitalism also creates an entire web of incentive structures that make it hard to develop more sustainable alternatives - e.g car industry creating 'lock-in', as described in this paper. I'm sure a similar paper could be written about some Soviet bloc state 60 years ago, but that's irrelevant. This is a problem of Capitalism and the Soviet bloc doesn't exist anymore. Just cause 'Stalin bad' doesn't mean 'Capitalism can do no harm ever'.

I was in the same position until a few weeks ago; mainly used YT for podcasts, downloading videos to watch while travelling etc.

If you have an Android phone, get the NewPipe app from F-Droid. It has pretty much everything that YT Premium offers, but free. It's been working really well for me.

I'm actually in favour of replacing most jet airliners with rail and maybe electric airships. Most short-haul flights can be replaced by rail; it's much more pleasant than flying anyway. Jets can be reserved for long-distance journeys. Being able to hop on a blimp would be cool, even if it's slower. We can make them much better and safer with today's tech.

I don't like the 'green offset' thing because it makes it look like we're 'doing something' when it's actually not doing much at all. If you want to be a utilitarian, it would be much more effective to just donate to an effective charity every time you fly.

I think that depends on demand. Some airlines already offer climate compensation packages. An additional payment to compensate your emissions.

A lot of those are scams or of questionable value unfortunately

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/may/04/carbon-offsets-used-by-major-airlines-based-on-flawed-system-warn-experts

Just read the German article.

It's interesting, but I have to point out that some of the evidence they use is stuff like manufacturers relocating to China, which happens regardless of tax rates.

The stuff about energy costs is also nothing to do with taxes but rather Germany's energy policy missteps.

Also the author randomly referring to "Genderforschern" und "Gleichstellungsbeauftragten" at the end damages the credibility of the article a lot - seems very culture-war motivated.

I agree that the way in which the taxes are implemented and how the bureaucracy works has a major impact though. But this doesn't mean taxing the rich is imppssible, just needs to be done right, like all policy.

I do. Because you are still here. Arguing on the internet, a cesspool of morons, you and I included.

Rich people waste time arguing with morons on the internet all the time! Have you seen Musk's Twitter feed lately?

In fact the only reason I am doing this is because I have time to kill; and that's only possible thanks to the fact that I am wealthy enough to take days off work pretty much whenever I want, without fearing starvation. Unlike ~90% of people globally who live paycheck to paycheck.

The idea that rich people are always busy being productive is simply wrong. I know enough of them personally to know that most of their 'working' hours aren't very strenuous to say the least.

https://www.readthemaple.com/i-was-born-wealthy-and-know-rich-people-dont-work-harder-than-you/

Because events, such as Corona and the ausraube war temporarily lower the estimated gains. Losses are expected. So the value weds to be corrected according to those losses.

Have you heard of the 2008 crash? Dot com bubble? SVB, FTX and other crypto crap, etc? Markets crash regularly regardless of Corona or wars.

Also the fact that markets fail to consider wars and pandemics, whereas experts were warning about these for years before they happened, is further evidence that we can do better than relying on markets for everything.

There must be some way to develop a system of knowledge aggregation, decisionmaking, and resource allocation that isn't prone to ignoring very obvious risks.

Greenwashing is only done in media. Company winnings and numbers don’t lie. (Except if they do. Fuck wirecard)

Company winnings and numbers lie all the time. https://yewtu.be/watch?v=Wx51CffrBIg https://yewtu.be/watch?v=Y9KPcQqG0ao

There are countless cases of companies making shit up and markets and investors falling for it.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10199188/

Found this paper ^ Haven't read it yet though

I think you may be partly right

But anecdotal evidence isn't very convincing. I've had the opposite experience; found being in Greek and Spanish houses during a heatwave way more tolerable than UK ones, even without AC. Idk about Germany but some older Czech houses feel like ovens when it gets too hot. Lovely for winter though.

Yes, unfortunately I am extremely stubborn. Sorry.

Fair, you do you mate

Because rockets are boring. Bubble and stuff is just extraordinary craftsmanship and black matter will take some time. And I overall hate relativity theory. I am hoping for gravitons. Wave functions rock.

Well, have fun with that, I will stop arguing.

Not stupid. Some sciences simply are idiotic. Do you have any idea how much I hate biologists. Entitled brats. Some of them have an extreme superiority complex. And don’t get my talking about physicists. Buch of weirdos. You should see physicists interact with biologists. It like two different species encountering each other. But communication attempts are futile.

llmaooo you should do science-themed standup

I only know three biologists and they are lovely people. Never seen them interact with physicists though so you may be right.

Sure, I like the idea of space megaprojects. I doubt sunsails in orbit would be profitable though. How would you monetise it? Put massive ads on them? Charge everyone a subscription fee?

Now, governments could probably do something like that, and I wouldn't be against it if safety and unintended consequences were taken into account somehow.

Also, I thought you believed space exploration tech was useless.

I agree there are many solutions. I don't think markets and capital are going to make them happen.

We can probably buy time with tech solutions. Long-term solutions will have to involve major fundamental sociopolitical change.

The rich would just leave the country and some other country would profit from their taxes.

This is an oft-repeated talking point but usually contradicted by data. Sounds smart but isn't smart.

https://www.theguardian.com/inequality/2017/nov/20/if-you-tax-the-rich-they-wont-leave-us-data-contradicts-millionaires-threats

https://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2017/11/20/if-you-tax-the-rich-they-dont-move-they-just-pay/

Rich people are people and most people don't just up and leave behind places they've built their lives in unless under extreme pressure. A few billionaires might relocate to the Bahamas but they're not going to be able to take their mansions and penthouses with them - and they lose out on the markets, infrastructure, and other benefits of their home countries. That's a major incentive to just pay the taxes.

If you believe to know which ones are overvalued, then you should try to go buy short positions in them. Maybe you become rich then?

Who says I haven't done that already?

The stock market is relatively precise, it also projects potential into the future.

The stock market is not precise. I have data and papers discussing this - but there's no need for them. I'll instead leave you with a simple question: if the stock market is so precise, why is there a major crash every decade?

Due to that many stocks to combat climate change have risen in popularity and a lot of money has been brought to said companies by purely capitalistic driven motives.

Sure, purely capitalistic motives, which is why a lot of these are impractical venture capital BS and outright scams. It is currently more profitable to greenwash than it is to actually solve the problem.

You don't have to take my word for it: https://www.cnbc.com/2020/02/26/chamath-palihapitiya-esg-investing-is-a-complete-fraud.html

Won't dispute that European housing is sturdier. And yes insulation works both ways - however, you need good ventilation. And shading etc. AFAIK insulation optimised for heat retention is different to that optimised for keeping cool.

If you have a study or something that compares Mediterranean vs other European house designs, please send it to me and I'll change my mind if I'm wrong.

As a German you should know that heatwaves have killed thousands of people in Germany as well.

Swedes, Germans, and French are also wealthier and have less extreme heat to deal with than Italy, Spain or Greece. You can't attribute that to house design. Again, if you have a study comparing these, send it to me and prove me wrong.

Firstly, that isn't 'already done'. It's a PR statement from the Chinese government about plans. The stuff they have already done, like reducing hail etc., is nowhere near the same level to what is needed to stop climate change.

Secondly,

Radical solutions such as seeding the atmosphere with reflective particles could theoretically help reduce temperatures, but could also have major unforeseen consequences, and many experts fear what could happen were a country to experiment with such techniques.

This is from your source ^

So is this:

In a paper last year, researchers at National Taiwan University said that the "lack of proper coordination of weather modification activity (could) lead to charges of 'rain stealing' between neighboring regions," both within China and with other countries. They also pointed to the lack of a "system of checks and balances to facilitate the implementation of potentially controversial projects."

Think of the geopolitical mess this kind of thing would create. If it works that is.

None of those links are about Chemistry or Physics. The demos link is Economics, The Entrepreneurial State. The youtube link is about the history of the internet. Maybe try learning something that isn't STEM. Might broaden your way of thinking.

I'll respond to the rest of your comment later, although I'm not sure I want to anymore since you clearly have no interest in taking into account new information.

Also how the fuck can you be interested in technology and say something like this:

Because most of it was useless. What kind of innovation did. space exploration bring to humans?

If you know anything about any science you should know how stupid of a point this is

Did you read any of those links? 10% of world GDP. That's not relatively little. That's insane.

And stocks doesn't automatically mean good. How much of that is speculative bubbles and hype-driven overvalued stocks?

The first one is about how wet bulb temperatures and extreme heat work. The second one is about Europe. Whether or not they are 'more' resilient doesn't matter.

Also I don't think you know what Europe is. Scandinavian, Central European and British houses are mostly made to keep heat in during cold winters. They're not good for heatwaves.

Mediterranean style housing is definitely better for heat. But that doesn't stop Italy, Spain, and France from having deadly heatwaves.

European style houses won't save anyone from extreme heat

https://climate.nasa.gov/explore/ask-nasa-climate/3151/too-hot-to-handle-how-climate-change-may-make-some-places-too-hot-to-live/

Europe has had plenty of fatal heatwaves in the past.

https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/weather/learn-about/weather/case-studies/heatwave#:~:text=More than 20%2C000 people died,Europe sweltering in August 2003.

Saudi Arabia has 'proven' whatever it has proven through insane levels of draconian state intervention in everything, a lot of oil rents, and using imported slave labour.

https://mideast.shisu.edu.cn/_upload/article/2f/5e/aaff7a9b4644a4b5234d6a4e6f0c/1f06bdf4-bf8b-4874-9567-d5412e350c32.pdf

https://www.hrw.org/reports/2008/saudiarabia0708/5.htm

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_workers_in_Saudi_Arabia?wprov=sfla1

Hardly a model for anyone to follow.

Also

This kind of futurist accelerationist thinking hasn't turned out well in the past: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurism?wprov=sfla1 It always ends up feeding into Fascism. I wonder why.

The 'future' is not inevitable. There have been countless collapses in history. Our technology doesn't make us immune. The people of the major Bronze Age powers probably thought the same.

Also we do not have the means for weather engineering. If you're talking about SRM, we have no idea what its consequences will be or how to do it effectively. It's all theoretical. No aircraft we currently have can do this stuff. Sure, we could design it and build one, but then you need global governance to actually implement it properly. Not to mention the risk of 'termination shock' and countless others.

Have a look at the scientific literature: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/Stratospheric-aerosol-injection-tactics-and-costs-Smith-Wagner/e4e5a78335eda8c16557b32af915798b06091362#cited-papers

Would you seriously risk the future of life on Earth on something this experimental?

I fear this arrogance will kill a lot of people and cause a lot of suffering.

btw they do store a lot of their money in vaults where it doesnt benefit the economy at all.

This is in the form of expensive art that stays in containers in tax-free zones, and offshore accounts in tax havens.

Please educate yourself.

https://archive-yaleglobal.yale.edu/content/how-wealthy-sell-treasures-tax-free

https://www.icij.org/inside-icij/2017/09/7-charts-show-how-rich-hide-their-cash

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panama_Papers

https://academic.oup.com/ser/article/20/2/539/6500315

Have you considered that this too might be an 'experiment'?

Defenders of monarchy and the divine right of kings used to argue the exact same thing - that we tried democracy before and it failed in the Roman Republic and Ancient Greece - so clearly feudal monarchy is the best, right?

Yet here we are, experimenting again.

Why is this joke of a system the ideal? It doesn't produce innovation - most of the stuff that led to the internet and modern computing came out of DARPA and various govt funded universities. All of our space advancements were from state-run NASA and the Soviet space programme. The wealthy CEO types only start 'innovating' after taxpayers fund most of the R&D. Same with medical advancements, material science, physics - almost every single positive innovation has come from state-run, taxpayer-funded, or non-profit institutions.

Maybe try reading a little bit more about all this innovation you seem so fond of:

https://academic.oup.com/ser/article/7/3/459/1693191

https://demos.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/files/Entrepreneurial_State_-_web.pdf

https://yewtu.be/watch?v=oLLxpAZzy0s

what's your favourite type of bollard and why?

You're welcome!

I'm not an expert by any means, but did Politics and Economics as my undergrad and did decently well in it; am happy to share my knoweldge. Also wanted to apologise if parts of my previous post seemed a bit condescending, wasn't my intention.

Would be happy to debate/discuss more at any point if you're interested.

Figure I might as well drop some more reading recommendations:

Specific to the topics of the discussion:

Chapter 14, from 23 Things They Don't Tell You About Capitalism by Ha-Joon Chang This basically expands on the meme, and explains the connection between liberal economics and 'pro-rich' economics, in only 9 pages. Not very in-depth, but quite good and readable - although note that this book is very much a pop-economics polemic, and Chang is an Institutionalist economist and very skeptical of 'free market' economics. He's fairly controversial among economists, but not super radical or anything. Link to pdf of this chapter only. The whole book is free to borrow on Archive.org.

Chapter VIII 'Monopoly and the Social Responsibility of Business and Labor', from Capitalism and Freedom by Milton Friedman. For a free-market take on monopolies, although a bit of an outdated take (the data has changed a lot, but the general arguments are still relevant). Free on Archive.org

Are markets efficient or do they tend towards monopoly? The verdict is in, by Joseph Stiglitz Pretty short article that expands on our discussion about monopolies in the modern world. Link to article

Chapter 2, Section 3 of 'The Poverty of Philosophy' by Karl Marx This is basically Marx arguing against Proudhon, so a lot of it is weird out of context, but does sum up Marx's views on monopolies. As with most Marx, not super easy to read, but very interesting. Link to text from Marxists.org

Chapter 2, 'Liberalism and Liberal Thinkers', from 101 Great Liberal Thinkers by Eamonn Butler A summary of liberal ideas, written by a self-described (neo)Liberal and founder of the Adam Smith Institute. Freely available from the American Economic Association

More Generally Relevant / In-Depth Stuff:

The Wordly Philosophers by Robert Heilbroner Is a nice and readable intro to the history of economic thought, would recommend for an enjoyable read and broad overview. Available to borrow on Archive.org

Economics: The Users Guide by Ha-Joon Chang This is somewhat of a 'pop-economics' text so is quite readable, but also has solid knowlege. Chapter 4 has a nice summary of some of the major schools of thought, and there's a lot of interesting economic history in here as well. Available to borrow on Archive.org

Market Reasoning as Moral Reasoning: Why Economists Should Re-engage with Political Philosophy by Michael Sandel Short article with interesting arguments about the limits of economics as a field, especially in considering the moral implications of allocating resources using markets. Freely available from the American Economic Association

Chapter 3, 'The Nature of Heterodox Economics' from 'Essays on the Nature and State of Modern Economics' by Tony Lawson Although this one is very academic, chapter 3 is only about 20 pages long and has a fairly good summary of some of the assumptions and criticisms of 'modern mainstream economics' vs 'heterodox economics'. The rest of the book is excellent as well, it's focused on a critique of modern economics and its attempts to be a 'hard science' by using lots of maths and models, with questionable results. Link to a pdf here.

Chapter 'The Place of Liberty' from An Introduction to Political Philosophy by Jonathan Wolff Especially recommend the section on problems with liberalism Available to borrow on Archive.org

The Economy by Core Economics This is just a textbook, not exactly light reading but it's free and written by some pretty high-profile (mainstream) economists. It's what I was mainly taught from so if you're interested in what they teach at mainstream econ courses but want to skip the whole 'paying massive tuition fees' part, here it is. Link to the textbook on their website.

Also, Marginal Revolution has good stuff on econ on their YT channel and website; they are very pro-free market.

Hope this is interesting and/or useful, have a nice day!

Sure, real economists don't explicitly hold those views. But the kinds of metrics and models liberal economists are fond of using basically lead to that flowchart.

I appreciate you trying to answer a question in good faith, but you're conflating 'liberal' with 'vaguely left-leaning', and none of what you've said makes any sense outside of current US political 'discourse' where 'Liberal' means 'slightly left-wing'.

What you describe as liberal economics is closer to Keynsianism or Social Democracy.

In economics, the 'Liberal' school of thought is generally against regulation and interference in the market, seeing it as being 'self-regulating'. In economic terms, Reagan and Thatcher were Liberals - hence them being associated with 'Neoliberalism'.

The whole thing you said about Capitalism tending towards monopoly is actually a very Marxist/Socialist idea - Liberal economic theory tends to argue that monopolies form because of government and that they wouldn't occur in a truly free market (although its more nuanced than that, there's major disagreements over 'Natural Monopolies' etc. within the Liberal school). Source: look up any Liberal economist/thinker and their view on monopolies. E.g Friedman, J.S Mill.

Capitalism being an economic system doesn't make it apolitical. 'In theory' Liberalism and Capitalism are very very closely intertwined, it's not implicit, it's absolutely explicit if you read any Liberal political or economic theory.

Economics is inherently political.

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/neoliberalism/#Libe Sections 3 and 4 of this are a decent starting point.

Also the idea of slightly changing our voting systems as the way to drive change is quite hilarious. Sure, moving away from FPTP would probably help a bit, but it's not like countries with other systems are doing fine. These issues are more fundamental. And historically, fundamental change has never occured through small technical adjustments to political systems.

Sharktopus, bad in a fun kind of way though

Love my USDDB cables, the built-in kettle function is a big plus 🇬🇧🇬🇧🇬🇧

I think the difference here is paying for a single newspaper vs having to get recurring subscriptions that are a pain to cancel. With print media, if I want to check multiple sources' take on an issue, I could go out and buy 5 different newspapers, and that's it. But with online news, I'd have to spend like an hour cancelling all the subscriptions after I'm done and if I forget to cancel any i'll realise when I'm down like £50 6 months later.

Also don't like having to enter personal details into so many websites.

Thank god for Archive.org.

I wonder why no news company has tried the 'buy today's digital newspaper for £1 and that's that' approach. I could be wrong and maybe someone has, haven't seen it though.

Spin-offs in other cities would have been cool

Ah this show was wonderful! Ahead of its time with the AI and mass surveillance stuff (IIRC it called it before the Snowden leaks).

Haven't read The Dispossessed yet, but love Le Guin's work ever since I read The Lathe of Heaven and The Word for World is Forest, can't recommend these enough. Am reading through a collection of her short stories now.

Anyone interested in a general Le Guin discussion thread, or a reading group type thing where we discuss a different book each month?

Yeah, plus it's not even like having to buy newspapers in the pre-internet days, it's all recurring subscriptions that are a pain to cancel. Truly a great shame.