Cost-Benefit Analysis, Climate Policy, and the Parasite Class
In a paper published in Philosophical Issues in 2001, David Schmidtz argued for an approach to environmental ethics β climate change in particular β based on Cost-Benefit Analysis (CBA). Iβm not at all convinced that CBA is an appropriate and/or useful tool to understand the ethics of the climate crisis, however, and quite recently, Jeppe von Platz raised serious doubts about the possibility of making the necessary calculations to apply CBA. Nevertheless, I do think that CBA is a useful tool to understand the policy situation. When the topic is the ethics of climate change it makes sense to apply...
Carbon-neutrality is dead.
So, now what?
After carbon-neutrality was declared an official goal in the 2015 Paris Agreement it became fashionable for governments and corporations to declare their intention to become carbon neutral by 2050 or soon thereafter. This was never more than an empty promise, however. The deadline was set far enough in the future to make immediate action unnecessary and few if any governments or corporations ever accepted a realistic plan to actually achieve carbon-neutrality. A decade later, they have largely given up pretense. Some have officially given up the goal; others have silently voided or discarded it. Of course, carbon-neutrality by 2050 was...
(Not) Too Late for What?
Some people seem to believe that it is too late to fight climate change. Others seem to believe that this kind of fatalism is as dangerous as climate change denialism (because both effectively advocate not doing anything). Itβs hardly a secret that Iβm rather pessimistic about climate change and its effects β just have a look at what Iβve written about the topic before β but that doesnβt mean that I think that it is βtoo lateβ to fight climate change. Rather, I think that the notion of it being βtoo lateβ (or not) in this context is nonsensical. The...
What to Do?
(This is part 8 in the No Time for Utopia series.) I never liked Tolkienβs books β I always found them badly written, reactionary garbage β but when I was trying to write this final chapter in the No Time for Utopia series I kept returning to this quote from The Lord of the Rings: βI wish it need not have happened in my time,β said Frodo. βSo do I,β said Gandalf, βand so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with...
A Theory of Disaster-Driven Societal Collapse and How to Prevent It
(abstract) β One of the effects of climate change is an increase in extreme weather and natural disasters. Unless COβ emissions are significantly reduced very soon, it is inevitable that the effects of disaster will exceed many (and ultimately all) societiesβ mitigation capacity. Compounding unmitigated disaster effects will slowly but surely push a society towards collapse. Because no part of the planet is safe from the increase in natural disaster intensity and because some of the effects of disasters β such as refugees and economic decline β spill over boundaries, this will eventually lead to global societal collapse. Furthermore, just...
The Ethics of Climate Insurgency
(This is part 5 in the No Time for Utopia series.) Letβs say that you want to avoid the Mad-Maxian hell of societal collapse that climate change is making increasing likely, then how can and should you try to do that? Youβd have an incredibly powerful and well-connected enemy, and just asking them to give up their short-term profits in order to save the planet isnβt likely to have any effect β at least, it hasnβt had any effect thus far. Then what? Very many different answers can be given to that last question, but I want to focus here...