Urgency of reaction: climate v virus

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 LeeWood 17 Mar 2020

Science tells us to curb emissions. Predictions of mortality and loss of land surface. All targets failed, some countries refuse responsibility.

Science tells us to hide from a virus. Predictions of mortality vastly inferior to climate. Everybody jumps.

Whats going on ?

https://www.dw.com/en/coronavirus-climate-change-pollution-environment-chin...

'With a global death toll of over 3,000, COVID-19 still appears far less deadly than fossil fuels, which, according to a recent study that Myllyvirta co-authored for Greenpeace, are responsible for 4.5 million air pollution-related deaths each year, aside from climate impacts. But scientists warn that warmer, wetter conditions are increasing the probability of such outbreaks. No one knows how deadly the next one might be'.

See also:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/mar/05/governments-coronavir...

Post edited at 11:49
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 Tigger 17 Mar 2020
In reply to LeeWood:

Ah but one is big news in the Daily Mail and forces people to immediately face their mortality. The other is more like some mould growing in the corner of a room "Is that patch bigger than it use to be? Ah I'll get round to painting it at some point"

OP LeeWood 17 Mar 2020
In reply to Blue Straggler:

lashback and catch-up

pity if they are not stimulated to see the broader/longer perspective

 krikoman 17 Mar 2020
In reply to LeeWood:

Isn't it proximity?

Obviously the average Joe can't do much about climate, whereas we can all see the benefits of self isolating, it's something we can help to stop and it's tangible.

We can also see directly, in the shops, what are the effects of the virus. It's a bit more personal and real.

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In reply to krikoman:

I think proximity is exactly it. We are good (sometimes too good) at reacting to things that are perceived to be nearby and immediate. We are very very bad at reacting to and appraising longer term or more diffuse risks such as climate change. 

Availability heuristics probably come into it as well that, as has been said, not only is the news saturated with CoVid but also we can see the effects in shops and at work. Availability of information, rightly or wrongly, affects how important we perceive something to be. And CoVid far outstrips climate change on that front too. 

 pec 17 Mar 2020
In reply to Tigger:

> Ah but one is big news in the Daily Mail and forces people to immediately face their mortality.

Is it only big news in the Daily Mail? Why so many threads on here about it then? Are UKCers all closet Mail readers or did they perhaps hear about it somewhere else?

 Tigger 17 Mar 2020
In reply to pec:

My point was more that papers such as the Daily Mail (and many others), are putting more info out regarding Covid-19 in a matter of weeks than they have about climate change.

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 Billhook 17 Mar 2020
In reply to LeeWood:

Its all to take our minds of Brexit.   Brexit will probably get dropped and buried under a few more COVID D19 victims.

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 DancingOnRock 17 Mar 2020
In reply to LeeWood:

Fossil fuels are not killing one in a hundred people. 
 

Why does no one seem to understand maths anymore? 
 

The virus has only killed around 3000 people? Out of 150,000 infections. Maybe the urgency is coming from the people who understand what that means. 

Post edited at 21:38
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 pec 17 Mar 2020
In reply to Tigger:

> My point was more that papers such as the Daily Mail (and many others), are putting more info out regarding Covid-19 in a matter of weeks than they have about climate change.


Whilst I'm not a Mail reader and have no reason to defend it your choice to single out the Mail does suggest a desire to politicise a situation which is too serious for scoring cheap politcal points.

OP LeeWood 17 Mar 2020
In reply to Yanis Nayu:

Outrage! or not enough of it ... 

What i'm beginning to think is that in one of these two crises - someone is lying - or exaggerating. Science (though not the same scientists for sure) is telling us that climate probs are a crisis but unlike the virus they are not prepared to create the outrage necessary to push us into decisive action. Or its the other way round - and there are other motives for the current panic.

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 ClimberEd 18 Mar 2020
In reply to LeeWood:

Climate change isn't (highly unlikely) going to kill people in the UK.

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 Jon Greengrass 18 Mar 2020
In reply to DancingOnRock:

Climate change will kill millions

 DancingOnRock 18 Mar 2020
In reply to Jon Greengrass:

It depends how rapid it is. If areas slowly flood and put pressure on land then people will have less ability to survive and restrict the number of children they have. Maybe millions won’t be born. 

 Tigger 18 Mar 2020
In reply to pec:

I'm not aiming to politicise the discussion just used, an example of a paper that probably takes climate change less seriously than some other papers. But also becaue the Mail is one of the most widely read papers when campares to say The Guardian.

Post edited at 07:35
 Pete Pozman 18 Mar 2020
In reply to LeeWood:

Is it possible that months' long reductions in air travel/car use/factory shut downs etc will evidence a direct benefit with regard to climate change, which we'll be able to cite in support of the case for a long term measured reduction in fossil fuel use?

Boffins only, of which there are many on here, need reply

 deepsoup 18 Mar 2020
In reply to ClimberEd:

> Climate change isn't (highly unlikely) going to kill people in the UK.

For the time being that just depends on the timescale you're thinking of.  Take a longer view than our politicians generally do and it most definitely will.

 jkarran 18 Mar 2020
In reply to Billhook:

Brexit happened, the settlement may be delayed. 

OP: we are instinctively attuned to immediate threats and the bonds in our society are strongest vertically, we are concerned for parents and grandparents, enough to take very difficult choices. For a number of reasons climate change never triggered the same immediate action instinct for us to act for our children and grandchildren. It probably never will, it'll need fixing by other means.

Jk

 jkarran 18 Mar 2020
In reply to DancingOnRock:

> Why does no one seem to understand maths anymore? 

Quite simply because most of us were never taught how to look at this analytically, it's not intuitive and there is no very easy compelling analagoy to be made.

Jk

 Richard Horn 18 Mar 2020
In reply to LeeWood:

Or on a similar note we change everything to save a couple of hundred thousand people here, but almost no-one seems to care / lift a finger when the same number are killed by war in Syria...

 DancingOnRock 18 Mar 2020
In reply to Richard Horn:

It’s likely to be close to 1m people if we don’t change something over Covid-19. With figures like 1% mortality with a fully functioning health system rising to 3.5% if the system becomes overwhelmed. 
 

All within 40 days. 

Post edited at 10:50
 freeflyer 18 Mar 2020
In reply to LeeWood:

Good post

There are some positive outcomes I think. Rather than have to talk about graphs and data and long words like exponential and so on, we can now say things along the lines of "it's like the virus, a bit slower but much harder to stop".

Whether that will make a difference is anyone's guess.


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