Advocates want to name heatwaves like hurricanes to raise awareness of dangers

Re:Advocates want to name heatwaves like hurricanes to raise... by tgsovlerkhgsel on Monday September 14, 2020 @02:03PM (#24473144)

Unfortunately, so far I have seen the opposite - people lapping it up and the "consensus" on the Internet (Reddit in particular) being that we're all doomed, with the more extreme outliers thinking about suicide because they genuinely expect the world to _inevitably_ become a literal Mad Max desert dystopia within the next few decades.

We've swung way too far from "completely ignoring the problem" to "absolute frenzy". Reminds me of Y2K.

Also, of course, if you don't agree with the hivemind (that everything is going to be much worse than actual science predicts), then you're a terrible person and need to be at least downvoted to hell, but ideally shunned and have your life ruined.

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Re:Advocates want to name heatwaves like hurricanes to raise... by perl4ever on Monday September 14, 2020 @05:57PM (#24475604)

>Reminds me of Y2K.

Well, people say Y2K wasn't a problem because we buckled down and solved it.

I just saw an article that claimed the UK was back to like 1890 levels of CO2 emissions. Maybe it's still salvageable if the US gets shaken out of its stupor. Maybe decarbonization will just happen anyway through market forces as renewable energy improves.

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Re:Advocates want to name heatwaves like hurricanes to raise... by tgsovlerkhgsel on Tuesday September 15, 2020 @07:12PM (#24487803)

> Well, people say Y2K wasn't a problem because we buckled down and solved it.

That's why I think it's a good parallel:

1. Something that would be an issue if nothing was done.

2. By the time the public got into a frenzy over it, things were already being done.

3. (Hopefully) will turn out to be a non-issue because things were done.

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