Bingo, this is exactly what I was going to say. The Earth sure is fault-tolerant, we just might not enjoy what PIDs get the kill signal to repair the system.

Over a geological timescale, the Earth will cease to exist once consumed by the Sun.

Homo Sapiens would almost surely survive as a species. Humans are like cockroaches. It might be horribly nasty though, and definitely not something we should invite.

I like Elon’s way of putting climate change: sure we may be wrong at least a bit, but is it wise to take our best habitable planet and dump a shitload of CO2 into the atmosphere and then just see what happens because YOLO?

If that's Elon's position then he must have a huge load of cognitive dissonance if he still thinks prioritizing colonization of Mars is a worthwile contribution.

I'm rarely one to defend Elon, but that isn't cognitive dissonance, it's trying to have a plan B in face of reality.

He certainly can't personally stop climate change, but maybe in theory he can get a step closer to building an ark.

Hope/push for the former, prepare for the latter.

I disagree. If we bring earth into a state where Mars looks like the better alternative, then we deserve to go extinct.

Have you seen how Mars looks like? What the conditions are like? Temperature? Atmosphere? Radiation? Ecosystems (none)? Water (none)? Breathable air (none)? How could that ever be more inviting than earth?

I've always thought of "saving the earth" as referring to the millions of intelligent and sensitive non-human lifeforms that we are currently obliterating. But I agree, the earth will continue to have life regardless of what humans do, it just won't include anything we currently know and cherish at the rate we're going.

I for my part also care about the thousands of species that are going extinct because of our behavior. I don't care tht much about the human species. It's our fault, we deserve to suffer. But the polar bear does not.

I agree. But to have an even small glimmer of hope of changing people's behavior, you need to sell the idea to them like successful companies do. Tell them how THEY're going to benefit.

As we have seen in this pandemic, even selling it like that isn't a recipe for success.

I just hate when people refer to that specific part of his standup as anti-environmentalist. I think he didn't meant it like people are quoting him to approve destroying nature. The planet will be fine (c), sure, this stone rock will be fine. Humans won't be, animals won't be, plants won't be. We probably won't be able to exterminate all living things on Earth, and some plankton and bacteria will evolve into something new again. But again, current snapshot of "nature", the one we are all living in will be lost if it continued to be destroyed.