The Gargantuan Lie That Is Collapsing the Climate
This article argues that the most damaging climate deception is not outright denial but the pervasive belief that we have more time. It traces how this lie, propagated by media, corporations, and politicians, has delayed action despite clear scientific warnings. Citing recent studies, it warns that within decades, global warming could cause billions of deaths and societal collapse, while news coverage of extreme weather fails to connect the dots. The piece calls for urgent recognition of the crisis's true scale.
As a species, we are behaving like a pod of dolphins beaching themselves because some kind of brain parasite disrupted their echolocation.
- yorwba
I wondered where this article got the idea that "half the planet" would die "in 26 years or less" with 3°C of warming. It appears to be a misreading of the table in https://actuaries.org.uk/media/ni4erlna/planetary-solvency.p... "Figure 12: Planetary solvency risk impact and likelihood definitions (illustrative)" qualified by "A risk impact matrix is a methodology for ranking potential impacts, not a prediction or
central scenario."
In particular, they rate ≥50% mortality as Extreme and also rate warming by 3°C or more by 2050 as Extreme (this is relevant for the colorful severity/likelihood grids that are the focus of the paper) and somebody appears to have made the incorrect connection that an Extreme climate would cause Extreme mortality, and also by the time the Extreme climate is reached and not afterwards. Elsewhere, the paper mentions that "We have not
shown an assessment for mortality in this illustration, as very
limited research has been carried out on the potential for
large-scale loss of life in relation to these interconnected risks on which to base an assessment."
Unfortunately, that makes the article title highly ironic.
- Synaesthesia
It's quite striking to note how media coverage of climate change and pollution have gone down so much. I remember in the 90's it was very much in the popular mileu.
What's more we are living through an actual green revolution. Solar power and batteries have never been so cheap - and still promising to get cheaper and better with sodium ion batteries.
- rendx
Just in case you miss it: The author of the post, Adam McKay, "is the Academy Award-winning director of The Big Short, Vice, and Don’t Look Up and the founder of Yellow Dot Studios."
- VCFundedGenYer
Eight excruciating paragraphs before the author stops rambling and gets to their thesis. So much fluff.
- whatifitoldyou
I think us people do not have the capacity as societies to effectively anticipate and solve problems that we can see approaching but have not become catastrophic yet. We always act shortsightedly and ..hope for the best. Most of the people will just not vote/support anything that might bring them some minuscule pain. Even if we know by logic that the problem is coming, we tend to follow whomever will tell us that it's not a problem and base our hopes on him/her. Think of a problem that we saw coming in the future and we collectively solved. I can think of none.
It is very hopeful that renewables are being pursued and developed by China at least to some degree and have become economically attractive. That's the only feasible way to minimize the damage that's already been done.
- gumby
I guess time zones are driving a significantly US-centric response. My company works on climate repair. We're just a four person menlo park startup so far with some pilots in the field but we have a couple of billion in our sales pipeline, entirely based on people who have sought us out. Global spend on climate doubled last year and is on a tear this year. Recent events, from the closure of the gulf of Hormuz to the huge fires in Europe have stiffened peoples' resolve.
Sure, the US cut spending since early '25, but even before those cuts, the US was less than 8% of global spending on climate intervention. But it's destructive: though we're based in the US, there is no commercial interest in the states and all our pipeline is outside the country.
Climate denialism is extremely destructive, but it's pretty much entirely a phenomenon of USA, Russia, Germany, Netherlands, France, UK, Canada, and Australia (crudely ranked by % of population), plus of course some gulf states. One of our three founders is an anthropologist and her field work has found that hardly anyone outside the top of the OECD has any doubt that the climate is changing and affecting them directly.
There's not enough happening but the derivative feels strongly positive.
- chronolitus
The gargantuan lie that is collapsing the climate is that we told ourselves nuclear is deadly dangerous, but coal & gas are merely "dirty".
- j4k3
Our economy is an abstract intangible system which requires infinite growth and debt issuance, this in reality requires more caloric expenditure and resource consumption. Thermodynamically this is pretty bad news. At one point the see-saw is gonna tip the other way, then it might cool off for a spell.