I already think technology is at a point where welfare does not have to depend on fossil fuel consumption. This is why the efforts to have low carbon or carbon neutral development like the Global Green New Deal and other international efforts are crucial. I don’t think the western world is a model to be followed as much as it is a warning of what not to do in many ways. But yeah, I think we are already at a place where development doesn’t have to require a larger carbon footprint, we may just lack the political willpower to implement those technologies at the scale required due to some perverse global economic incentives around that issue.
I share concerns about religious fundamentalism and radical ideology. I don’t think I’ve seen any data suggesting that development inherently makes these things worse though and my intuition tells me that rationality is more likely to thrive in a world with higher average welfare and/or decreased inequality.
The environmental Kuznets curve (EKC) is a hypothesized relationship between environmental quality and economic development[17]: various indicators of environmental degradation tend to get worse as modern economic growth occurs until average income reaches a certain point over the course of development.[18][19] The EKC suggests, in sum, that “the solution to pollution is economic growth.”
There is both evidence for and against the EKC. I’m guessing the evidence varies for different aspects of environmental quality and between regions. I’m not an expert on this, but that Wikipedia section would probably be a good place for someone interested in the topic to start.
I already think technology is at a point where welfare does not have to depend on fossil fuel consumption.
I think I broadly agree, but that it’s also true that present-day welfare is cheaper if we use fossil fuels than low/no carbon fuels (if we’re ignoring things like carbon taxes or renewables subsidies that were put in place specifically to address the externalities). I think carbon mitigation is well worth the price (including the price of enacting e.g. carbon taxes) when we consider future generations, and perhaps even when we consider present generations’ entire lifespans (though I haven’t looked into that). But there are some real tensions there, for people who are in practice focused on near-term effects.
I already think technology is at a point where welfare does not have to depend on fossil fuel consumption. This is why the efforts to have low carbon or carbon neutral development like the Global Green New Deal and other international efforts are crucial. I don’t think the western world is a model to be followed as much as it is a warning of what not to do in many ways. But yeah, I think we are already at a place where development doesn’t have to require a larger carbon footprint, we may just lack the political willpower to implement those technologies at the scale required due to some perverse global economic incentives around that issue.
I share concerns about religious fundamentalism and radical ideology. I don’t think I’ve seen any data suggesting that development inherently makes these things worse though and my intuition tells me that rationality is more likely to thrive in a world with higher average welfare and/or decreased inequality.
A useful concept here might be that of an “environmental Kuznets curve”:
There is both evidence for and against the EKC. I’m guessing the evidence varies for different aspects of environmental quality and between regions. I’m not an expert on this, but that Wikipedia section would probably be a good place for someone interested in the topic to start.
I think I broadly agree, but that it’s also true that present-day welfare is cheaper if we use fossil fuels than low/no carbon fuels (if we’re ignoring things like carbon taxes or renewables subsidies that were put in place specifically to address the externalities). I think carbon mitigation is well worth the price (including the price of enacting e.g. carbon taxes) when we consider future generations, and perhaps even when we consider present generations’ entire lifespans (though I haven’t looked into that). But there are some real tensions there, for people who are in practice focused on near-term effects.