So there's a big question here (beyond the obvious, existential one) for the VC and startup community. What role do we play in all of this? Can we play a constructive role? What might that look like?
The current Silicon Valley model of pursuing hyper-growth and aiming at making a few people (founders and investors) very rich is part of the problem, not the solution.
However, a more balanced startup culture that focuses on people well-being and environment sustainability as their ultimate goals could be part of the solution if they manage to find a working model within the current capitalist framework. The problem is that such framework is intensively individualistic and, without Government intervention, creates the worst possible outcome from a sustainability point-of-view because it assumes eternal growth and results in the concentration of resources into only a few hands.
I would love to see a startup that focuses on making its customer's lives more fulfilling while at the same time less "affluent", which is possible to because after you have all your basic needs covered (food, shelter, medical care), no amount of money can make you happier... but small things, like a stimulating social life, or a sense of pride on what your work produces, definitely can. The founders of course, would need to be living proof that their startup delivers on that promise, so they wouldn't make a penny more than necessary to live a fulfilling life where most fulfillment came from bringing happiness to others. That's where I think this idea breaks down! I am sure there would be founders doing this if they thought they could make a billion $$$ first :D but if they could do that, the whole motivation for the project would've been undermined already.
So there's a big question here (beyond the obvious, existential one) for the VC and startup community. What role do we play in all of this? Can we play a constructive role? What might that look like?
The picture isn't really so good for a lot of these startups, no.
You know it in your heart.
It's very unclear how an ethical person is supposed to be behave. If we believe that this huge machine is destroying the planet, surely we should stop participating in it - and yet if we do that, we become unable to support ourselves.
I compensate by trying to consume as little in my personal life, and trying to get jobs that aren't unethical.
We know that global warming is forcing many animals around the world to flee their normal habitats, but now, an exhaustive analysis has shown marine species are booking it for the poles six times faster than those on land.
Drawing together 258 peer-reviewed studies, researchers compared over 30,000 habitat shifts in more than 12,000 species of bacteria, fungi, plants, and animals.
The resulting database, named BioShifts, is the first comprehensive analysis of its kind, and while the database is limited by our own, human research biases, the data we have certainly suggests marine species are following global thermal shifts much closer than land animals.
...
In the review, amphibians were found to be moving up slope at over 12 metres a year, while reptiles seem to be headed towards the equator at 6.5 metres a year.
Insects, which incidentally carry many diseases, were found to be moving poleward at 18.5 kilometres per year.
Relatively, that's a lot, but in the bigger picture, marine species were moving towards the poles at an average pace of nearly 6 kilometres per year, while land animals were only shifting upslope at a mean pace of nearly 1.8 metres per year (slightly faster than previous estimates for land species, but still comparatively slow).
We know that global warming is forcing many animals around the world to flee their normal habitats, but now, an exhaustive analysis has shown marine species are booking it for the poles six times faster than those on land.
Drawing together 258 peer-reviewed studies, researchers compared over 30,000 habitat shifts in more than 12,000 species of bacteria, fungi, plants, and animals.
The resulting database, named BioShifts, is the first comprehensive analysis of its kind, and while the database is limited by our own, human research biases, the data we have certainly suggests marine species are following global thermal shifts much closer than land animals.
...
In the review, amphibians were found to be moving up slope at over 12 metres a year, while reptiles seem to be headed towards the equator at 6.5 metres a year.
Insects, which incidentally carry many diseases, were found to be moving poleward at 18.5 kilometres per year.
Relatively, that's a lot, but in the bigger picture, marine species were moving towards the poles at an average pace of nearly 6 kilometres per year, while land animals were only shifting upslope at a mean pace of nearly 1.8 metres per year (slightly faster than previous estimates for land species, but still comparatively slow).
It's sad but true. People even deny native genocide. I had a comment yesterday saying the natives didn't experience genocide but were simply "moved off their land".
But I guess I can understand it somewhat. It took me a long time to come to terms with it as well. The genocide of the natives didn't sink in until I saw a list of the native languages that were wiped out along with the natives. It was dozens and dozens of languages. Many times more languages than exists in the whole of europe.
"Thus husbands and wives were together only once every eight or ten months and when they
met they were so exhausted and depressed on both sides ... they ceased to procreate. As for
the newly born, they died early because their mothers, overworked and famished, had no
milk to nurse them, and for this reason, while I was in Cuba, 7000 children died in three
months. Some mothers even drowned their babies from sheer desperation.... this way,
husbands died in the mines, wives died at work, and children died from lack of milk ... and
in a short time this land which was so great, so powerful and fertile ... was depopulated. "
Bartolomé de las Casas - A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies
Europe had many more dialects and languages than now... Some of extinction stories are genocidal as well. We have to assume a lot about what happened as Rome colonised southern europe, for example, but much of it probably rhymes what happened in the americas.
> Europe had many more dialects and languages than now...
Yes I know. The difference is that with the natives, the language disappeared because the people got exterminated rather than through forced standardization/adoption of national languages.
this is like people comparing the indigenous african slave trade to the triangle trade - completely facile.
>Rome colonised southern europe
colonization in the ancient world wasn't rapacious like it was in the new world. conquered peoples maintained much of their way of life and simply became vassal. in the roman case (towards the end) they even got roman citizenship.
Edit:I finally figured out hn downvotes - paper over a genocide nbd - use the word facile downvotes
The people being conquered in Europe were also a lot less vulnerable in several key ways— my understanding is that they were largely overwhelmed by superior military tactics and infrastructure (roads and so on), but once conquered they were at a similar level in overall technology and well positioned to participate in the larger Roman economy.
North American native peoples faced new infectious diseases that they weren't at all prepared for, a huge technological disparity (guns), and a lot of predatory economics (trading away valuable furs for beads and trinkets).
>In the five centuries between Caesar's conquest and the collapse of the Western Roman Empire, the Gaulish language and cultural identity underwent a syncretism with the Roman culture of the new governing class, and evolved into a hybrid Gallo-Roman culture that eventually permeated all levels of society
Can you point to symbiosis with native American culture that resembles that to any extent today in the US? All we have are racist football team mascots
What's the saying? History is written by the victors? I don't think there will ever be a reconciliation in history for the elimination of native peoples across two continents.
It's disheartening / devastating / infuriating that the genocide of 120-40M people barely pierces the consciousness of the dominant culture when talking about apocalypses or genocides...
Winners don't talk about the people they murdered to win. Same thing about Australia, Canada and less so New Zealand.
It is also hilarious that the USSR is the only country apart from Japan to successfully industrialize and avoid a colonial genocide from a Western power.
If you could pick a place to live being a Russian in Moscow 1919 would give you a much better chance of surviving compared to being an Indian in Manhattan in 1624, Toronto in 1787 or Melbourne in 1835.
Please study the actual history of the USSR-- there were multiple genocides of different religions and ethnic groups. Most notable were the pogroms and the death of millions in the Ukraine:
Interesting how all the groups who had genocide perpetrated against them somehow ended up with a double population than when they were conquered with, meanwhile Ireland still has a smaller population than they had in 1800.
As the other comment points out, some of the major GHG's CO2 and CH4 are comprised of carbon. It is often used as a catch-all.
For example, the news earlier this year about treeplanting, spoke about removing Carbon from the atmosphere. Typically, the GHG's will be rolled up into either CO2e (CO2-equivalent) or just C. In the latter case, you often just have to do some molar math to get the CO2e from C.
As long as GDP is related to emissions and globally advanced countries engage in zero sum competition, exploiting others by pressing their historical power advantage, there is a very strong incentive for China, India and the rest of the developing to catch up by any means necessary.
