Making large life decisions based on your own personal GHG emissions is living as though you are already dead.
I moved out to the country. Bought a big diesel. Started a farm. My GHGs went way up.
And yet, my lifestyle change has zero impact on climate change.
It's like voting--if you know game theory at all, you know it's a waste of time, just like it's a waste of a life to spend your time calculating and optimizing how "green" you're being. Zero real impact, beyond whatever it makes you feel.
Hey, I enjoy dirt bikes and the shooting guns on my land. My kids do too. Maybe you enjoy riding the bus and being efficient. To each their own. But don't live a lesser life just to live up to some lifestyle meme--whether it's the homesteading trend or the green trend--just do what you like.
I can understand the argument that individual consumer changes are not enough to stem the tide of climate change. But I’m not sure that means individual choices have zero real impact.
I think the voting analogy is good, but I take a different lesson from it. Not that voting is pointless. Individual actions matter a great deal in their cumulative effect.
Your impact is not zero. Small numbers exist. Unfortunately physics doesn't round down before aggregating individual numbers. You and your kids not living "a lesser life" just means your grandkids will. Mine, too. It's that easy.
Maybe people who don't think voting is a waste of time will generate an environment where these decisions are made on a societal level and individual responsibility is less important. Which presumably you'd welcome. It's unlikely.
It's all about aggregate actions and incentives. I have no problem if people want to live that kind of lifestyle - I think they should be free to do so. I do think we should have a carbon tax so that some of the externalities it creates are priced in. At the margin, perhaps some people would decide not to choose more carbon intensive activities, or work harder to find ways to mitigate them (buy a Ford electric truck instead of the diesel, say).
I moved out to the country. Bought a big diesel. Started a farm. My GHGs went way up.
And yet, my lifestyle change has zero impact on climate change.
It's like voting--if you know game theory at all, you know it's a waste of time, just like it's a waste of a life to spend your time calculating and optimizing how "green" you're being. Zero real impact, beyond whatever it makes you feel.
Hey, I enjoy dirt bikes and the shooting guns on my land. My kids do too. Maybe you enjoy riding the bus and being efficient. To each their own. But don't live a lesser life just to live up to some lifestyle meme--whether it's the homesteading trend or the green trend--just do what you like.