We are still screwed: the coming climate disaster

Well in keeping with my new “when Trump does something obviously against the interests of the United states just see how it benefits his boss in Russia” line of thinking…

Turns out Russia is the only country that exports asbestos to the USA…

I like your very dark thoughts on this, but I think that a lot of new research believes we will reach a tipping point where increased temperatures start releasing sequestered CO2 on its own. The planet won’t need our help to continue cooking itself now that we have kindled the fire.

Very true (thus the asterisk and some babbling I did on that.)

Of course, it is the runaway warming I am really worried about most of all. Because I don’t think we even have a clue on how to stop that once it starts.

This, plus it’s a little disconcerting that so many of the descriptions of post-warming stasis and recovery can be summarized as “…once 90% of the people have died, we’ll be able to do this…”

Lol bro, we’ve had refrigeration tech since like 1460AD (that’s when I got it in Civ, anyway, I’m assuming it’s historically accurate). Just send Bruce Willis up with some Maytag boys and build a fridge around the planet and BOOM, problem solved.

An interesting data point is that need of car ownership does not correlate to car ownership. In most European countries where car ownership is really unnecessary for most people (we do like our high population density cities) car ownership is higher than in the US with its suburbs.

I think you information is out of date. There was an article in the Atlantic from 2012 that showed the US ownership was down, but will cite 2017 information as the US being the second highest.

That’s motor vehicles. For cars a quick google finds this.

Also this is the article I think you referred to, which I think uses the same data I linked above (sorry, in a hurry)?:

I think the world bank data is not public anymore, but when looking at cars (not vans or trucks) the US seems to be below the EU in general (makes sense, and you would have to look at usage to get a clearer picture, since many trucks in the US are used as cars -private, not-business use as transportation-).

Actually this is the second source your Wikipedia link (the one used for US numbers) , which does include some data for passenger vehicles:

Can’t find the original data, though.

Edit: Found some hard numbers:

http://www.nationmaster.com/country-info/stats/Transport/Passenger-cars/Per-1%2C000-people

US comes at number 22. It’s mostly 2007 data but it can’t have moved that much. Again, it might discount pickup trucks owned for private passenger transportation in the US, but it’s the best I’ve found.

Thank you.
I would love to see what it’s like per household. I wonder if having younger population has an impact.

Yeah, it’s a surprising statistic (I was certainly surprised when I first read about it) and I agree probably there’s a way to look at the numbers that makes more sense or points as to why the perception/data disparity.

Purely anecdotal, but the kids around here, the high school kids, they don’t want cars and many opt to delay getting their driver’s licenses. They want their parents to drive them around and for reasons I don’t understand, the parents do it.

If there was ever a generation ready not to spend their lives as car owners, it seems we might have one now.

I’ve seen this a LOT, and it blows my mind.

I’m fine with it as it means fewer kids looking at their cellphones while driving.

The same is true in California. My daughter knows several young adults who at almost 28 years of age don’t have drivers licenses. And around here the mass transit is limited to a mediocre bus system.

I think Uber/Lyft has made this possible for many of them. I know someone who plans on their kid Ubering to junior college this coming semester because they don’t drive and she will be unavailable to play taxi for them due to work.

On the plus side, teenages are dangerous on the road, so fewer drivers, especially younger drivers, the better.

While true, it also means they don’t get experience driving which still leaves them as more dangerous drivers as they get older.

It cuts down on the stupid teenager doing stupid things to some extent, but it also means people in their 20’s with no driving experience to speak of rolling around.

Sure but some people who live in the big cities, they may never drive or don’t drive until they leave. I’ve known a few people who didn’t learn until almost almost 40 or so because of that. But the forty year old, they’re still more cautious, slower reflexes, but they kind of know about… death. Teenagers, for good and bad, they are still very much fearless.

I’m just saying I think if we’re going to see a shift or at least a willingness to get more metro, use uber, or something we haven’t thought of left, I think that generation will be all over it. It might not be so forced so much as a gradual shift. Now sure, some of us will be forced. We don’t even have buses in the city I live in, but those kids, they don’t want to drive. That’s a big piece of the puzzle.

Oh, it’s a net gain I suspect. And for metro areas people using public transport or even bikes is a big plus.

I’m just thinking of how terrible people drive out here in the sticks. Of course a lot of them have 40+ years of driving under their belt and they’re like that, so there are definitely diminishing returns on the experience end.

If I go my whole life without reading about some kids dying trying to race a train to a crossing I’d be happy, so I think I’m in favor of the shift if it comes.

I think when I was a kid, we had like six maybe five teens die in a single car accident, rolled an SUV. They made a law about how many unrelated young people could be in a car after that.

Uber/Lyft, they min at 25 right, for insurance or… do they?