The comments section reminds me of The Dead Great-Grandfather Test
[Science fiction writer Bruce] Sterling was using the term specifically to describe the hairshirt green lifestyle that is driven by eco-anxieties. For hairshirt-green types, life is all about saving water, recycling, composting, reducing eco-footprints and various other behaviors marked by a kind of fearful, non-generative retreat from living. Permanent existential hibernation.
Sterling's rule of thumb for spotting acting-dead behaviors is a great one: if it's something your dead great-grandfather can do better than you, it's a case of acting dead. Your dead great-grandfather uses no water or plastic, and is actually recycling himself as we speak, not just his possessions. Try and top that.
But acting dead goes beyond hairshirt-green behaviors. While spartan frugality is a virtue, when it becomes the entire purpose of your life, there's a problem. For a portion of the dying American middle class, frugality has turned into a life purpose.
https://ribbonfarm.com/2011/12/08/acting-dead-trading-up-and...
“You’re just acting like your dead grandpa!” I holler, as I push the earth towards ecological collapse
Thanks for the ragebait. Reminding myself that the flaw here is obvious, there’s no need to respond, arbitrary „tests” aren’t binding to anyone, protecting the future is perfectly defensible as a moral stance even at cost of present convenience.
Is getting in touch with nature, appreciating the value in things and protecting complex ecosystems really 'Acting Dead'?
I would say 'Acting Dead' is actually sitting at home ordering on Amazon/Temu, watching brainless TikTok/Instagram/Netflix/YouTube videos, and talking to a transformer model all day.
Both of those are entertainment. What work are either of those accomplishing? People need houses and food, and more people are happening. "Acting dead" is people who are getting in the way of providing for people.
Ecosystems are incredibly important for human survival. Once they are gone, we are in a lot of trouble.
This is a fallacy. People 100 years like your great grandfather ago solved problems they had 100 years ago. People today solve problems they have today.
This is about a dead grandfather as he is decomposing in the ground. Not about his life which might have been more energy-intensive than that of many moderns.
Not sure about your great-grandfather, but mine didn't own a car, didn't travel on vacation by airplane, and, while he may have used a stove to heat his house, he probably only used it sparingly, because coal was expensive. So I doubt his life was more energy-intensive than mine.
Now I'm wondering what the CO2 efficiency of a modern airplane per tonnage of cargo/people is compared to coal fuelled ships, obviously ignoring the aspect of _where_ aircraft emit their exhaust in the atmosphere which IIRC makes a difference.
It's nothing relevant to your comment, I thoroughly agree, but just got me curious.
Mine drove a gas-guzzling GMC CCKW 353 truck, putting out up to a kilogram of CO2 per 1 km on inefficiently planned (but scenic) routes.
What a shitty way to dismiss anyone with any concerns whatsoever.
Is this some sort of straw man against trying to stay within your CO2 Budget? I really don’t understand the aim of this comment.
It's a really dumb test. You can apply it to argue against reducing or stopping literally anything. My dead great grandfather uses no fentanyl and commits no murders. If we're not doing those, we're as good as dead!
well thank god for the US citizens then taking one for team earth <3
ill keep supporting my local politicians who take a private jet for 100 kilometer journey to advocate for co2 reductions
I think it’s along the lines of “premature optimization is the root of all evil”. These little micro optimizations take your attention and energy away from places that might be less visible and less enjoyable but more consequential.
Whoever responds "we need to stay within our CO2 budgets, otherwise we'll be in real trouble in 20 years" with "being a hippie and organizing your life around recycling" is really building up some sort of weird straw man and not really usefully engaging in solving the problem.
Basically "Don't live beyond our collective means" = "Die".
Are you buying the latest iPhone every year? If not, you might as well be dead.
I wish people would realize that life is not about stuff. Living within your means, being frugal and focusing on what really matters (time with family, experiencing nature, thinking interesting thoughts) is not at all "permanent existential hibernation".
I resent the "The Dead Great-Grandfather Test" and similar "growth"-at-all-costs ideologies. Its implications are disgusting.
Yeah, the average Swede emitted 3.43 tons of CO2 in 2023, which is less than a quarter of what an average US citizen emitted. Does that mean that a US citizen is four times more "alive" than a Swede?
Yes exactly what's the problem with profiting from child slavery if I only do it every 3 or 4 years? Pfff, get good guys.
What's your point? Do you mean "everyone is equally bad", so reducing your resource usage is pointless? Because that's not true, clearly.
Do you mean that owning any electronics at all is morally wrong? That's a more consistent point, but what are you posting from then?
This sort of all-or-nothing mentality is really reductive and pointless. It's like saying you shouldn't go to the gym unless you plan to become the worlds strongest man.
In my opinion, it is the responsibility of each and everyone to live as frugally w.r.t. the environment as possible, while keeping in mind that each of us has a job to manage in order to feed our families.
I own a phone, but it's as old as I can have in order to still have access to banking. I own a car, but it's as old as I could find while still driving well and being reasonably fuel efficient. I drive as little as I can, while still allowing myself to travel to meet family. I eat food but I buy organic and avoid imported food as much as possible. And so on.
Another important factor is that one should strive to improve the laws. Because clearly, reducing your own impact is not enough. And the political work one does, of course needs to be calibrated to what time one has available.
I'd never judge somebody for prioritizing family over political work, or buying a second-hand iPhone in order to save time on setting up a Fairphone or similar.
I will judge somebody who buys the latest car, or latest phone, or something like that. I will not judge but gently inform someone of the facts, if they buy meat that I consider coming from an unethical animal industry. And I will listen to a vegetarian if they'd like to inform me about the realities of the industry that produces the meat I eat, even though I personally consider it "ethical enough", because perhaps they'll change my mind.
> I will judge somebody who buys the latest car, or latest phone, or something like that
That's the spirit!
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It's funny because this comment reminds me of something else... cope.
You can apply the same to FIRE if you want to trigger half this board.
Good that he didn't or the comment would be long [dead]!