[redpoint5]

You're describing me in some of those comments, some of which would be an inaccurate description of what I have said.

Following my reasoning requires an understanding of my values.

I value humanity above other species for the following reasons:

• I'm a member of the human species
• Humanity is the most important species on earth
• Humans are the only ones with a notion of good vs bad (values)
• Humans are the only ones with the ability to imagine the future and take action to shape it

So, the wellbeing of people is most important to me.

I got the distinct impression that some here are more concerned with the dollars and cents of it than anything else- better to do nothing than threaten the dollars and cents.

To your first assertion, that some are more concerned with economics than anything else, you might be right. Economics and well-being are inextricably linked. In other words, improve the economic output, and you improve well-being. Sure, some of that improvement in economic output takes the form of Yachts, which most of us would agree is an extravagance, but increased economic output also takes the form of more people getting sufficient nutrition in places that didn't previously.

There are some people that think (mistakingly) that if there were only 2 people left in the world, they could split the entire world's wealth and be fabulously well off. The problem is that wealth exists in the activities of other humans, not in a self-existing wealth pie.

I got the distinct impression that some here don't think anything can be done even if there is climate change- and that was a big IF.

Just thinking about it as a regular person that has experienced a lot of weather when outside, I wouldn't know where to begin to change the outdoor thermostat. Standing a few feet back from a campfire, I can hardly tell I've had any impact on the environmental conditions. If the problem were easy, we'd have solved it.

There is a lot of hubris to think we can alter things without unintended consequences. The whole reason CO2 has skyrocketed is because people struggled to harness the power of fossil fuels, and it had consequences that at the time were not within the realm of perception. When we "fix" climate change, what unintended consequences will we be dealing with? Is it unreasonable to question what the cost (in all meanings) of a fix will be as a way to avoid negative unintended consequences, some of which might be worse than the initial disease?

With 7,500,000,000 and growing em effers infesting the planet, some even think we're at risk for UNDERpopulation issues!

Based on the assumption that humans are most important, a dwindling population is certainly a bigger problem than too many people. A negative population growth rate is unsustainable, and if not addressed, would result in extinction. You can't have 0 population and exist at the same time, but there is no hard existential limit to maximum population.

Using the same capacity to imagine the future as climate change alarmists, I can envision a future in which population dwindles, and brings with it all the reductions in well-being that small populations entail (less wealth, less able bodied people, aging population, less innovation, less exploration, less diversity...). To envision a future where population dwindles does not imply that our numbers are appropriate now, just as the absence of net catastrophe from global warming now does not imply that we won't suffer in the future.

Or that it is up to OTHERS to do something: government, business, religious, ANYONE but themselves.

Without concerted and enforced effort globally, there is no hope to affect meaningful change. The earth doesn't care if you eat vegan and don't own a car. That impact isn't measurable. Dying is the "greenest" thing any of us could do, and the climate doesn't care.

I've recently seen reports of youth angry with their elders for creating and doing little to nothing to mitigate the sh!thole they stand to inherit.

Youth are ignorant; that's why they are so loud. Once they get out of their parent's pocketbook they begin to realize "well-being" doesn't fall from the sky, and it isn't a right.