this post was submitted on 22 Nov 2024
254 points (99.2% liked)

World News

39100 readers
5145 users here now

A community for discussing events around the World

Rules:

Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.

We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.

All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.


Lemmy World Partners

News [email protected]

Politics [email protected]

World Politics [email protected]


Recommendations

For Firefox users, there is media bias / propaganda / fact check plugin.

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/media-bias-fact-check/

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
top 23 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 hour ago
[–] TheEighthDoctor 5 points 2 hours ago

I guess, "do not become addicted to water"

[–] [email protected] 23 points 23 hours ago* (last edited 23 hours ago) (2 children)
[–] Duamerthrax 4 points 2 hours ago

Well, yes, but many regions that are going to have water supply issues aren't near the animal ag farms. Closing a dairy farm in New Hampshire isn't going to help things in central Africa. The bigger culprit is Climate Change bringing dry air flows to areas that previously had more humidity and precipitation.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

unsurprisingly, this "research" is also infected by poore-nemecek 2018

[–] TheTechnician27 1 points 21 minutes ago* (last edited 19 minutes ago) (1 children)

To clarify what this user is referring to, Poore & Nemecek 2018 is a recent, widely cited meta-analysis covering over 1530 studies assessing the environmental impacts of food. It's published in one of the world's top academic journals – Science – and authored by Dr. Joseph Poore, the director of the University of Oxford’s food sustainability program, and Dr. Tomas Nemecek, an expert on agroecology and life cycle assessments from the Zurich University of Applied Sciences.

They somehow constantly appear like a spectre whenever this study gets brought up to try to spread FUD about it through vague and unsubstantiated nonsense. They do this because it's extremely compelling, effectively unambiguous evidence that many animal products such as dairy are abysmal for the climate ("because it's devastating to my case!"). I highly encourage anyone interested to read it for themselves. The article is paywalled, but Dr. Poore hosts it for free through their personal website, so you don't have to take either of our words for it.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 17 minutes ago (1 children)

it is not compelling, because the LCA references explicitly say that they cannot be combined with other LCA studies. poore-nemecek ignores this guidance and draws hyperbolic conclusions.

[–] TheTechnician27 1 points 2 minutes ago

This is the FUD I was referring to. I've asked you before to point to even a single paper responding to this extremely high-profile meta-analysis with something even resembling this vague concern; you haven't been able to turn one up. This should be trivial, because an LCA is an ISO standard, and thus failure to comply with it would be unambiguous for the hundreds if not thousands of scientists familiar with LCAs who have surely read and even cited this paper. I've even pointed out that the animal agriculture industry would be champing at the bit to refute a paper like this and has millions of dollars and teams of scientists to throw at the problem. But you can't, because one doesn't exist.

Your entire argument boils down to "Um, actually, meta-analyses are bad science", which is completely hilarious. Hell, assuming Poore & Nemecek, the peer reviewers, and the entire scientific community ignored this alleged basic oversight, I've pointed out to you multiple times that you yourself could author a paper rebutting this and get it published if what you're saying is even remotely credible. But it isn't. Because you have no idea what you're talking about regarding this paper except to the extent that you're lying.

[–] ms_lane 55 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (2 children)

Nestle: Just as planned

edit: On the bright side, Solar Stills will probably work a lot faster in the future.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 day ago

America would rather invade Canada for water than tell private corporations they need to be regulated more.

[–] [email protected] 39 points 1 day ago

I know you are joking, but for people that don't know: Solar Stills are total scams. They might work in a pinch as a survival tool, but for long term it's a non starter.

They have many issues, for example in places that don't have a lot of water and thus would be the most needed, they simply don't work. If there isn't a lot of water in the air, there isn't any to extract. Even in perfect conditions these things produce very little water, in most conditions you'd be lucky to get a couple of drops. Second issue is the water isn't clean, there is so much stuff floating in the air, you can't drink the water that comes out without filtering / boiling first. If that step is required you might as well go with ground or surface water sources. And if there isn't any ground or surface water sources, there won't be any water in the air most likely. Third issue is you are creating a hot and humid environment, which is an excellent breeding ground for all sorts of nasties. Think legionnaires disease and all sort of other bacteria and fungi. Within days it becomes a serious health hazard. Last issue is the materials used are almost by definition cheap and exposed to hard uv a lot of the time. This makes them degrade quickly and fall apart. Leaving plastic waste and chemicals leaking into the water it produces, until it just falls apart.

There have been so many crowd funding campaigns for clean water from the air over the past decades. Maybe some of them are simply naive and well meaning, but almost all are plain old scams. Feeding off the desire of people to help other people, only to fill their own pockets.

And furthermore, the problem with access to clean water is capitalism. There is plenty of water available, we have the means to extract it from the ground, surface and sea. We can process it, clean it, recycle it. Use trucks or pipes to transport it to places that don't have it. The only issue is, that costs money and the people living where the water is needed don't have a lot of money. So bringing water to these places simply doesn't generate a profit and thus doesn't get done. It isn't some kind of huge technical issue, there are many rich places in the desert that have plenty of water. Think oil states in the Middle East, or places in the US like Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico etc. Capitalism is the issue, not technology.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 21 hours ago

If water consumption doesnt increase from the average of the last 2030 years, we will run out of water in the year 5075

There is nothing to worry about /s

[–] FlyingSquid 7 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Well, the Danes are about to get super rich. Guess they were right to keep hold of Greenland.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Much like Canada though, I don't think they have resources to defend their water

[–] T00l_shed 6 points 23 hours ago

Trumps claim that canada will solve the US water crisis worries me.

[–] Death_Equity 21 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Dont worry, there will be a considerable drop in demand due to artificial circumstances. So I wouldn't worry if you survive what is to come.

[–] andallthat 10 points 1 day ago

Plus, you know that a human body is like 70% water? If you're one of those billionaire vampires you are going to be just fine.

[–] aleq 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Also not an issue if you're in the rich part of the world, or just one that has a lot of water. Fortunately I don't think water is gonna be what makes Russia invade, don't know what their supply looks like but I can't imagine it's not enough.

[–] Death_Equity 5 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Russia has the largest freshwater lake by volume, Lake Baikal, so they aren't likely to invade anyone because of their drinking water needs. Especially because Ukraine has been instrumental in reducing their need of fresh water.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 hours ago (1 children)

It's a big lake but a bigger country. I don't think Russia will be the first to have big water issues. Rather, I would look to Mexico City, Panama, Arizona, Nevada, California.

[–] Death_Equity 1 points 1 hour ago (1 children)

There definitely will be other areas with far greater issues.

Russia has a current population of around 143.8m people. One quarter of the Earth's freshwater is in Russia. Lake Baikal has a total volume of 6 quadrillion, which is 20% of Earth's freshwater.

The average Russian household uses 64 gallons of water per day. So Russia, with only Lake Baikal, has enough access to freshwater for over 10,000 years if no water is added to the lake and the population doesn't change.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 47 minutes ago (1 children)

Lake Baikal is out by Mongolia and the majority of Russians live in the west of the country.

[–] Death_Equity 1 points 40 minutes ago

Russia has previously unlocked pipeline technology and aren't all that concerned with ecological impacts of their actions.

If they had to tap Lake Baikal to supply the population, it wouldn't be unimaginable.