One development I wanted to share with you / this community is ChatGPT. Would be keen to hear everyone's thoughts.
I have a rolling list where I campaign to governments, councils, businesses etc on environmental issues like fossil fuel subsidies, carbon offsetting regulations, single use plastics, illegal logging, petrol powered leaf blowers (to the council + Bunnings) etc. I try to write and send one of these letters per week and I had lost all hope of ever getting through the list entirely.
Chat GPT did all of them in under 30 mins. And they were useable. I added a few extra sentences or links to personalise them and provide additional info but otherwise the AI said everything I would have said and more. And yes, I still had to do the research of finding the person to write to, sending it all off etc but one big chunk of work was done for me. I feel like the washing machine has just been invented for me!
I share many of the concerns that have come up about the ethics of AI that you've spoken about in previous podcasts. I certainly don't want to live in some of the future scenarios people are gleefully drumming up.
But now people can't say they have no time to write a letter to their local MP, or petition a company to be more sustainable, eco-friendly - chatGPT can do it for us for the moment.
The insurance industry play a good game - painting themselves as a quasi emergency service - but it’s all in the small print. With bushfire, for example, what is fire damage? For many heat damage, without damage from flames, doesn’t count. That small print will get tighter and tighter, so while there will be those that are uninsurable, there will surely be greater and greater numbers of policyholders who lack an adequate level cover when the worst happens. And, most don’t check until it’s too late.
Insurance is a fear based business. Insurers have a hive of actuaries that work out what the risk of an event occurring and price insurance accordingly. If the price is high they emphasis the risk of a natural event wiping someone out to change that risk appetite and make the idea of paying a huge premium more palatable.
I think the insurers lobby government that this is a community problem, not an insurance problem. Whilst the government is reluctant they protect their bottom line. No room for sentiment and that ad is your evidence
Sarah, After consideration, knowing how informed insurers are on climate change, I think the NRMA ad is quite aware, perhaps a little sarcastic, pragmatic and ultimately trying to be reassuring (?!)..lol. In contrast, the bit you wrote about imminent El Niño stirs up simple dread.. but I want/need to get beyond that somehow.
Bill McKibben has done some good stuff (his Eaarth book is great) and he really seems to understand our predicament. Except that he appears to believe that so-called renewable energy and EVs are going to save us. No energy source is clean (except foraged food) and anything which enables civilisation to continue more or less as normal will only continue the destruction of this planet. Most of the damage we've seen and measured happened before climate change really started to have an impact (though it does now) so attempts to halt GHG emissions will only, potentially, address one of our predicaments. In nature, you can't do just one thing.
I'm curious as to why more people don't simply accept the science and start planning around it.... instead the majority appear immobilised in their 'magical thinking' that somehow, somewhere, someone will make it all 'go back to normal', at some future point (or at least close 'enough' to normal that we won't need wholesale change). I find this thinking even amongst many scientists.... we had two ecologists assess our property for potential regeneration projects, and both wrote us reports that simply gave us a list of what species 'used to be here' and recommended planting them back.... when I questioned one of them directly about why I wouldn't be planting species that are more suited to climate scenarios in 50 or 100 years for our property I was met with a blank stare at first and then a polite but conversation ending 'cause that's not how it's done'... type of response. I find this inability to accept the data and then plan for it with hope and optimism somewhat baffling at times. I see it as simply being adaptive.... using our unique human characteristic of foresight, to look at ways to plan for the future. OK... so fires, floods, droughts and flash downpours... how do we design our property, commons land with our neigbours, community and family to cope with that? What are the specifications for drainage and bush fire attack levels, what sort of trees will we need in 100 years that will cope with those extremes, etc. etc...
I accept that on one hand it's being somewhat pessimistic around human behaviour (and it certainly means giving up on the 1.5c argument...) but isn't this type of thinking the same mental model that we use to buy house insurance now? (even if we can't in the future). We accept that there is a risk that our house might burn down or be flooded, so we insure against that. Why is it such a jump to start planning for a climate and world that scientists already predict is going to be wild ride? I mean... really.. what choice do we have? The alternative is to continue hand-wringing and worrying about humanities capacity to pull off magic tricks... that sounds like a whole lot of risky thinking to me..
I've found those NRMA confounding too and if they're trying to be clever, then something's definitely been lost in translation.
I've pointed out the issue of insurance to so many people in recent years and most people think you're exaggerating when you tell them that in the not-too-distant future, many Australian homes will be completely uninsurable, but it's coming faster than most people realise... It makes me wonder if and how it will shift the cultural obsession we have with the 'Great Australian Dream'?
Hi, I had a general insurance business for 23 years, so have some understanding of the industry. The big reinsurance companies have been warning about the effects of climate change for years. I tell anyone who is in denial about the impacts of climate change to pul out their last five years of insurance bills and see how much they have risen because of increased claims. I tell them that this is the new carbon tax that we all are paying.
yes I certainly do think that this ad is denialism in action. I was thinking about whether those of us who are members of NRMA should send in letters of disgust ( hence if there are petitions etc..thanks Sarah
Thanks again for another lovely newsletter.
One development I wanted to share with you / this community is ChatGPT. Would be keen to hear everyone's thoughts.
I have a rolling list where I campaign to governments, councils, businesses etc on environmental issues like fossil fuel subsidies, carbon offsetting regulations, single use plastics, illegal logging, petrol powered leaf blowers (to the council + Bunnings) etc. I try to write and send one of these letters per week and I had lost all hope of ever getting through the list entirely.
Chat GPT did all of them in under 30 mins. And they were useable. I added a few extra sentences or links to personalise them and provide additional info but otherwise the AI said everything I would have said and more. And yes, I still had to do the research of finding the person to write to, sending it all off etc but one big chunk of work was done for me. I feel like the washing machine has just been invented for me!
I share many of the concerns that have come up about the ethics of AI that you've spoken about in previous podcasts. I certainly don't want to live in some of the future scenarios people are gleefully drumming up.
But now people can't say they have no time to write a letter to their local MP, or petition a company to be more sustainable, eco-friendly - chatGPT can do it for us for the moment.
The insurance industry play a good game - painting themselves as a quasi emergency service - but it’s all in the small print. With bushfire, for example, what is fire damage? For many heat damage, without damage from flames, doesn’t count. That small print will get tighter and tighter, so while there will be those that are uninsurable, there will surely be greater and greater numbers of policyholders who lack an adequate level cover when the worst happens. And, most don’t check until it’s too late.
Insurance is a fear based business. Insurers have a hive of actuaries that work out what the risk of an event occurring and price insurance accordingly. If the price is high they emphasis the risk of a natural event wiping someone out to change that risk appetite and make the idea of paying a huge premium more palatable.
I think the insurers lobby government that this is a community problem, not an insurance problem. Whilst the government is reluctant they protect their bottom line. No room for sentiment and that ad is your evidence
Sarah, After consideration, knowing how informed insurers are on climate change, I think the NRMA ad is quite aware, perhaps a little sarcastic, pragmatic and ultimately trying to be reassuring (?!)..lol. In contrast, the bit you wrote about imminent El Niño stirs up simple dread.. but I want/need to get beyond that somehow.
Bill McKibben has done some good stuff (his Eaarth book is great) and he really seems to understand our predicament. Except that he appears to believe that so-called renewable energy and EVs are going to save us. No energy source is clean (except foraged food) and anything which enables civilisation to continue more or less as normal will only continue the destruction of this planet. Most of the damage we've seen and measured happened before climate change really started to have an impact (though it does now) so attempts to halt GHG emissions will only, potentially, address one of our predicaments. In nature, you can't do just one thing.
I'm curious as to why more people don't simply accept the science and start planning around it.... instead the majority appear immobilised in their 'magical thinking' that somehow, somewhere, someone will make it all 'go back to normal', at some future point (or at least close 'enough' to normal that we won't need wholesale change). I find this thinking even amongst many scientists.... we had two ecologists assess our property for potential regeneration projects, and both wrote us reports that simply gave us a list of what species 'used to be here' and recommended planting them back.... when I questioned one of them directly about why I wouldn't be planting species that are more suited to climate scenarios in 50 or 100 years for our property I was met with a blank stare at first and then a polite but conversation ending 'cause that's not how it's done'... type of response. I find this inability to accept the data and then plan for it with hope and optimism somewhat baffling at times. I see it as simply being adaptive.... using our unique human characteristic of foresight, to look at ways to plan for the future. OK... so fires, floods, droughts and flash downpours... how do we design our property, commons land with our neigbours, community and family to cope with that? What are the specifications for drainage and bush fire attack levels, what sort of trees will we need in 100 years that will cope with those extremes, etc. etc...
I accept that on one hand it's being somewhat pessimistic around human behaviour (and it certainly means giving up on the 1.5c argument...) but isn't this type of thinking the same mental model that we use to buy house insurance now? (even if we can't in the future). We accept that there is a risk that our house might burn down or be flooded, so we insure against that. Why is it such a jump to start planning for a climate and world that scientists already predict is going to be wild ride? I mean... really.. what choice do we have? The alternative is to continue hand-wringing and worrying about humanities capacity to pull off magic tricks... that sounds like a whole lot of risky thinking to me..
For what it's worth...
I've found those NRMA confounding too and if they're trying to be clever, then something's definitely been lost in translation.
I've pointed out the issue of insurance to so many people in recent years and most people think you're exaggerating when you tell them that in the not-too-distant future, many Australian homes will be completely uninsurable, but it's coming faster than most people realise... It makes me wonder if and how it will shift the cultural obsession we have with the 'Great Australian Dream'?
Hi, I had a general insurance business for 23 years, so have some understanding of the industry. The big reinsurance companies have been warning about the effects of climate change for years. I tell anyone who is in denial about the impacts of climate change to pul out their last five years of insurance bills and see how much they have risen because of increased claims. I tell them that this is the new carbon tax that we all are paying.
yes I certainly do think that this ad is denialism in action. I was thinking about whether those of us who are members of NRMA should send in letters of disgust ( hence if there are petitions etc..thanks Sarah
is there a petition to NRMA re these billboards..or just contact them indivdually ?