sanctimonious: Feigning piety or righteousness:

Ugh, you call that a utopia? Imagine what traffic will be like in 30 years with a world population of 9 billion and everyone having their own car. Imagine how much space will be needed just for parking all these vehicles?

Also, I have to say that I don't think Tweev is trying to convince anyone to do things he/she has listed. He's just pointing out that out of all the things you can do to benefit the environment, buying a Prius is very low on list.

 

This is controversial, but we've got nuclear power today. You've got to be careful with the byproducts of nuclear plants, but they don't pollute in the same sense that coal and oil do. We have the technology to build more nuclear plants today; we had it 20 years ago. All it takes is the political will to start building new plants.

Combine nuclear power with PHEVs and eventually fully electric vehicles and the problem is solved. We've got the technology today to make a 100 mpg car (with the Hymotion plug-in kit). 300 mpg cars are coming soon (Aptera).

It's much more likely that a person will buy a 300 mpg car than that he will stop driving entirely and bike instead, or move closer to work so that he can walk.

 

While I think technology can be beneficial in some cases I tend to side with you on this one. Technology routinely creates more problems than it solves.... Jared Diamond would agree with us as well.

It is better not not create than it is to create.

 

This is a classic example of good technology on a small scale going bad when it reaches a large scale. At face value your idea sounds good but when one considers resource extraction, shipping, and production of cars, infrastructure such as roadways and parking, the whole idea just gets out of hand as far as environmental health is concerned. If they are interm steps towards mass transit then they may be a good option which is why I drive a Prius and would love an Aptera. But in the grand scheme these are not sustainable unless population growth completelty stopped and we stopped most other forms of outward development. People need to be packed into cities and their consumption reduced and efficiency increased if we are going to make it much longer. Creating more roadway infrastructure inhibits this goal. That is why many cities are ripping out inner city roads/streets and putting up mass transit, housing and businesses. They know this is the best way to go.

 

Why any of you waste time on this pons scum I fail to understand. This sanctimonious bastard calls us the very thing he is.

A so called environmentalist degree that profits nothing gives him the right to tell you how to live? He gets to damn you for having children?

He gets to tell us he thinks more for his hobbies than for peoples live's?

He gets to condemn us for owning a Prius but he wants one?

What has he ever done for this country? He would rather hug tree's and arab terrorists and calls me a racist redneck because I can dare to hate the evil that wants to destroy America?

And in case he doesn't know about what he is talking about west Virginia miners rebelled and formed unions to fight deadly mine conditions. Those organizers wore a red bandanna around their necks and became known as rednecks. Hardly a bad epithet.

Now why don't we ignore this enviro troll and get back to enjoying our community?

A community that he is not a part of!

 

There are 3 things wrong with our current '1 person per car' transportation paradigm.

1) It depends on foreign oil which is making it increasingly expensive
2) It's very harmful to the environment
3) It won't scale given the limited space and the population growth we have

I think people are so focused on problems 1 and 2, that they don't realize problem 3 is there. I don't know about your city, but where I live traffic comes to a standstill during morning and evening rush hours, and the length of rush hour is expanding steadily. It just seems ridiculously inefficient (in energy and time) to me to have these 2 ton vehicles transporting 1 160 pound person at a standstill. I think it's ridiculous that your typical mega-mart dedicates 3/4 of it's real estate to car parking. I like to bike and walk to destination whenever I can, and I'd like my children to be able to continue doing this. 8 lane roadways make this very difficult.

 

And that's the big problem, right there. It's not a technological issue at all. It's zoning. Putting factories, houses, and shops all on opposite sides of the city is a stupid idea. It's not easy to find a 'walkable' community, but they exist. I know, I found one. And when I'm tired of walking to work, I'll be quite comfortable right here, receiving information by fax and email, and filing tax returns electronically. What commute?

 

I think Sheepdog has only read the 1st post and the one where you called him a redneck.

 

"BY the way, the evil that is destroying America is not across the pond but from within."

and one of it's names is Tweev

 

It's funny Tweev, I think you said you were 30-something, but you talk like you're early 20's... a little naive. I don't mean that as an insult though, just an observation.

Here are some of my personal reactions to your sentiments. Note that I'm not offended by things you've said, just mostly a little bewildered:

* You have moments of lucidity in your writing here, where it seems like you have some understanding and want to keep an open mind, but you keep lapsing back into a hypocritical and/or trollish manner (e.g. repeating obviously inflammatory, possibly incorrect statements and not bending slightly to reason... making sweeping generalizations about a community that has clearly demonstrated its diversity in this very thread...).

* I don't trumpet to the world that I own a Prius. I'm a member here at PriusChat because it's a fantastic community with a TON of great technical help on a very technically interesting car.

* People DO approach me (both strangers and acquaintances/coworkers) to talk about my car, and from the things they say it's obvious that they, like you, come to me with the assumption that I'm maybe a little sanctimonious. I try to downplay the enviro discussion because I know that driving any car is the least of my pro-environment choices. Most people change their attitude pretty quickly when they see that I'm not a preacher, but just a guy who owns a cool car.

* I completely disagree with your statement about buying a cheap car and giving your money to R&D. If you can find me a way to donate money in a meaningful way to automotive R&D, other than through the purchase of a new car, then I will congratulate you. As the industry stands, change happens only when consumers demand it, and I do see my purchase as an incremental but important demand for better technology.

* I had wanted to buy an electric car since I was 15. I was sorely disappointed that I had to settle and buy a Prius as my first car. I was fairly pleased with myself that I managed to avoid buying my own car, and live mostly without a car for the 16 intervening years.

* During those 16 years, and the years before and since, I've favored, in order of personal preference: cycling, rollerblading, public transit, walking. Walking is only last because most places I travel to are either too far for that to be reasonable, or I need to carry things, or both. I still ride my bike to work daily. I'm pretty fit.

* I've also been vegetarian for most of my life, and even with the poorest of math skills I think anyone should see that it's the absolute easiest way to drastically reduce your carbon footprint. Even in vegetarianism I'm a hypocrite though because I know it would be substantially better to be vegan.

* I've lived for years in dense urban settings, and for years in suburban settings. If I could afford to live in NYC while maintaining the personal space I value so much, I'd do it. I'd still rent a car once in a while to get out and enjoy the world though!

* I compost and have a vegetable garden. Composting has reduced the volume of my landfill-bound waste by probably 60-70%. I was really surprised by that. Next I'll be installing rain barrels so I don't have to buy water to put on my garden.

* As I'm going through this list I'm thinking to myself... Tweev is right... buying a Prius was probably about #115 on my enviro priority list, but I did get to it eventually... maybe we don't disagree as much as I thought, or maybe your phrasing offended me more than I admit.

I guess post #2 said it pretty well, since you're being sanctimonious about other people being sanctimonious. Hopefully you'll start to see that we don't all fit the mental picture that you have drawn up for us. Show us a little more respect, and we'll do likewise.

p.s. I was listening to NPR the other day and there was a report about "green-speed-dating" in San Fran or some other liberal hippy douche city. They interviewed one guy who basically said, "yeah, I drive an SUV... but I started recycling, so I'm being pretty green." I shook my head in sanctimonious disgust. They interviewed another guy who really was doing some extreme things in the pursuit of green... he said nobody there was green enough to bother with a date!

 

I said I had enough, but there is so much to be said about the technical aspect of all of this that it's un-real.

Hear is another story on wind. I don't want a 100 turbine farm out in the middle of no where because it is unsightly. If you watch this video The man said it took 6 months to put it on line. Breaking News | Latest News | Current News - FOXNews.com

From the looks of this turbine, most of the structure with the exception of the turbine itself is built just up (50 miles) the road in both directions from where I live, the blades LM glassfiber and the towers are from DMI. It takes a bit of doing and I have talked to some of the project managers and their bigest problem is site prep. (a good access road - set the pad and pour the crete and electrical) An other problem is trained bodies.

Is it on the right coast, or is it the left, no now it's happening in the middle, not in my back yard.

 

T.Boone Pickens is putting 2 Billion dollars worth of those wind turbines in Texas. He even is paying for commercials to say it is the future. He is an oil man from way back and says that oil isnt a good answer anymore and he is just responding to the obvious.

Unsightly? I dont think so at all. It's all American with no Arab control attached at all!

 

Tweev, I think there is a basic disagreement here which boils down to this:

Tweev: If you are not doing everything you can to limit environmental damage then you may as well not bother.

Most of the rest of us: Any change in the right direction is good, and cutting your fuel usage by half is a pretty good start.

Is that about right?

 

I far prefer the view of wind turbines over the view of coal plants

 

We have a company from GA putting in a 4.8 bil out west, and we say BRING IT ON!

 

I guess this is what I mean about people being in denial. Only a couple of people have acknowleged that #3 is an issue. Why hasn't anyone else commented on this? Do you think I'm over-reacting? Does it not matter to you because it won't be too horrible in your lifetime? If you have reasons to believe it's not a serious problem I'd like to hear them.

 

I don't know that the good doctor would agree with your statement, but I suppose we'd have to ask him to find out. I certainly don't agree with it, but that's only me.

Would you prefer to live in a world that lacks all technological advances? I doubt that. You'd probably prefer to live in a world that has many fewer technological advances -- and those would be ones you would choose to remove. I'm not pointing the finger just at you, F8L, because I'd do the same.

The problem is with people, and it always will be. We come up with great ideas and great advances, and then we succomb to selfishness and greed, and some of us gain while others lose. Any one of us who has even the opportunity to read PriusChat has been on the winning side. In fact, our ancestors were as well. Some survived and prospered and some didn't. We're the ones who did. I don't mean it to be a fatalistic finding, but simply an observation. (I don't think I'm an environmental determinist.)

I can't believe you actually mean this, F8L! What would our species be without creativity? We live to create and we create to better our living and to provide for our progeny.

Yes, we've gone far afield from the OP's original post. He suspected the need for an asbestos suit, but I think the roasting has been fairly well distributed.

I think my fundamental disagreement with the OP is that the quest to improve our environment should not be done at the cost of human growth and advancement, but for the benefit of each other and the earth that supports our lives. Buying a Prius could be #144 (or so) on a list of things to do to save the environment (at least from the OP's perspective), but that doesn't mean it isn't higher in reality. The sanctimony arises from the presumptiveness of "knowing" you are correct: whether it is a statement that buying a Prius has little to no value in environmental terms or a statement that the evil destroying America is coming from within.

I would say that buying a Prius instead of a gas-hog and higher-polluting _______ car is better for the environment. I would also suggest that if America is being destroyed by an evil from within, then havign us change our own withins is going to be better for America.

The car-loving American society is not going to give up the automobile within a generation or two. We still have horse races! What we can do is so influence the culture by proving the technology on a wide scale. This will open the door for further creativity and further advances.

It doesn't mean we continue to be pigs but just hope we find cheaper slops. We must stop filling landfills. We must recycle, reuse or avoid. These are things to be done from a neighborhood scale on up. So can we also stop the incredible pollution to our air, water and soil from petroleum exploration, production and use by finding a way to reduce it and, eventually avoid it.

One last point from me (?): I can't agree with Sheepdog on a number of his points, but I'm all over the one about decreasing our dependence on foreign oil. I'd like to decrease our dependence on oil, period, but let's start with reducing the demand on the oil that forces us into making ridiculous foreign policy decisions.

Hmm . . . maybe we could start by having a national energy policy?

 

"ne last point from me (?): I can't agree with Sheepdog on a number of his points, but I'm all over the one about decreasing our dependence on foreign oil."

That's OK pal. I fought in a war to guarantee your right to disagree with me. I had friends who died for it and I would fight for that right even now.

The right to free speech doesnt give you the right to unrestricted speech however like the OP troll vomits.

The right to free speech is the right to be responsible for that speech. I will always object to those who assume they can use words as weapons.

The OP is a whack job and needs serious medical help.:der: