This is the cue for fossil fuel defenders to say "Whelp, we tried. But what are you gonna do when India and China...blah blah. Let's just try to deal with it now, no point burning less fossil fuels.".

You can see an example of that attitude in this very thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50202929

No, we didn't try. We didn't even pretend to try. These are all lies.

The truth is even if India and China didn't exist on the earth, we'd be heading for the same fate. Maybe 20 years later, but in the same direction. Europe and North America emit just as much carbon as China even today[1], despite China building a coal plant every time you take a breath or whatever "fact" fossil-heads come up with.

China has probably made the best effort out of everyone, with its prioritization of solar, wind, and batteries. But even that was too little, too late.

Now the target is 2.5C.

1. https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/annual-co-emissions-by-re...