[Tanada]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Cloud9', '
')If J.P. Morgan implodes they implode the clearing house for SNAP cards. It is my understanding that J.P. has considerable exposure to the European crisis. I think the system is like a drunk walking the edge of the precipice. It can go on for a very long time or it can collapse in an instant. Contrary to popular belief, the outcome is much more a matter of luck than the construct of central planning.

[dissident]

I don't think it has sunk in yet into the public consciousness that AGW will be beating down humanity for thousands of years. This will occur regardless of how much CO2 humans emit after civilization collapses. By 2100 the oceans will have warmed up enough and become net CO2 sources on a scale beyond any human output. Once they warm up more in the coming centuries we will see the release of the clathrates which hold 5-10 trillion tons of carbon, which will come out as CH4. Rapid release is not excluded so we could see enormous CH4 concentrations in the atmosphere producing global warming of several degrees in just a few years. A global warming of over 10 C will occur sometime in the next few centuries. Mammal life over most of the land surface will die out. Perhaps the few remaining humans can move to the Arctic coast. But they will not be leading an agricultural life.

It's funny how there is terrorism over religion (i.e. afterlife) but no one hunts down the maggots that promote burning all the fossil fuel deposits we can get our hands on (coal, fracked shale oil and gas, etc.). The surviving fragments of humanity will be cursing the current era and its insane deciders into the far future.

[Ibon]

I have read through this thread and so many of you have expressed the same concerns that have echoed through my mind, some during the past 10 years, others during the past 30 years. I have read the predictions and analysis of the experts. I have at times drawn my own certain conclusions.

Yes there are rational explanations of system resiliency and weakness but it is not possible viewing the paramaters either in isolation or in convergence to really make out a clear trajectory forward or what the singular event might be that ends up being a tipping point.

I am beginning to believe that with all the brain power we spend trying to understand these topics in the end it will be totally irrational events or unexpected and unpredictable incidences that will mobilize modern humans. I have often spoken of the catalyst of consequences but do we really think we have a grasp on which consequences are going to be the real catalysts?

Finding so much uncertainty out there has led me to abandon these queries and focus more on the day to day tasks that are in my immediate sphere of influence. With so much unknown I surrender to the uncertainties that are beyond my control to influence or even to fully understand.

Wasn't there a wise man that once said...... be in it but not of it......

[Newfie]

These last two posts pretty much sum up my personal fears and current philosophy.

I believe/fear the 2016 election. There is a good chance that we will be in a deepening recession/depression, that some third party will yank us far to the right, and that will start a ugly period of civil stress. If not 2016 then some time there after.

I need a plan to work to, and that is the best near term scenario I can come up with. I might be wrong, but its a start, a theory to adjust.

In the long run there is just too much uncertainty to be other than very cautious and very flexible. There is no telling which way the herd may head. Best to be nimble and quiet. No stopping it, but perhaps there may be surviving it.

[Plantagenet]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Newfie', 'T')hese last two posts pretty much sum up my personal fears and current philosophy.

I believe/fear the 2016 election. There is a good chance that we will be in a deepening recession/depression, that some third party will yank us far to the right, and that will start a ugly period of civil stress.

[Cloud9]

These are not our leaders. They are talk show hosts reprsenting our corporate sponsors.

[Plantagenet]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pstarr', ' ')Plant ... believes selfishness is a virtue.

[Ibon]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pstarr', ' ')inside our Gated Community and behind the tidy little Guard House.

[Plantagenet]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ibon', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pstarr', ' ')inside our Gated Community and behind the tidy little Guard House.

[Ibon]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pstarr', '
')The underlined pretty much sums it up. We are all rugged individualists, don't need nobody. But this only works when we have the luxury of standing alone, independent and free

[rangerone314]

A better question would be, given the paradigm for the world's foremost economic power (America) for dealing with issues---which is wait until a growing problem is just about an unsolvable crisis---will there be enough time to transition to something different than what we have now when the powers-that-be develop the political will to try and do something constructive about collapse?

All the theoretical solutions are irrelevant if our political and economic systems are not up to the task. Just read "Diamond".

[rangerone314]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pstarr', 'P')lant, you want to go gaffe for gaffe with me?
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '4')8. "You teach a child to read, and he or her will be able to pass a literacy test." -Townsend, Tenn., Feb. 21, 2001

[ralfy]

Lack of resources applies to both, as socialism can take the form of state capitalism.

[Ibon]

With the constraints that are coming from a combination of factors that we are all familiar with, us baby boomers, who are the predominant group here discussing this topic, its all about the transition and adaptation from an economic and energy abundance to scarcity and constraints.

What about the generation that is born that never knew of the abundance that us baby boomers dispair losing? If you never knew anything different than decline and living within contraints then your psychological orientation is quite different.

Happiness and wellbeing is actually quite relative. We can descend quite far down the slope of declining resources and still be able to maintain the basics of food production, sanitation and transportation.

What we all perceive as a crisis, being the baby boomers that we are, may not even be defined as crisis for the generations emerging in this century.

So really this site, and other similar ones, is really more than anything a comforting place for worried baby boomers to come and share their anxieties. For the young generation emerging there is no crisis.

[Plantagenet]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('rangerone314', '
')Socialism only works until you run out of someone else's money.

Capitalism only works until you run out of someone else's resources.