[Novus]

People are not going to wake up to PO until it starts affecting them personally. Canceling Christmas would be a good watershed event for this country. Not Chirstmas the religious holiday but Christmas the month long consumer orgy between Thanksgiving and New Years.

I think there is a very high probability that there will be a major truckers' strike this fall. Diesel is already approaching $3 a gallon. A month long truckers strike in November would ruin the Christmas shopping season. It would do the country good because then most would wake up. It would proove to the most spoiled people in the world that their way of life is not unneogotiable but can and will be taken away from them by forces beyond even a Superpower's controll.

[eric_b]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('max_power29', 'P')eople should keep this kind of thing in mind, especially if they believe there will be no such thing as a great die-off. This is nothing compared to what we will be dealing with in the future. If nobody cares about people quitely dying in their homes now, I expect that nobody will in a much lower energy world either. Once your body runs out of stored energy and you start digesting yourself you die quietly also.

[lyrl]

There was flooding in Asia about a month ago that killed 100,000 people.

Didn't even make American news.

People don't really care about natural disaster deaths. It seems, well, 'natural' that it should happen. (A seven-figure death rate, like the tsumani, is the only exception to this rule.) Reading about murder is what really gets people's blood riled up. So the media report murders.

The heat wave in Chicago about 10 years ago did have a lasting impact, though. There was a similar heat wave last year: but this time, public air conditioning centers were set up and heavily advertised on the radio, there was an air conditioning hot line for people who needed to get out of the heat, etc. Deaths were very few. This didn't make national news, but I lived in Chicago at the time and heard all the radio advertisements.

It's expected that if France has another heat wave in the near future (next couple of decades), something similar will be observed: help will be made available for most who need it. Death tolls will be nowhere near the 30,000 they were (and I heard about that, too - it did make news here in the US). It takes time to set up those resources, though, and when a culture is caught completely unprepared (i.e. the first heat wave in 500 years), they simply are not available.

I guess my point is, even a few hundren deaths will make the local community take action (assuming there is a breather period, to build up resources, between the events that cause a death toll). Several thousand deaths spread over the country would probably cause nationwide action (again, assuming there is a breather period to take action in).

[cube]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('mommy22', '.').............
But, historically, France never got too hot, even in the summer, so AC was never a high priority. I just hope they've gotten around to cooling the hospitals over there, if these heatwaves continue. I had a child in Belgium, and that floor (delivery and nursery) had no air...women were instructed to bring their own fans! This was 1998.

[savethehumans]

This coming winter is REALLY worrying me. Not where I live (north Texas), but in so many other places that will REALLY get cold. . . .

My guess at your avatar, Jack, is a little red dragon prepares to fly his Pilgrim rider somewhere. Am I even close to being right?

Sheeple here will start caring when it happens in THEIR back yard. They (and we?) are all NIMBYs, of course!

[SurvivalAcres]

It's pretty obvious the media will refuse to print the truth - about anything and everything these days (rhetoric, sorry).

So - what do, can we do about it? Besides this kind of discussion? I've got a plan for a sustainable community - but fat lot of good it's going to do if a whole lot of other people haven't figure out why they are going to do, meaning, they'll be hungry...

[Free]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('eric_b', '
')
Anyone here ever gone on a fast? I went through a fasting phase in my late 20's.
Longest I ever went without food was close to two weeks. Drank nothing but water.
The first few (three days) were the hardest. After that the body adjusts and
starts consuming itself. Not much energy. There does seem to be a spiritual
component to fasting. I felt very clear. I remember I broke the fast by eating an
apple. Incredible! It seemed to suffuse my body with sweetness. But I digress here.

[Jack]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('savethehumans', '
')My guess at your avatar, Jack, is a little red dragon prepares to fly his Pilgrim rider somewhere. Am I even close to being right?

[eric_b]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Free', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('eric_b', '
')
Anyone here ever gone on a fast? I went through a fasting phase in my late 20's.
Longest I ever went without food was close to two weeks. Drank nothing but water.
The first few (three days) were the hardest. After that the body adjusts and
starts consuming itself. Not much energy. There does seem to be a spiritual
component to fasting. I felt very clear. I remember I broke the fast by eating an
apple. Incredible! It seemed to suffuse my body with sweetness. But I digress here.

[DaveA]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('gg3', 'D')eaths tend not to make news unless they're visible and dramatic. In a heat wave, people die quietly indoors. In a terrorist attack they die in a most visible and dramatic manner, and plagues are good for this also.

What gets more attention is when the living are suffering in such a manner that they can still muster up the capability to make a big stink in public, for example by rioting.

Re. "death by temperature (too cold/ too hot)": Almost all of the buildings in use today were built during times of relatively cheap energy. This is a problem that will have to be addressed, in many cases by demolishing the worst of the worst and starting from scratch.