PeakOil is You
All Kidding Aside, I'm Scared
Re: All Kidding Aside, I'm Scared
by trespam » Tue 04 Oct 2005, 13:34:51
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MacG', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('trespam', ' ')My first employer built and ran the original internet (ARPANET)
Wonderful! Lets open a tread "memories from the war"!
Hmmm... Did you actually have an account on ArpaNet? In that case I bow in respect. Otherwise I challenge you for real dates of engagement. I got connected in -87. That was before the browsers. We only had SMTP/POP, FTP, TelNet and the likes. Trumpet WinSock anyone?
First account in '84 when I joined BBN, though it was in the 70s when they built the IMPs that connected up the ARPANET for the first time. A lot of the people I worked with--my supervisors when I started--were involved with it the internet project though. The wonderful "@" sign that we use day-in, day-out is a gift from one of them. See more here [link]
My point--obnoxious as it is--is the same as that of Taleb who I quoted and who has a little article here [link]--there is a lot of noise, and a lot of people with barely any credentials at all posting their pet theories about social darwinism and peak oil and related topics.
Taleb says that when he reads something in the popular press, or even on the internet, he primarily investigates the bringer of the news. Folks here like to play like they are oh so logically minded. They hate the ad hominem. Sounds good. But they are full of shit. In a world of competing opinions--billions of them--the first task of anyone who wants to rise above the crowd is to figure out which opinions can be ignored because they are delivered by idiots. Ad hominem is in fact the starting point of a thinking person's checklist. Otherwise you'll spend your life debating with idiots.
There is noise everwhere. And the internet just makes it worse--in a lot of ways--making people check obsessively all day long to see--hmm, what's the price of oil, what's the latest on peakoil.com, what's the latest on oildrum, any new articles on political intrigue. I'm prone to do it, and must stop myself.
People who spend day in day out bathing in an environment like that can't think straight. As I've said before, I largely ignored peakoil.com for about six months. Actually, I left in disgust after some particular discussion which included moderators or soon-to-be-moderators spouting off on neo-darwinism and similar ugliness, telling me that any discussion of morality is namby pamby naive thinking. But my trip away, and analyzing instead a large number of papers and books on the topic of energy--upwards of 250 papers in my electronic library and probably on the order of 300 books on the topic in my personal library--made me realize that much of the worthwhile here gets buried in noise. So I'll just point that out now and then. There is good stuff as well (the recent depletion analysis is great stuff).
Open forums like this, similar to the yahoo forums, degrade into noise and lose their value at some point. I suspect this is true on almost any topic. They are of value for a while. For someone new to the topic, perhaps--though the noise and clutter can be misleading to those without appropriate backgrounds. But open forums are, long-term, probably inhabited by those with nothing better to do. Which means they don't evolve towards truth. Because the noise of the forums drives those interest in the truth away. Tighter editorial control, tighter winnowing of the information, is the only way to make progress.
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trespam - Tar Sands
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Re: All Kidding Aside, I'm Scared
by EdF » Tue 04 Oct 2005, 14:25:22
Milnet 1980 myself. Am I old enough?
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Re: All Kidding Aside, I'm Scared
by Vexed » Tue 04 Oct 2005, 21:53:15
Trespam wrote:
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'M')y point--obnoxious as it is--is that there is a lot of noise, and a lot of people with barely any credentials at all posting their pet theories about social darwinism and peak oil and related topics.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'M')y point--obnoxious as it is--is that there is a lot of noise, and a lot of people with barely any credentials at all posting their pet theories about social darwinism and peak oil and related topics.
Hi Trespam,
When I first found this website I was absolutely inspired, as you probably were, by the amount of real information that was being posted here.
Things have changed to a great extent. It takes more work to wade through the shallows to find the gems.
But I wonder if that isn't because the idea of PO is attracting the notice of younger generations. Hard as it is for most young'uns to admit, they are still very naive. There is still much to learn and what they don't own in knowledge and experience they make up with vivid imaginations and outright fantasy. I tend to think the average poster these days whom you call pathetic poor and envious is actually just young.
There are many movements that would sacrifice a lot for young blood.
Just a thought...
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Vexed - Coal
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Re: All Kidding Aside, I'm Scared
by trespam » Wed 05 Oct 2005, 13:42:44
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Vexed', 'T')respam wrote:
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'M')y point--obnoxious as it is--is that there is a lot of noise, and a lot of people with barely any credentials at all posting their pet theories about social darwinism and peak oil and related topics.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'M')y point--obnoxious as it is--is that there is a lot of noise, and a lot of people with barely any credentials at all posting their pet theories about social darwinism and peak oil and related topics.
Hi Trespam,
When I first found this website I was absolutely inspired, as you probably were, by the amount of real information that was being posted here.
Things have changed to a great extent. It takes more work to wade through the shallows to find the gems.
But I wonder if that isn't because the idea of PO is attracting the notice of younger generations. Hard as it is for most young'uns to admit, they are still very naive. There is still much to learn and what they don't own in knowledge and experience they make up with vivid imaginations and outright fantasy. I tend to think the average poster these days whom you call pathetic poor and envious is actually just young.
There are many movements that would sacrifice a lot for young blood.
Just a thought...
I agree with you. I'm just acting the jerk. I shouldn't do it. For all those smart people who are just looking at peak oil, please do take into account what Vexed has to say. Peak Oil is real. But use a very wary eye on all the predictions that are made about it. And that includes from many of the misanthropic moderators on this particular site. Some of them are genocidal, thinking we should kill people to solve the peak oil problem. Many of them would be afraid no matter what the source. Peak oil is just convenient for them: they can focus their fears on it. If not peak oil, they'd find another reason to invest in gold, argue that the human race is pathetic, etc.
Reality is: the human race is pretty pathetic. But what isn't. Consider a volcano that blows its top, or an asteroid that decimates most of the earth's species. Isn't that kind of pathetic. Isn't that kind of sad. I think so. Humans are doing what humans are designed to do. Just as other species do. We're making a bit of a mess with the nest, as they say, the nest being mother earth. But what to do?
Here's what to do. Either (a) do nothing and get on with your life or (b) go to college and focus on something that might make a difference: physics, ecological economics, nanotechnology; (c) design a web based ride share network that incorporates wireless phones and other means to make riding sharing or using something like buses more convenient or (d) go work at a kitchen that make meals for homeless families.
Definitely educate yourself on peak oil. But just remember, even the experts haven't a clue. Really they don't. So don't expect that reading the next post at this particular place is going to get you much further. Or looking at the price of oil fifteen bazillion times a day. I've done all that. And now am through with it. I've moved on. It's pointless. Reading too much here is pointless. I take my hats off to the modelers, but even that is somewhat pointless. We'll know when we know. The price will tell us. And then the real action will start. In the mean time, prepare yourself. But I'm not proposing you build a thatched roof hut in the jungle. Always have supplies for emergencies. E.g. water and food. But I'm saying prepare your mind. Educate yourself. The people who think there is no future, and no reason to do anything about the future, are confusing themselves. Our actions should be morally based, unlike our moderators who are often very immoral in their arguments and thinking--throwing morality out through their social darwinistic thinking.
No, operate morally. And I think from a moral basis the right thing to do is to prepare oneself to help society through peak oil. Become an ecological economist, become a social worker, become a nanotechnologist.
Just don't think that your going to find much in the way of truth here. I spent a lot of time here. Sometimes posting bullshit. Maybe this is bullshit right now? But after doing so, as with many things, I find it's time to move on. I'll keep perusing, looking for ways to act the fool. But my primary message is: peak oil is real. Now get on with living.
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trespam - Tar Sands
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Moods change as we all know. Now I would post it as, 'who knows, jesus, let's just wait and see!' As to the admonition on the first page (before my own input to my thread was diluted beyond recognition) to buck up and not be a wimp, well said, but remember, I have more irony than ayoob does by any stretch of the imagination.
