[Battle_Scarred_Galactico]

"The only real way to make a transition now is to institute draconian measures. We are talking about uprooting families, slavery conditions for 90%+ of people, massive rationing that makes WWII look like a feast."


This is the first solution I've seen posted that is at all realistic. And it's a bit of a far cry from electric cars isn't it?

I believe that by default the Government will desperatly try to scramble for something resembling this, as ever, not until the last minute.

[Battle_Scarred_Galactico]

"Why, because you're hding in a bunker somewhere and plan to emerge and live in some utopian fairyland (without suburbs)?.Come on. Get some counseling and go get a job."


Ahhh, don't like the message so attack the messenger. The old ones are the best.

[Wildwell]

I'm wondering if cars could come with a health warning and people will sue beceause they can't get over their addiction. Anyway, I'll post the myths about the jobs on POD another time and show where they came from.

[MonteQuest]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Daryl', 'M')onte, I was doing some reading of your links. I apologize. I didn't understand that you are a seer. I am honored that you have emerged from your temple to address me.

Honestly, you are belaboring the obvious. A cursory study of geologic history makes it painfully obvious that the human species time frame for existence is very small. Basic astronomy teaches us we are tinier and more emphemeral in relationship to the universe than bacteria are to us. Duh!!! Did you grow up watching Star Trek and it just dawned on you that our presence here is temporary? We're just trying to figure out a way to delay the die-off. Why? Because we don't want ourselves or our children to be ones to experience it! So you think modern technology and population growth will trigger our demise and it's going down tomorrow. It could just as easily be 2000 years from now be caused by something else. You don't know. You want to engineer a die-off now? Why, because you're hding in a bunker somewhere and plan to emerge and live in some utopian fairyland (without suburbs)?.Come on. Get some counseling and go get a job.

[ashurbanipal]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'I') didn't understand that you are a seer. I am honored that you have emerged from your temple to address me.

[Daryl]

OK I apologize. I was out of line. I read some more of the back threads. I see you are a hard working man. Sorry about the get a job comment.

Having said that, you should be able to take some teasing about your tone. It is a bit oracular at times, isn't it? I'm not sure that is helpful, because so many doomers I read sound eerily like the literalist Book of Revelations Christians. A chosen few are saved to heaven/bunkers after which a time of troubles reigns on earth. Sinners suffer/SUV owning surburbanites eat each other. Finally, history/the modern world ends, the newly saved rise to heaven/bunker people emerge to establish eco-fairyland, rich with bicycles, women with hairy armpits and little wooden waterwheels spinning away in fresh streams.

[Ludi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Daryl', '.')

Having said that, you should be able to take some teasing about your tone.

[richardmmm]

an electric car will do 500,000 miles without needing a service, i think that answers most of the questions about why we don't have electric cars. no oil change, no spark plugs, so parts etc etc. the thing just rolls.

[LadyRuby]

There seems to be this assumption that we have to make all of these massive changes within just a few years. Why assume we can't gradually reduce our oil consumption (with higher prices) by conservation, switching to more fuel efficient cars, etc.?

- We hit peak oil.
- Prices go up as supply goes down.
- Some countries are priced out.
- Fuel conservation, fuel efficient cars, etc. reduce demand in countries not priced out.
- Alternative energy sources developed more quickly.

Yes, we may have some very serious economic problems as we navigate through all of this (i.e., an economic depression), and yes we're way behind on developing these renewable energies. But we're not going to be at the point in 10 years where there's no oil available. There will still be quite a bit. I definitely see hard times ahead, but I don't invision seeing a bunch of grannies running around with knives trying to eat small children.

[azreal60]

I tease monte about his tone all the time. But generally i don't use adhom attacks while doing it, I be, well, teasing about it. He takes that as well as anyone.

And yes, he does sound a bit preachy, but that's because those preachers are what i like to call learned men. Monte, like them, likes to use the written word like a woodcarver uses a knife. He likes the beauty of the sentence and the paragraph. Trust me, if you where ever in gradutate school there are a million guys who talk just like him. What it comes down to is, he is a very eloquent speaker on the topic. If your looking for a similar opinion with more real world examples, i saw you met matt savinar on another post. He's very doomeristic, but he does tend to be more grounded in the world you and i can see. Monte is more of a theorys guy. Don't blame him for having theorys that are pretty well grounded in alot of studies and facts though.

[SHiFTY]

I agree. There is no good reason that car use cannot reduce by 50% in the developed world relatively easily, rendering peak oil not a problem for the short-medium term.

In a NZ Government document about options for the country in the event of a fuel "shock" 1979 style, there was a startling graph of car usage in NZ that showed the vast majority of car journeys to be discretionary- people using their cars for non-essential purposes.

The market will be the solution to the peak oil problem. If the price of oil goes up to $100 or $200 a barrel, people will reduce their driving, and switch to alternative means. Fuel demand is elastic, the price just hasn't gone high enough yet.

If the high prices last for a long time, there may well be a recession. However at some point electric cars will certainly become viable, you already see them in London all over the place, pure electric 2 seaters! And that is with prices under 1 pound per liter ($US6 a gallon or so.)

And the demand for decent public transprt and new electricity generation will go through the roof, providing many make-work opportunities.

I don't think it will be all that bad myself. Life may be very different in 30 years time though if all this comes to pass. That is something that no-one can know...

[Atlantean_Relic]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'H')aving said that, you should be able to take some teasing about your tone. It is a bit oracular at times, isn't it? I'm not sure that is helpful, because so many doomers I read sound eerily like the literalist Book of Revelations Christians. A chosen few are saved to heaven/bunkers after which a time of troubles reigns on earth. Sinners suffer/SUV owning surburbanites eat each other. Finally, history/the modern world ends, the newly saved rise to heaven/bunker people emerge to establish eco-fairyland, rich with bicycles, women with hairy armpits and little wooden waterwheels spinning away in fresh streams.

[0mar]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('LadyRuby', 'T')here seems to be this assumption that we have to make all of these massive changes within just a few years. Why assume we can't gradually reduce our oil consumption (with higher prices) by conservation, switching to more fuel efficient cars, etc.?

- We hit peak oil.
- Prices go up as supply goes down.
- Some countries are priced out.
- Fuel conservation, fuel efficient cars, etc. reduce demand in countries not priced out.
- Alternative energy sources developed more quickly.

Yes, we may have some very serious economic problems as we navigate through all of this (i.e., an economic depression), and yes we're way behind on developing these renewable energies. But we're not going to be at the point in 10 years where there's no oil available. There will still be quite a bit. I definitely see hard times ahead, but I don't invision seeing a bunch of grannies running around with knives trying to eat small children.

[Daryl]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('richardmmm', 'a')n electric car will do 500,000 miles without needing a service, i think that answers most of the questions about why we don't have electric cars. no oil change, no spark plugs, so parts etc etc. the thing just rolls.

[Ludi]

Daryl, it's really difficult to be patient with you. Do you understand why the doomers are doomeristic? I don't think you do. Would you be willing to try to understand them? I really hope you will. I really do.


They are doomeristic because they do not see anyone implementing the solutions people are mentioning here. Do you understand this? Not that those aren't good solutions, but that they are not being implemented fast enough.

More complex systems aren't a solution because they require more energy to implement and maintain, not less.

[Daryl]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ludi', 'D')aryl, it's really difficult to be patient with you. Do you understand why the doomers are doomeristic? I don't think you do. Would you be willing to try to understand them? I really hope you will. I really do.


They are doomeristic because they do not see anyone implementing the solutions people are mentioning here. Do you understand this? Not that those aren't good solutions, but that they are not being implemented fast enough.

More complex systems aren't a solution because they require more energy to implement and maintain, not less.

[MonteQuest]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Daryl', 'O')K I apologize. I was out of line. I read some more of the back threads. I see you are a hard working man. Sorry about the get a job comment.

[Ludi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Daryl', '
')
What is picture you have posted, a chicken?

[MattSavinar]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
')
Monte and Matt think that it's really important the we stop moving to more complex systems. I don't understand how that is important to the favored "we are going to collapse within 5 years scenario", but I'm new around here. Maybe I will figure that out one day. I think it is part of the long term die-off, then bicycles solution.

Let's assume they know what they are talking about on this subject. The electric car system is starting to sound simpler and simpler, when you mentioned the above advantages of electric transportation.

[orz]

Yet, here we are, a bit past the Hunter-gatherer stage, no? 2 steps forward, 1 step back.

Don't think I contend that point, only issue for me and many others, is how large a step back? Perhaps the global economy will fade for a few decades and come back? A bit of suffering, some death(more in some areas than in others), but not necessarily a full blown die off.