[Tyler_JC]

More than Peak Oil or Peak Energy, what about Peak Raw Materials?

Copper, iron, silver, gold, and all of the other "useful" metals are beginning to run out. We can't recycle our way out of a copper shortage. The Market can't magically produce silver from thin air. Lots of energy is required to produce nearly every raw material. We may have already hit peak silver. There is very little left to find and the stuff that’s left is energy-expensive to extract. When the energy shortages come, we might have to close down all of those nice little coal mines that were supposed to save us. If extracting the remaining coal is too energy-expensive, it won’t be extracted.

Remember, the Stone Age didn’t end because we ran out of stones. We couldn’t maintain a Roman Empire style of living after PO because there isn’t enough easy to find metal to continue the Iron Age. Recycling steel will cost energy. We may have a lot of rusting SUVs and no way recycle them into something useful. We used up all of the cheap stuff first. We did it with copper, we did it with iron, we did it with coal, and we are doing it with oil. We may end up in a Middle Ages type environment with no way out.

It gets worse. If Europe hadn’t found coal, Europeans would have been screwed. They were cutting down trees faster than the trees could re-grow. Africa is currently doing this right now. At this rate, Africa will be treeless by 2050. When humans try to heat their homes with the forests, things get ugly. If global warming wasn’t bad enough, we will add to it by cutting down every damn tree in a desperate attempt to survive.

Most of the survivalists talk about wood as a plentiful source of renewable energy. They are right up to a point. If we cut the trees down faster than they are capable of being grown, trees cease to be a renewable resource. We would eventually hit peak wood and then be completely hopeless. By that point, I hope to be long dead.

[gnm]

Well, speaking as someone who heats with wood - a typical 3-5 acre lot of forest can provide enough wood to heat a home indefinitely. Now scaling that up to tens of millions might become a problem. But seriously, there is enough leftover steel in cars to run an iron age forever. I doubt very much it would even come to that...

-G

[trespam]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Tyler_JC', 'M')ore than Peak Oil or Peak Energy, what about Peak Raw Materials?

[rerere]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Tyler_JC', 'M')ore than Peak Oil or Peak Energy, what about Peak Raw Materials?

Copper, iron, silver, gold, and all of the other "useful" metals are beginning to run out.

[Tyler_JC]

Energy is tied into material extraction. I was trying to show that when energy use crashes, so will the amount of available raw materials.

To answer the last part, depends on where the person lives. I generally put the value of an American a lot higher than the value of say, someone living in Zaire. If we must nuke that country to save a town here, it's a worthy trade as far as I'm concerned. Another thing, when resources get tight, I'm inclined to take what I need at the expense of others. I want to, but if I have to, I will. So I put the life of someone else lower on the Value Scale than I put my own life...duh. I can't understand the people who think differently.

[TrueKaiser]

person a: hey mate where did you get that suit of armor?

person b: made it from a thing called a hummer, just one of them was enough to make two suits for me and one for my horse.

[backstop]

Rerere & Tyler - I don't think you realize that what you're talking of, in terms of approving murder, even genocide, for the sake of your material indulgence, is simply the continuation of the American Fascist Party's politics.

Personally I'm not remotely squeamish about killing - I breed and train hunting dogs as a pastime, slaughter farm stock for the table and am very far from being a pacifist.

Yet what you're calmly discussing seems to me abhorrent.

In 1940 the US fascist party had 800,000 members, and, since America was actually founded on the genocide of its native peoples, I suppose it's not surprising that some of its people have yet to grow out of such barbaric views.

What you don't yet comprehend is that those views are the core of the problem of peak oil -

If, rather than heading into various scales of warlordism, we pull together internationally to allocate resources equitably, then a soft landing and eventually a sustainable society are eminently achievable. If not, then America, and many other countries, are as you say, TOAST.


Backstop

[BastardSquad]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('backstop', 'I')f, rather than heading into various scales of warlordism, we pull together internationally to allocate resources equitably, then a soft landing and eventually a sustainable society are eminently achievable. If not, then America, and many other countries, are as you say, TOAST.


Backstop

[Guest]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
') What a LOAD OF CRAP!!!!

Screw the international community!People say we invaded iraq for oil....maybe.People say we did it to get rid of an evil tyrant.....perhaps.People say we did it for our own personal safety and security......could be.But most importantly we did it because WE COULD!!!!!......WE COULD,WE CAN,WE WILL,and WE DID!!!And there's not a damn thing anyone can do about it!Things may not be going according to plan right now,but if/when we finaly take the gloves off iraq we be reduced to a smoldering hole in the ground!

[Guest]

Not half a percent make that five percent

[nero]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'W')hat a LOAD OF CRAP!!!!

Screw the international community!People say we invaded iraq for oil....maybe.People say we did it to get rid of an evil tyrant.....perhaps.People say we did it for our own personal safety and security......could be.But most importantly we did it because WE COULD!!!!!......WE COULD,WE CAN,WE WILL,and WE DID!!!And there's not a damn thing anyone can do about it!Things may not be going according to plan right now,but if/when we finaly take the gloves off iraq we be reduced to a smoldering hole in the ground!

[BastardSquad]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('nero', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'W')hat a LOAD OF CRAP!!!!

Screw the international community!People say we invaded iraq for oil....maybe.People say we did it to get rid of an evil tyrant.....perhaps.People say we did it for our own personal safety and security......could be.But most importantly we did it because WE COULD!!!!!......WE COULD,WE CAN,WE WILL,and WE DID!!!And there's not a damn thing anyone can do about it!Things may not be going according to plan right now,but if/when we finaly take the gloves off iraq we be reduced to a smoldering hole in the ground!

[backstop]

Nero - it may well be prudent for Canada to arm itself if the US heads still further from its senses, but not for God's sake with nukes (which are anyway wildly overrated as weapons of war, and which can themselves be used as justification for war).

The rational strategy is surely to prepare the minimum effective force that is able to Discourage (not Deter) invasion. Marshall Tito in Yugoslavia faced down Stalin's Russia with this strategy in the 1950s, and its a very very long time since anyone invaded Switzerland, for the same reason. Hence the strategy has provenance.

In Canada's case I'd suggest territorial forces along Swisse lines with dispersed caches of materiel. The storage of ample portable SAMs would be particularly effective for deflating Pentagon assumptions of air-sufficiency.

Also the training of special forces to counter invade for sabotage (not, of course, counter-productive terrorism) would face US planners with the prospect of war on US soil, with losses of media, transport, energy and production capacities.

Perhaps the strongest defence is that the US is made to see that it would be ejected from NATO, while Canada would remain Europe's trusted ally.

For the US to come to its senses a combination of peak oil, intensifying climate destabilization, and the discrediting of the Neo-Cons look like an appropriate recipe. Its just a matter of timing . . .

regards,

Backstop

[BastardSquad]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('backstop', 'N')ero - it may well be prudent for Canada to arm itself if the US heads still further from its senses, but not for God's sake with nukes (which are anyway wildly overrated as weapons of war, and which can themselves be used as justification for war).

The rational strategy is surely to prepare the minimum effective force that is able to Discourage (not Deter) invasion. Marshall Tito in Yugoslavia faced down Stalin's Russia with this strategy in the 1950s, and its a very very long time since anyone invaded Switzerland, for the same reason. Hence the strategy has provenance.

In Canada's case I'd suggest territorial forces along Swisse lines with dispersed caches of materiel. The storage of ample portable SAMs would be particularly effective for deflating Pentagon assumptions of air-sufficiency.

Also the training of special forces to counter invade for sabotage (not, of course, counter-productive terrorism) would face US planners with the prospect of war on US soil, with losses of media, transport, energy and production capacities.

Perhaps the strongest defence is that the US is made to see that it would be ejected from NATO, while Canada would remain Europe's trusted ally.

For the US to come to its senses a combination of peak oil, intensifying climate destabilization, and the discrediting of the Neo-Cons look like an appropriate recipe. Its just a matter of timing . . .

regards,

Backstop

[nero]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'H')EHEHEH...........Canada Sucks........Canadians are pussies!

[Guest]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Tyler_JC', 'E')nergy is tied into material extraction. I was trying to show that when energy use crashes, so will the amount of available raw materials.

To answer the last part, depends on where the person lives. I generally put the value of an American a lot higher than the value of say, someone living in Zaire. If we must nuke that country to save a town here, it's a worthy trade as far as I'm concerned. Another thing, when resources get tight, I'm inclined to take what I need at the expense of others. I want to, but if I have to, I will. So I put the life of someone else lower on the Value Scale than I put my own life...duh. I can't understand the people who think differently.

[Jenab]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('gnm', 'W')ell, speaking as someone who heats with wood - a typical 3-5 acre lot of forest can provide enough wood to heat a home indefinitely. Now scaling that up to tens of millions might become a problem. But seriously, there is enough leftover steel in cars to run an iron age forever. I doubt very much it would even come to that...

[Jenab]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Anonymous', 'W')hat's funny is our leaders think that about you, dear peasent. The American royal families (Bush, Kerry, etc) you the same way the Saudi Royal family see its citizens. Expandable . . .

[Jenab]

I accidentally hit the post button before I was finished editing!

We really should be able to edit our posts in these forums.

Anyway, the moral error that Tyler noticed, about which the guest was mistaken, is not its dual nature. Those are natural.

The moral error is, rather, the fact that Americans permitted their own tribal morality to be undermined and circumvented by a clever group of oursiders who made its exercise impolitic through years of psychological conditioning conveyed by the mass media, especially television. That's what let them sneak up on us.

That's why we not only can't trust our government now, we can pretty much assume that it will betray us, tax us without compensation, and attack us whenever it serves their purpose. The US government will increasingly often treat Americans as enemies because the US government has been increasingly taken over by the enemies of Americans.

The enemy did not err. They calculated accurately, planned brilliantly, and carried off a well-coordinated attack on us that involved misdirection, inducements to vice, redistributions of wealth, mass-brainwashing, a money system designed to enslave us, and many other tricks.

We erred in letting this happen.

Jerry Abbott

[BastardSquad]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Jenab', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('gnm', 'W')ell, speaking as someone who heats with wood - a typical 3-5 acre lot of forest can provide enough wood to heat a home indefinitely. Now scaling that up to tens of millions might become a problem. But seriously, there is enough leftover steel in cars to run an iron age forever. I doubt very much it would even come to that...