If you feel like yelling at your computer screen for five straight minutes you should check out Peter Huber and John Stossel jerking each other off in 20/20's latest don't-worry-be-happy piece:
Myths, Lies, and blah blah blah
It's still quite some one-sided misinformative tripe ABC manages to come up with.
I love when Huber calls the solar system a "finite resource"!
He says solar energy will one day run out but no one's worried about that. Perhaps that's because it's an inevitability no one can change, while massive social chaos due to oil depletion is (or was, actually) something preventable.
At one point Stossel actually trips him up (however unintentionally) by asking, "what then?" after we've used up the "100 years world supply" (itself a highly deceptive figure) of Alberta's tar sands. Huber guffaws and stammers for a second and then basically says, "look, I don't know what the future will bring." But his future MUST consist of whizz-jets and McNuggets. No way in hell our technology won't carry us forever. And if not, well, our great-grandchildren will have to deal with it, not me, so why should I give a damn? Is this not the same line of thinking that got us into all these intractable situations in the first place?
PeakOil is You
John Stossel's at it again...
John Stossel's at it again...
by jeezlouise » Sat 13 May 2006, 11:37:29
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jeezlouise - Lignite
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Re: John Stossel's at it again...
by dub_scratch » Sat 13 May 2006, 13:09:05
Peter Huber & John Stossel erect the ultimate depletionist strawman argument: the world is about to run completely out of the last drops of petroleum. And then they rely on this claim to knock down Mr Strawman:
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')he tar sands of Alberta have enough hydrocarbon energy to fuel the world for 100 years
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')he tar sands of Alberta have enough hydrocarbon energy to fuel the world for 100 years
That 100 year of tar oil a gross over estimation of the source (or down right lie). If the world were to rely on tar for 100% of todays oil consumption on Canadian tar, the size of that source would have to be 3.1 trillion barrels. Where is the evidence of that? Not only are they going beyond the recovery factor to claim 100% of the source being extracted, but they are passing disinformation on the size of that source. Why don't they claim that the Saudi oil source is 3 trillion and that we will be able to get 100% of that? It would be just as big of a lie.
The show is called Myths, Lies and downright stupidity after all.
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Re: John Stossel's at it again...
by FoxV » Sat 13 May 2006, 13:44:58
Yup, they took the whole premiss of our arguement and made it the whole point of their arguement.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'W')e're not running out of oil, we're only running out of cheap oil
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'W')e're not running out of oil, we're only running out of cheap oil
Then they carry on with no discussion about the implictions that the end of cheap oil will have for the world
Isn't it a classic debating tactic, to take your opponents arguements and use them to defend your own points.
One of the reason why people say we are running out of oil (which has been true since they day we first pumped it) is that its an easy statement to understand.
if we just say "we are running out of cheap oil" people will say "so, I'll pay more", end of discussion.
I think one of the big problems about the whole Peak oil debate is that it is so compicated, that you cannot actually tell people about it. They have to find out the information on their own (things like how will we produce 1 Trillion barrels of oil from Alberta, which is only a 30 year supply, not 100, while we are running out of Natural Gas and water).
Angry yet?
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Re: John Stossel's at it again...
by arretium » Sat 13 May 2006, 14:49:07
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'I') love when Huber calls the solar system a "finite resource"!
He says solar energy will one day run out but no one's worried about that. Perhaps that's because it's an inevitability no one can change, while massive social chaos due to oil depletion is (or was, actually) something preventable.
He says solar energy will one day run out but no one's worried about that. Perhaps that's because it's an inevitability no one can change, while massive social chaos due to oil depletion is (or was, actually) something preventable.
Technically, he's right. The sun will in about 4 billion years expire and stop producing solar energy. The sun is a finite resource, it's just the expiration date of the sun is so far out there that it seems futile to consider solar energy from the sun as a finite resource.
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Re: John Stossel's at it again...
by jeezlouise » Sat 13 May 2006, 15:56:39
yeah but Huber is drawing a parallel between the sun and the oil in the ground, which are two completely different things. Oil is a helluva lot more finite than solar energy. Anyway, from what I hear, the sun will first expand into a "red giant" and swallow up everything out to Mars' orbit before it collapses and dies. It's just that it's more than a little disingenuous to compare the two.
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Re: John Stossel's at it again...
by dub_scratch » Sat 13 May 2006, 18:12:48
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('FoxV', 'Y')up, they took the whole premiss of our argument and made it the whole point of their argument.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'W')e're not running out of oil, we're only running out of cheap oil
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'W')e're not running out of oil, we're only running out of cheap oil
Then they carry on with no discussion about the implications that the end of cheap oil will have for the world
John Stossel had as one of his myths the idea that suburban sprawl is bad. But being that cheap oil is the lifeblood of mass suburban sprawl, how willing is he to draw the conclusion that the end of cheap oil is the end of sprawl and the impoverishment of the previous investment behind it?
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'I')sn't it a classic debating tactic, to take your opponents arguments and use them to defend your own points.
One of the reason why people say we are running out of oil (which has been true since they day we first pumped it) is that its an easy statement to understand.
if we just say "we are running out of cheap oil" people will say "so, I'll pay more", end of discussion.
Great point. The cornucopian klan rely on a simplistic & extreme criteria for oil depletion (i.e. when will we completely exhaust the very last drop of oil on the planet). IMO, they do this to order to distract from the more real, more complex issues. This tells me that it is because they have nothing but faith in technology and do not have evidence to adequately refute the Limits camp. Huber's Bottomless Well book has no reference to oil peak or the Hubert's peak at all. If they had concrete evidence instead of weak assertions and fallacious arguments I'm sure they would hit the Peak Oil issue head on. But instead they do the "we are not completely running out" song and dance in the hope to end the discussion.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
')I think one of the big problems about the whole Peak oil debate is that it is so compicated, that you cannot actually tell people about it. They have to find out the information on their own (things like how will we produce 1 Trillion barrels of oil from Alberta, which is only a 30 year supply, not 100, while we are running out of Natural Gas and water).
Of the 1 trillion (not 3 trillion!!!), how much can be extracted? How fast can it be brought on line? What is the maximum daily production we can possibly see? What is the net energy of this oil? How much natural gas will it take? Is there enough? How much water will have to be contaminated? What are the environmental consequences? What are the C02 emissions?..... Yes, the issues behind tar sand oil is far more complex than whether or not there is a lot of it. Talk is cheap.
