$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('rwwff', 'I') see that we are simply saying the same thing back and forth, though I think you are missing the point that I think your idea of how things ultimately will fall out is 95% likely to be the way it ends up. Mostly because, as I mentioned, I doubt fusion works on any scale smaller than a star, and I think true geothermal may be beyond the reach of engineering on any scale shorter than a thousand years.
On the other hand, I can't completely discount the possibility that fusion might work. I also can not ignore the fact that the leadership and actions of about 3 billion people have decided to "go for broke", they will either achieve fusion, or take the current biosphere down into a putrid, sooty, carbon swollen hell. There isn't any middle ground, the decision has been made. Right or wrong, its done.
So far, your arguments have demonstrated why you believe that to have been the wrong decision. However, nothing in your arguments have demonstrated anything to rebut the proposition that the decision has already been made to go "all in".
PeakOil is You
Energy and the Mother of Invention
Re: Energy and the Mother of Invention
by MonteQuest » Sat 10 Jun 2006, 21:39:06
And I wasn't trying to rebutt that proposition. All was was saying was that there just may not be the energy to go "all in". Even if we could develop fusion, it would take decades to develop and distribute it.
I'm talking about ramping up solar, wind, geothermal, etc. The current batch of renewable technologies that could be brought to bear on the energy problem.
Look at it this way: Peak oil will cause us to reduce consumption to meet supply. That is a given.
Let's say we lose 5% instead of being able to add 3%.
That makes for a 8% shortfall. A decline plus an inability to increase it.
So, now we have only 92% of the energy we demand.
Out of that 92% you must take 3% for growth to service the debt and create new jobs, clothe house and feed the newcomers.
Now you have 89%. We must make an 11% cut in economic/energy activity in order to match supply, which results in job loss and business failures.
Now you must re-employ those displaced workers whose jobs were cut due to conservation measures to cut demand on "useless occupations" and superfluous energy consumption taking it from the only remaining source of energy.
Now you have 78%, using 11% to replace the jobs with productive employment and useful purchases.
But now you have cut 11% from the economy again (no where else to get the energy), so you create more job losses and business failures. In other words, it matters not what their occupation is, it requires energy.
When you speak of the market making corrections, yes, this is true, but in the past when the market was making corrections there was an overall net increase in energy consumption as products and occupations were phased out and replaced, not a decline.
"Only with growth do all plants get watered."
Meanwhile, you are trying to wage resource wars and ramp up alternatives energies, taking more from the 78%, causing more job loss and business failures.
Some where, sometime, this loss must be absorbed as a reduction in living standards.
Bottom-line, you cannot grow in a declining energy base. All you can do is lower the standard of living and reduce per capita consumption to free up energy for any kind of necessary expansion.
When you stop to think of the scale of the problem to replace fossil fuels with alternatives, this will take trillions of dollars and terawatts of energy to bring to fruition.
I keep asking where the energy will come from. I'll tell you , from the only place where you can find an abundant supply of fossil fuel energy---The American Standard of Living. Which, by the way , "Is not negotiable."
A Saudi saying, "My father rode a camel. I drive a car. My son flies a jet-plane. His son will ride a camel."
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MonteQuest - Expert
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Re: Energy and the Mother of Invention
by rwwff » Sat 10 Jun 2006, 23:50:53
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MonteQuest', '
')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
')So far, your arguments have demonstrated why you believe that to have been the wrong decision. However, nothing in your arguments have demonstrated anything to rebut the proposition that the decision has already been made to go "all in".
')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
')So far, your arguments have demonstrated why you believe that to have been the wrong decision. However, nothing in your arguments have demonstrated anything to rebut the proposition that the decision has already been made to go "all in".
And I wasn't trying to rebutt that proposition. All was was saying was that there just may not be the energy to go "all in". Even if we could develop fusion, it would take decades to develop and distribute it.
Then all we are disagreeing about is what all-in means. Even a man with only a penny left to his name can go all in. It just means his wager is just that single penny. In our case as a global organism, we have the lifeblood of 6 billion humans and a few billion other medium and large animals that we can wager. And the wager has been placed.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'S')o, now we have only 92% of the energy we demand.
Change to, "now we have only 92% of the energy we currently demand." Then I'd have absolutely no objection to the statement. "we would otherwise demand" would be ok, but is a bit fuzzy. "we demand" is fuzzy beyond all ability to calculate.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
')Bottom-line, you cannot grow in a declining energy base. All you can do is lower the standard of living and reduce per capita consumption to free up energy for any kind of necessary expansion.
I think thats exactly what I was saying, though I phrase it differently in terms of the price / demand curve.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
')I keep asking where the energy will come from. I'll tell you , from the only place where you can find an abundant supply of fossil fuel energy---The American Standard of Living. Which, by the way , "Is not negotiable."
Why do you people keep listening to what dribbels out of the mouths of politicians. The actions of politicians are the only thing worth any attention at all; and the actions of all the politicians tell us that the current US Standard of living is known to be out of whack and they are deseperately hunting for any and every possible way to lower it gently towards something more closely resembling that of our competitors. No Japanese middle class family drives 20,000 miles per year. No Japanese middle class family lives in a 2500 sq ft house. No Japanese middle class family eats 400 pounds of beef a year. Yet we do all that without a thought. And the Japanese are perhaps the only competitor of ours that even remotely resembles our standard of living; most of the rest are way, way below us.
Politicians are not stupid. They know that they can not speek the truth about the situation and still get elected. They also know that people care most about the show, not the votes and signatures. Show up on TV, scream loud and long about the injuries suffered by American workers at the hands of global corporations; then turn around and place votes and contracts that utilize those same global corporations to move money and tasks around in order to reduce the imbalances in the system. The job of these politicians is to serve us, not necessarily blindly obey; a gentle drop over a few years might make a few people nautious, but we'll still all eat silly amounts of food, watch TV, and more or less remain comfortable. If they drop the ball, by obeying, and there is a struggle upwards, the crash that follows will be unmistakeable and very uncomfortable. At which point we'll fire them for having obeyed us; we'll replace them with folks that can remember how to lie convincingly while doing what needs to be done to make sure we aren't hungry tomorrow.
So, to put it bluntly, of course the American standard of living is totally negotiable; it always has been, is now, and for as long as congress meets, will continue to be.
