[ohanian]

For those of you who is wondering when the "tipping point" would occur?

It shall occur when Runaway Global Warming kicks in.

The exact date for that is 21st December 2012


After that date, Katun 2-Ahau kicks in with:

For half of the people there shall be food, for the other half disasters. This 20 year period brings the end of the "word of God". It is a time of uniting for a cause.

The Maya believed that the world shall be reborn, in a sense 're-created,' in the year we call 2012. All the values and assumptions of the previous World Age shall expire, and a new phase of human civilization shall commence. It will be a new kind of world. By the way, don't expect anything exciting to happen on 21st December 2012, it would be just another day, just like 1st January 2001 is just another day.

[turmoil]

Right now about 75 million people are added to the globe annually. Let's see what happens when that many are lost annually (swapping the birth and death rates). How long would it take to reduce the global population to 2 billion?

Turns out it's less than one might expect: 60 years (all things being equal).

$this->bbcode_second_pass_code('', '
year cumulative loss
1 75
2 150
3 225
4 300
5 375
6 450
7 525
8 600
9 675
10 750
11 825
12 900
13 975
14 1050
15 1125
16 1200
17 1275
18 1350
19 1425
20 1500
21 1575
22 1650
23 1725
24 1800
25 1875
26 1950
27 2025
28 2100
29 2175
30 2250
31 2325
32 2400
33 2475
34 2550
35 2625
36 2700
37 2775
38 2850
39 2925
40 3000
41 3075
42 3150
43 3225
44 3300
45 3375
46 3450
47 3525
48 3600
49 3675
50 3750
51 3825
52 3900
53 3975
54 4050
55 4125
56 4200
57 4275
58 4350
59 4425
60 4500
')

[dohboi]

gg3, I'll see your doom and raise you by a factor of 10. Now I'm the biggest doomer.

But seriously, folks. EU and others are right that there is no rational reason to expect that we will avoid die off... And Bas rightly points out that therefore the only kind of hope we can salvage, unfortunately, is the realization that our rationality can be wrong for a variety of reasons. This I find a rather wan, weak kind of "hope," but it's really all we've got. As EU pointed out elsewhere, saying that die off, like anything else, can not be predictied with 100% absolute certainty is only very reassuring to those desperate to be reassured. But that includes many. I still think the bravest approach is to do the right thing even though there is no very real hope of anything remotely resembling a positive outcome.

Thanks for the Lincoln quote to that effect: "The probability of failure ought not deter us from the support of a cause we deem to be just."

[Kylon]

I think y'alls arguement against Bas and Bas's arguement against the rest of y'all is pointless. Y'alls main arguement is about semantics, not about the general point that he's trying to make.

While Bas shouldn't have called y'all unimaginative. But I understand the frustration he has. I personally think there are a lot of things that could easily be done which would actually make our civilization money, but involve too much thinking on the part of politicians and mess with too many politics.

It's not that things can't be done, it's that things won't be done.

I think we can all agree on one thing here, we're all doomed.

Let's focus on our commonalities. There are too few of us as it is.

[DefiledEngine]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
')So you haven't learned anything, EU?


Or is everyone less intelligent than you are?

[Revi]

I happen to feel that my little portion of the planet isn't beyond hope. I tend my trees, recycle my trash and use half the fossil fuels we used to use. It may all be beyond hope, but I refuse to give up.

It seems to be one of the things that gives my life meaning.

It's never too late to do the right thing, and it's fun.

[Ludi]

What you seem to be saying Revi, is that you would be living the way you are now no matter what, not only is it the "right thing to do" but you enjoy it.


Same here with my small efforts. I'd be doing it anyway, not to "save the world" or any such.

[EdwardAbbyman]

One issue I never see is that through our outrageous trade policies, we have allowed China and India to pollute at our 1950;s levels, yet no major environmental organisation is calling for these growing economies to retrofit (they have billions in profits) to our standards for pollution.

I also think we will go past tipping point, and the cascade effect will be faster, although alot of people are thinking that already.

Whatever happens, its just nature. Has Man run his course? We are still rather primitive tribal beings.

I have no regrets, I'm a product of this modern world, and nature seems to be saying that our time has come. Too many people! I cant take it anymore.

We are the parisites, and we are destroying the host! Global profit corporations are a big part of it. Add to this, as in America and Europe, who's populations have stabilized or are shrinking, the need for ENDLESS unmitigated immigration, more consumers/workers to replace the ones never born to the western world, to feed the corporate monster.

What would the 'scientific' solutions be? We would have to have a massive wealth transfer, etc....economic slow down to 25% of current production, and who is in charge?

Corporate America is a little worried, but it wont be enough.

Mother nature is pissed off. And she's pissed off at us.

[Zardoz]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('EdwardAbbyman', 'I') also think we will go past tipping point, and the cascade effect will be faster, although a lot of people are thinking that already.

[bodigami]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('DefiledEngine', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
')So you haven't learned anything, EU?


Or is everyone less intelligent than you are?

[Precipice]

Hi all,

Many a time I have read about how western Europe manages to get by on about half the oil consumption per capita as the US, and in many ways (west) Europeans generally have living standards which are slightly better than their US cousins. This curious situation has me wondering: what might the correlation be between average living standards and oil consumption per capita in a given country??

Is it possible that reducing oil consumption per capita actually improves living standards up to a point but then causes a (possibly sharp) decrease in living standards once oil becomes too scarce? Or is the relationship much more complex and context-specific (e.g. other factors play an important role such as prices of energy, prices of other goods, people's responses as informed by cultural mentality, avaliability of alternative ways of doing things, etc etc).

Essentially, what I would be interested to know is: what is the minimum level of per capita oil and/or energy consumption that would allow a person to sustain a recognizably first-world standard of living??

[wisconsin_cur]

It is a mistake, I think to make broad equations across locations. Just as one cannot expect to get the same corn yields in Sicily as Iowa once cannot automatically equate energy consumption with a living standard without taking a variety of considerations into account.

Just one example would be the distance people live away from ports. I will go out on a limb here and suggest that the average American lives farther away from a port than the average European. It takes more energy (in the form of trucks or trains) to get a foreign made I-pod to me than it does to the average European, using more energy.

There is also the question of the energy consumed to make the goods exported by any given nation or group of nations in contrast to one another. If a country exports steel I would guess that they use more energy than a nation that produces a lot of cheese or perhaps oil or maybe financial services.

So each nation is going to have its own tipping point based upon the many web of relationships and the particulars of its individual dependencies. Trying to determine what will happen when is kind of like trying to predict the moment the rain will start to fall. You can see the clouds, hear the wind but it is a waste of time to make a bet on the second the first drop will hit your head.

Best to spend that effort picking up your tools, getting in the house and getting ready for rain.

[ReducedToZero]

It seems to me to that the infrastructure and culture play a roll here. The way people get around, the pace of life, what they purchase, quantities of purchase, what they import, what they export, currency... all factors.

[skeptik]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Precipice', 'H')i all,

Many a time I have read about how western Europe manages to get by on about half the oil consumption per capita as the US, and in many ways (west) Europeans generally have living standards which are slightly better than their US cousins. This curious situation has me wondering: what might the correlation be between average living standards and oil consumption per capita in a given country??

[Olle]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Precipice', 'E')ssentially, what I would be interested to know is: what is the minimum level of per capita oil and/or energy consumption that would allow a person to sustain a recognizably first-world standard of living??

[alokin]

US-Americans - only excuses!

I guess it takes more energy to transport the ipod from China (or where ever it is made) than from the port to your home.

Yes cities are different in Europe but Europeans didn't have the possibility to plan American cities, whereas we copied American solutions after the second world war which was quite desastrous (our own fault). Have there been huge demonstrations against new motorways in the US?

It's more about habits. Why does and average US household has a clothes dryer whereas an average European does not? More of us are living in small apartments were it's diffiult to get the clothes dry.

Why do you drive bigger cars? You buy them, not your government.

Why do Americans have their meal in MCxxx and we cook mainly at home?

This post is quite nasty, and Europeans are surely not the better guys but the higher energy consumption cannot only be explained by external things.

When I was a kid in the 60th, a relative was married with an US soldier. I was really impressed how wasteful they were compared to the other households I knew.

[wisconsin_cur]

And the fact that most of Europe is warmer than it should be thanks to ocean currents, is that an "excuse" also?

Sure there is plenty for us to blame ourselves for but not everything is an excuse. Europe is well served by its long coast line and the temp. regulating nature of water. Even keeping my house cold in January, I still use a lot of BTUs, even though I drive a 47 mpg vehicle, America is a bigger place than Denmark or France and while there is more freedom of movement with the EU, Americans have had the opportunity to spread out for much longer than Europe.

Do I travel to see my grandfather or to a funeral of a family friend? Accidents of history and geography have spread us out. I maintain community with them so I travel. If a family has spread to all corners of France over the last 50 years a "get together" will not use as much energy as the same family in the United States.

So are Americans at fault for some of the problem? Sure. Is there a role of chance and happenstance as well? Yes there is.

[Precipice]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Olle', 'D')epending on what you mean by "living standards". If you use the basic GDP/capita I think only Luxembourg is better of than the US.

[wisconsin_cur]

There is also the "accident" that we were producing a lot of oil at the time that we were building our model of transportation and the infrastructure to support it. Even today we do better than Europe as far a percentage of energy use produced at home. [url=http://www.theoildrum.com/files/EU%20AND%20USA%20FF%20SELF%20SUFFICIENCY.PNG]Chart (large)[url]

So even before taxes the net loss of using energy is less since a larger percentage of that money stays at home. This will only increase because while our own production is in terminal decline I believe the North Sea fields are declining even faster.

We are responsible for (among other things) our failure to tax oil appropriately but it is an "accident" of economics and geology that we had so much to begin with and the effects of that abundance upon how we decided to organize our national transportation scheme.

[cube]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Precipice', 'H')i all,

Many a time I have read about how western Europe manages to get by on about half the oil consumption per capita as the US, and in many ways (west) Europeans generally have living standards which are slightly better than their US cousins. This curious situation has me wondering: what might the correlation be between average living standards and oil consumption per capita in a given country??