by wisconsin_cur » Tue 26 Feb 2008, 04:22:06
I am forever amazed at out ability to confuse short-term mitigation of a problem with an actual solution. Most recently in the Lake Lanier thread I read:
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('EnergyUnlimited', 'S')o on Oct 14th 2007, when this thread was started there was 3 months of water left.
Now 4.5 months are gone and we have still 3 months of water left (if not more).
Looks like nothing to worry about
The
is an attempt to poke fun at the idea that 4.5 months ago there was three months left according to current dynamics at the time. That those dynamics were changed enough to stave off the problem during the time of the year when the least amount of strain on the system is taken as proof that there is not a problem or, at the very least, that those who think that there is a problem should be shamed into silence.
The same rhetorical act is repeated often and I only blame those who use it, when they use it. It is like mistaking chemo-therapy for a cure to cancer or prozac for a cure to depression.
I have no doubt that there are plenty of short-term steps we can take to postpone the worst effects of peak oil but those mitigations come at a cost. Communities down stream of Lake Lanier are suffering from the reduced rates of flow that, in part, furnished this reprieve. We can avoid die-off here by many tactics of lesser or greater moral foundation, but there will be a cost.
If we confuse short-term mitigation with long-term solutions then we run the risk of never making the hard choices that need to be made in order to find solutions. If we do not come to a solution than mother nature will.
