[advancedatheist]

Is the World Using Up Its Resources?, by Rand Simberg.

Here is an interesting assertion from that piece:

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')he largest environmental disasters have been in countries in which unaccountable dictators made decisions about the allocation of resources (e.g., Saddam draining the marshes, the denuding of Haiti's forests, the vast environmental messes of the former Soviet Union, etc.)

[Dvanharn]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '"')What I do say is that we have some attributes (foresight being one of them) that (for example) the Easter Islanders didn't have..."

[advancedatheist]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Dvanharn', '"')What I do say is that we have some attributes (foresight being one of them) that (for example) the Easter Islanders didn't have..."

[johnmarkos]

Well, that's the sort of essay that gives cornucopians a bad name around here.

I far prefer JohnDenver. A cornucopian is a person who believes that technology and human ingenuity will resolve resource constraints (as I do, in some moods). This guy needs an anti-JohnDenver to go and refute all of his outrageous assertions, one by one.

As for the assertion that fossil fuels are renewable, that's just silly. People who talk about fossil fuels and other substances as "nonrenewable resources" don't claim that they're impossible to synthesize under any conditions or that they're nonrenewable in some universal, absolute sense. But on this planet, in the next few decades, on the massive scale required to make up for depletion? Good luck.

You don't solve problems by denying they exist.

[DriveElectric]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('johnmarkos', '
')You don't solve problems by denying they exist.

[Dvanharn]

Advancedatheist states in error that:

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'D')vanharn wrote:
"What I do say is that we have some attributes (foresight being one of them) that (for example) the Easter Islanders didn't have..."

[Sys1]

"For instance, most people consider solar energy to be renewable, but the sun will, after all, burn out one day. Better hurry up and use it while we still can!"

Damn, he worries more about sun depletion than oil one
He is totally insane.

[linlithgowoil]

i dont get why people totally discount the idea that we'll come up with a solution. why? we've come up with a solution every single time in the past, why not now? just because we dont have the answer at this precise moment, doesn't mean the answer isnt there ready to be discovered.

i think the problem with pessimists is the type of attitude that goes along with pessimism. If these type of people were in charge of everything, we'd still be huddling in caves saying 'we can't venture outside - something bad will happen'. Pessimists also fail to realise the absurdity of their position - the comforts of life that they enjoy were all developed by 'optimists' and human ingenuity. So - you guys have no faith in the very thing that is keeping you alive...?

I would hate to have had any of you in charge of Britain during the early stages of WWII - you'd have given the keys to Britain to Hitler because you would have thought there was no hope of winning - and yet, with the odds stacked massively against us, we prevailed. History teaches us great lessons.

[Sys1]

linlithgowoil : Sure, there's a solution : Abandon capitalism. As long as society believes in growth, we can't be anything but pessimistic. Now, you can consider that we'll find alternative to oil, gaz... and WATER, but then you are crazy !!!

BTW, 1929 crisis leaded to WW2. This was the "solution".

[Doly]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('linlithgowoil', '
')I would hate to have had any of you in charge of Britain during the early stages of WWII - you'd have given the keys to Britain to Hitler because you would have thought there was no hope of winning - and yet, with the odds stacked massively against us, we prevailed. History teaches us great lessons.

[peaknik]

Quote from a "convince sheet" we are just composing at Crisis Energética:

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'S')o called "pessimists" just can be wrong in a way: bringing forward some years what sooner or later must be an ineludibly necessity. Optimists, on the contrary, have a much bigger responsibility: if they are wrong, we'll have lost a precious and irrecoverable time.

[johnmarkos]

The chief distinction here isn't between optimists and pessimists, is it? Rather, it is between determinists and those who believe we can actually affect things.

Deterministic optimist says, "Everything is going to be fine. I'll just sit back and watch TV.

Free will optimist says, "Everything is going to be fine if we take the proper actions. I believe we have the strength of character to do so."

Deterministic pessimist says, "Everything is going to be dismal. I'll just stock my bunker and stay out of trouble."

Free will pessimist says, "We have some major problems here and if we don't rouse ourselves to action, we're going to be in big trouble. I doubt we have the strength of character to do so."

I suspect that these distinctions have more to do with personal energy level and disposition than with actual ideology. Although I acknowledge that we have some serious problems, I happen to be a generally happy person who is easily motivated (natural free will optimist). Sorry, I just can't help myself.

[linlithgowoil]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'l')inlithgowoil : Sure, there's a solution : Abandon capitalism. As long as society believes in growth, we can't be anything but pessimistic. Now, you can consider that we'll find alternative to oil, gaz... and WATER, but then you are crazy !!!

[Sys1]

Pessimistic are the only people able to change the world. Optimistic believes that God will come down to help them. At least, i admit they are happy until death

"Growth, though, does not have to mean disaster - we can have controlled development and we certainly should. We cant just decided one day - 'Thats it - no more growth for us..'. Why? Because what about all those people who are starving and have no shelter - they need to be helped - so we need to assist them with development."

Actually, as Earth is not infinite, exponential growth in itself means disaster. Moreover, things won't be about choosing growth or abandon it : Nature has already chosen. We'll have to adapt to this very new situation, and i bet it won't be easy.

[Wildwell]

I’m not sure which is more bizarre: The view that this unknown technology will somehow be figured out and will save us. Such is the belief, that everything should be based on this blind faith.

Or the belief that everything should return to the pre industrial revolution stage, because on some date in the not too distant future complete and utter breakdown will occur and there will be no fixes.

Of course a lot of these things are psychological. The limit of technology is us and our ability to understand, use and invent it. Who has friends and relatives that cannot program video recorders, work mobile phones and use computers now? The answer is most of us. In a recent study, it was revealed that most people did not understand ‘Geek speak’. If many people cannot grasp technology now, what is our ultimate hope?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/4413155.stm

Energy is the next big question.

Is much of this blind faith in technology because of sci-fi books? I’m sure many people get their inspiration from books that describe many impracticable technologies, simply because they sound like a good idea. Flying cars might sound like the ultimate in flexibility and convenience. On the surface a ‘natural progression’, but does anyone really think such a thing is practical or desirable? Think of privacy, terrorist risk, the limits of space, the energy required…that’s just the beginning. On a base level just how is someone that can hardly operate 1970s technology like VCRs be expected to fly mach 2 to the local store?

Scientists agree, most of the big ideas have already been figured out. There are many debates over time travel and technologies like anti-gravity – The latter would defeat the known laws of physics. The former has this awful paradox, the so-called grandfather problem. Yet the debate still goes on – because these ideas are a faith, similar to religion and in the wrong hands just as dangerous.

Have the Geeks: The programmers, economists and accountants taken over?

Will people fall out of love with technology, a sort of new Luddism? There are already signs this is happening with the rejection of GM food, cloning and even nanotech. Technologies other big limit is fear – something else sci-fi writers never take into account. Comparisons with people’s early fear of magnetism are not valid. Once you threaten people’s very way of life and reduce their existence to a bundle of genes ripe for manipulation, the result is outright rejection. People still control the political, safety and societal basis in which we live and operate.

At the other end of the scale is the romanticism of the pre-industrialists. Maybe it is because of readings of the works of George Eliot and JRR Tolkien? Who knows! Although the green side of the story is often put over as a group of ‘Tree hungers’, when really to debate is about practical limits and man’s manipulation of nature.

Eventually each side will get used to the idea of *practical* techno-fixes, because that’s what comes about in the end although mistakes are made.

The debate about right and left is just irrelevant. Montiquest makes some excellent points about this in his book ‘Madmen at the helm’. Essentially the issue is about collectivism or individualism. Again the question must be, is there anyone that seriously believes markets and individuals have all the answers or a complete top-down command and control structure is better, because the people that rise the top are the allegedly the brighter ones? Again we’re back at blind faith, not reality.

[killJOY]

linlithwhatever

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'i') dont get why people totally discount the idea that we'll come up with a solution. why? we've come up with a solution every single time in the past, why not now? just because we dont have the answer at this precise moment, doesn't mean the answer isnt there ready to be discovered.

[linlithgowoil]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'P')essimistic are the only people able to change the world. Optimistic believes that God will come down to help them. At least, i admit they are happy until death

[linlithgowoil]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'H')ow about publishing some data rather than your usual prayer sessions?

[Doly]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('linlithgowoil', 'S')cientific knowledge is very limited and progresses in fits and starts - with no way of knowing when these fits and starts will happen.

[shortonoil]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'M')y church tells us not to get too attached to earthly things because they are but temporary and will never bring true happiness - who can disagree with this?