[julianj]

Here's a good article I just found.

Written in an engaging style it shows how many things are made from oil products - the sort of information to direct sceptics to.

The Long Fingers of Petroleum

[airstrip1]

It is a neat article but like so many illustrations about the impact of Peak Oil it can not resist going over the top. I have tried some of these arguments on people I know in the UK and they have quite correctly pointed out that the houses they live in were built in late Victorian and Edwardian Britain long before oil products or the motor car were common place. These dwellings contain steel, plumbing and some even had rudimentary electric systems. They argue that their immediate ancestors survived without any petroleum so they think that they will be able to cope in a world of declining oil supplies. I think they are wrong but I need better arguments than this article gives me.

[deconstructionist]

and how about agriculture?? this article doesn't mention that it doesn't even matter that john's refridgerator has been reduced into a pile of metal because all of the food inside of it would be gone too...

yeah, way over the top i'd say. rising prices and decreasing production does not mean anything previously made from petrolium is going to dissapear. drawing that scenario makes this article totally useless because the scenario is alarmist bullshit. i would highly reccomend NOT showing this piece to anyone that you're trying to turn on to peak oil theory. a skeptic would dismiss this article as the unrealistic and irrelavant piece of drivel that it is. it draws light to some important information, but the delivery of this information makes it undigestable.

yes, it is important to realize the numerous ways in which our lives are dependant on petrolium products. but instead of painting the picture of it all "disappearing," why not just sort out and name of the things that would be impossible to have without cheap oil? then point out that we're consuming it faster than the world can produce it. then get into alternatives, EROEI, transportability, numerous uses, economics, etc...

[Sys1]

deconstructionist : Take this article just as an introduction to peak oil. Before speaking about supply disruption, it's better to explain what is our level's dependance to oil. Beside that, i agree that they should have spoke about food in the little story... and even the existence of John himself