Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Chaos and carnage? This is simply melodramatic nonsense.
Ever heard of history? Like Great Depression or Great Recession and stuff? It's not just some "theorizing" on my part, it's something you should know from your experience. Technological economies (free market or planned ones) must grow continuously or significant human suffering would occur, including break down of society, revolutions, civil wars, or tripling of the food stamp programs on the milder side of the spectrum.
Free market economies are much more vulnerable, even 0% growth is a major disaster that is correlated with spikes in mortality, murders & suicides. Very melodramatic. That's why it's virtually impossible to watch TV news or hear some politician bubbling crap without hearing "growth, growth, more growth". Even "Marxist" Obama is in love with "growth". A few days back I've heard (by chance) North Carolina governor talking about recent snow storms. It's almost disgusting, but the guy was really concerned with people cutting on driving and buying less crap, and that would endanger growth and jobs. Just a few days of the decreased economic activity worry a governor. Think. How insane in that? Could you get in touch with the guy and lecture him about melodramatic nonsense?
Quote:
No. Nothing like this is tied to anything. It has been convenient in the past to model some empirical data in this way. There is no causal mechanism here. Are you mistaking correlation for causation?
All increasing per capita energy consumption not only correlates with growing GDP, GDP growth is caused by all increasing energy consumption, among other things. Otherwise, why bother with North Dakota oil, let's just cut energy consumption tenfold and see if we can maintain the same levels of GDP by trading smart phone apps, dried leaves craft, poetry, psychic services and other low energy intangibles people might want to buy.
Quote:
Again, this is simply speculative nonsense. Didn't the Mayan calendar predict something like this? And then the Y2K folks? How about Nostradamus? I remember exactly these same kinds of ideas being taken seriously during the oil embargo of the early 1970s.
What does Nostradamus, Y2K or even oil embargo has to do with a necessity to maintain and grow energy consumption in order to grow economy and to keep peace among other things? Do you have any (as in ANY) historical examples where cutting off energy supplies did increase GDP and lead to peace and tranquility?
Is oil embargo still around?
Quote:
Ah, yes. This is the key point, and here is their conceptual mistake. The authors of the cited paper, both of whom are in a semiconductor institute in Ukraine, have made exactly the same mistake that you have. The foundation of their paper is extrapolation using an exponential model.
Even if their numerical estimates are wrong, it's not a conceptual mistake, so the point of your reply is not quite clear. The concept would be the following: earth is being warmed by absorbed radiant energy, it is losing heat in various ways, a fluid heat balance defining current planetary temperature exists. Mankind releasing energy affects that heat balance, at some point mankind' contributions to planetary heat balance would become significant to affect global temperature.
You are not consistent, on one hand you claim humans are so clever at exploiting their environment, at another hand you doubt that mankind would come up with new and new ways to obtain energy. How come? Especially considering that for the past 400 years mankind kept an impressive pace of energy consumption growth.
Plotting data from the Energy Information Agency on U.S. energy use since 1650 (1635-1945, 1949-2009, including wood, biomass, fossil fuels, hydro, nuclear, etc.) shows a remarkably steady growth trajectory, characterized by an annual growth rate of 2.9%
There is a nonzero probability humans would maintain 2.9% energy growth for the next 100-200 years, there is a nonzero probability for mankind to become a significant contributor to Earth' heat balance and only then exponential growth would collapse.
Quote:
No. You continue to miss the point. Business as usual will not continue forever. Moreover, business as usual has never persisted for long.
You have faith that business as usual would morph into something far less energy intensive and damaging, if not Utopian, while dismissing collapse as a possibility business as usual might end with. That's a peculiar faith you have. Especially considering that all (like in All) economic and social control models mankind tried so far promised growth and depend(ed) on growth. For example, Communism is Soviet power plus the electrification of the whole country (Lenin). Our economy cannot exist without growth, concept of profit cannot exist without growth, banker' interest cannot be repaid without growth, our financial system cannot exist without growth, etc., etc.
Quote:
Things are always changing, and they will continue to change. The problem is that neither you nor I can predict how they will change. That's the point -- the stuff that you are mapping out will be shown to be nonsense in retrospect, just as the passing of time has shown all past doomsday scenarios to be nonsense.
Again, historically, people fought for the changes that would increase/re-destribute economic output including energy consumption.
We can predict a lot. We have 10,000 years of consistent averaged growth and environmental changes that may bite us in the butt rather sooner than later. We have 500 years of consistent industrial growth. You have no historic precedents to make claims about "change" because nothing changed since the times immemorial. Humans just follow natural "paradigm" all life forms follow. A life form grows its numbers, share of food & space until it exhausts its food supplies, or its growth is checked by predators and diseases. In a way, humans can't transcend that key paradigm of mother Nature despite being so clever. The ways nature balances itself is never pretty, but in human case it might get really ugly once we would reach the point of equilibrium of our cleverness with environment it would shape.
Last edited by RememberMee; 02-19-2014 at 12:39 AM..
The increasingly certified and educated American workforce coupled with a lack of well paying middle class jobs is going to result in a movement to make sure that good benefits are offered to lower paying jobs. I think this is going to be a big part of America's future.
The future will be decided by the generation working at the time. Better be prepared to face the world competition. Working creative and smart with minimal corruption and govt interference needed to win the competition. I worked in China and saw hard working intelligent workers making peanuts. Better be ready.
OK, I will admit that you are the first human being in history who can accurately predict the future, that projecting exponential trends out for 150 years gives meaningful information, that the multitude of people who predict different outcomes are all wrong, that civilization will end in chaos, that doomsday is just around the corner, that people will stand by with their hands in their pockets and dopey grins on their faces as all this happens, and that we are lucky to have read your work here first on the CD forum.
EDIT -- By the way, about your "paradigm," you would likely enjoy reading the work of Thomas Malthus, especially his 1798 essay on population growth
Last edited by Hamish Forbes; 02-19-2014 at 04:32 AM..
OK, I will admit that you are the first human being in history who can accurately predict the future, that projecting exponential trends out for 150 years gives meaningful information, that the multitude of people who predict different outcomes are all wrong, that civilization will end in chaos, that doomsday is just around the corner, that people will stand by with their hands in their pockets and dopey grins on their faces as all this happens, and that we are lucky to have read your work here first on the CD forum.
EDIT -- By the way, about your "paradigm," you would likely enjoy reading the work of Thomas Malthus, especially his 1798 essay on population growth
Let's psychoanalyze your blah, blah. Somebody projecting exponential trends in 1864 would have been right on, what's so different about 2014? You are not as optimistic as you would like to appear. Deep down you doubt that our cleverness could pull 150 years more of the exponential growth. Why? You proved Malthus wrong, you postulated superiority of human brain that can overcome just about anything and then, unexpectedly, this gnawing worm of doubt. Why?
Following your doubt, if not exponential growth then what? What are the alternatives? Credit driven free market capitalism cannot exist without growth. Soviet styled socialism failed because of the insufficient (for people' tastes) growth, going back to horse and buggy would mean chaos and carnage you can't imagine. What are the rosy alternatives you envision? People stand by with their hands in their pockets and dopey grins on their faces just fine, just get out of you bunker and see for yourself. The largest chunk of population denies that threats exist, how is that for dopey grins? Let me guess, you have no alternatives to all of that, NONE. You just have faith that everything would work out just fine. Maybe you should start the Church of Holy Locust then, you'd make a mighty fine supreme priest.
Last edited by RememberMee; 02-19-2014 at 07:48 AM..
The future will be decided by the generation working at the time. Better be prepared to face the world competition. Working creative and smart with minimal corruption and govt interference needed to win the competition. I worked in China and saw hard working intelligent workers making peanuts. Better be ready.
If hard working intelligent people jump of the cliff, should we follow? If my neighbor bangs his head on the wall, should I compete with him? If somebody is "willing" to work 12 hrs/day for peanuts, it's not a trivial matter for people (10,000 miles away) to accept the idea that they should compete with that, some mass conditioning is a must.
As it's, it's surreal outside, people work more and more in the jobs they like less and less to produce more crap only crippled in some ways people should want or need, the crap that's not only not needed to survive a day (or live happy), the crap that endangers both survival, health and happiness. How intensifying this absurd would make a positive difference? And lastly, how have this absurd treadmill come into being, who runs it and who benefits the most?
Last edited by RememberMee; 02-19-2014 at 07:44 AM..
I'm thinking something along the lines of a boot stomping on a human face, forever.
But, hey - nearly half the nation is okay with that so long as "somebody is making money" and the people being stomped on are not them (at least not obviously) and are ideally a member of some unpopular minority.
Let's psychoanalyze your blah, blah. Somebody projecting exponential trends in 1864 would have been right on, what's so different about 2014? You are not as optimistic as you would like to appear. Deep down you doubt that our cleverness could pull 150 years more of the exponential growth. Why? You proved Malthus wrong, you postulated superiority of human brain that can overcome just about anything and then, unexpectedly, this gnawing worm of doubt. Why?
Following your doubt, if not exponential growth then what? What are the alternatives? Credit driven free market capitalism cannot exist without growth. Soviet styled socialism failed because of the insufficient (for people' tastes) growth, going back to horse and buggy would mean chaos and carnage you can't imagine. What are the rosy alternatives you envision? People stand by with their hands in their pockets and dopey grins on their faces just fine, just get out of you bunker and see for yourself. The largest chunk of population denies that threats exist, how is that for dopey grins? Let me guess, you have no alternatives to all of that, NONE. You just have faith that everything would work out just fine. Maybe you should start the Church of Holy Locust then, you'd make a mighty fine supreme priest.
My goodness, you do seem a bit overconfident in divining what I really think about this and that.
But you keep making the classic beginner's mistake, the mark of a truly rank amateur. This concerns exponential projections.
Here are some exponential extrapolations from trends long-established by 1969: (1) vehicles will attain the speed of light by 1982, (2) immortality will be achieved by 2000, and (3) a single person will control the energy equivalent of the full output of the Sun by 1981 (see World Futures, below).
Moreover, both you and the authors of the paper you cited seem completely unaware of the use of the logistic rather than the exponential in technology forecasting. People interested in the study of the future learn about this their second day, so to speak. For a relentless application of the logistic to technology forecasting see, for example, the extensive work of C. Marchetti.
If you would like to learn something about these topics, I suggest that you begin by reading an old book titled World Futures, written by Barry Hughes and published by Johns Hopkins University Press. I have already mentioned The Art of the Long View, by Schwartz. We can discuss these matters further once you come up to speed, if you would like.
-- "It is utterly implausible that a mathematical formula should make the future known to us, and those who think it can would once have believed in witchcraft." -- Bertrand de Jouvenel, from The Art of Conjecture.
I'm thinking something along the lines of a boot stomping on a human face, forever.
But, hey - nearly half the nation is okay with that so long as "somebody is making money" and the people being stomped on are not them (at least not obviously) and are ideally a member of some unpopular minority.
Neo slavery, neo feudalism, old fashioned fascism, Nazism, concentration & labor camps, dictatorships, world wars, etc. pop up each time populations outstrip their energy and food supplies. World is a relatively peaceful place as of 2014 because of availability of cheaper energy and technologies to extract and use it. People of almost all nations concentrate their efforts on changing their environment to climb the status ladder, extract more food and stuff instead of killing each other.
There are some exceptions, of course, but overall it's peace and quiet. Whatever calamity is out there, people are fighting to jump start Western like resource and stuff extraction machines in their own countries, see Middle East revolutions, Ukraine, etc. What would happen once it becomes clear that available technologies cannot extract all increasing amounts of energy, stuff and food regardless of magic of free market and cleverness of human science, or what would happen if extraction process is interrupted by the environmental changes? It's a big question, but it will not be Pollyanna in either case. So let's just believe it would never happen .
Just pay attention at American ideological scene. Vilifying the poor and those currently not employed is as American as an apple pie, it's a small step from there to denying excessive labor supply their right for life, freedom, etc. Anglo Saxon West has proud tradition of anti-vagrancy laws, work houses, chain gangs, gallows and other means to contain excessive (with respect to the pecking order, food and energy supplies) human mass. Of course, we transcended that , but you better not to live in the times bad enough to test your belief.
If hard working intelligent people jump of the cliff, should we follow? If my neighbor bangs his head on the wall, should I compete with him? If somebody is "willing" to work 12 hrs/day for peanuts, it's not a trivial matter for people (10,000 miles away) to accept the idea that they should compete with that, some mass conditioning is a must.
As it's, it's surreal outside, people work more and more in the jobs they like less and less to produce more crap only crippled in some ways people should want or need, the crap that's not only not needed to survive a day (or live happy), the crap that endangers both survival, health and happiness. How intensifying this absurd would make a positive difference? And lastly, how have this absurd treadmill come into being, who runs it and who benefits the most?
Yeah philosophically I agree, having just gotten off the working 12 hour a day routine myself...but it was certainly not for peanuts. The reality of life is that we live in a competitive world where we compete for material goods, mates, security, fun, etc. Because I have been successful in the world view, I can take some time off the wheel but unfortunately my kids and our kids now are in that competitive world.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
