Perpetual economic growth

[lovett]

No, it's impossible to "go back" really, the future will have many of the problems of the past, combined w/ new problems we have created for ourselves since then.

This boils down to, then, that humanity won't invent a new supply of energy because 'it's different this time'?

Of course, every large challenge humanity has faced (and solved) has been different. What makes finite oil supplies so radically different that humanity cannot overcome it?

 

[Mulholland]

I'm getting off on a tangent, the moral is that we should strive to be more independent as a nation. Not isolationist but not so vulnerable to global fluctuations & changes in mood of our trading partners. This goes for any nation.

Globalization is not necessarily a bad thing. It has helped increase the standard of living immensely in India for example. People worried that globalization would be a one way street, but now we have Indian multinationals buying western companies and funneling investment into our economies. I think that brilliant honestly, it will help to open up new markets for us and the Indians. Plus without globalization the Indians wouldn't have access today to the 2000 dollar car.

 

[JohnRM]

How in fact do you know John, that we won't have alternatives. When exactly is this crunch? When? 5 years? 10 years? You don't think its possible for something to be invented or perfected in the meantime? Peak oil just means peak of world production. Nothing else.

The crunch is now, but it will get progressively worse until we find that alternative. At the moment, there are no other sources of energy that can replace petroleum at the moment and even forgetting that fact, how long after we develop one will it take to build the infrastructure it would take to utilize this energy?

What makes these alternatives more expensive anyways? Lack of R&D? Well that's being solved by the high price of oil

So far, the price of a barrel of oil is far outpacing any cuts in the price of the alternatives. What makes the alternatives more expensive, as opposed to oil is that these alternatives have to be manufactured. They don't just exist in the ground somewhere ready to be refined.

The reason why we're having the debate on oil and alternatives is because the price of oil went up because Bush destabilized the Middle East. My goodness you should be thanking the man for that, if you're worried about a world without oil, because if we hadn't have been doing what we did, how long would it have gone before we talked about alternatives...

You are being terribly naive if you really think the War in Iraq is the cause of the higher oil prices. All that I can tell you is that it is the case that demand has risen and is beginning to outpace supply. Production will not increase and soon enough supply will decrease, if it has not already. If you disagree, well then there is nothing that I can do for you.

Yes, I'm being silly, but I find it highly amusing that you, John, can state with certainty where the technological progress of mankind will be and that it won't be enough.

That sounds like arrogance to me. Of course, you yourself have done just that, assuming that we will find an alternative, or that we already have. I am not saying that we will never find an alternative, but I am almost certain that we won't find one and utilize it before the diminishing petroleum production begins to cause us some significant or serious problems. I also highly doubt that our newfound energy source will be as cheap and effective as oil, but I suppose I might be wrong. I guess we'll see.

What we do know is everything that has come before. Each and every time a major challenge to our survival has occured...mankind somehow found a way.

And you cannot believe that we could ever fail.

 

[El Koeno]

John HSOG: I'm willing to concede that the end of oil might produce a temporary setback. But the point of perpetual economic growth as meant here isn't that the economy should grow every single year. As soon as we adapt to a new way of managing energy, the pace will pick up once more. Yes Rome fell, as did other empires, but new ones stood up every single time, and you have done nothing to proof that it will be different this time.

The transition to other energy sources might be very painful, or not, who knows? The point is that in two hundred years we will have completely forgotten oil. The fact that you and I do not know how we will solve this problem does not mean that there is no solution.

 

[JohnRM]

John HSOG: I'm willing to concede that the end of oil might produce a temporary setback. But the point of perpetual economic growth as meant here isn't that the economy should grow every single year. As soon as we adapt to a new way of managing energy, the pace will pick up once more. Yes Rome fell, as did other empires, but new ones stood up every single time, and you have done nothing to proof that it will be different this time.

The transition to other energy sources might be very painful, or not, who knows? The point is that in two hundred years we will have completely forgotten oil. The fact that you and I do not know how we will solve this problem does not mean that there is no solution.

Is your argument truly that since that because a specific event has never occured before that it will never occur? Because there has always been an empire to replace the fallen empire that there always will be? Is there never a first for anything? That is not much of an argument. "Things have always been this way, so they will always be this way."

There is simply only so much that we can do in a finite world with a finite amount of resources. I don't know how anyone could possibly argue otherwise.

 

[El Koeno]

There is simply only so much that we can do in a finite world with a finite amount of resources. I don't know how anyone could possibly argue otherwise.

No. There is a limit on how many resources we can extract. If there is a limit on what we can do with it, we can not know.

 

[C~G]

Is your argument truly that since that because a specific event has never occured before that it will never occur? Because there has always been an empire to replace the fallen empire that there always will be? Is there never a first for anything? That is not much of an argument. "Things have always been this way, so they will always be this way."

Let it go John, let it go.

It is just the illusion of perpetual progression that makes quite plenty of people to believe it is so.

It's very unfortunate of course it if makes people unable to react to things that might actually affect that state and make their illusion to come down like a bird shot out from the sky. They never saw the train coming even though it was the only light they saw on the end of the tunnel.