Like the illusion of Wall Street, with its vast and powerful investment banks, now shuttered, China too is an illusion perpetuated by the Globalists that gave us the 15,000 mile Caesar salad, poisoned cat food and lead based paint on babies' pacifiers. Like the illusion that money would come from thin air to always push housing prices higher, China has spent a generation pursuing its illusion. Pursuing an unattainable dream to be like the West, while 6000 years of its carefully shepherded top soil blows into the sea.
Joined: May 26, 2008 Posts: 1190 Location: Chicago, IL
Posted: Mon Aug 18, 2008 11:53 am Post subject: Re: Tackling the Cornucopians
Nicholai wrote:
How do you sell "population reduction" to the West? In an age when the political will is in the hands of the Baby Boomers, a platform of "trimming the heard" will not be well received.
Hi, Nick. Indeed, a very tough sale, but if you will, that's the beauty about overshooting; it sells itself. One day, 50, 100, 200 years from today, the folks living then will hit a brick wall and the population will be reduced one way or the other.
Nicholai wrote:
...it just seems obvious to me that a reduction in consumption is both easier to implement and easier for the general public to stomach...
Not really. How many people do you know that have willingly downsized? Did you participate in the "How many children do you have thread?" Did you see that a whopping 60% of people have 1 or 0 child?
Joined: Jun 15, 2007 Posts: 594 Location: St.Albert, AB
Posted: Mon Aug 18, 2008 2:21 pm Post subject: Re: Tackling the Cornucopians
VMarcHart wrote:
Not really. How many people do you know that have willingly downsized? Did you participate in the "How many children do you have thread?" Did you see that a whopping 60% of people have 1 or 0 child?
To use the peak oil forum as a statistic for the general public is ludicrous.
VmarcHart wrote:
One day, 50, 100, 200 years from today, the folks living then will hit a brick wall and the population will be reduced one way or the other.
50...100..200 years? When our ability to produce phantom carrying capacity (total liquid production) peaks, THAT is when the population problem REALLY becomes apparent. This isn't 50 years away, this issue is 5-10 years away. How long did it take for the shelves to empty in Barcelona during the trucker strikes?
Posted: Mon Aug 18, 2008 4:15 pm Post subject: Re: Tackling the Cornucopians
Nicholai wrote:
VMarcHart wrote:
Not really. How many people do you know that have willingly downsized? Did you participate in the "How many children do you have thread?" Did you see that a whopping 60% of people have 1 or 0 child?
To use the peak oil forum as a statistic for the general public is ludicrous.
VmarcHart wrote:
One day, 50, 100, 200 years from today, the folks living then will hit a brick wall and the population will be reduced one way or the other.
50...100..200 years? When our ability to produce phantom carrying capacity (total liquid production) peaks, THAT is when the population problem REALLY becomes apparent. This isn't 50 years away, this issue is 5-10 years away. How long did it take for the shelves to empty in Barcelona during the trucker strikes?
So you think we're facing global population decline by when? 2020 and the population will be lower than today? Really?
Joined: Jun 15, 2007 Posts: 594 Location: St.Albert, AB
Posted: Mon Aug 18, 2008 4:50 pm Post subject: Re: Tackling the Cornucopians
Dezakin wrote:
Nicholai wrote:
VMarcHart wrote:
Not really. How many people do you know that have willingly downsized? Did you participate in the "How many children do you have thread?" Did you see that a whopping 60% of people have 1 or 0 child?
To use the peak oil forum as a statistic for the general public is ludicrous.
VmarcHart wrote:
One day, 50, 100, 200 years from today, the folks living then will hit a brick wall and the population will be reduced one way or the other.
50...100..200 years? When our ability to produce phantom carrying capacity (total liquid production) peaks, THAT is when the population problem REALLY becomes apparent. This isn't 50 years away, this issue is 5-10 years away. How long did it take for the shelves to empty in Barcelona during the trucker strikes?
So you think we're facing global population decline by when? 2020 and the population will be lower than today? Really?
World Energy Consumption
It all depends on our ability to draw down on finite reserves of oil and natural gas. Why do you think these two graphs are so similar? Without this ghost acreage, Liebig's law would have limited our growth long ago. It is this constant and ever-increasing supply of ghost acreage that keeps us afloat. If we peak in oil supply, and begin the slippery slide, our population will continue to grow, only to be hit by limited supplies of fertilizer, petrol, labour disruptions etc. long before any progress on population reduction can take place.
It is important to remember that all organisms overshoot their environment, but they're provided with checks and balances; some will die of starvation, some will die from predation etc. We do not have these checks and balances in a time of industrial medicine etc. all provided by the drawing down of ghost acreage. Once this slows down, we'll find ourselves in a very precarious situation. As you can see by the quote on your left hand side, most suspect a peaking in oil supply with 10-20 years. Tick tock, tick tock. Time is of the essence.
Posted: Mon Aug 18, 2008 5:08 pm Post subject: Re: Tackling the Cornucopians
Quote:
So you think we're facing global population decline by when? 2020 and the population will be lower than today? Really?
Current growth rate is 77 million/annum. In order to get to population reduction you need to explain 77 million deaths a year.
With an estimated 800 million people close to starvation already that does not strike me as very far fetched.
Ever heard of the great famine in Ireland. Popular story is that the potato harvest failed and a lot (~3 million people) died as a result. That is only part of it. Truth is that the harvests failed in most of Europe. Ireland was particularly hard hit because the richer countries forced poor Ireland to make up the shortages there.
The moral of this story is that any shortage felt in the West will be transferred to the 3rd world and hit there 50 times as hard.
After all you only need one Iowan to deprive 50 Bangladesians from their living.
Joined: Jun 15, 2007 Posts: 594 Location: St.Albert, AB
Posted: Mon Aug 18, 2008 5:33 pm Post subject: Re: Tackling the Cornucopians
Dezakin wrote:
Oh so many doomerland buzzwords that I dont really want to rehash, just when do you expect population to decline?
My prediction:
You'll die of old age before you see a population decline. Or even a decline in global living standards.
Doomerland buzzwords? I dare you to refute Catton. In fact, it would make my evening for you to show me how a post-peak world could continue, as well as increase, fertilizer inputs, greater trade stability, greater harmonization (in terms of food production) all after peaking in oil supply.
Would you rather side with the technocorpians and their fervent belief in nuclear-generated ammonia fertilizer?
Dezakin, I don't know how anyone can take you seriously. You didn't give rhyme or reason for anything you put forward.
If only farting in the wind could move mountains.....or feed Bangladeshis.
Posted: Mon Aug 18, 2008 5:45 pm Post subject: Re: Tackling the Cornucopians
Nicholai wrote:
Dezakin wrote:
Oh so many doomerland buzzwords that I dont really want to rehash, just when do you expect population to decline?
My prediction:
You'll die of old age before you see a population decline. Or even a decline in global living standards.
Doomerland buzzwords? I dare you to refute Catton.
Oh take it to the overshoot forum. I've wasted enough time on Catton. Populations eventually overshoot when they behave static rules, sure. Humans are different because they engineer. You can throw around the cargoist ad-hominem if you want but it wont stop the pace of technological change from altering the rules every engineering cycle.
Eventually Malthus is right because theres only so much work you can get out of an isolated thermodynamic system, and the universe will approach heat death someday, but theres a lot of room between here and there.
Quote:
In fact, it would make my evening for you to show me how a post-peak world could continue, as well as increase, fertilizer inputs, greater trade stability, greater harmonization (in terms of food production) all after peaking in oil supply.
Would you rather side with the technocorpians and their fervent belief in nuclear-generated ammonia fertilizer?
Sure; After all we wont need it for at least 50 years, seeing fertilizer production isn't a function of oil at all but of natural gas and coal.
Quote:
Dezakin, I don't know how anyone can take you seriously. You didn't give rhyme or reason for anything you put forward.
I've explained my position many times before: All human needs can be met by sufficient energy and we we can show energy limits to be at a minimum 1000 times larger than global consumption today for at least 16 million years.
And I honestly dont expect civilization to be controlled by beings subject to the limits of biology in several centuries.
Joined: May 26, 2008 Posts: 1190 Location: Chicago, IL
Posted: Mon Aug 18, 2008 6:01 pm Post subject: Re: Tackling the Cornucopians
Nicholai wrote:
Tick tock, tick tock. Time is of the essence.
Absolutely 1,000,000% agreed. However, nothing of magnitude, whether accentuated problems or beginning of a solution will happen before 10-20 years. We'll see the population double before the masses really embrace population and standard of living controls.
Joined: May 26, 2008 Posts: 1190 Location: Chicago, IL
Posted: Mon Aug 18, 2008 6:06 pm Post subject: Re: Tackling the Cornucopians
Dezakin wrote:
You'll die of old age before you see a population decline. Or even a decline in global living standards.
Dezakin and I disagree on numerous things, but here's one that we do agree. My view: we're going to come up with the next "invention", the next gadget, the next dooheekey that will prolong the inevitable, and then boom ... die-off. I wish for sensate and cool heads, but knowing the little I know about us, I don't see it. Sad, isn't it?
Posted: Mon Aug 18, 2008 6:21 pm Post subject: Re: Tackling the Cornucopians
VMarcHart wrote:
Dezakin wrote:
You'll die of old age before you see a population decline. Or even a decline in global living standards.
Dezakin and I disagree on numerous things, but here's one that we do agree. My view: we're going to come up with the next "invention", the next gadget, the next dooheekey that will prolong the inevitable, and then boom ... die-off. I wish for sensate and cool heads, but knowing the little I know about us, I don't see it. Sad, isn't it?
I dont see how that can happen. If we dont die off in the next 50 years, benign demographic transition takes over and the population stabilizes at about 10-12 billion for another 50 years. Then the AI revolution makes everything unpredictable as all of civilization becomes cybernetic and the whole die-off meme becomes meaningless.
Posted: Mon Aug 18, 2008 6:35 pm Post subject: Re: Tackling the Cornucopians
VMarcHart wrote:
Nicholai wrote:
...I dare you to refute Catton...
Et tu?
I wish someone would actually post up the work the reference the most. I suppose it isn't surprising since significant flaws have been found in quite a few other sources but I can't say I wouldn't be pleasantly surprised if for once there wasn't something sticking out. _________________
Joined: Jun 15, 2007 Posts: 594 Location: St.Albert, AB
Posted: Tue Aug 19, 2008 12:26 pm Post subject: Re: Tackling the Cornucopians
Dezakin wrote:
Nicholai wrote:
Dezakin wrote:
Oh so many doomerland buzzwords that I dont really want to rehash, just when do you expect population to decline?
My prediction:
You'll die of old age before you see a population decline. Or even a decline in global living standards.
Doomerland buzzwords? I dare you to refute Catton.
Oh take it to the overshoot forum. I've wasted enough time on Catton. Populations eventually overshoot when they behave static rules, sure. Humans are different because they engineer. You can throw around the cargoist ad-hominem if you want but it wont stop the pace of technological change from altering the rules every engineering cycle.
Eventually Malthus is right because theres only so much work you can get out of an isolated thermodynamic system, and the universe will approach heat death someday, but theres a lot of room between here and there.
Quote:
In fact, it would make my evening for you to show me how a post-peak world could continue, as well as increase, fertilizer inputs, greater trade stability, greater harmonization (in terms of food production) all after peaking in oil supply.
Would you rather side with the technocorpians and their fervent belief in nuclear-generated ammonia fertilizer?
Sure; After all we wont need it for at least 50 years, seeing fertilizer production isn't a function of oil at all but of natural gas and coal.
Quote:
Dezakin, I don't know how anyone can take you seriously. You didn't give rhyme or reason for anything you put forward.
I've explained my position many times before: All human needs can be met by sufficient energy and we we can show energy limits to be at a minimum 1000 times larger than global consumption today for at least 16 million years.
And I honestly dont expect civilization to be controlled by beings subject to the limits of biology in several centuries.
Joined: Jun 15, 2007 Posts: 594 Location: St.Albert, AB
Posted: Tue Aug 19, 2008 12:27 pm Post subject: Re: Tackling the Cornucopians
Dezakin wrote:
I dont see how that can happen. If we dont die off in the next 50 years, benign demographic transition takes over and the population stabilizes at about 10-12 billion for another 50 years. Then the AI revolution makes everything unpredictable as all of civilization becomes cybernetic and the whole die-off meme becomes meaningless.
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