[AdamB]

The LTG model is explained here:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... g-collapse

Anyone want odds that the article doesn't say a word about GIGO, or how the model explains how the world managed to live without the resources that LTG said ran out a long time ago? You'd think that journalists would be required to think...somewhere along the line...when judging the usefulness of a model. Or...not.

[Newfie]

The LTG model is explained here:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... g-collapse

Birth rates, etc., are affected by levels of poverty, which in turn are affected by availability of energy and material resources.

Availability of energy and material resources, including oil and minerals, is affected by diminishing returns, i.e., increasing amounts of energy needed to get decreasing amounts of resources which have lower quality. It's seen in peak oil and in peak mining:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TFyTSiCXWEE

The cause of that is a limited biosphere and gravity.

Since the global economy is dependent on energy and material resources, then degrowth is inevitable.

I Bolted that last statement. It seems so bloody obvious, arguing against it is like arguing against gravity.

Yet here we are.

[theluckycountry]

Yes there are some clueless people here alright, little to no understanding of science other that what they glean off youtube. The simple fact is all elements of the renewable transition rely on massive inputs of fossil fuels and minerals and always will. The only hope for general sustainability is to not be dependent on them. That is sustainability in terms of eating, not in terms of the modern comfort lifestyle, which is heading for the grave either way.

But what the average punter in his suburban dogbox can't get their head around is the fact that people like George Bush, Bill Gates, and all the mega-rich that eat in those $2000 a meal restaurants really don't care about them. There is plenty of mineral and oil wealth on Earth if you deny it to 99% of the public. That is what de-growth really is, the vast masses of the public giving up all their luxuries so the elite classes can enjoy them. Just like it was throughout all history before the oil age. Stupid shell games like democracy, a political system instituted by the elite classes worldwide to prevent repeats of the French Revolution and the American Revolution, are just a means of controlling the masses while giving them the illusion of being in control. I would have thought the last 20 years of American politics would have made that abundantly clear, but no, the brainwashed public still plays the game.

[Newfie]

That is what I found interesting in the WEF Global Risk Report, it was a glimmer of a clue that we might be at the beginning of the end.

I guess I take that WEF report as sort of a glimpse into how the global elite see the word. It is a peek into their stream of consciousness. They are starting to awaken. That could be good, or not.

[ralfy]

Around 70 pct of people worldwide live on only a few dollars a day. They obviously want to earn more in order to avoid poverty, and they are earning more. With that money, they are buying more of things they need, and increasingly things that they want.

The other 30 pct are relying on them to earn and spend more because their own returns on investment and income are dependent on increasing sales of goods and services.

There are several who rely on earning through financial speculation, i.e., making bets on anything, but they also know that the value of their credit is maintained only if there is increasing economic activity, which is what's described above, because when that activity stops, then all of that credit becomes worthless.

Given that, I think very few want degrowth or volatility, i.e., wild swings leading to quick profits and crashes. Most want lower but steady growth.

That's why even given peak oil, which is not very hard to understand (it's part of trying to get more things using the same or less energy from a planet with physical limitations and gravity), they need to find out ways to avoid the twin problems of limits to growth and pollution coupled with climate change.

Hence, they come up with proposals involving more equitable growth (i.e., helping the 70 pct) but also more regulations, plus "green" energy including tech like those from Quaise.

I raise this because the same global elite include those who are part of Club of Rome, which came up with the idea of limits to growth.

[AdamB]

I Bolted that last statement. It seems so bloody obvious, arguing against it is like arguing against gravity.
Yet here we are.

Seriously Newfie, you're blowing away posts because I point out some nuance to GRAVITY? What the hell?

[Newfie]

No, I blow away posts when you attack individual posters.

You have leave to say pretty much whatever you want EXCEPT to attack other participants.

There is good reason for this. We strive to be an open forum where folks are free to come and express their ideas. Doing so opens one to criticism and then the ideas need to be dissected, defended, and improved.

One can challenge someones method, or style, or argumentative posture. There is a lot of freedom here.

You are not allowed to attack the individual himself.

Your post was not about gravity but about denigrating a poster. Thus a free pass to the trash bin.

It is not about attacking you, but about protecting others and the free exchange of ideas.

[AdamB]

It is not about attacking you, but about protecting others and the free exchange of ideas.

The free exchange of ideas was the LAST concept of this place once upon a time. Monte erased entire posting histories that didn't agree with the required true believer narrative. As we now know, the CORRECT narrative no less.

Was there a date specific when the old school kind of bashing, attacking, personal denigration and moderator support of thought control by erasing posts not endorsed in the peak oil Bible transitioned into modern "be nice to everyone because peak oil is about sweetness and light and wholesome treatment of others"? Was this new policy on an on-purpose and documented somewhere with a rule change, or only the new moderator preference once the unbelievers, i.e. people who knew better, had been driven off?

Not that this place is much about peak oil anymore, for obvious reasons, but still...

[AdamB]

That's why even given peak oil, which is not very hard to understand (it's part of trying to get more things using the same or less energy from a planet with physical limitations and gravity),

Your interpretation of peak oil is incorrect. The definition is so simple that anyone, including Third Worlders, should understand it.

Well, if they are interested in peak oil anyway rather than using it as a Rapture trigger for their prepping. From the definition.

Peak oil is the point in time when the maximum rate of global oil production is reached, after which it is argued that production will begin an irreversible decline.

Some folks, let us refer to them generally as the "oil uninformed" thought it hapened awhile ago, as far back as the turn of the century. Others want to confuse the issue by using the word "energy" rather than oil, which ignores not just oils place in the transportation mix (where it mostly resides) but in petrochemicals and other uses. Certainly resources are no more gravity than peak oil happened all those years ago, but we'll let such basic misconceptions slide as, well, who knows what education levels are like in parts of the world, or population, where there was and are suckers born every minute, some of whom like peak oil for reasons other than the moment when humanity learns better than to cotinue wasting the stuff for things so STUPID as burning.

[Tanada]

It is not about attacking you, but about protecting others and the free exchange of ideas.

The free exchange of ideas was the LAST concept of this place once upon a time. Monte erased entire posting histories that didn't agree with the required true believer narrative. As we now know, the CORRECT narrative no less.

Was there a date specific when the old school kind of bashing, attacking, personal denigration and moderator support of thought control by erasing posts not endorsed in the peak oil Bible transitioned into modern "be nice to everyone because peak oil is about sweetness and light and wholesome treatment of others"? Was this new policy on an on-purpose and documented somewhere with a rule change, or only the new moderator preference once the unbelievers, i.e. people who knew better, had been driven off?

Not that this place is much about peak oil anymore, for obvious reasons, but still...

This was announced in August 2020 and the announcement is still at the top of every forum if you just click on the board index and open any discussion forum you can see it easily enough.

announcement-please-read-t77731.html
https://peakoil.com/forums/announcement-please-read-t77731.html

[theluckycountry]

That is what I found interesting in the WEF Global Risk Report, it was a glimmer of a clue that we might be at the beginning of the end.

I guess I take that WEF report as sort of a glimpse into how the global elite see the word. It is a peek into their stream of consciousness. They are starting to awaken. That could be good, or not.

If a bunch of plumbers, office workers, and car salesmen, like us, can figure this out then I'm sure the elitist class got the message long before. Their world is all about money and power and they have innumerable people working for them who would give them the heads up. They control the flows of capital, they buy and sell oil companies, they know the score. The CIA wrote a paper on all this back in the 70's, probably after reading LTG?

Either way a lot of the investments of these wealthy elite point to the fact they are aware of the limits and have parachutes ready to be deployed when the crunch comes. They own the WEF, it's their think tank, their mouthpiece. If it's leaking doom it's not because they want the masses prepared, it's so they can say they tried, but no one listened. What was Buffets' holding prior to the GFC? I doubt he was caught unawares. After, when the market was at it lowest he was buying bank shares for a song and subsequently made huge profits. The insiders know what's about to happen because they engineer it, at least in the financial spaces.

What is the crunch for them? Well it could simply be when it becomes unsafe for them to commute in their limos between their Hampton estates and the opera. Mexico is like that now isn't it. A lot of these overseas holdings they have are in relatively stable countries, they have private islands, with private security and hand-picked staff, Switzerland in the winter for skying, the Virgin islands when the weather is balmy, a nice estate in a politically secure nation like Singapore. The world is theirs to do with as they wish.

[Newfie]

Lucky,

Maybe but I am not so sure. What you say makes perfect sense BUT people often have a very strong bias to justify their world view. In my own experience I run into otherwise intelligent and thoughtful people, p eople with an otherwise good technical knowledge, who are completely convinced ced climat change is a total hoax.

By comparison many not these financial elites sre sites very well versed in the oh h sicak world, don't understand systems and just have a terrible time wrapping their minds around these problems. I personally know a very bright lawyer, Mayer of the year in NJ, argued a case before the US Supream Court who just can not get that human population may drop. Another guy, a research physician, can not understand why anyone would not want to live in a city, who can not understand why you would read a book over 100 years old.

I think we here on PEAKOIL are not representative of the general population.

[AdamB]

Was there a date specific when the old school kind of bashing, attacking, personal denigration and moderator support of thought control by erasing posts not endorsed in the peak oil Bible transitioned into modern "be nice to everyone because peak oil is about sweetness and light and wholesome treatment of others"?

This was announced in August 2020 and the announcement is still at the top of every forum if you just click on the board index and open any discussion forum you can see it easily enough.

Got it. Darned if I don't remember something now about when this thing came out.

Thanks, and I will attempt to do better in the future.

[theluckycountry]

Lucky,

Maybe but I am not so sure. What you say makes perfect sense BUT people often have a very strong bias to justify their world view. In my own experience I run into otherwise intelligent and thoughtful people, p people with an otherwise good technical knowledge, who are completely convinced ced climat change is a total hoax.

I think we here on PEAKOIL are not representative of the general population.

Yes, those people you interact with haven't a clue, but they are not Bush or Buffet or a Rothschild are they. They are just salary slaves who watch TV and believe what it tells them, they haven't the time, or inclination, to read what we have and digest it. It takes a certain personality to reject all the mainstream lies, all the fashion. I don't watch TV, I don't spend money on expensive cups of coffee every day, I don't have a $4000 dog, I have never changed out my wardrobe because this years shirts are Yellow and not brown. The average person does much of this though, they are a slave to fashion and to the beliefs held by society in general. It's why they buy these cheap modern houses with plastic plumbing rather than looking for an older decent brick one that has copper piping and solid timber floors.

They are brainless! They waste all their money on garbage and invest their life savings in a volatile stock market. Just look at the people who buy EV's, we know they are twice as expensive as a conventional car of the same design and comfort, we NOW know that they don't save bucket loads on running costs, they have all these shortcomings but people flocked to buy them, for no other reason than they were trendy, touted as "the Future"

Now how much TV do think the elites watch? Could you see Buffet sitting down to watch the weekly episode of Game of Thrones or some cheap reality show? He's entertaining friends over cocktails or sitting at table eating off silver service. Would he put his dinner on his lap in front of the TV like millions of average Americans? He know the TV is all lies, he spreads enough of them through that media himself. So do all the captains of industry, the elites. No, they are not stupid, they are not ill informed as the general public is. I can't see them believing the lies about climate change and oil depletion. Or the elite bankers the lies about borrowing your way into prosperity. Hell, they are the ones getting rich by selling those lies.

We are the lucky ones. Today I am surrounded by neighbors that are beginning to struggle with the high interest rates and the high inflation. They look disturbed, they are starting to sell their boats etc. They couldn't see this transition coming yet it was obvious it would come? It's come many times before, even in their own lifetimes. Stupid people, slaves to the TV and all the happy talk.

[AdamB]

Just look at the people who buy EV's, we know they are twice as expensive as a conventional car of the same design and comfort, we NOW know that they don't save bucket loads on running costs, they have all these shortcomings but people flocked to buy them, for no other reason than they were trendy, touted as "the Future"

Those of us who own EVs, are surprised that they don't match your description very well. I mean, you aren't even factual. And while provincials unfamiliar with currency might think "buckets" are buckets of bananas in trade for something perhaps, my EV#2 was in the bottom 10% of all my lifetime cage purchases, although EV #1 was more in the middle. It was also newer and had only 10k miles on it when I purchased it.

No shortcomings noticed, and this statement comes from experience approaching a decade now, and 360k km of use. I don't imagine there are many EVs out there in the Third World unless the Chinese are subsidizing them for their captive customer base in countries they've taken over.

We are the lucky ones.

We certainly are. Not so sure about folks who claim knowledge of EVs with zero experience though.

[Newfie]

Lucky,

Since I don’t know these folks personally I can not answer from 1st hand experience.

Research shows that in average most people are average, and there is nothing very special about the elites. I just scanned an article by Mr. Gates bemoaning his past life, that he ignored those things he values most; his family. Sounds pretty average to me.

My personal experience leads me to believe that they, the elites, made their money in some specialty, and they got financially lucky. I suspect they live in a pretty delusional world, that they have tons of cognitive bias to the world where they made their fortune, and if anything they deeply invested in protecting and promoting that world.

Thats why I found the Global Risk Report interesting, it showed cracks in that world view.

[ralfy]

Peak oil refers to diminishing returns, and also takes place for mining: increasing energy needed to obtain decreasing amounts of resources and of lower quality. The reason are a limited biosphere and gravity.

That's basically it. This issue is not debatable.

[AdamB]

Peak oil refers to diminishing returns.... This issue is not debatable.

Not only is it debatable. but it proves you don't even know the definition of peak oil. <sigh>

"Peak oil is the point in time when the maximum rate of global oil production is reached, after which it is argued that production will begin an irreversible decline." Source.

[Newfie]

Funny, I find the two definitions to be functionally equivalent.

[AdamB]

Funny, I find the two definitions to be functionally equivalent.

Maybe it is just the words being different and having a different meaning that makes them functionally nothing alike?

Peak oil is nothing more than a maximum production rate. Which supposedly will never be matched again, unless we are talking about multiple peak oils, which are quite common as we all now know. Peak oil doesn't describe the cause of said peak, it could be either supply or demand related, it could be limitations imposed by development in a certain basin and restrictions in another, land restrictions, governmental restrictions, it could be geological in nature, it could be economic in nature, etc etc, and it can be reversed decades later by decreasing returns happening in conjunction with any or all of these reasons. Because there is no requirement for the correlation ralfy would like the reader to fall for.

Ralfy is old school LATOC, diminishing terms wasn't the scary item of interest as taught by unemployed ambulance chaser to the father figuring seeking groupies that were members of his site (his claim, not mine), it was peak oil, and these folks who knew nothing about geology or economics, that was irrelevant as well, because it was all about the scenarios derived from it that attracted the attention. End of world! Draft! Amero! Starvation! Buy gold! Or a farm! Guns, ammo, MREs! Etc etc. Review the history of this place, it is great for examples as well.

Anyway, ralfy is just doing the same thing he did back then. Peak oil is one of those boogey men of yesteryear, a means to an end, a way to claim this thing is going to happen <fill in the blank, peak oil, Mayan calendar, Yellowstone exploding...again>, and when it does, OH BOY...WATCH OUT....<fill in geopolitical gold buggery neo-lib-con psychobabble here>.

So yeah, diminishing returns is a thing, usually best thought of as a change in efficiency of some process or another. But it isn't peak oil. Peak oil is thrown in to be all SCAREY. "Diminishing returns" doesn't have decades of hysteria attached to it.

ADAM, I am doing you a favor here, not deleting your post but editing it demonstrate the concept. If you were to delete the struck through passages then it would be an acceptable post.

As a general hint, be careful whenever you refer to another poster.