I agree with your critique 100%.
I appreciate his vision - and it is certainly apocalyptic - but fear that many people will dismiss his attempts to shock people "out of complacency." We can only hope that a significant number get the memo.
i thought the last two chapters weaken the book. nobody can possibly predict the future to the level that kunstler tries.
but i would agree overall that he is trying to "shock the monkey" there at the end. (as if the opening chapters aren't enough!?!?!)
i'm utterly confused by this whole peak oil business. the recent escalation of the price of oil clearly points to a tight, tight market ... but is this the plateau period or is 2005 the peak? does it matter? maybe it is a refinery bottleneck. that makes some sense.
next on my list is simmons' book. from what i have read, saudi arabia underpins this entire thing, so let's see if his data-driven book makes things clearer than kunstler's shocker
Have not read Kunstler's LE.
However, his message, IMHO, is that our energy-intense/ resource-intense culture and infra-structure (think End of Suburbia) is doomed for collapse if any of these life lines are cut. And the coming cut is a sure and unkind thing.
Even if you live in a city with mass transit, think about it. How did the food in the supermarket get there? How did the plow plow? How did the harvester harvest? How did the transport truck or train bring it from farm to market?
That Made-in-China shirt on your back. How did the boat from you-know-where get here and bring the cheap labor product to our Wal-Mart?
I guess Kunstler cusses cause no one's listen'n to Cassandra.
How does the food get here? How about the same way it goes across oceans: in refrigerated ISO containers.
Only instead of riding on container ships, they'll be on flatcars on trains and powered by taps on the diesel-electric systems. That should be good for at least a 5:1 reduction in oil use, and big diesels can be modified to burn powdered coal slurry if it comes to that.
Does Kunstler even hint at such possibilities, laying out a path away from disaster? If not, what good is he?
I'm glad some people are reading the book before commenting on it!
I read it in a bookstore; good read, and would have been fabulous if I'd never heard of Peak Oil.
In my view, Kunstler is correct in that we are facing an emergency, EVEN IF we rise to the challenge in ways he does not personally expect.
Kunstler has taken a lot of heat. He's been scapegoated by people who don't understand the issue. People need to get into peak oil and decide for themselves, not bend spoons over irrelevant marginalia and their own projected fears of the future, which they attach to Kunstler prior to dismissing.
My last pet peeve on the topic is people who say "he's not an expert" on the topic. Wrong, he is, self taught, and he references as primary sources oil guys with over 40 years experience in the biz ...
Colin Campbell, Deffeyes, Simmons, T. Boone Pickens...
E-P - Remember that most people don't know the first thing about peak oil.
Kunstler is good for providing a kick in the seat. And his book has been selling well. People need to get this information before they can start fixing the problems.
He is definitely not the only possible source for that, but when one of the few MSM types who looked at Peak Oil summed it up by saying we needed to "Drill more" (Kevin Drum), I'd have to recommend Kunstler over him.
The first book I actually recommend to people is Deffeyes Hubberts Peak, the source is impeccable, the book is concise and to the point.
The problem with scare tactics based on partial information is that people show where the author is wrong in his conclusions because of facts he left out, and the public dismisses the entire thesis.
People are ignorant, but they aren't stupid; they've learned to distrust the MSM because they found they weren't getting the whole truth, and they'll marginalize people like Kunstler if they are no better.
EE-Poet: You make some good points.
However, on your 7:52 pm post, what you say about ignorant people is probably wrong.
For the most part they are "stupid" in the sense that they think with their emotions rather than with the logical part of their brains. They do not "distrust MSM". Quite the opposite. They have faith-based devotion to MSM-news. It's not important if it's not on MSM-news.
PO is not on MSM-news, ergo there are plenty of easy solutions even if it is true. Why heck, we'll just switch to coal. We got plenty of that. Or the scientists will come up with something, they always have. Histroy always progresses forward. We are not going back to being cave men. Anyone that cusses is a mad man. Ergo Kunstler is a mad man. You don't see G.W. cussing. Ergo he is a good and rational man. I looked into his eyes and saw goodness. Besides, he prays a lot.
All the above, of course, said with tongue in cheek. Have a good weekend.
Has Kunstler ever noticed human ingenuity?
Or human feedback in response to environmental conditions?
I gather not.
What a series of straight-line projections he offers.
Unimaginative.
Worry is not a bad thing but the result is progress.
E-P,
I think it is fair to point out that in reading his book, I came across a few technical errors, though not serious ones. I didn't see anything glaring; certainly points of contention exist. He smacked on Amory Lovins Hypercar, which is neither here nor there - Amory Lovins is a genius, and there aren't any hypercars on the road. Who wins that one?
And, the last chapters of the book - where he lays out his scenarios and ideas are somewhat weak. I disagree with him in areas, but I don't fault him for being out of step with little old me in his projections.
We've all got our ideas about what comes next, and history will pick the winner in 40 years.
I think the key framing trick is to remember there is a difference between what we TRY to make happen, and what we think WILL happen.
We're rolling into peak oil at 67 miles an hour, and we should be doing 55 in plug in hybrids.
Negativity is frankly justified at this late date.
David--
The linear nature of Kunstler's ideas struck me also. I saw that as a result of the narrative frames he was using. Kunstler's a story teller, and he uses a very traditional, Aristotelian "beginning, middle, end" model.
Jon-- That's largely my approach to the final chapters. I also noticed the "smackdown" of Lovins, which I thought was a little harsh, though I see your point. At the same time, wasn't the hypercar the prototype for the gas-electric hybrid? Please correct me if I'm wrong...
Peak Oil has been the subject of a couple of multi-minute pieces on NPR.
I'll stand behind my claim that the public is ignorant; specifically, most Americans are scientifically illiterate and mostly innumerate. There are managers in auto companies (AUTO COMPANIES!) who can't see why an electric car can't run itself indefinitely by attaching a generator to the wheels; these people believe in 200 MPG carburetors and perpetual motion because they never learned otherwise.
I think the way to deal with this is to put cards on the table and puncture the nonsense from the free-lunchers; sooner or later the straight dope is bound to rise above the hooey.
E-P:
You're absolutely right about public ignorance... I know I have to keep reminding myself that the plasic bag I'm throwing away comes from cheap oil, and I'm burning more of it when I drive to the suburbs to shop, etc., but most people don't give any thought to these kinds of activities: we've accepted them as "normal" parts of our lives. That's good on one hand -- there are many simple, daily actions we can take in response to peak oil. At the same time, I'm sure we're going to see a lot of resistance to the notion that people need to take these simple steps, as well as larger ones... We live in interesting times...
I think the word is "hubris".
Most of the scientifically ignorant people in the USA are proud of their ignorance. They are not stupid. They are proud. Proud to know as little as possible.
Let the nerdy engineers (and poets?) figure out on their nerdy slide rules how to make the car "go". All I need to know is how to turn the key.
Question: How many scientifically ignorant Americans does it take to screw in an energy saving light bulb?
Answer: None
They let Dilbert do it. He's got the knack.
it is hard to tell whether some of the more blanket criticisms here have actually read the book, or any of the other recent excellent books on the same subject of energy depletion.
I challenge anyone to predict the future once they have taken the trouble to try and understand the message, but one things for sure, it is very unlikely to be business essentially as usual, especially for the developed world.
Kunstler exaggerates to shock people, and that's a bad idea. People retreat into denial when things seem hopeless. Plus his tone is aggressive and insulting, and people resent that.
How do you get through to people that peak oil really is important? I think the exchange and honing of ideas through blogging is good. The MSM is important - it can be educated. Beyond that, I'm not sure. But emotional attacks aren't going to do it, I'm pretty sure.
My major complaint about Kunstler is that he discredits the side he's allegedly promoting. The only way he could be worse is if the GW/peak oil denialists were paying him.
Or maybe not; if it was proven that he was being paid to discredit GW/peak oil by the likes of Exxon-Mobil, it would probably rally people to the side of doing something. I suppose that the worst case is that he's honest.
As best I can tell, Kunstler really wants high-energy, high-tech civilization to collapse, and hopes peak-oil will do it.
I agree with him that our current emotional and social life is a long, long way from ideal. But his approach of hoping for economic collapse, and selectively looking for evidence for it, is neither a good way to come to an objective assessment, or a good way to find a path to a better future.
Maybe he'll inform a few people, but mostly I think he'll send people into denial or despairing paralysis. Not helpful.
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