I kept staying at home and shopping online during Christmas.
I had ordered many gifts for my friends, include Cosmetics & Perfume, Discount Cosmetics, magazines. I really like this magazine website.
"In fact, can you name one non-renewable resource that we as a human race have ever exhausted?"
I've been looking for one for years and have yet to find one. I've moved on to a second question. Name one non-renewable natural resource whose real price has increased over the long run (multiple decades.)
I've got real problems finding one of those as well.
ScottG,
Paul Ehrlich couldn't find one either!
(I'm no genius but I think that first comment is spam damnit!)
Paul
If only we could run out of the very much renewable resource that is ignorant stupidity. There seems to be a glut in the amongst the greens and politicians. But, alas, If wishes were oil even environmentalists might drive SUV's
This one is very close to my heart. I have a tendency to waffle so bear with me.
We know something needs to be done. I hope we don’t have any people who deny that human interference is causing drastic changes to our environment? Because there are people denying this now. There always have, but up until a few years ago it’s been a handful (and it really is a very small number) of SCIENTISTS that deny it. Now we have some people in the media so these fringe views are getting aired. Which is dangerous IMHO. I can go in to the details of why we know big and dangerous changes are happening if you want me to, I have done so much reading on this issue.
On the point of Kyoto effecting economies; of course it will affect economies, but not necessarily in a bad way. The whole World minus America is signed up and many have been working toward the Kyoto treaty for years. So the effect is spread around the World, so the people who have an economic advantage are the people who are better prepared. That’s where the problem lies, that’s why this is the only country we hear the deniers. I am keeping away from the “global warming” tag as it’s not about global warming, as you know it could end up in a big freeze.
So America is not prepared, and there is no motivation by the general public to change. Which is why America will never sign up to Kyoto, the rest of the World need to continue anyway, we have no option. This is for real guys, and it’s not just a dooms day environment. Yes the green people have done a very bad job of communicating and have taken a very weird stance on many things which has turned many people off. We seem to be going through a PC backlash, because of a few over zealous liberals. It’s not just about catastrophe; it’s about general health of the population and the economic effects of that. As libertarians, I believe this fits in to your world view as well. You want a smaller government, how can we do that when we have huge organization like the EPA, Medicare etc? Look at the rates of cancer and environmentally caused illness. Look at asthma, allergies, autism, ADD, ADHD all caused by pollution. These are other reasons we should be cleaning up out act.
So on to the solution as people see it in this country, cap and trade. Sounds great, and because it’s a “market” people naturally think it must be good. Not at all so. It moves the problem and delays reductions of emissions. It will actually localize the issue. Me and my wife do work with Autistic kids. Another subject close to my heart. The link between Autism and Mercury (in the environment) has almost been proved conclusively. Cap and Trade is going to make things worse. Why? It’s simple, people will trade pollution points when it is expensive to make changes that reduce emissions. While cap and trade will improve things nationally, in much more local areas it will make things worse. Studies have been done as to who will be trading and it’s going to be high density areas, where turning off a power plant to repair would cause the most problems. So cities, Chicago will be one of the worst areas hit, and Chicago already has one of the highest Mercury rates in the country. It cost the school district over $40,000 a year for each Autistic child, and the increase in Autism is just crazy. Autism and ADD and ADHD are very similar and it seems the like between heavy metals like Mercury is also pretty well defined (although there is a genetic attribute as well). Look at the numbers of ADD and ADHD suffers huge numbers. You cannot fix this problem, the damage is already done… there will be no cure, just heavy psychotic drugs. What’s the governments answer? Reduce Mercury emissions by 50% over 10 years. Mercury stays in the environment for a very long time, the rates will keep increasing for the next several decades. It will be a mess, and already it’s irreversible.
So while the deniers are focusing on the hockystick curve, this problem keeps on going and going. We could fix this. And here are some things that could help;
1) Distributed energy. 10% of all energy is lost delivering it to your home or office. 10%, that alone would make a HUGE difference. You cannot fix the grid, that’s would cost too much, but putting energy production closer to the source would help. And we can do that in an environmentally friendly way.
2) Cleaner energy. Chicago has grants for solar power in your home, up to 5k. Who knows about it? We even have programs in place to sell excess energy back to the power companies! This is perfect, but nobody has even heard about it. It’s cheap, it’s easy, minimal outlay, it will pay for it’s self and it will work.
3) We need to localize our industries more. It’s stupid to send materials to China, to have products made and fly them back. It’s stupid to freeze food, fly it half way round the World for use. Now I know some things need to be done like this. But not to the extent we do now.
There are many more, but this is getting to long.
Also you guys seem to be saying we will not be running out of oil? Well even the GOP do not agree. Even the oil companies and economists are now saying that peak oil is near. We probably have hundreds of years of oil left. But it's the cost issue that is the real issue.
Also Paul you mention mortality rates, American age expectancy went down for the first time this year. But as i said it's more about the illnesses assoiated with polution. I gave some basic examples.
While i am on this subject i would like to recommend a magazine called Skeptical Enqirer. It's not a liberal, conservative or politically motivated publication. It's scientists, Scholars and nobel prize winners. It was more about the debunking myths, but now it's about critical thinking. It's one of the few publications i really love.
Here is a good article on distributed energy...
http://www.csicop.org/si/2005-01...-01/
energy.html
Interesting post, thanks for sharing.
As a race, we haven't run out of many consumables besides dodos and whales, though if you looked I think you could find a lot of things that are much rarer now, like mahogany. But we do know oil and coal reserves are finite. U.S. oil production peaked in the 1970s and has been dropping ever since, and world production may peak in the next 10-20 years (there's some evidence the Saudis are lying about how much oil they have; they're very secretive about their reserves. A lot of people don't realize that Saudi Arabia has hundreds of billions in debt secured by that oil.) We won't completely run out for hundreds of years, because there's a lot of oil in areas that aren't currently economically feasible to extract from but will be when oil is over $100/barrel.
The problem with gradually running out of oil is that there's no cheap alternative. $100/barrel is where the alternate sources start to become competitive. That will mean life gets a bit harder for everyone than they would be otherwise. Not the end of the world, but not pleasant either.
All that said, standards of living will continue to rise. Computers will get faster and do more useful things, new materials with useful properties will be developed, and new products will delight and amuse not only us but our grandchildren, who will wonder at the idea of people who lived when there was no Internet. Maybe fusion will finally become not just commercially viable but cheap enough that people don't miss oil. But that will take awhile.
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