Man is 'Killing the Planet'

[spidergoat]

What about the dust bowl of the depression? Doesn't that prove that mankind's actions can result in an environment that can no longer support us? Luckily it wasn't more widespread, but the same things are happening in other places- deforestation leads to erosion, silting up of rivers, and permanent wastelands, such as areas of the the Amazon basin.

 

[Baron Max]

What about the dust bowl of the depression? Doesn't that prove that mankind's actions can result in an environment that can no longer support us?

Well, no it doesn't! Look at the "Dust Bowl" today ...it's some of the richest, most productive farmland in the world.

So ...what that shows is that we can fuck things up royally and still recover and still survive and, more importantly, that we can even make it all much better than it was before. See? Neat, huh?

Baron Max

 

[Golgo 13]

The naive notion that it is literally impossible to make the planet uninhabitable for human civilization is contradicted by the number of nuclear warheads sitting in silos and on submarines that could be fired at a moments notice.

We could flush everything down the toilet in 45 minutes if we wanted to.

 

[Hapsburg]

You know, by the time the planet starts to dry up, and whatsuch, completely, we'll all be long dead...so why do we care?

 

[Baron Max]

You know, by the time the planet starts to dry up, and whatsuch, completely, we'll all be long dead...so why do we care?

Well, we just have to have something for which to wring our hands in despair and whine and cry and moan about!

I mean, geez, life is so easy and simple that it gives us too much time. Thus we need to invent things to worry about and become upset about.

Baron Max

 

[Golgo 13]

You know, by the time the planet starts to dry up, and whatsuch, completely, we'll all be long dead...so why do we care?

This has been the mentality for the past 150 years. "I'll be dead before it happens, so let's screw over our children". If you consider the fact anyone under 40 is going to have to live with the effects of oil depletion in an entirely oil-dependent industrial society, then you'll realize that the consequences are starting to come around in the immediate sense.

It's no longer a horrid hellhole of a bombed-out future with no hope you can just pawn the bill off to the next generation and subject your kids to the consequences while you live in carefree excess, it's something we're facing now. And $60 a barrel for oil is just the beginning.

Welcome to the age of entropy.

 

[Baron Max]

Oh, don't worry, our children will survive and probably do just fine. Especially if we don't scare 'em to death with dire predictions of their future first!

I grew up in the era when the Russkies were gonna' bomb us into oblivion ....and I survived even with all the scare tactics and dire predictions. Our children will survive, too.

Baron Max

 

[Edufer]

Spidergoat: the Dust Bowl had nothing to do with man's activity. It was a purely natural event. Droughts and rains are cyclical, and most probably related with Sun's eleven year sunspot cycle.

And Golgo 13, Bernard Shaw, the British thinker, and one of the pilars of the green movente based on Malthusian philosophy, once said this: <b>"What have the future generations done for me that I should care about them?"</b> Hard, but real, down to the ground. We care for our own children, and perhaps for our grandsons (those of us who have them, and found they are not little sons of b... getting stoned, tatooed and boozing rye and speed).

But what do we care about our gransons' children? O much closer: about our neighbor sons? Get down to Earth! Do you think our grandparents thought for a second about our grandsons? No way! They worked hard and thanks to their effort our parents had a better life -- and we a still better one. And working hard we'll leave our sons a world we'd desired for us, but, darn it! we were born a little too early! I envy our children for the world we are leaving them.

Enjoy life while you can. Go and make love before the planets collide!

 

[Golgo 13]

Oh, don't worry, our children will survive and probably do just fine. Especially if we don't scare 'em to death with dire predictions of their future first!

What I'm reporting aren't baseless predictions, but the results of some simple arithmetic.

These take different estimates of the URR (Ultimate Recoverable Reserves) of oil and estimate various peak dates based upon the figure. The concensus figure is and has been for quite some time 2,000 billion barrels. We've already used half of that, so that puts us at the peak at like right about now. The mean estimate puts it oput to 2019. Now those figures are very uncertain, + or - 50%. We're already at the lower curve so it's obvious it isn't - 50%. The URR in all likelihood lies somewhere between the first and second curve, closer to the first curve being most probable.

The lower curve has a 90% probability, median 7%, and upper 3. So no matter how you look at it, if you don't expect to be dead by now and 2019 then you are going to live to see the end of the age of oil.

And Golgo 13, Bernard Shaw, the British thinker, and one of the pilars of the green movente based on Malthusian philosophy, once said this: "What have the future generations done for me that I should care about them?" Hard, but real, down to the ground.

"Unlike plagues of the dark ages or contemporary diseases we do not understand, the modern plague of overpopulation is soluble by means we have discovered and with resources we posses. What is lacking is not sufficient knowledge of the solution but universal consciousness of the gravity of the problem and education of the billions who are its victim."

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

So fuck em, right? Let's pawn off 2 centuries of destructive practices on them and care less if they fail and the whole project of civilization or the human species goes with them. "I'm dead, so I don't have to worry about it" is the vision of the future.

Let's create future victims of circumstance that we generate and let someone else clean our mess.

You have to have a pretty brutal mind to even think in those terms.

And if Peak Oil has you sitting in the dark with no food because there's no petrochemicals to grow it en masse with or trucking system to deliver it from 1400 miles away like clockwork then I want you to remember that you're just reaping the fruits of your own philosophy. Don't blame wasteful excess consumption in past generations, because you would be doing the same thing.

That philosophy becomes much less appealing when suddenly your generation is the one stuck paying the piper.

 

[Jeremirroer]

stop your whinging. all of you.

I have an idea. If you kill yourself now then you won't be a drain on resources. Another benfit is you won't have to worry about what happens to the plalent.

Silly silly tree huggers.

 

[Frank King]

Kangaroos are important for the planet!

Say no to sex before drugs

 

[Golgo 13]

Just because I want civilization to be able to sustain itself which it cannot on it's current course by no means makes me a "tree hugger".

It's called "moderation". It's probably a new concept for you, but what it essentially means is that you waste less today so you have something for tomorrow. Don't blow next month's rent in Vegas today.

Kind of like how you go on a diet before you die of obesity/related ills. A radical concept in a nation that's 50% obese, I know, but maybe a few people will listen.

But such has never been our practice until we're faced with the consequences.

 

[Jeremirroer]

Oh yes, moderation, what a difficult concept to understand....

By the way, if humans live for another 1000 years or 2000 years or even 20,000 years. What's it to you?

you will be dead.

tree hugger!

 

[Frank King]

did you draw them?

 

[Baron Max]

Just because I want civilization to be able to sustain itself which it cannot on it's current course ....

The problem is not what YOU want, but that you're suggesting that we ALL follow YOUR dictates! YOU are trying to force everyone else to do what YOU think is best. ......that ain't very nice of you.

Don't blow next month's rent in Vegas today.

But what if we want to blow it? Should YOU make those decisions for all of the rest of humanity?

Baron Max

 

[Golgo 13]

Oh yes, moderation, what a difficult concept to understand....

Evidently.

What's wrong with a little moderation? Nobody ever died from resource depletion as a result of exercising conservative practices. But quite the opposite has been ovserved several times throughout history. Easter Island being a perfect example.

Do you have a life insurance policy or ever plan to get one in the future? if so then why? I mean, you're dead so what do the beneficiaries menan to you? You will be dead, after all.

Using that logic then I guess there would be no cause or principle you would be willing to risk your life in order to uphold or preserve since your philosophy doesn't seem to extent past your own selfishness.

Man am I glad that my country had heroes willing to put it all on the line for a greater cause so we all can enjoy the freedoms we have today and weren't just greed-driven self-centered externalizing machines.

But what if we want to blow it? Should YOU make those decisions for all of the rest of humanity?

As opposed to the person that wants to blow it and we all have shared money? Hell yes.

Of the 2 courses, mine is much less likely to have everyone out in the street, so if it's anyones judgement we should be trusting, either by looking at historical precedent previous examples, examining the soundness of the logic, and using a little common sense to see what the end results of the decisions are, then it would be mine/those with a sense of preservation. Not this wanton suicidal binge of destruction nonsense we see being advocated here.

Which person would you want dictating the energy policy of your country?

William Simon, Energy Advisor to President Ford:

"Energy industries agree that to achieve some form of energy self-sufficiency the U.S. must mine all the coal that it can."

"We should be trying to get as many holes drilled as possible to get the proven (oil) reserve . . ."

The faster we can get the last bit of those resources up out of the ground and finish using them, the better off we'll be, according to him.

Or would you rather have President Carter:

"We simply must balance our demand for energy with our rapidly shrinking resources. By acting now, we can control our future instead of letting the future control us."

handling the situation?

Following in the footsteps of "depletion is good!/Strength through exhaustion" William Simon is an invitation to distaster. Listening to conservative President Carter is the road to sustainability. So the logical choice is clear.

 

[KitNyx]

I agree with both of you...Golgi, conservation/moderation normally means that the use of "something" has to be cut back (sorry, no definiative examples were specified). So to take Baron Max's side, who gets to choose what we can and cannot do? Who gets to choose what we can consume and what we cannot. Currently, in a capitalistic society we do this by supply vs demand and production vs consumption analysis...Even WalMart believes that it is bad business to produce more product then they can sell, so if someone is buying it then there must be a demand...if there is a demand then who's job is it to inform the consumers that "they/we/you" have just decided that x consumable which they value is no longer going to be available...perhaps if they were asked they would have chosen to "cut back/ conserve" something that you value consuming...am I expressing myself okay? Sorry if not...

Okay, now to take Golgo's side (not that either of you asked for my help, so sorry). This is difficult because I am very much an antisocialist...nothing matters but the individual/ objectivism. However, to I do have to say that I large part of who/ what I am is my emotional attachment to others, the memories I have of places, etc...So, even if all that is important in life in the individual, namely me, it should be high on my list of priorities to show those I care for the places I have been abd the things I know (in doing so I make them more like me, hence increasing my chances of continueing on beyond my inevitable death). Also, since these people are now "more like me" then it should be in my best interest to allow for their continuation (as that is the only way in which I will continue)...

- KitNyx

 

[Golgo 13]

Basically it boils down to which camp appeals more to you. Suicidal bingefest clusterfuck, or responsible, moderate order.

As the price of oil continues to shoot up and gasoline climbs sky high because we've ran as fast as we could up the oil production curve and now get to go downhill all the way, the conservative camp logic will become undeniably clear. Although at that point it will be too late to make any sort of preparations because the situation is already at hand.

 

[KitNyx]

I respect that that is your belief and I am not saying it is not mine, but I think tolerance is definitely needed while making these decisions. Not to mention the difference between suicidal bingefest clusterfuck, and responsible, moderate order is a relative one. You may believe in the latter but I am fairly certain you are not advocating Taoism, or some similar belief that advocates a return to a more primitive way of life. So, if the more "your" side is better then you are now at least as far to the "otherside" as Baron Max is to you. So who is right? Like I said, I agree with your logic and me taking "extreme" examples in no why negates that logic, I am only advocating tolerance and respect of others beliefs, but I guarantee you that we will all do as we please anyway, so why bother...right?

- KitNyx

 

[KitNyx]

And, does everyone here honestly believe that all negative climactic alterations are caused by humankind? The arabian penisula was once, according to both biblical and fossil records, a veritable "Garden of Eden". Oh wait, according to the Bible that was us too...damn. Well, religion aside...did we cause those climactic changes...here is a link:

http://members.cox.net/quaternary/

- KitNyx