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"There Are A Hundred Flashing Red Warning Signs Coming From The Environment"
Submitted by Adam Taggart via Peak Prosperity,
Following up on the previous chapter focusing on human-caused resource depletion, the other disheartening part of the story of the environment concerns the things we humans put back into it, and the impact they have on the ecosystems that support all of life -- ours included.
Like the economy, ecosystems are complex systems. That means that they owe their complexity and order to energy flows and, most importantly, they are inherently unpredictable. How they will respond to the change by a thousand rapid insults is unknown and literally unknowable.
Like any complex system, an ecosystem will tend to remain in a stable form until the pressures become too great and then they will suddenly shift to a different baseline and exist there for a while. That is, instead of having some magical preferred equilibrium, they have many -- and some of those will be decidedly less or more awesome for humans to exist within.
If the world tips from a stable climate to a less stable one, as it has done many times in the past, then growing enough food for everyone will become difficult if not impossible.
An ocean acidified will remain that way for possibly hundreds of thousands or even millions of years. Overly-depleted cod fisheries will take many decades to recover, if and only if they are not fished in between. A species wiped out remains that way forever.
An overpumped aquifer may take thousands if not tens of thousands of years to recharge.
There are a hundred flashing red warning signs coming to us from the environment, the Earth, and all of its supporting ecosystems. Either we get off the 'growth at any cost' express train or we risk wrecking important, valuable, essential and beautiful species, ecosystems and support systems that we rely upon for our health, our wealth, and our happiness.
Once again, you and I do not have any particular need for constant exponential economic growth. It is only our money system that has that demand.
Either we figure out a way to live on our own terms or we'll simply default into doing the things that our money system demands of us. The former has a possible future; the latter does not.
The full suite of chapters in this new Crash Course series can be found at www.peakprosperity.com/crashcourse
And for those who have yet to view it, be sure to watch the 'Accelerated' Crash Course -- the under-1-hour condensation of the new 4.5-hour series. It's a great vehicle for introducing new eyes to this material.
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O gots a sore throat and's going to Walter Redd.
Who's he been hugging and kissing contagious?
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/12/06/us-usa-obama-throat-idUSKBN0JK...
Obolarang
Might have something to do with his relationship with the lower regions of Wall Street bankers.
It's almost like something long and cylindrical shaped is being repeatedly rammed down his throat. What can that be?
Might just be a little Fukushima (aka NuKuFuCu).
If you want your tumor, you can keep your tumor.
Shocking video.
Bitcoin, cryptocurrency, is the basis of new monetary system which will help, by removing the massive economic distortions caused by a failing fiat system.
How could anyone POSSIBLY question... HERO... 'AL GORE' style warning signs (after all he's done for HUMANITY for sake of 'THE ENVIRONMENT')?
/SARC implied
Is it 4 weeks already since he met that nurse?
Did he have intercourse with her?
I'm tired of apologists for TPTB trying to substitute "ecological disaster" for the financial disaster that they have cooked up. The immanent disaster is economic and political.
Ecological disaster may occur sometime centuries from now.
"Oh, if only 90% of you peons would disappear, we could save the planet!!"
You and your family first.
Both financial and ecological collapse are incoming, they are both man made.
Like I said,
financial collapse = 2015
ecological collapse = 2215.
Hope the ghost of Joan Rivers pays him a visit.
Great minds.
As soon as I saw that story, I thought, swallowing too much come.
Someone doesn't know Barry is gay. Must be the New York Times, because otherwise, they would have run the story.
Right?
Wooden dicks contain splinters.
Fuck "climate change", what are they gonna do about "season change"?
Just a couple months ago it was a real pleasant 85 F where I live. Now? 45 F and raining. And this is expected to go on for months. Add to that, snow is rumored.
What are you gonna do about that, Al Bore?
Queue the parade of imbeciles....
Seriously...
OT, but relevant to this...
Just tuned into a program "The Four Horsemen" on FSTV (Free Speech TV), and up pops this quote:
"The things you own end up owning you" -Tyler Durden.
It was preceded by...
"The root causes of terrorism will not be solved by increasing economic inequality. If governments really are serious about combating terrorism, then they must start with real structural reform back home.
As long as banking empires chase infrastructure in debt deals in pursuit of profit, the West will continue to export injustice through finance.
Millions will be displaced, terrorism will thrive and Neo-colonialism will continue to end more and more lives."
The Four Horsemen here are:
- A rapacious financial system
- Escalating organized violence
- Abject poverty for Billions
- The exhaustion of the earth's resources riding roughshod over those who can least afford it.
They gallop unchallenged, because the map that's been put in place by our schools, universities and our media do not question the accepted norms. Instead, there is apathy.
For more, see...
topdocumentaryfilms.com/four-horsemen-documentary
as well as other documentaries that every well-informed person should view.
Unsustainable means unsustainable in whatever iteration you look at, be it environmental or economic. In fact those two are firmly attached at the hip.
In a moar culture less is suicide. Of course moar is too. But what a way to go.
I think we're making progress. Permaculture looks very promising to me, and its advocates are not just typical hippies. Sepp Holzer comes to mind.
In truth I think many of the solutions to our problems are already avaliable to us, and if you wet your finger and test the winds of the zeitgiest, it tells you that people everywhere are looking for a change (if only on a subconscious level at this point).
What stands in our way is not the false dichotomy of political affiliation, but the corrupt and entrenched infastructure of the existing system itself.
The human race is in the denial stage at the moment, anyone remember what comes after that?
permaculture is common sense.
nfortunately, common sense is not common.
Any economy and monetary system built on compound interest is based on exponential growth.
It doesn'T matter which political system. It's a mathematical foundation of the biggest fraud in history.
Any economy and monetary system built on compound interest without allowing bankruptcy is based on exponential growth.
There, fixed it for ya'.
Historically, self-destruction is the common denominator for past human civilization, culture, and society:
http://blogdredd.blogspot.com/2014/11/phases-of-empire-freezing-to-death...
An ocean acidified will remain that way for possibly hundreds of thousands or even millions of years.
Predictions on the scale of millions of years. Now there's a new low, in many ways.
Um, yeah. I like the CC guys, but this was a quick scan and a yawn. Hey Taggart, don't worry so much, the "growth" problem is taking care of itself. See my avatar for proof...
A yawn is right, a big yawn at that. My take away is that the environment is so complicated we can't know what we are doing to damage it but we have to stop doing it or else. Then we need Al Gore's wisdom to come up with a tax that will correct all those mistakes we didn't know we made and give the funds to the big money men. Then we can force ourselves into exponential recuction of everything until only the overlords are left and the earth will smile again.
stop with the straw-man, it's dishonest; nowhere in the article or the video does it suggest coming up with a tax.
as far as not knowing what we are doing to damage the environment, yeah right! the poisons that monsanto makes like roundup that's going into the environment by the ton, might, just *might*, have something to do with honeybee colony collapse disorder.
ya think?
"nowhere in the article or the video does it suggest coming up with a tax."
Are you a fucking simpleton? We all know this is driven by that fucking carbon tax.
Fukushima blows up and the Gulf overflows with oil. Where the fuck is Al Gore and his eco-comrades?
Nowhere. That's where.
Fuck you.
you can engage in name-calling all you want, you still haven't answered the question:
where in the article or in the video does it suggest a tax?
do you honestly believe that just because someone wants to examine the effect that humans are having on the environment, that automatically means they are pro-carbon tax?
who exactly is the simpleton here?
Fuck you.
I think you just clarified who is the simpleton.
Fuck you, too.
Your argumentative skills are so great you just lost the argument. By the way, I'll just preempt you by saying f*** you.
MF, maybe you should read up on the Dunning-Kruger effect and take a honest look in the mirror....
good to see you back, flak ;-)
Yes. Now where's that cat_? Here Kitty Kitty Kitty
7 billion humans, doubling every 40 years like locusts. Look at the air pollution in China and the water pollution in India. People swimming and bathing in their own feces. These 2 most populous countries are what the world will be like in a few generations. Mexico City coming to the southwestern US. Fast.
If humans survive another 100-200 years of their own idiocracy it will be a miracle. The earth will heal and become clean again after that. Thousands of years mean nothing.
But we believe we're exceptional in a millennia or two, or five.
Ain't that a hoot?
The transhumanist bastards expect to live forever, so no problem for them...
...except...
..."accidents."
http://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/energy-environment/226050-offshor...
The Obama administration and Department of Interior (DOI) have announced their planned Jan 29, 2015 auction of hundreds of thousands of acres of North Atlantic ocean area to wind developers under President Obama’s Climate Action Plan.
UK’s offshore wind energy projects' results should serve as the catalyst for termination by the administration of its proposed ocean auction to wind limited liabilities corporations. U.S. rate and taxpayers are unacceptably exposed by this administration’s blind eye to the UK’s failed offshore wind program. Neither the ocean area the federal government holds in trust for U.S. citizens, nor U.S. citizens themselves, should be exploited by an industry that historically fails to deliver public benefits.
Germany’s flagship BARD Offshore I is a 400MW wind project intended to supply the energy needs of 400,000 households. But Bard Offshore 1 remains out of operation according to industry source Offshore Wind Biz (June 2014) citing: “frequent technical problems with the converter substation,” “a smoldering fire,” “failure of the system,” “five unplanned outages since the beginning of 2014” and “transmission problems.”
WindPowerOffshore (September 19, 2014) reports the Danish company Vattenfall is going to dismantle the Yttre Stengrund in Swedish waters after only 13 years of operation. “Only one in (5) turbines is currently operational.”
Europe’s offshore wind energy endeavors reveal the challenges of the harsh and corrosive marine environment. GE deployed the Cape Wind prototype GE 3.6 MW wind turbines at Arklow, the wind farm offshore of Ireland. GE subsequently “discontinued” the Cape Wind 3.6 MW wind turbine even while Cape Wind, the wind farm planned for offshore Massachusetts, was under permit review by the DOI. That review advanced Cape Wind as a “reliable” energy source.
Cape Wind changed specifications to Siemens 3.6 MW during their power purchase contract negotiations with the national grid. But Siemens is not boasting offshore wind success, according to the Wall Street Journal [1/08/14]:
“Siemens, the world’s largest manufacturer of offshore wind turbines, and its partners concede they underestimated the challenges behind offshore wind. The financial fallout from these challenges was highlighted on Thursday, when Siemens said it booked €128 million ($171 million) in new charges related to connecting offshore wind farms to the power grid. It blamed unexpectedly high costs for shipping, installing and starting up grid components.”
A Spiegel International article ‘Turbine Trouble: Ill Wind Blows for German Offshore Industry’ says, “Operators of offshore wind farms depend on sufficiently high electricity prices to refinance their investments.” This runs contrary to public interest. Citizens need commercially reasonable energy sources that are reliable, while offshore wind energy technology is historically not reliable, yet its price is high.
The stunning and sobering candor of an executive of the “world’s largest” manufacturer of wind turbines, Vestas, would be comical if not for the serious context — billions in public funding along with the sacrifice of the thousands of ocean acres that DOI intends to grant to wind LLCs.
In 2011, Anders Søe-Jensen, then president of the offshore division at Vestas said, “It’s a bit like buying an old crappy car. It’s starts cheap, but spends most of the time in the workshop costing you a fortune, so you didn’t drive much, and your cost per driven mile is staggeringly high. It’s the same with the cost of energy when you look at capital expense and operating costs with overall production.” ...
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There's an assumption that wind LLCs, minerals rights, oil, gas, are separated, but they're indivisible. Cape Wind's Jim Gordon is just diversifying his energy investment portfolio to include wind. Follow DeepWATER WIND Board of managers to liquid natural gas. Or British Petroleum to BP Wind. Offshore Wind is the "stalking horse" for the oil, gas, minerals rights and aquaculture industries.
Chemical king Monsanto is ready to feed the government's frankenfish. Sadly, government is in partnership with industry working against public interest. The feds can't serve two masters as the Enron energy crisis demonstrated. Enron was and is about energy market manipulation and government colluding with industry...perhaps not adequately addressed by the FERC.
DeepWater Wind BOD is/was President of Kenetech Energy Systems.http://dwwind.com/about/board-...
(that formed EcoElectrica) .
http://www.sec.gov/Archives/ed...
EcoElectrica is a Bermuda limited partnership
formed by affliates of KENETECH Energy Systems, Inc. (KES)
and Enron Development Corporation (Enron).
EcoElectrica’s general partners are KES Bermuda, Inc., and Buenergia, B.V., each which holds one percent interest. Ecoelectric’s limited partners are KES Puerto Rico, L.P. and Buenergia Enron de Puerto Rico, C.V., which are both indirect wholly-owned subsidiaries of KENETECH Corp.,which also owns KES. Buenergia B.V. and
Buenergia Enron de Puerto Rico, C.V. are both indirect wholly-owned subsidiaries of Enron Corporation, the Parent Company of Enron Development Corporation.
http://www.fossil.energy.gov/p...
EcoEléctrica
to construct an LNG pipeline FERC 2014
http://www.ferc.gov/whats-new/...
Limousine Libs always want stuff just not in their backyards. The Cape Wind project is going to interfere with their yacht racing. In addition to the turbines, they should put barges of floating solar panels out there. John Kerry and the Kennedy clans know they will crash into these things as they sail hammered on gin and tonics.
Lumberjack, Don't know why anyone would downvote your information. It is all a matter of public record. It's a shame that our politicians don't spend more time talking to engineers instead of liberal arts majors with an agenda.
Thanks. I helped the industry get rolling again after the disasters with renewables during the last energy crisis. People still are being sold a bill of goods and over the last 20 years i have been fixing disaster after disaster. These systems are expensive and not as reliable as many claim them to be. That also includes unit output etc.. On small scale systems many do it yourselfers ALWAYS fuck up by undersizing the sytems and storage/power conditioning devices. Another big mistake is not properly accounting for phantom loads.
The supersized utility size systems are also inherently problematic. Add that to intermittent resources and you end up eith costly failure after failure. Then throw in the subsidies at about 65 % of cost and voila, some bsstsrds hot rich and you have to pay forthr failure and higher rlectric rates.
I could go on about spinning reserve required to keep these renewable boondoggles going but now digress.
http://online.wsj.com/articles/tim-phillips-wind-power-is-intermittent-b...
--------------------
Paying Wind Generators Not To Produce Powerhttp://ijpr.org/post/paying-wind-generators-not-produce-power
Chances are your utility bill has gone up this year. One small part of the reason may be that you’re paying for electricity that was never generated.
Jefferson Public Radio takes a look at how Northwest electricity customers got saddled with more than $2.7 million in payments for power they didn’t use.
The Bonneville Power Administration operates the federal hydropower dams in the Columbia Basin. In springtime, during snow melt, there can be so much water in the river that – combined with the output of the dozens of wind farms that have cropped up in Oregon and Washington – there’s more electricity in the system than anyone can use.
Dam operators could dump the extra water over the spillways. But as the BPA’s Doug Johnson explains, that causes problems for salmon and other fish.
Doug Johnson: “When there’s a lot of water coming down, what happens is you get a lot of dissolved gas in the water. This can be harmful to those fish.”
To avoid that, the excess water gets run through the turbines. This leaves BPA with lots of electricity and nowhere to put it. So, Johnson says, there’s really only one solution.
Doug Johnson: “What’s left is our ability in an orderly fashion to take wind off the system and serve the load with hydro.”
But, shutting down the wind generators has a cost.
Doug Johnson: “Because we have to take them offline, we compensate them for the costs that they incur for not generating the electricity they could be generating at the time.”
------------
Wind farms paid record sum not to produce electricityhttp://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/earth/energy/windpower/11029583/Wind-far...
http://windfarmaction.wordpress.com/the-dummies-guide/spinning-reserve/
Recent information has been made available that the cost of Spinning Reserve, the backup to UK wind generation, could amount to £10 billion by 2020 with the construction of 17 gas powered generating stations. What is worse, as they will only be working part of the time they will need to be highly subsidised. Guess who pays. The Consumer. A matter of consequence is that a gas power station running in reserve actually creates more CO2 than one working at full power. Perverse as it may seem, this must be laid against the Wind Industry claims that wind saves CO2. Demonstrably wind is carbon positive. Click on the photo for the whole story!
Energy giants want billions for back-up to windfarms
http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/article-2008055/Energy-giants-want-bi...
Britain's richest energy companies want homeowners to subsidise billions of pounds worth of gas-powered stations that will stand idle for most of the time.
Talks have taken place between the Government, Centrica, owner of British Gas, and other energy companies on incentives to build the power stations needed as back-ups for the wind farms now being built around the country.
It is understood 17 gas-fired plants worth about £10 billion will be needed by 2020.
he Energy Department has been warned that without this massive back-up for the new generation of heavily subsidised giant wind farms, the lights could go out when the wind dies down.
Sam Laidlaw, chief executive of Centrica, said renewables, such as large-scale wind energy, were intermittent and required back-up generation, a role gas was uniquely qualified to fill.
But as power stations that operate only intermittently would not be financially viable, Laidlaw said: 'The building of new gas-fired capacity must be incentivised so that gas can fulfil its role as a bridging fuel.'
To that end, energy companies are asking the Government for 'capacity payments'. This ensures firms are paid a fee all year round for keeping a plant on standby.
As in previous subsidies, homeowners would be asked to pay for them through yet another levy on their fuel bills, which are already expected to soar by up to 20 per cent this year alone. The Department is considering the request from energy companies and an answer is expected in a new energy White Paper due later this year.
Industry sources insist the Government has no alternative but to agree to the 'capacity payments' for standby generation if it wants wind power, which also receives huge subsidies, to provide one-third of Britain's energy needs.
In winter, when the most intense cold period coincides with a high pressure front, most wind turbines do not work.
Back when I was playing EVE Online, a fellow corp member was a trucker who specialized in over-sized loads; he'd often deliver new wind turbines to be installed. He passed on to me what the engineers told him: that Wind Power in its current state is a subsidised scam. The avg. time for a turbine to pay for itself is 12 years; but the avg. lifespan of a turbine is 10 years. This is for inland installations, without the extra challenges of a marine environment.
The author says, "Europe’s offshore wind energy endeavors reveal the challenges of the harsh and corrosive marine environment."
From my experience sailing and in the real world I must say any endeavor where you will come in contact with salt is a nightmare. Salt eats the shit out of everything!
FFS, not the ocean acidification meme again.
The Libertarian position is always and everywhere anti-government.
Obongo's EPA is trying to cram through regulations that would give them power over every stream in the country. If they succeed, it will be nearly the end for all private property. The goons will dictate what you can and can't do under the cover of water quality. May they rot in hell.
humans have indisputably been dumping exponentially increasing amounts of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere from the beginning of the industrial revolution, primarily through the burning of fossil fuels. Second, the oceans have absorbed about one-third of this carbon dioxide which then forms carbonic acid. This reduces the pH of the water in an acidic direction. Third, scientists have documented through direct observation the changes in ocean species, both large and microscopic, that have resulted from this increased acidity.
What the scientists are finding is troubling. First, the entire food chain of the ocean could be short-circuited. Second, ocean acidification in combination with other human impacts on the ocean could result in mass extinctions. Third, no one knows how such changes might affect life on land which is by no means isolated from the ocean.
Study Links GMOs To Over 22 Different DiseasesYet More Evidence GMOs Should be Banned
“. . .we have data for 22 diseases, all with a high degree of correlation and very high significance. It seems highly unlikely that all of these can be random coincidence.”
http://naturalsociety.com/study-links-gmos-22-different-diseases/
Why Is Russia Banning GMOs While the US Keeps Approving Them? Russia sees GMOs as threathttp://www.globalresearch.ca/why-is-russia-banning-gmos-while-the-us-kee...
GMOs cause animals to lose their ability to reproduce, Russian scientists discoverhttp://www.naturalnews.com/036710_GMO_animal_experiments_infertility.html
93% want GMOs labeled in USA but it is denied them:
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/28/science/strong-support-for-labeling-mo...
All stupid bullshit...
amazing science in that contribution
I'm sure Monsanto has things under control
and your interests at heart
why do you think they fight like hell to keep their product identified (read advertized) Hint: data tracking
Bum Sauce - May your guts leak for ever and ever
2 words
Social Credit.
He has a nice voice.
Tax my oxygen though and I'm going to fight M'Fers.
So a bunch of morons want me to believe that the only resources in the universe reside in the top couple percent of the ground here on Earth?
Whocouldanode?
...and when you larn...you node.
Also it demonstrates a fundamental lack of knowledge of a coming invention, the fusion arc.
You know, when we conquer fusion, we will start to be able to make the elements that currently are only made in stars from the fusion/supernova process. That's what the fusion arc is.
Fusion is 30 years away and always will be. Even if we had it, volumes are so low that it would not be cost effective to produce all but a few of the rarest elements. Asteroid mining is better, but to get that going on any significant scale we will have to defeat the people who want to keep all of humanity holed up on this prison planet. Guess we'll have to live within our means.
We can thank big corps for this mess we're in.
plenty of alternatives products are out there (like hemp) that could substitue for petroleum but they insist on it.
there is alot of potential in this world and there are very smart people out there who can make a difference but they're too busy working for industrial corporations ruining the planet.
you know as a species were fucked up when our best and brightest are on wall street creating/betting on derivatives. i actually feel tihs way about alot of 'succesful' people who are white collar professionals: actuarys, accountants, lawyers., marketing professionals, any corpoate job.. most of these jobs are the epitome of busy work
Not the best and brightest. Maybe the most overpaid and arrogant but far from the best and brightest. Just ask anyone who has worked with them.
The really bright innovators are busy changing the world on a budget smaller than a wall street playa spends on hookers and blow.
The environment will take care of itself in time, right after most of us leave, and if you look at those charts, you will realize why those in 'official' circles refer to our times as the 6th Extinction and understand most of their policies therein.
What's amazing is that after 40 years of false alarmist commie predictions about resources and the environment, people still py any attention this crap.
Cough Bull$#*T. Cough. Name one of these warning signs that is unique to this millenium.
The ocean is not becoming acidic. It is becoming less basic. Water is a base. Clowns.
Pure water has a neutral pH of 7. Sea water has a pH of about 7.5 and thus is slightly basic. as asmospheric CO2 concentrations rise the ocean is getting less basic. this process is generally refered to as ocean acidification.
7.5 is not correct. Ocean is 8.1, down from a historical/long-term 8.2. Decrease is due to co2 emissions.
WHat is this ridiculous assumption that it is the growth of the human species causing the demise of species. Nature takes care of that quite well on its own. Things change and the species that don't adapt, vanish. Many become minor minor players on some forsaken acre somewhere - unable to compete beyond a specialized piece of real estate.
There are many more species that have not been discovered yet than are probably in existence. Certainly many more than those that have vanished in the last 500 years
Making up and projecting nonsense is a not a strong argumentative technique once you get beyond 3rd grade or so...
http://youtu.be/RytiPMIomtg
Ghandi said something to the effect that 'there are more than enough resources for human need, there will never be enough resources for human greed'.
Our dead-end growth paradigm is driven by the western corporate organizational model. Multinationals are like sharks, they are either growing or they die. The first thing that MUST change is a return to traditional modes of agriculture. Small farmers build soil fertility, conserve water and ensure a vast diversity of food resouces. Big ag is highly entropic, highly destructive (socially and environmentally) and it carpets the landscape in unsustainable monocultures.
We need to rediscover and value rural life. With the advent of high speed internet the big cities have outlived their usefullness, and have become hives of overpopulation, pollution, and cultural and societal decay.
There is NO difference between these Doomster Marxist Hippy whacko's and the BS about Ocean Acidification and the equally educated Banksters and Government Elite.
100% Fucking LIARS.
regards
If capitalism was the real miracle most of us believe it is, you know, the unseen hand and all that. Then real capitalism with drivers from market forces should self correct for the problems coming. Yet I hear the same old crap, that to self correct would destroy the economy. I doubt that very much. Instead of crashing the economy, taking action on pollution at all levels, water usage and global runaway warming, we would not only not crash the economy, the solutions would spur a great capitalist revival like non since the 1800s. The entrenched interests that seek to maintain their share prices, even if destroying the world was required, are not capitalists. They are communists, seeking to use government power to maintain monoply postions. Where as if the great disasters facing us were totally priced into the markets, then capitalism would take hold and drive us in the directions that preserved the economy and solved the problems. Government protecting big oil is why the price of Global Warming is not part of the price of oil, the destruction done is shifted to the public, and big oil pays nothing of the long term costs. In a real capitalist system, big oil would pay all costs of their products. And then the market would go to work.
People who claim the most to be capitalist, support the governments tireless work to protect big oil from all the costs, these are priced out, and priced in to the commons. Like a commons in Britain in the Middle Ages, the guy who over grazed the commons was soon taught the true costs of overgrazing the commons. Simple really, Price it in, make it part of the market, then capitalism will go to work.\The government in Washington DC is a Communist Soviet of the Corporations and Banks. The USA it dead, it is now The CSCB.
Yup. "Externalities" When we covered that in Econ 110, my reaction was shocked disbelief that a sane, honest person could propose such a thing with a straight face. I was severely demotivated to learn anything else in the course, and have since viewed all economists not as "scientists" or "scholars" but as the crooked used car salesmen they actually are.
Fallacy:
Capitallism MUST include .Gov protections for Big Massive Business and Corps.
No. Easy enough to give corps a lifespan like a patent. NN years, you die.
This will create all sorts of odd ball short term game the system arrangements, but it will cut back on the bigger grift.
so who gets to give corps a lifespan or decide on the years?
corps and govs are made-up fictions, get rid of all of them, end the games.
it's time for us to live free lives without interference from bush-type "deciders".
Why in all the smart ass sarcasm and solemn doomsaying doesn't BIRTH CONTROL ever actually be advocated? One county in Utah has a higher birth rate than Bangladesh for cripes sake! Oh. sorry! Churches and religions may not get enough fianancial growth and political power...
This guy knows nothing about commercial fishing.
BTW, Three storms coming in off the Pacific to California.
My rain gauge in PHX has 14 inches this year so far.
Yeah, about that.
You know how a given fishery will be over hauled and then collapse to 5% of existing and stay at that level?
You know what else does that? Old oil wells.
Except that oil does not reproduce and replenish itself like fish...oh wait....
He forgot to mention that the sky is falling.
I'll accept this premise, that we either cut our population by 90% or nature will do it for us. And I'll take natural selection, thank you, over the dictates of some government eco-bureaucracy where the author hopes to find employment. Nature has done this job for four billion years and has proven herself quite adept at it.
Life goes on.
Everyone is looking for the magic bullet to allow continued growth and expansion of the present lifestyle without consequences but this is not possible.
The only solution is to simplify life, do with less. No more cars, small houses, limited electricity and manual labor.
This wil never happen until the last tree, as what happened on Easter Island, is chopped down and the environment is crushed. You can issue a million warnings and no one will take heed because we collectively are unable to face reality.
Nobody really knows how much longer all the pieces will stay together and when they will fall apart. So why stop now if we can keep going for another decade or two.
The lights will go off sooner or later anyway.
Put the blame firmly where it belongs. What monetary event occurred in 1971. Bounds to the natural world were severed when we totally went off the gold standard. Look at the environmental situation- it has deteriorated rapidly since we allowed capital to be created from thin air. The gold standard was reduced earlier but damage to the environment really ramped up once we removed the last vestige in 71'. Interestingly that's when we also started moving heavily polluting industries offshore due to Nixon's clean water/air act. So not only were corporations gifted unending wads of cash they could muddy up the waters and air of other nations with slave labor to boot.
This is how we get back to the gold standard. We accuse the Central Banks, Import-Export Bank, World Bank, IMF, and BIS of golbal warming. Their monetary policies and unholy alliance with oil industry- capital intensive suckers- as the root problem behind climate change. Other damage is also their fault. Would credit be expanded so everyone could have a new phone every time Apple deems they need another billion? NO-it wouldn't. Would government be trillions in debt- no they wouldn't
Government can't have it both ways. They can't hound and tax us for carbon use and then support monetary policies of Central Banks who supply the capital for destruction. Gold is discovered at about a 2.5 % increase roughly equal to population growth. Tying currency to precious metals will force money masters to treat capital as precious which it is. It will keep capital allocated apropriately and not get the banks with nearly $800 trillion in derivatives and company stock buy backs.
You want a better environment then tie the money system to a physical precious metal or group of physical precious metals. Is mining damaging- yes but at least it will be better than what we've got. The oil industry has had its shot- its time to move on. My theory why solar and wind power is resisted is because no one can point to a pile of wind or sunshine and say I own that. Prices for renewables are coming down per MWh. The fossil fuel industry doesn't pay a penny toward protection of oil shipping lanes or soldiers required to protect oil producing countries- we could avoid that mess.
Maybe protection would move to gold mining regions but the Middle East ia a quagmire. Maybe the West is against gold because China has become a big partner with Arican nations- gold source. Who knows but something has got to give. What we have now is clearly not working for most people- just the few who have decided they deserve to hold all the cards.
We need to do something before the idiots in Congress declare war on Russia- see H. Res 758.
With 4 months lead time all of the leaves on earth could be composted into topsoil sutiable for next spring's planting.
It won't feed everyone as well as with the stored energy of fossil fuel, but it will feed 20% or more.
This does not include all kitchen garbage, household paper waste, and suitable animal output. Then there is burning anything else and blending it with room temperaure liquid nitrogen. Even most plastics will burn down to C plus whatever after a few torchings.
We are fine, stop panicking everybody...
Leraconteur- burning plastic emits toxic substances itself. I have no problem with it as long as the facility is able to capture the by products released after a few torchings. Why can't we add a couple of more R's to the mantra reduce, recycle, reuse. What about rethink and restrain- plastic is not benign. If anyone is interested I have a thesis that includes a discussion on plastics- in particular styrene and endocrine disruption. If enough interest I will try and create link.
Man can not control the macro environment.
We can only control and build our own micro environments so long as we have the energy to do so.
Civilization is a Ponzi, face it!
It can take centuries for atmospheric carbon dioxide levels to cause a significant rise in the carbon dioxide levels of the oceans.
So, this short video is just more government nonsense.
In the not-too-distant future everybody who is anybody will live in outer space because the Earth will have become a dump.
And it will have been caused by the anti-capitalistic "environmentalists" who, in fact, don't give a damn about the environment.
I think we will die from an overpopulation of endagered animals like Canadian Geese crapping all over the place.
The problem: http://www.census.gov/popclock/
1 new international migrant added every 40 seconds? WTF?!
Overpopulation in the United States will become THE single greatest issue facing Americans in the 21st century. We either solve it proactively or nature will solve it brutally for us via water shortages, energy crisis, air pollution, gridlock, species extinction and worse.
U.S. population will double from 300 million to 600 million on its way to 1 billion in the lifetime of a child born today if we fail to change course.
- Frosty Wooldridge (2000)
What's with the fucking communist propaganda articles posted every weekend about peak this and overpopulated that. It's complete and utter nonsense and a tool of the ingnorant leftists. I'm suprised to see it here.
http://mises.org/library/myth-over-population
You might want to rethink that position....
Indeed....
EXPONENTIAL MEET EROEI.......
Economy is a subset of ecology, not the other way around.
To all the people who think we can just grow our way out of this they are wrong. If you think the worlds surging population will not become a problem because of new energy sources I say, wake up! To all the people who think the worlds surging population will not become a problem because of new energy sources I say, wake up!
Anyone with even the slightest mechanical knowledge will tell you that solar panels, wind mills and such take a lot of energy to build and often are maintenance intense. Both these complicated systems have a short lifespan and require a great deal of energy to be expended in just keeping them up and running. Carry no illusions the days of cheap energy are behind us and not only has the low hanging fruit been picked it has been eaten. Sadly, if we look back we will see much of this energy was allowed to go to waste. The article below looks into the cost of failing to plan long-term and questions if collectively mankind is incompetent.
http://brucewilds.blogspot.com/2014/12/does-peter-principle-apply-to-mankind.html