Thread: The Future: What Will It Be Like?

Originally Posted by Xei

The future won't progress. All throughout history writers have embodied their deepest dreams and nightmares in fictional utopias and dystopias. The reality has always been different from either prediction; reality has always been a grey compromise.

Oil is the low entropy chemical source which provides for modern society. Oil is running out quickly. Globalisation will collapse; there will be no transport, there will be mass starvation, there will be no more plastics or mass production, and there will be an energy famine. And then it will all be over. The oil age will just be a 300 year blip in the 1,000,000s of years of human history, and we shall return to the land; the memories will quickly fade and the litter will fade soon after, and then there will be nothing.

Sorry...

Yeah, but lets be optimistic. It's us who decide how we'll destroy ourselves after all. I say we have another revolution and communism... then we're saved and develop a Star Trek kind of world. Indoctrinate everyone with zen Buddhism to replace other false religions and to stimulate the growth of the worlds mental capacity, to evolve from our primitive tendencies just enough to save ourselves. Then we create a spaceship named the Enterprise and appoint somebody named Kirk as captain.

Originally Posted by Xei

Oil is running out quickly.

Why does everyone believe this? SOOOOOOO not true. You'll see.

True,it's not true, but it will run out in a long time, and future generations will be screwed when that happens.


And it's like the Earth's heroin. It seems like a good idea, you start to like it, it grows on you, you get addicted, and then you realize that it was a bad idea to start with, but by then it's become a part of you and you can't stop using it, or if you do it will take a long time and you will experience nasty withdrawal symptoms. And if you don't manage to quit in enough time,you are majorly fucked.

Why does everyone believe this? SOOOOOOO not true. You'll see.

Oil prediction has peaked this year, give or take a few years. It's the opinion of pretty much every authority on the subject. All you have to do is look at the curve of any general oil field and then the total output of the planet and you'll see we're at the peak.

[http://www.exitmundi.nl/oilproblem_2..._peak_oil.jpg]

Oil prediction will now start to decline geometrically... however the demand is obviously now higher by an order of magntitude.

The oil shocks of 71 were caused by a dip in oil production of about 5%. What exactly do you think is going to happen a few years into that bell curve?

And anyway, regardless of if it happens in five years or twenty years (although the latter idea is ridiculous), it's going to happen, and modern civilisation will fall. Why exactly do you think this is not the case?

I think you understand the ingenuity of people. Everyone knows oil will run out in the very near future, there are lots and lots of alternatives though. 90% of cars in Brazil don't use a drop of fossil fuels. They're called flex-fuel cars and they are widely available outside of the USA. They run on gasoline, alcohol, or any mixture of the two. In brazil, it's nearly exclusively alcohol.

No amount of ingenuity can overcome the fundamental laws of physics.

Brazil has tropical conditions and a huge landmass. What will the rest of the world do? And where would we grow food if we're growing so much biocrop? Bearing in mind that pesticides, herbicides and fungicides are made out of crude oil and the source of hydrogen for fertiliser is also crude oil, so the farming situation will already be pretty dire.

Originally Posted by ninja9578

there are lots and lots of alternatives though.

I agree with you ... as always, of course. High five, partner!

Such as..?

Originally Posted by Xei

Oil prediction has peaked this year, give or take a few years. It's the opinion of pretty much every authority on the subject. All you have to do is look at the curve of any general oil field and then the total output of the planet and you'll see we're at the peak.

[http://www.exitmundi.nl/oilproblem_2..._peak_oil.jpg]

Oil prediction will now start to decline geometrically... however the demand is obviously now higher by an order of magntitude.

The oil shocks of 71 were caused by a dip in oil production of about 5%. What exactly do you think is going to happen a few years into that bell curve?

And anyway, regardless of if it happens in five years or twenty years (although the latter idea is ridiculous), it's going to happen, and modern civilisation will fall. Why exactly do you think this is not the case?

I think it will be another 50 years before it runs low. By then we will have alternative fuels/machines in mass production. If not... the skyrocketing oil prices would make us.

It's not "quickly" running out.

there will be wars between major nations and as a result economies will die, nukes will be fired and the world will change as we know it.

I think it will be another 50 years before it runs low. By then we will have alternative fuels/machines in mass production. If not... the skyrocketing oil prices would make us.

It's not "quickly" running out.

What can I say? If you can't interpret basic graphs that's that.

There won't be any oil in 50 years, and the supply starts falling decades before it starts 'running out'.

Originally Posted by Xei

Such as..?

Nuclear, solar, ethanol, electric, and whatever manipulations of matter we can come up with in the future. Technology is hauling ass, and I don't forsee us in a Mad Max type of world. "Necessity is the mother of invention."

Originally Posted by Xei

and the supply starts falling decades before it starts 'running out'.

exactly. That's how I know it's not running out yet. Thanks for proving my point.

Its hardly even "falling" yet... Still cheaper than fucking milk.

Well, we'll see pretty soon I reckon. But you really don't seem to understand the issue. It's not about their being no supply at all, it's about demand exceeding supply. That happened by 5% in 71 and War nearly broke out. Imagine what'll happen at 50%...

Nuclear, solar, ethanol, electric, and whatever manipulations of matter we can come up with in the future. Technology is hauling ass, and I don't forsee us in a Mad Max type of world. "Necessity is the mother of invention."

You can't power a petrol engine with a nuclear power plant.

We didn't invent oil, we found it. And it truly is an incredible substance. A biologist calculated that the amount of energy in oil we burn in a year exceeds the catabolisms of every organism on Earth by something like 100 times.

When we burn oil we are effectively burning millions of years' worth of organic activity, compressed into an extremely dense form.

Originally Posted by Xei

You can't power a petrol engine with a nuclear power plant.

I wasn't planning on keeping petrol engines, and I wasn't saying they should be run by nuclear power plants. We have nuclear engergy technology and a history of majorly advancing our technologies. Our advancement will keep continuing.

Originally Posted by Xei

We didn't invent oil, we found it. And it truly is an incredible substance. A biologist calculated that the amount of energy in oil we burn in a year exceeds the catabolisms of every organism on Earth by something like 100 times.

I was talking about things that are more like nuclear power. We will be finished with oil pretty soon. It will become a memory from a primitive era.

We are definitely going to be moving away from oil in the foreseeable future. However, I completely disagree that this will spell the end of modern civilization.

If history has shown us anything, it's that markets figure out how to adapt in the face of problems of supply and demand. For example, as supply of oil decreases and prices rise, demand will necessarily lower; the most fundamental rule of economics is that people respond to incentives. We will see people switching from SUVs to hybrids (we already see this happening), home solar panels becoming more attractive, home owners and businesses keeping their heaters a few degrees cooler, etc. Meanwhile as oil prices rise, alternative energy sources will start to become economically viable - especially if governments start subsidizing them, which is likely. And so on.

The long and short of it is that "peak oil" will likely cause an economic hiccup, but our collective ingenuity will enable us to adapt and ultimately move on. Frankly I expected more from you than to support what is essentially another case of doomsday fear-mongering.

The problem is that you can't argue with the physics, specifically the first and second laws of thermodynamics. What do you plan to use for transport? Nuclear power stations? There's only about 40 years of 235 left, too, and that's only at the current rate of use. So what then? Nobody's funding fusion seriously now, and when oil hits the roof nobody will be thinking of it then either, and then the resources will be gone.

How can you look to history? Throughout the entirity of modern history, oil has been cheap, and available. When one source temporarily failed, we could always pump more from somewhere else. What we're talking about now is completely different. All sources will fail and there won't be anywhere to turn.

As I said, you have to understand how much of a miracle oil is. Its energy density is ridiculously - irreplacably - high.

All you can do with this issue is face the facts and do the calculations. Turning the thermostat down by a few degrees - are you serious? The savings as a proportion of total energy requirements would have to be written in standard form. What other alternatives are there; for fertilisers, pesticides, herbicides, fungicides, and farm machinery; for transport; for electrical power generation? You can't reference some technology, you have to actually do the sums.

And don't look to economics either. The axioms of economics are totally wrong. They treat the economy as a physical machine and then completely ignore the fact that a machine needs a source of energy and low entropy to run, which it soon won't.

You remind me of the people who said manned flight is impossible and the later people who said it is guaranteed that humans will never land on the moon. Our species is notorious for coming up with brilliant inventions. I am not worried at all. I would bet my any amount of money that the kind of fusion machine Doc used at the end of Back to the Future will end up being a reality, for example.

Originally Posted by Xei

Nobody's funding fusion seriously now

We have a president who believes in science now. Congress has already starting putting more funding into alternative energies, including fusion. So has Germany, Japan, and Canada to name the biggest players. It's called the ITER. Even so, I don't think fusion is the future.

As for where all the corn will come from... the USA is many times the size of Brazil. You are obviously uneducated about the subject if you think that growing ethanol will offset the amount of food. Ethanol is made mostly of the stalks, not the corn itself.

Originally Posted by Universal Mind

You remind me of the people who said manned flight is impossible and the later people who said it is guaranteed that humans will never land on the moon. Our species is notorious for coming up with brilliant inventions. I am not worried at all. I would bet my any amount of money that the kind of fusion machine Doc used at the end of Back to the Future will end up being a reality, for example.

"Something's gotta be done about your kids, your daughter marries a black guy!" - Doc in Back to the Future in Family Guy


Remember, the necessity drives invention. Oil will run out very fast, I'll still be young when it's all gone. Something will come about to replace it.

Originally Posted by Xei

The problem is that you can't argue with the physics, specifically the first and second laws of thermodynamics.

What a red herring. Nobody is trying to argue with the laws of physics.

By the way, I would like to see documentation that nuclear power can only support mankind for about 40 years. (Ignoring for a moment the fact that this is not our only alternative energy source.)

Anyway, my remark about looking to history was not focused on availability of oil or examples of oil crises, it was more broadly focused on the economic truth that societies adapt to problems of supply and demand. Related to this point is that you seem to have deliberately misinterpreted my remark about turning down the thermostat. Obviously this is not going to solve our energy dilemma. Rather, this is one example of decreasing demand in response to high prices - the overall point being that demand is not going to continue to soar despite decreasing supply, leading to suddenly and exorbitantly high oil prices. The level of demand is related to the level of supply, as mediated by price. You mention oil "hitting the roof," sources "failing." This seems to imply an abrupt end to the oil supply, presumably due to your misguided view of ever-increasing demand in the face of decreasing supply. I think we both know that isn't how it will play out - perhaps you should take another look at the graph you posted (assuming it's the graph that I think it is; the link is broken). While the supply of oil tapers off, we will have both time and incentive to explore alternative energy sources.

Oil is (was?) indeed an amazing source of relatively cheap energy. However, it's not the only viable source of energy. If your opinion is that we will be unable to find a suitable replacement(s) as the oil age gradually wanes, then we are simply sitting at odds, and only time will resolve the matter. However, the supply and demand issues elaborated above are not a matter of opinion - they are a matter of fact. I acknowledge that this may be difficult to see for someone who rejects both history and economics. We will have ample opportunity to properly address the energy issues headed our way - as for whether or not we will successfully overcome them, that is a matter of faith.

You remind me of the people who said manned flight is impossible and the later people who said it is guaranteed that humans will never land on the moon. Our species is notorious for coming up with brilliant inventions. I am not worried at all. I would bet my any amount of money that the kind of fusion machine Doc used at the end of Back to the Future will end up being a reality, for example.

Why? Manned flight is simply a case of building a machine which exerts an upwards force equal to mg. Landing on the moon is just a case of doing work equal to GmM/r.

Doing work without energy is a case of breaking a fundamental law of physics. So is decreasing the entropy of an isolated system.

Mr. Fusion was a joke. It's no more realistic than Mr. Fission. Even less so in fact, at least fission has worked for 70 years or so. Any fusion is an undeterminable number of decades away, if at all.

We have a president who believes in science now. Congress has already starting putting more funding into alternative energies, including fusion. So has Germany, Japan, and Canada to name the biggest players. It's called the ITER. Even so, I don't think fusion is the future.

As for where all the corn will come from... the USA is many times the size of Brazil. You are obviously uneducated about the subject if you think that growing ethanol will offset the amount of food. Ethanol is made mostly of the stalks, not the corn itself.

There we go with the maths again. Sugar cane has an energy yield of about 8:1. Corn has a yield of about 1.2:1, if that. You need to do the sums, we are not talking about a qualitative issue here.

What do you suggest if not fusion?

And I just googled for 'Obama fusion funding' and found absolutely nothing.

The data about 235 reserves was in some obscure sites but here are two links which estimate it:

http://209.85.229.132/search?q=cache...&ct=clnk&gl=uk
http://knowledge-storage.com/science...nce/48-uranium

Please don't start the whole 'obvious misinterpretation' thing, obviously nobody has an agenda here and neither of us is 12.

No, my point was clear: you haven't provided any answers. The one which you did was completely insufficient. Again: this is a quantitative matter.

Yes, demand will have to fall. And the only way to do this is radically change society. Hence, the end of modern civilisation.

There's no point in splitting hairs about conceptual ideas here: oil is an extremely special material and the only way to respond is to give some physical, quantitative methods by which it can be replaced.

Human ingenuity is no match for hard, physical facts. Consider a man falling out of a plane without a parachute.

Originally Posted by Xei

Human ingenuity is no match for hard, physical facts. Consider a man falling out of a plane without a parachute.

A couple people have survived that. Sorry to bust your bubble.

They already have shit running on other fuels... I would imagine if petrol was about to be a thing of the past, we would super boost production of alternatives. Only because that is when the most money is in it. Until then, there's not enough money in the business for greedy ass people.

Originally Posted by Xei

you haven't provided any answers. The one which you did was completely insufficient.

Which one was that? What kind of answer are you looking for anyway - do you want me to devise a global energy plan? I am not so arrogant as to presume to be able to do this, so quit asking.

Originally Posted by Xei

Yes, demand will have to fall. And the only way to do this is radically change society. Hence, the end of modern civilisation.

It won't take radical doomsday scenarios for demand to fall. Just off the top of my head I listed several relatively easy and likely ways that oil demand will decrease in the face of climbing prices. These are hardly radical changes, and doubtless there are many methods even more feasible than these.

It's understandable to be skeptical, but keep in mind that we have seen oil demand fall before - in 1998, oil prices dropped to a historic low when the Asian financial crisis caused a dramatic decrease in consumption despite rising production. These Asian countries went through a difficult period, but 11 years later they are not really any worse for wear - the decreases in demand neither caused nor were caused by societal collapses. One does not necessitate the other.

The difference between then and the scenario we will soon be facing is that we will be racing against the hour glass to develop long term alternatives to transfer the demand to. More on that below.

Originally Posted by Xei

There's no point in splitting hairs about conceptual ideas here: oil is an extremely special material and the only way to respond is to give some physical, quantitative methods by which it can be replaced.

Clearly we must and will respond with concrete methods for phasing out oil. No one is in disagreement there. My conceptual "hair splitting" is aimed at your notion of an abrupt societal collapse.

Originally Posted by Xei

Human ingenuity is no match for hard, physical facts.

There is where we differ. Human ingenuity has a long, successful history of overcoming hard, physical facts which opposed us. I assume the one you are now referring to is that our current primary source of energy will eventually be depleted. I see no special reason why this is an inherently unsolvable problem. To say that I have faith that it will be solved is probably not a very satisfying answer to you, but if you want a more satisfying answer than that you should really be asking the experts.