Indeed, our G8 (pronounced "great") leaders cannot even recognize what the problem is.
I read an article today on Yahoo entitled "G8 leaders back Greece in euro zone, call growth 'imperative'".
This is a bit of problem as I enumerated in the following comment on the article:
"Our G8 leaders don't get it. Growth is done. The easy oil is gone. All this unrest you are seeing in the world is the result of us hitting hard limits. Politicians and economists just don't get it."
Brief and to the point. Definitely not my usual style.
The first cogent reply was from Joe S. from Kansas City, United States where he wrote:
"Growth is not done... we just need to allow individuals to pursue their dream, but of course with some and limited oversight. If governments got out of the way, we'll have growth within months.
Consider the attack by Obama and democrats on the coal and oil industry. They killed the Keystone pipeline and his type of people are regulating the coal industry to death.
The socialists want businesses under their control and that is why they pursue an unsustainable "green" energy that requires subsidies.
That is why growth appears to be done.... socialistic concepts.
Ronald Reanan(sic) quote:
If it moves, tax it.
If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving,
subsidize it'"
Sigh. Perhaps it is not just politicians and economists that don't get it.
Joe, I agree that this is a problem of ideology, but the ideological problem is not republican vs. democrat, free-market vs. socialist. Deficit spending will not solve this problem because creating additional financial claims on a limited pool of resources isn't going to fix anything. Cutting regulation and taxes to stimulate business isn't going to do anything because of resource limits, you can't grow what you don't have.
An aside though, funny how you should mention that Obama and the democrats are attacking the fossil fuel industry, by trying to regulate it. Perhaps the best way is for the Obama administration to cut all subsidies to the fossil fuel industry and let them compete on their own merits, just like in a true free market? Of course the Republicans would rail against that. And you are back to status quo, pinning the hopes of your economy on a non-renewable fuel source.
The economy runs on energy, without access to ever increasing energy you have cannot have a growing economy. And unfortunately due to a flaw in the foundation of classical and subsequent neo-classical economic thought our global economy must grow or die.
What is that flaw? From the times of Adam Smith, Thomas Malthus, and John Stuart Mill, economics as a system, consisted of land, labour and capital. Neoclassical economics subsumed land into capital, treating land as a subsystem of capital. The error, one that has been made worse from the transition of classical to neoclassical economics is that land is first a subsystem of economics, then a subsystem of capital.
All along we have had it exactly backwards.
The Economy is a subsystem of the Environment (land).
Without environment, which provides all externalities, you can have no economy. Thus laws governing environment (physics) take precedence over rules governing economics. And that law is the second law of thermodynamics. The easy oil that fueled economic growth is nearly gone and I say again that the unrest you are seeing, riots, political uncertainty, debt crisis, housing crisis, unemployment, food crisis, climate change, repeal of freedoms, all stems from the energy crisis.
This might have been something that could have been dealt with 30 years ago, but now it is far too late. So while those in the US continue to treat politics like a team sport, the really important decision do not get made, indeed the really important issues do not get discussed.
Energy Consumption
Saturday, May 19, 2012
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
The Giant's Footprint (aka Where is Salby’s Peer Reviewed Article?)
A gentleman commented on my blog the other day pointing me to another article written by our resident climate skeptic Eric Booth issuing a challenge to all those that subscribe to climate change driven by CO2. It was a talk given by Professor Murry Salby.
I figured it must be pretty good stuff seeing as when I did a search on his name there were blogs titled:
“An Emily Litella moment for climate science and CO2”
“Greenie Watch”
"It continues to unravel"
“Al Gore, My Favourite Whore”
“The Climate Scum: Salby Demolishes AGW Theory”
“Another Nail in the Coffin”
“Prof. Murry Salby falsifies Anthropogenic Global Warming”
and my personal favourite:
"The Climate Change Debate Should be Declared Over!"
It is interesting to note how many of these blog posts spread out like wild-fire in the first week of August, telling the exact same story with very little analysis or original commentary.
So I went to search for the peer reviewed paper but I ran into a problem, I couldn't find it. Most of these blogs were dated around Aug 2011, most likely soon after the talk was given and some of them talked about a paper being submitted for review. The latest blog dated April of this year said 6 months until it was to be published.
All this celebration and it hadn't even been reviewed yet.
Please, by all means, if you know where Salby’s article has been published in a peer-reviewed publication, throw me a link and I’ll change this posts title.
In the meantime there has been a rebuttal. A few actually.
http://www.skepticalscience.com/Murry-Salby-Confused-About-The-Carbon-Cycle.html
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2011/08/unforced-variations-aug-2011/ from about comment 37 on. Pay special attention to comment 81 as to why no one in the “warmist” camp is getting all hot and bothered by Salby’s talk.
And of course Professor’s Salby’s co-worker Professor Colin Prentice had something to say as well, just scroll down to the bottom of the page:
http://www.climatefutures.mq.edu.au/eventsandnews/commentary/
Notice the blurb under the link (emphasis mine):
“This article is in response to a recent talks delivered at the IUGG and Sydney Institute by Professor Murry Salby. As Professor Salby has not yet provided any data (published or unpublished) to support the ideas presented, this piece is a response to the verbal content of his talk only.”
Me, I'll wait for a peer-reviewed journal like the Journal of Climate (or some other peer-reviewed source) to publish the paper and then get excited about the prospect of an underdog scientist defeating the establishment scientists.
I am reminded though that this is one scientist with one paper (that has not been reviewed yet), so I fall back on Michael Shermer's ten famous rules for unearthing bullshit:
Drumroll please.
1. How reliable is the source of the claim?
2. Does the source make similar claims?
3. Have the claims been verified by somebody else?
4. Does this fit with the way the world works?
5. Has anyone tried to disprove the claim?
6. Where does the preponderance of evidence point?
7. Is the claimant playing by the rules of science?
8. Is the claimant providing positive evidence?
9. Does the new theory account for as many phenomena as the old theory?
10. Are personal beliefs driving the claim?
I figured it must be pretty good stuff seeing as when I did a search on his name there were blogs titled:
“An Emily Litella moment for climate science and CO2”
“Greenie Watch”
"It continues to unravel"
“Al Gore, My Favourite Whore”
“The Climate Scum: Salby Demolishes AGW Theory”
“Another Nail in the Coffin”
“Prof. Murry Salby falsifies Anthropogenic Global Warming”
and my personal favourite:
"The Climate Change Debate Should be Declared Over!"
It is interesting to note how many of these blog posts spread out like wild-fire in the first week of August, telling the exact same story with very little analysis or original commentary.
So I went to search for the peer reviewed paper but I ran into a problem, I couldn't find it. Most of these blogs were dated around Aug 2011, most likely soon after the talk was given and some of them talked about a paper being submitted for review. The latest blog dated April of this year said 6 months until it was to be published.
All this celebration and it hadn't even been reviewed yet.
Please, by all means, if you know where Salby’s article has been published in a peer-reviewed publication, throw me a link and I’ll change this posts title.
In the meantime there has been a rebuttal. A few actually.
http://www.skepticalscience.com/Murry-Salby-Confused-About-The-Carbon-Cycle.html
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2011/08/unforced-variations-aug-2011/ from about comment 37 on. Pay special attention to comment 81 as to why no one in the “warmist” camp is getting all hot and bothered by Salby’s talk.
And of course Professor’s Salby’s co-worker Professor Colin Prentice had something to say as well, just scroll down to the bottom of the page:
http://www.climatefutures.mq.edu.au/eventsandnews/commentary/
Notice the blurb under the link (emphasis mine):
“This article is in response to a recent talks delivered at the IUGG and Sydney Institute by Professor Murry Salby. As Professor Salby has not yet provided any data (published or unpublished) to support the ideas presented, this piece is a response to the verbal content of his talk only.”
Me, I'll wait for a peer-reviewed journal like the Journal of Climate (or some other peer-reviewed source) to publish the paper and then get excited about the prospect of an underdog scientist defeating the establishment scientists.
I am reminded though that this is one scientist with one paper (that has not been reviewed yet), so I fall back on Michael Shermer's ten famous rules for unearthing bullshit:
Drumroll please.
1. How reliable is the source of the claim?
2. Does the source make similar claims?
3. Have the claims been verified by somebody else?
4. Does this fit with the way the world works?
5. Has anyone tried to disprove the claim?
6. Where does the preponderance of evidence point?
7. Is the claimant playing by the rules of science?
8. Is the claimant providing positive evidence?
9. Does the new theory account for as many phenomena as the old theory?
10. Are personal beliefs driving the claim?
Wednesday, May 02, 2012
In Defense of Minimum Wage
The following was a video posted by a Craiglist dignitary whom we've nicknamed Slavery Boy (based on his admission that voluntary slavery was preferable to minimum wage).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j0c2vmFGbtk&sns=em
My critique:
The premise is that minimum wage laws are in fact causing job destruction. In the simple model employed by the narrator of the video, he does appear to mathematically demonstrate the subsequent reduction in the consumer and producer surplus with the establishment of a minimum floor.
Of course with all simple models, invariably what happens is it leaves something out so it is not actually modeling reality at all, but rather it is modeling wishful thinking.
Minimum wage laws are indeed a tool that redistributes the wage pie in a way that is advantageous for the worker. The narrator would like us to think that to do so we must rob Peter to pay Paul, i.e. to prevent some from working so others can work for more money. The model conveniently omits increases in productivity achieved by better business practice and innovations in technology, what I like to refer to as the "productivity dividend".
The natural consequence of increases productivity is one can produce more products for the same amount of input. Or conversely, generate the same amount of product, with less input.
Input consists of raw materials, energy and labour. Thus if productivity outstrips the business's capacity to sell it all, the logical conclusion to benefit from the productivity dividend is to downsize your workforce and redistribute the savings. In the aggregate, employer's demand for labour over time is shrinking.
Historically the redistributed savings would end up with upper management and the shareholders, with the workers receiving very little as their jobs are increasingly tenuous over time placing additional downward pressure on wages due to increasing productivity.
In Summary:
1. The reduction of hours will proceed at pace, irrespective of minimum wage laws.
2. Minimum wage laws are a way to force businesses to redistribute some of the productivity gains to the workers and fight the downward pressure on wages that is devaluing labour in absence of union protections.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j0c2vmFGbtk&sns=em
My critique:
The premise is that minimum wage laws are in fact causing job destruction. In the simple model employed by the narrator of the video, he does appear to mathematically demonstrate the subsequent reduction in the consumer and producer surplus with the establishment of a minimum floor.
Of course with all simple models, invariably what happens is it leaves something out so it is not actually modeling reality at all, but rather it is modeling wishful thinking.
Minimum wage laws are indeed a tool that redistributes the wage pie in a way that is advantageous for the worker. The narrator would like us to think that to do so we must rob Peter to pay Paul, i.e. to prevent some from working so others can work for more money. The model conveniently omits increases in productivity achieved by better business practice and innovations in technology, what I like to refer to as the "productivity dividend".
The natural consequence of increases productivity is one can produce more products for the same amount of input. Or conversely, generate the same amount of product, with less input.
Input consists of raw materials, energy and labour. Thus if productivity outstrips the business's capacity to sell it all, the logical conclusion to benefit from the productivity dividend is to downsize your workforce and redistribute the savings. In the aggregate, employer's demand for labour over time is shrinking.
Historically the redistributed savings would end up with upper management and the shareholders, with the workers receiving very little as their jobs are increasingly tenuous over time placing additional downward pressure on wages due to increasing productivity.
In Summary:
1. The reduction of hours will proceed at pace, irrespective of minimum wage laws.
2. Minimum wage laws are a way to force businesses to redistribute some of the productivity gains to the workers and fight the downward pressure on wages that is devaluing labour in absence of union protections.
Friday, April 06, 2012
A Review of Economics in One Lesson by Henry Hazlitt.
I would like to start off by saying that Henry Hazlitt does a great job in breaking down economic myths like parity-pricing and within the context of economics I agree with a majority of what he says. I have a few issues however and will address them in this essay.
In Chapter 4 pg 31, he begins by stating that "everything we get, outside the free gifts of nature, must in some way be paid for". There is no such thing as free gifts, period. Everything has a cost, some of which cannot be valued accurately in monetary terms.
Economies are a subsystem of the environment, without environment there is no economy. Economies only put costs on labour, energy and material. Energy and material derive their economic costs from private property enclosures. Somebody owns the land from whence the raw materials come, hence a negotiated price come with the allowance to use the resource. Materials that do not have an owner, like water or air, tend to be used and misused ie. Pollution because their is no "cost" associated with them.
This is a regular tragedy of the commons, which on the face of it lends a certain strength to the argument that all property should be enclosed, even water and air. By assigning an owner, thereby assigning a cost, it will make those who use the resource and pollute it think twice as it hits their bottom line. Perhaps this would even work if you have faith that the price system could communicate the real value of air and water, but seeing the history of the cost of oil, massively undervalued, I don't.
In Chapter 3, page 26 Hazlitt distinguishes the difference between need and demand. Need is essentially mirrors demand to the extent that it has purchasing power backing it up. Excess need (in excess of purchasing power) is irrelevant to the economy. Hazlitt has a real problem with the government intervening to prevent excess need from going unfulfilled which I would agree to in the case of subsidizing oil companies when in fact they are raking in record profits, but some sort of intervention is required for those of our citizens who have insufficient purchasing power to feed themselves. It is a basic requirement for the foundation of good communities to take care of it's most vulnerable members.
He chides us for reviling profits and to a certain extent I agree that profits are ok. However it is the system that makes maximum profits mandatory by law (CEO fiduciary duty to the shareholder first and foremost) and the relatively short time horizons combined with a vested interest in options to buy shares in the company that makes an honest CEO a rarity.
If given the choice between logging a tract of forest sustainably in perpetuity for a ROI of 10% per year or logging the forest to its destruction in 10 years for an ROI of 15% per year, the CEO, conscience aside, would be hard pressed to pick the former option as the BoD would be moved to remind the CEO of his mandate, profit maximization for his shareholders. And with a ten year time horizon his options will likely end up "in the money" and retire very wealthy.
He accuses labour unions of suppressing wages and even goes so far as to say that unions and minimum wage laws have nothing to do with the advancement of salary over time. Mr. Hazlitt needs to read more history, some of which he lived through. In Howard Zinn's "A People's History" he lays out the awful and violent battles between workers and owners. If the owners of capital had their way, workers would steadily have their pay cheques whittled away as the profits rose. Workers had no choice but to fight back.
Also minimum wage laws establishes a floor and a measuring stick that raises the bar for everyone. Minimum wage laws force businesses to do what Henry Ford did willingly in the beginning of the 1900's, double his workers wages. He, and soon other CEO's, recognized that workers that were not paid well could not absorb all the excess inventory brought about by mechanized production. Mr. Hazlitt seems to recognize that wealth is not tied to money nor just production, but the rate of production per man hour of labour. What Henry Ford did and what business's refuse to do now is share out what I like to call the "productivity dividend". Technological development has proceeded apace to the point at which for some industries it no longer makes sense to assign variable costs based on man hours of labor and some have switched to assigning variable costs based on machine hours instead.
This is why businesses refuse to share out the productivity dividend anymore, or do so very grudgingly, because people are becoming increasingly irrelevant in production thus unions are losing their bargaining power as they lose people. Back in the 1800's it was not unusual for unions to go on strike and field hundreds of thousands of strikers. Today it would be a surprising event to see tens of thousands. With the increasing popularity of temporary workers, full time or part time employment with all of the onerous costs to business (pesky things like medical coverage, vacations, dental, sick leave, etc) is becoming a thing of the past.
Still on the subject of labour, Hazlitt doesn't acknowledge the huge power differential between labour and capital in the favor of capital that is only getting worse as technological means of replacing labour, either directly through automation, or indirectly through outsourcing, increases. Unions are the last bastion of the worker and it is fading fast.
Hazlitt talks disparagingly of alternative economies and production-for-use. He seems to think that the price system is so miraculous and efficient and no group of men or governments could possibly plan it better. But he fails to mention the fact that a high percentage of start-ups and investors fail. Eventually a small percentage will find a winning combination, but the carnage of private capital to get there is substantial. One thing that capitalism has done to compensate for this, is it is really, really good at liquidating mal-investments, when allowed to do so.
Additionally he thinks that the price system and therefore money is the only way to communicate the publics demand to industry and the industries supply to the public. For example, you could just as easily have the public communicate their demand directly through POS systems, the problem of what to allocate to which industries will be enormously simplified when you stop, as a culture, trying to sell your neighbors useless crap or junk that is designed for the dump.
Reserve allocations for the basics, food, water, clothing, shelter, transportation, and medical care, produced on demand, any excess left over to be allocated on a first come first served basis, which is not quantitatively different from being deprived of a purchase due to lack of purchasing power. The focus should be putting as many services and goods under the auspices of the civil commons as possible. If you don't like the "first come first served" system, everything else can be dealt with via barter or monetary exchange.
Lastly Hazlitt doesn't recognize, even after his 30 year update, that it is not government calling the shots, transnational corporations that pay lip service to the idea of the free market and capitalism write legislation which gives big business all the protection from competition it needs and thus protects their profits.
In Chapter 4 pg 31, he begins by stating that "everything we get, outside the free gifts of nature, must in some way be paid for". There is no such thing as free gifts, period. Everything has a cost, some of which cannot be valued accurately in monetary terms.
Economies are a subsystem of the environment, without environment there is no economy. Economies only put costs on labour, energy and material. Energy and material derive their economic costs from private property enclosures. Somebody owns the land from whence the raw materials come, hence a negotiated price come with the allowance to use the resource. Materials that do not have an owner, like water or air, tend to be used and misused ie. Pollution because their is no "cost" associated with them.
This is a regular tragedy of the commons, which on the face of it lends a certain strength to the argument that all property should be enclosed, even water and air. By assigning an owner, thereby assigning a cost, it will make those who use the resource and pollute it think twice as it hits their bottom line. Perhaps this would even work if you have faith that the price system could communicate the real value of air and water, but seeing the history of the cost of oil, massively undervalued, I don't.
In Chapter 3, page 26 Hazlitt distinguishes the difference between need and demand. Need is essentially mirrors demand to the extent that it has purchasing power backing it up. Excess need (in excess of purchasing power) is irrelevant to the economy. Hazlitt has a real problem with the government intervening to prevent excess need from going unfulfilled which I would agree to in the case of subsidizing oil companies when in fact they are raking in record profits, but some sort of intervention is required for those of our citizens who have insufficient purchasing power to feed themselves. It is a basic requirement for the foundation of good communities to take care of it's most vulnerable members.
He chides us for reviling profits and to a certain extent I agree that profits are ok. However it is the system that makes maximum profits mandatory by law (CEO fiduciary duty to the shareholder first and foremost) and the relatively short time horizons combined with a vested interest in options to buy shares in the company that makes an honest CEO a rarity.
If given the choice between logging a tract of forest sustainably in perpetuity for a ROI of 10% per year or logging the forest to its destruction in 10 years for an ROI of 15% per year, the CEO, conscience aside, would be hard pressed to pick the former option as the BoD would be moved to remind the CEO of his mandate, profit maximization for his shareholders. And with a ten year time horizon his options will likely end up "in the money" and retire very wealthy.
He accuses labour unions of suppressing wages and even goes so far as to say that unions and minimum wage laws have nothing to do with the advancement of salary over time. Mr. Hazlitt needs to read more history, some of which he lived through. In Howard Zinn's "A People's History" he lays out the awful and violent battles between workers and owners. If the owners of capital had their way, workers would steadily have their pay cheques whittled away as the profits rose. Workers had no choice but to fight back.
Also minimum wage laws establishes a floor and a measuring stick that raises the bar for everyone. Minimum wage laws force businesses to do what Henry Ford did willingly in the beginning of the 1900's, double his workers wages. He, and soon other CEO's, recognized that workers that were not paid well could not absorb all the excess inventory brought about by mechanized production. Mr. Hazlitt seems to recognize that wealth is not tied to money nor just production, but the rate of production per man hour of labour. What Henry Ford did and what business's refuse to do now is share out what I like to call the "productivity dividend". Technological development has proceeded apace to the point at which for some industries it no longer makes sense to assign variable costs based on man hours of labor and some have switched to assigning variable costs based on machine hours instead.
This is why businesses refuse to share out the productivity dividend anymore, or do so very grudgingly, because people are becoming increasingly irrelevant in production thus unions are losing their bargaining power as they lose people. Back in the 1800's it was not unusual for unions to go on strike and field hundreds of thousands of strikers. Today it would be a surprising event to see tens of thousands. With the increasing popularity of temporary workers, full time or part time employment with all of the onerous costs to business (pesky things like medical coverage, vacations, dental, sick leave, etc) is becoming a thing of the past.
Still on the subject of labour, Hazlitt doesn't acknowledge the huge power differential between labour and capital in the favor of capital that is only getting worse as technological means of replacing labour, either directly through automation, or indirectly through outsourcing, increases. Unions are the last bastion of the worker and it is fading fast.
Hazlitt talks disparagingly of alternative economies and production-for-use. He seems to think that the price system is so miraculous and efficient and no group of men or governments could possibly plan it better. But he fails to mention the fact that a high percentage of start-ups and investors fail. Eventually a small percentage will find a winning combination, but the carnage of private capital to get there is substantial. One thing that capitalism has done to compensate for this, is it is really, really good at liquidating mal-investments, when allowed to do so.
Additionally he thinks that the price system and therefore money is the only way to communicate the publics demand to industry and the industries supply to the public. For example, you could just as easily have the public communicate their demand directly through POS systems, the problem of what to allocate to which industries will be enormously simplified when you stop, as a culture, trying to sell your neighbors useless crap or junk that is designed for the dump.
Reserve allocations for the basics, food, water, clothing, shelter, transportation, and medical care, produced on demand, any excess left over to be allocated on a first come first served basis, which is not quantitatively different from being deprived of a purchase due to lack of purchasing power. The focus should be putting as many services and goods under the auspices of the civil commons as possible. If you don't like the "first come first served" system, everything else can be dealt with via barter or monetary exchange.
Lastly Hazlitt doesn't recognize, even after his 30 year update, that it is not government calling the shots, transnational corporations that pay lip service to the idea of the free market and capitalism write legislation which gives big business all the protection from competition it needs and thus protects their profits.
Thursday, April 05, 2012
The Not So Terrible Madness of David Suzuki
I had come across an article in the Island Independent article on March 30th basically decrying the environmentalist movement as some NWO plan to sneak in one world domination via the Green Climate Fund. At the bottom of the article I see a radio station and a blog, so I go check out the blog.
I had intended to do a piece on the article in the Island Independent, but instead I got sucked in to his front page attack piece on David Suzuki. I have no great love for Mr. Suzuki, he has alienated quite a few people over the years with his demeanor. But I do agree with the substance of his arguments and I had just gotten done reading "Denialism" by Michael Spector so it was exhirlarating for me to encounter a denialist so near to my home turf. I couldn't resist, I commented on his blog which you can read here.
Now Eric was kind enough to furnish a reply so I returned the honor. However it got alittle lengthy so I decided to make a post out of it rather than overwhelm his blog.
Without further ado, my reply (his comments in quotes and italics)
"Vasper Call me anything you want. My primary focus of this particular article was related to freedom of (a) speech and (b) reasoned debate, two matters which I'm sure you support and respect."
Certainly, reasoned debate is always welcomed. An additional attribute that is a necessity is the art of being wrong. A great book I read on the subject is "Being Wrong" by Kathryn Schulz.
Science, in a way, is about being wrong. That is an integral part of the process of discovery. Thomas Edison once said "I didn't fail a thousand times to build a lightbulb, I just discovered a thousand ways not to build one." I jest alittle, but that in a nutshell is the scientific method, constructing a falsifiable hypothesis and proceeding to go out and falsify (disprove) it. The hypothesis of Anthropocentric Global Warming (or Climate Change if you will) was not dreamed up over a few beers and a BBQ. The precursors to all the pieces that make up the theory, for example, that CO2 is a greenhouse gas, was drawn from painstakingly thorough research by other independent scientists, vetted and shredded by other independent scientists. Any scientific journal is riddled with references to the work of dozens of other papers which each one of them in turn reference dozens of other papers. All these papers represent thousands if not 10's of thousands of man hours of research and contemplation. Science isn't like working at a movie theatre, they don't "phone" it in, they are passionate and deeply knowledgeable about their area of expertise. Do they get it wrong sometimes? Sure they do, it is a consequence of being human, but that is why scientists have the peer review process. You don't get to be the top of the heap without intellectual rigor.
"Currently ice cover is lower than the average 1987-2007. However, one doesn't have to look too far back in time to find similar levels of ice cover. "
In a previous comment of mine I mentioned the big five (I had said six, my bad) extinction events, each one of them, incidentally, had CO2 levels much higher than today and the rate of change in CO2 concentration was swift. So maybe unrelated (and at least to one, the K-T event it is), but certainly worth the look.
"You mention "polar caps," plural, melting. Antarctica is gaining ice mass while, for the time being, the Arctic is slightly reduced. Sea level rise is not coming anywhere near the UNIPCC's doom and gloom computerized projections. "
Yes, sometimes ice is gained and sometimes ice is lost. What I do for my job is look at trends as well as variances.
"Nor do I, especially the theory/belief that global warming's primary driver is CO2."
Ok I'll bite, if not CO2, then what could be the primary driver?
"I don't know if you have children yourself, but, I have 3 children, and two grandchildren, and I would never "emotionally blackmail" them, let alone allow someone else to."
I have two. Both pretty young. I came to an early realization that I did not want to leave a mess for my children to inherit. I grew up and took responsibility. It is time that the human race grew up and took responsibility. If that means Santa has to die, then so be it.
"The nature and scale of the problems we face as climate changes are yet to be determined with any accuracy. Temperature as an example is below even the lowest UNIPCC's predictions. "
Let's say your right and the problem is too ambiguous to resolve with any clarity. We can take the "wait and see" approach, however, I think when the evidence that will be sufficient to convince the rank and file and the diehard denialists it will be too late to do anything about it. I like to sum it up with this picture.
"Suzuki directed those comments at students, hoping to incite them. You are also taking it as a given that there is no dispute as to the severity or cause of climate change."
Someone needs to get riled up about something. As for taking it as a given about the severity or cause I would echo Al Gore when he said that the climate question was "a settled science". Of course being settled doesn't mean that there are not a few detractors, but the key is that whatever studies they've done or evidence they've uncovered, is not sufficient to convince their peers.
Of course there are many non-scientist detractors but you can see why I don't give their opinions much weight.
But let's say, for the sake of argument, it is only half as severe as the scientists say it is, isn't that enough to take action? Again refer to the above picture in the link.
"Every day new studies indicate things aren't quite as bad as we have been led to "believe.""
More often the case these new studies are misinterpreted like the Weaver study. Myself, I would look at where the preponderance of evidence is pointing, a la Michael Shermer, and that points to man-made climate change with CO2 as the mechanism.
"Take a moment and look at the history of communist revolutions around the world. They start out isolating one group, and the next thing you know 20 million of their countrymen, women and children have been erased."
You make one error in this parallel. Science is not politics. Science is not an ideology. I'm not saying that science cannot be politicized or used to support an ideology, but comparing a ideological revolution that is based on how decisions get made and resources get allocated to scientists saying "hey bro, we got troubles on the horizon" is a far stretch. But let the environmental degradation continue and you'll no doubt see a similar type revolution where millions get erased due to increasing scarcity.
"Interesting comment...in the context of global warming, perhaps if all extreme environmentalists threw themselves off a cliff the net reduction in CO2 would save the planet. They could start by drawing straws to see who would be honoured with the first sacrifice of the greater good...(sarc)"
We make the adult decision to make small but real sacrifices now (reducing our carbon footprint in a non-dying sort of way) , so we don't have to throw anyone overboard in the future. So the rational decision is to make the right decision while we still have the option to make a decision.
" And do you believe in the kind, gentle new world order government that is now being proposed by Suzuki, et al? Good luck with that one. All rights are limited by groups of people - e.g. governments and religions. I have no problem in Suzuki saying anything. But, for him to suggest only he and his believers should be able to speak on ANY subject, is immoral. I understand Suzuki didn't give one of your proposals the time of day. Under a Suzuki government, how would your beliefs fare?"
I find the thought of Suzuki as a supreme dictator quite amusing. It wasn't my proposal, but rather it belonged to a group I had associated with.
Suzuki has been alive a long time (perhaps it explains his grumpiness), long enough to have shed most of his political naïveté but in the end he is a scientist first. Totalitarian governments are not his forte.
I see you are still characterizing science as some sort of religion. Belief doesn't enter into the picture, belief doesn't matter; empiricism, observation, evidence, that is what matters. Suzuki doesn't frame it as eloquently or as gently, maybe because he is old and time is short, but ultimately he wants people to think first, then speak. Much of the damage to the climate change debate has come from the non-scientists. Scientists, through long habit, hedge everything they say. They deal with theories, they rarely use the absolute term "fact" even if in fact, it is a fact. The non-scientist deniers make free use of polarizing language, rhetoric if you will, that moves the masses who hear it. Politicians use this technique all the time and people respond to the projection of absolute confidence and certainty. Perhaps more scientists should take a page out of Suzuki's playbook, but I would just settle for being on the right side of the debate.
" I agree the status quo will not hold...however, I do believe given the current state of technology and Moore's law of exponentially increasing knowledge, within the next 20 years "free energy" will be a reality and we will begin the transition out of the oil age."
You'd really like Ray Kurzweil and Dennis Bushnell, I suggest the formers books and the latters video's and radio appearances. Unfortunately I think it is a dead heat, pitting the Law of Accelerating Change vs the Law of Diminishing Returns. Quite literally we may run out of the energy needed to sustain the complexity of society before we find the holy grail. Another reason to start this shift now. Climate change and Peak everything are very much entwined.
"I agree, and anyone who would support the limitation of freedom of speech does so at the peril of having it come back and bite them on their ass."
As you and I both know we already do support the limitation of free speech. We limit hate speech, the right to accuse someone of witchcraft, the right to shout fire in a crowded theatre and of course, slander. In Canada we have a reasonable limits clause written into our Charter. We should be against ignorant speech much like we are against driving while impaired. Both are done hastily and without much sound thought.
I had intended to do a piece on the article in the Island Independent, but instead I got sucked in to his front page attack piece on David Suzuki. I have no great love for Mr. Suzuki, he has alienated quite a few people over the years with his demeanor. But I do agree with the substance of his arguments and I had just gotten done reading "Denialism" by Michael Spector so it was exhirlarating for me to encounter a denialist so near to my home turf. I couldn't resist, I commented on his blog which you can read here.
Now Eric was kind enough to furnish a reply so I returned the honor. However it got alittle lengthy so I decided to make a post out of it rather than overwhelm his blog.
Without further ado, my reply (his comments in quotes and italics)
"Vasper Call me anything you want. My primary focus of this particular article was related to freedom of (a) speech and (b) reasoned debate, two matters which I'm sure you support and respect."
Certainly, reasoned debate is always welcomed. An additional attribute that is a necessity is the art of being wrong. A great book I read on the subject is "Being Wrong" by Kathryn Schulz.
Science, in a way, is about being wrong. That is an integral part of the process of discovery. Thomas Edison once said "I didn't fail a thousand times to build a lightbulb, I just discovered a thousand ways not to build one." I jest alittle, but that in a nutshell is the scientific method, constructing a falsifiable hypothesis and proceeding to go out and falsify (disprove) it. The hypothesis of Anthropocentric Global Warming (or Climate Change if you will) was not dreamed up over a few beers and a BBQ. The precursors to all the pieces that make up the theory, for example, that CO2 is a greenhouse gas, was drawn from painstakingly thorough research by other independent scientists, vetted and shredded by other independent scientists. Any scientific journal is riddled with references to the work of dozens of other papers which each one of them in turn reference dozens of other papers. All these papers represent thousands if not 10's of thousands of man hours of research and contemplation. Science isn't like working at a movie theatre, they don't "phone" it in, they are passionate and deeply knowledgeable about their area of expertise. Do they get it wrong sometimes? Sure they do, it is a consequence of being human, but that is why scientists have the peer review process. You don't get to be the top of the heap without intellectual rigor.
"Currently ice cover is lower than the average 1987-2007. However, one doesn't have to look too far back in time to find similar levels of ice cover. "
In a previous comment of mine I mentioned the big five (I had said six, my bad) extinction events, each one of them, incidentally, had CO2 levels much higher than today and the rate of change in CO2 concentration was swift. So maybe unrelated (and at least to one, the K-T event it is), but certainly worth the look.
"You mention "polar caps," plural, melting. Antarctica is gaining ice mass while, for the time being, the Arctic is slightly reduced. Sea level rise is not coming anywhere near the UNIPCC's doom and gloom computerized projections. "
Yes, sometimes ice is gained and sometimes ice is lost. What I do for my job is look at trends as well as variances.
"Nor do I, especially the theory/belief that global warming's primary driver is CO2."
Ok I'll bite, if not CO2, then what could be the primary driver?
"I don't know if you have children yourself, but, I have 3 children, and two grandchildren, and I would never "emotionally blackmail" them, let alone allow someone else to."
I have two. Both pretty young. I came to an early realization that I did not want to leave a mess for my children to inherit. I grew up and took responsibility. It is time that the human race grew up and took responsibility. If that means Santa has to die, then so be it.
"The nature and scale of the problems we face as climate changes are yet to be determined with any accuracy. Temperature as an example is below even the lowest UNIPCC's predictions. "
Let's say your right and the problem is too ambiguous to resolve with any clarity. We can take the "wait and see" approach, however, I think when the evidence that will be sufficient to convince the rank and file and the diehard denialists it will be too late to do anything about it. I like to sum it up with this picture.
"Suzuki directed those comments at students, hoping to incite them. You are also taking it as a given that there is no dispute as to the severity or cause of climate change."
Someone needs to get riled up about something. As for taking it as a given about the severity or cause I would echo Al Gore when he said that the climate question was "a settled science". Of course being settled doesn't mean that there are not a few detractors, but the key is that whatever studies they've done or evidence they've uncovered, is not sufficient to convince their peers.
Of course there are many non-scientist detractors but you can see why I don't give their opinions much weight.
But let's say, for the sake of argument, it is only half as severe as the scientists say it is, isn't that enough to take action? Again refer to the above picture in the link.
"Every day new studies indicate things aren't quite as bad as we have been led to "believe.""
More often the case these new studies are misinterpreted like the Weaver study. Myself, I would look at where the preponderance of evidence is pointing, a la Michael Shermer, and that points to man-made climate change with CO2 as the mechanism.
"Take a moment and look at the history of communist revolutions around the world. They start out isolating one group, and the next thing you know 20 million of their countrymen, women and children have been erased."
You make one error in this parallel. Science is not politics. Science is not an ideology. I'm not saying that science cannot be politicized or used to support an ideology, but comparing a ideological revolution that is based on how decisions get made and resources get allocated to scientists saying "hey bro, we got troubles on the horizon" is a far stretch. But let the environmental degradation continue and you'll no doubt see a similar type revolution where millions get erased due to increasing scarcity.
"Interesting comment...in the context of global warming, perhaps if all extreme environmentalists threw themselves off a cliff the net reduction in CO2 would save the planet. They could start by drawing straws to see who would be honoured with the first sacrifice of the greater good...(sarc)"
We make the adult decision to make small but real sacrifices now (reducing our carbon footprint in a non-dying sort of way) , so we don't have to throw anyone overboard in the future. So the rational decision is to make the right decision while we still have the option to make a decision.
" And do you believe in the kind, gentle new world order government that is now being proposed by Suzuki, et al? Good luck with that one. All rights are limited by groups of people - e.g. governments and religions. I have no problem in Suzuki saying anything. But, for him to suggest only he and his believers should be able to speak on ANY subject, is immoral. I understand Suzuki didn't give one of your proposals the time of day. Under a Suzuki government, how would your beliefs fare?"
I find the thought of Suzuki as a supreme dictator quite amusing. It wasn't my proposal, but rather it belonged to a group I had associated with.
Suzuki has been alive a long time (perhaps it explains his grumpiness), long enough to have shed most of his political naïveté but in the end he is a scientist first. Totalitarian governments are not his forte.
I see you are still characterizing science as some sort of religion. Belief doesn't enter into the picture, belief doesn't matter; empiricism, observation, evidence, that is what matters. Suzuki doesn't frame it as eloquently or as gently, maybe because he is old and time is short, but ultimately he wants people to think first, then speak. Much of the damage to the climate change debate has come from the non-scientists. Scientists, through long habit, hedge everything they say. They deal with theories, they rarely use the absolute term "fact" even if in fact, it is a fact. The non-scientist deniers make free use of polarizing language, rhetoric if you will, that moves the masses who hear it. Politicians use this technique all the time and people respond to the projection of absolute confidence and certainty. Perhaps more scientists should take a page out of Suzuki's playbook, but I would just settle for being on the right side of the debate.
" I agree the status quo will not hold...however, I do believe given the current state of technology and Moore's law of exponentially increasing knowledge, within the next 20 years "free energy" will be a reality and we will begin the transition out of the oil age."
You'd really like Ray Kurzweil and Dennis Bushnell, I suggest the formers books and the latters video's and radio appearances. Unfortunately I think it is a dead heat, pitting the Law of Accelerating Change vs the Law of Diminishing Returns. Quite literally we may run out of the energy needed to sustain the complexity of society before we find the holy grail. Another reason to start this shift now. Climate change and Peak everything are very much entwined.
"I agree, and anyone who would support the limitation of freedom of speech does so at the peril of having it come back and bite them on their ass."
As you and I both know we already do support the limitation of free speech. We limit hate speech, the right to accuse someone of witchcraft, the right to shout fire in a crowded theatre and of course, slander. In Canada we have a reasonable limits clause written into our Charter. We should be against ignorant speech much like we are against driving while impaired. Both are done hastily and without much sound thought.
Monday, March 26, 2012
The Face of Education
Education Has Gone Astray
To get to a certain point we all need some basic instruction, how to read, how to write/type, and basic math. Once we have those skills we can quite easily take over the course of our own education, tailored to our interests and our strengths.
Nothing is more demotivating to a child than having to learn something they are absolutely not interested in and yet are forced to learn. Then why do it?
Why do we have mandated by law instruction until the age 16, when by the age of at least 7 they have acquired the rudimentary skills to continue down the path that they choose and at their own pace?
Think about why our education system is like it is. It is shaped by corporations, curated by government, and mandated by law to produce a particular subset of workers (not thinkers) that fit into the current economic and cultural milieu.
This would be acceptable except for the fact that the system is now failing our children. If the free market guaranteed some form of employment for the time spent in school it would be an equitable trade off.
However, what is happening is that the level of education required by today's corporations is insufficient, the governments are too broke to provide more subsidies and corporations will not step in unless there is a profit to be had.
Hence all further education investments are coming from private individuals to get their children a degree from a university. The result: a hoard of over-educated mail-room clerks.
The over production of young adults with degrees has raised the bar for those seeking employment. Why hire a high school grad, when you can get a University grad for the same price? All this on the dime of the private individual.
Student loans? One of the hardest loans to discharge through bankruptcy, essentially creating a self-reinforcing loop that requires young adults to:
1. Get a degree
2. Take on massive amounts of debt
3. Take the first job offered to allow them to pay that debt
Which drives down the ratio of labour cost to the level of education a company gets.
So why pay for the privilege of having a degree or a diploma when the same education can be had for the price of a library card and a good computer?
Some of the greatest innovators (see links) in history share a common trait, either they were self-taught, or they were kicked/dropped out of school and then self-taught. Schools, as configured, squash innovation and encourage conformity.
http://www.autodidactic.com/profiles/profiles.htm
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_notable_autodidacts
Grades are degrading.
Grades are a shorthand that teachers and employers can use evaluate the quality of conformity attained by the pupil. A student that receives mostly A's and B's is praised while another student that receives mostly C's and D's is looked at as performing at an unacceptable level. Grades are little more than branding, establishing social hierarchies before they are let out into the "real" world.
Creating a situation of scarcity, for example, grading on the curve, creates an environment of competition which discourages information sharing (often referred to as "cheating") which in turn creates an atmosphere of fear of being wrong. The result: a roomful of mediocre students who end up being mediocre adults who take no risks, stand for nothing, all for fear of being wrong.
Children are natural collaborators. Don't believe me? Watch them at play in pre-school environments, you will see them learn about games, structures, songs, in groups and often spontaneously. Ironically this behaviour is one of the first the education system tries to snuff out with rigid formations (desks in a row), rigid schedules (class time length, recess length, occurrence of lunchtime), no talking, and repeated discipline for the offenders (non-conformists) that do not fall within the range of "acceptable" behaviour.
What does a diploma tell you? Or a degree or designation? All it says is that the student knew the material well enough to pass a standardized test. It does not demonstrate or illuminate the passion or adeptness the student possesses with the material. The only way to know how well someone knows their field is to talk to them and better yet to have them talk to others that share their passion and expertise, thus both at once demonstration their ability and maybe learning something more about what they love.
The Way Forward
Provide the basics for our children: reading, writing, and math, which are the bare essentials that provide a platform to acquire more knowledge on their own. In short, once the children are able to absorb and choose the knowledge they want to acquire, then we allow them to do so. No grades are to be given, no diplomas earned, instead the child is allowed to pursue an education path as far as his or her ability allows them to progress.
Initially knowledge would be acquired through a Khan Academy-like environment (http://www.khanacademy.org) where the child watches/reads a section, then answers a number of questions at the end of the chapter, if they are right, then the child progresses to the next level. At some point when the child exhausts a particular path in Khan Academy then he or she "graduates" to partaking in discussion circles/forums where others share the same interest in furthering on the same educational pathway.
As they demonstrate a firmer grasp on the material, the collaborative environment of the discussion circles/forums will stimulate new theories, new material, and new ideas to pursue. As their knowledge increases they in turn reinforce or increase the knowledge of others. The one truth that they will hold is that novelty can come from anywhere and from anyone.
To get to a certain point we all need some basic instruction, how to read, how to write/type, and basic math. Once we have those skills we can quite easily take over the course of our own education, tailored to our interests and our strengths.
Nothing is more demotivating to a child than having to learn something they are absolutely not interested in and yet are forced to learn. Then why do it?
Why do we have mandated by law instruction until the age 16, when by the age of at least 7 they have acquired the rudimentary skills to continue down the path that they choose and at their own pace?
Think about why our education system is like it is. It is shaped by corporations, curated by government, and mandated by law to produce a particular subset of workers (not thinkers) that fit into the current economic and cultural milieu.
This would be acceptable except for the fact that the system is now failing our children. If the free market guaranteed some form of employment for the time spent in school it would be an equitable trade off.
However, what is happening is that the level of education required by today's corporations is insufficient, the governments are too broke to provide more subsidies and corporations will not step in unless there is a profit to be had.
Hence all further education investments are coming from private individuals to get their children a degree from a university. The result: a hoard of over-educated mail-room clerks.
The over production of young adults with degrees has raised the bar for those seeking employment. Why hire a high school grad, when you can get a University grad for the same price? All this on the dime of the private individual.
Student loans? One of the hardest loans to discharge through bankruptcy, essentially creating a self-reinforcing loop that requires young adults to:
1. Get a degree
2. Take on massive amounts of debt
3. Take the first job offered to allow them to pay that debt
Which drives down the ratio of labour cost to the level of education a company gets.
So why pay for the privilege of having a degree or a diploma when the same education can be had for the price of a library card and a good computer?
Some of the greatest innovators (see links) in history share a common trait, either they were self-taught, or they were kicked/dropped out of school and then self-taught. Schools, as configured, squash innovation and encourage conformity.
http://www.autodidactic.com/profiles/profiles.htm
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_notable_autodidacts
Grades are degrading.
Grades are a shorthand that teachers and employers can use evaluate the quality of conformity attained by the pupil. A student that receives mostly A's and B's is praised while another student that receives mostly C's and D's is looked at as performing at an unacceptable level. Grades are little more than branding, establishing social hierarchies before they are let out into the "real" world.
Creating a situation of scarcity, for example, grading on the curve, creates an environment of competition which discourages information sharing (often referred to as "cheating") which in turn creates an atmosphere of fear of being wrong. The result: a roomful of mediocre students who end up being mediocre adults who take no risks, stand for nothing, all for fear of being wrong.
Children are natural collaborators. Don't believe me? Watch them at play in pre-school environments, you will see them learn about games, structures, songs, in groups and often spontaneously. Ironically this behaviour is one of the first the education system tries to snuff out with rigid formations (desks in a row), rigid schedules (class time length, recess length, occurrence of lunchtime), no talking, and repeated discipline for the offenders (non-conformists) that do not fall within the range of "acceptable" behaviour.
What does a diploma tell you? Or a degree or designation? All it says is that the student knew the material well enough to pass a standardized test. It does not demonstrate or illuminate the passion or adeptness the student possesses with the material. The only way to know how well someone knows their field is to talk to them and better yet to have them talk to others that share their passion and expertise, thus both at once demonstration their ability and maybe learning something more about what they love.
The Way Forward
Provide the basics for our children: reading, writing, and math, which are the bare essentials that provide a platform to acquire more knowledge on their own. In short, once the children are able to absorb and choose the knowledge they want to acquire, then we allow them to do so. No grades are to be given, no diplomas earned, instead the child is allowed to pursue an education path as far as his or her ability allows them to progress.
Initially knowledge would be acquired through a Khan Academy-like environment (http://www.khanacademy.org) where the child watches/reads a section, then answers a number of questions at the end of the chapter, if they are right, then the child progresses to the next level. At some point when the child exhausts a particular path in Khan Academy then he or she "graduates" to partaking in discussion circles/forums where others share the same interest in furthering on the same educational pathway.
As they demonstrate a firmer grasp on the material, the collaborative environment of the discussion circles/forums will stimulate new theories, new material, and new ideas to pursue. As their knowledge increases they in turn reinforce or increase the knowledge of others. The one truth that they will hold is that novelty can come from anywhere and from anyone.
Tuesday, March 13, 2012
Z-Day 2012: A Review
Post Z-day 2012.
So I've had some time to let the speakers words sink in. I didn't stay for the main event as I had my brother-in-laws B-Day to attend to and to be frank I had more fun at because I found talking to normal people about the worlds events refreshing.
Regular joes, like my brother-in-law, do not, in fact, have their heads buried in the sand. They are usually fairly knowledgeable about politics and economics and the environment and are open to hearing different perspectives.
But I digress, I saw most of the speakers with the exception of dear leader. I figured I could catch that later on YouTube. Actually I could have caught the whole thing on YouTube and saved myself the venue money and parking/transit. But I felt I should at least see them in person once.
So where to begin? I'll start with a list of offenses:
1. Material abundance = misnomer
Let's call a spade a spade. Stop sugar coating this. What you are referring to is material sufficiency not material abundance. Enough to feed everyone? Yes, only if the Earth is managed carefully and at present rates of depletion and regeneration, but most importantly reduces levels of consumption. You allude that no one can have a 40 room mansion, but in truth no one can have a 2500sq ft house either. They are both unsustainable. I know why you frame it like this, because it is scary. But scarier is what happens if we don't rein it in.
2. Technology, although cool, is not energy.
It takes energy to make and energy to maintain.
3. Energy is certainly abundant but...it has to be available to do useful work.
I get into this more later.
4. Complexity
Refer to the Law of Diminishing Returns or as I like to call it the Law of Getting Thoroughly Crushed by Complexity. It trumps the Law of Accelerating Change.
As societies become more complex more energy is required to sustain that complexity. The reason why most great civilizations of the past collapsed? Too much complexity and insufficient energy.
5. Population
Let's have a frank conversation about the population. You've glossed this over with the twin tenets of abundant energy and technology, when that is really not the case. There are three ways to reduce the impact of the human ecological footprint, one is to vastly increase the land, energy and resources available, this is one of the least likely scenarios. Another option is to let the population crash, not a great solution, but doesn't require much planning. The third is to reduce individual consumption, this choice is by far the hardest and the second most unlikely because it requires that people understand the global ecology and that every choice they make has an impact.
So unless Doug manages to find us another handful of planets and truly doesn't believe in annihilation, then the third option is the way to go. Is it a tough sell? Sure it is, but do it consistently and do it softly. Live it if you can.
6. Wealth. (the resources/currency)
Also while we are at it let's have a frank conversation about wealth redistribution. It's not going to be voluntary. See point 7.
7. The rich. (people)
You can rarely educate away privilege and entitlements. Maybe try peer pressure. But seriously how are you going to deal with the gatekeepers who currently control the majority of the resources? Guilt? Puppy dog eyes? The current system works for them. If we enter collapse, it won't be them or their children dying. They don't have a dog in this fight.
8. The Viking.
Whom I thought might have been VTV with dyed hair.
9. PJ's vocabulary. (CFOX)
I get it, you need to project the intelligence, literally oozing out of your orifices, but let's be honest, it comes off sounding a wee bit douchey.
You want to be accessible, dipshit, not wall yourself off with words. You can say profound things using words of just a few syllables.
I am well read. This is not me bragging, I have a 4 fucking hour commute daily so I have time to kill by attempting to make myself smarter. It hasn't worked yet, but I am hoping for an osmosis type reaction.
But I digress, you will not hear me talking like I'm smarter than I am for the following reasons:
1. No one likes a smartass.
2. For fear I would trip myself up
trying to enunciate some of that
shit. For example, I avoid saying the
word "enunciate". I also avoid the
word "Kunstler" but for different
reasons.
Mark my words, this word salad will come back to bite you. Perhaps it already has in the legions who attempt to emulate you and piss people off with some regularity I.e. VOR. You've got nothing to prove, just be yourself. Unless of course that is "yourself" in which case just pretend I didn't say anything.
10. Freemasons.
If you have a conflict of interest allegation then make it. Something I've learned in my travels is that you don't need a nefarious conspiracy if everyones goal happens to be the same. Your movements premise is that there are systematic irregularities that generate scarcity and inequality, so WHERE exactly do Freemasons play into that analysis?
11. End of work.
Quit selling the "no more work" angle. You will be working, not for money, but because you want to and your community expects you to contribute. And you will be working damn hard at what you do.
When you say no more work or end of work as you know it, it makes the hard core anti-welfare, Ayn Randians and libertarians hate you a little bit. Instead focus on the hard work that volunteers do and just how rewarding it feels.
12. No more cars.
Holy Jesus you might as well say no more hockey. I get it, cars are big resource hogs that sit around 80% of the day, but in people's minds they see endless waiting at bus stops, crowding into a smelly cramped bus (which I currently do so I know). Lead with a palpable alternative first, if you can. Cars epitomize freedom and the first world living. You need to do a better sell job on this.
13. EROEI. Nuff said.
Ok maybe not...because the concept of abundant energy seems to be a non sequitur for your movement. "We can build wonderful things, don't worry, energy is plentiful". Yes, logically you can build wonderful things and yes logically energy is all around. But one does not follow the other logically because you need energy accessible to do the work and you need energy and material inputs to build the toys, neither of which is plentiful or accessible.
You are constrained by the laws of thermodynamics, and thus constrained by EROEI, when it take 1 barrel of oil to extract 1 barrel of oil (or whatever energy equivalent you'd like to use) it is game over.
Oil is the most flexible, energy dense substance we've ever discovered. There is not another energy source that has all three attributes that made our current society possible, scalability, energy density, and flexibility. Some may have one element or two but not all three.
14. Playing to the singularitarians.
Yes technology is growing exponentially, but so is everything else, resource depletion, population, ecological destruction, extinction. Seems to me we are putting our foot on the gas, headed for a cliff, with the hopes of catching the singularity as we fall off, like in an action movie, and rise like the Phoenix.
15. You call us techno skeptics but you haven't given us skeptics anything other than to poo-poo our apparent lack of common sense. You have shiny new toys, but these have to come from somewhere and that takes energy.
You got boundless enthusiasm in your hand, I see that and raise you some realism.
16. Marahall (even my iPhone autocorrects to Marshall)
Take some time with your editing. I was sitting watching Moritz's speech and he had on the big screen spelled "Marshall" as "Marahall" not once but twice. It is one thing to have something spelled wrong but when it is a name it is worse. Of course the irony is not lost on me that this was during the "Competent Communications" section. It comes off as lazy and sloppy.
17. Canadian stereotypes.
I realize this was played for humor, but the underlying subtext is that people are generally fearful and ignorant, and are fearful because they are ignorant. True or not, this approach lacks tact. If you are going to use humor, self-deprecation holds the audience and those external to your tenets, harmless. If you are going to hold the system accountable, don't make fun of people's ignorance. These are the people you want to reach.
Conclusion:
In the final analysis I was heartened that people showed up, even if not in overwhelming numbers, because it shows that these people are looking for a better way. I suspect, however, there are far more people out there like myself, who have grown disillusioned with magical thinking and have move on, looking for more realistic solutions.
So I've had some time to let the speakers words sink in. I didn't stay for the main event as I had my brother-in-laws B-Day to attend to and to be frank I had more fun at because I found talking to normal people about the worlds events refreshing.
Regular joes, like my brother-in-law, do not, in fact, have their heads buried in the sand. They are usually fairly knowledgeable about politics and economics and the environment and are open to hearing different perspectives.
But I digress, I saw most of the speakers with the exception of dear leader. I figured I could catch that later on YouTube. Actually I could have caught the whole thing on YouTube and saved myself the venue money and parking/transit. But I felt I should at least see them in person once.
So where to begin? I'll start with a list of offenses:
1. Material abundance = misnomer
Let's call a spade a spade. Stop sugar coating this. What you are referring to is material sufficiency not material abundance. Enough to feed everyone? Yes, only if the Earth is managed carefully and at present rates of depletion and regeneration, but most importantly reduces levels of consumption. You allude that no one can have a 40 room mansion, but in truth no one can have a 2500sq ft house either. They are both unsustainable. I know why you frame it like this, because it is scary. But scarier is what happens if we don't rein it in.
2. Technology, although cool, is not energy.
It takes energy to make and energy to maintain.
3. Energy is certainly abundant but...it has to be available to do useful work.
I get into this more later.
4. Complexity
Refer to the Law of Diminishing Returns or as I like to call it the Law of Getting Thoroughly Crushed by Complexity. It trumps the Law of Accelerating Change.
As societies become more complex more energy is required to sustain that complexity. The reason why most great civilizations of the past collapsed? Too much complexity and insufficient energy.
5. Population
Let's have a frank conversation about the population. You've glossed this over with the twin tenets of abundant energy and technology, when that is really not the case. There are three ways to reduce the impact of the human ecological footprint, one is to vastly increase the land, energy and resources available, this is one of the least likely scenarios. Another option is to let the population crash, not a great solution, but doesn't require much planning. The third is to reduce individual consumption, this choice is by far the hardest and the second most unlikely because it requires that people understand the global ecology and that every choice they make has an impact.
So unless Doug manages to find us another handful of planets and truly doesn't believe in annihilation, then the third option is the way to go. Is it a tough sell? Sure it is, but do it consistently and do it softly. Live it if you can.
6. Wealth. (the resources/currency)
Also while we are at it let's have a frank conversation about wealth redistribution. It's not going to be voluntary. See point 7.
7. The rich. (people)
You can rarely educate away privilege and entitlements. Maybe try peer pressure. But seriously how are you going to deal with the gatekeepers who currently control the majority of the resources? Guilt? Puppy dog eyes? The current system works for them. If we enter collapse, it won't be them or their children dying. They don't have a dog in this fight.
8. The Viking.
Whom I thought might have been VTV with dyed hair.
9. PJ's vocabulary. (CFOX)
I get it, you need to project the intelligence, literally oozing out of your orifices, but let's be honest, it comes off sounding a wee bit douchey.
You want to be accessible, dipshit, not wall yourself off with words. You can say profound things using words of just a few syllables.
I am well read. This is not me bragging, I have a 4 fucking hour commute daily so I have time to kill by attempting to make myself smarter. It hasn't worked yet, but I am hoping for an osmosis type reaction.
But I digress, you will not hear me talking like I'm smarter than I am for the following reasons:
1. No one likes a smartass.
2. For fear I would trip myself up
trying to enunciate some of that
shit. For example, I avoid saying the
word "enunciate". I also avoid the
word "Kunstler" but for different
reasons.
Mark my words, this word salad will come back to bite you. Perhaps it already has in the legions who attempt to emulate you and piss people off with some regularity I.e. VOR. You've got nothing to prove, just be yourself. Unless of course that is "yourself" in which case just pretend I didn't say anything.
10. Freemasons.
If you have a conflict of interest allegation then make it. Something I've learned in my travels is that you don't need a nefarious conspiracy if everyones goal happens to be the same. Your movements premise is that there are systematic irregularities that generate scarcity and inequality, so WHERE exactly do Freemasons play into that analysis?
11. End of work.
Quit selling the "no more work" angle. You will be working, not for money, but because you want to and your community expects you to contribute. And you will be working damn hard at what you do.
When you say no more work or end of work as you know it, it makes the hard core anti-welfare, Ayn Randians and libertarians hate you a little bit. Instead focus on the hard work that volunteers do and just how rewarding it feels.
12. No more cars.
Holy Jesus you might as well say no more hockey. I get it, cars are big resource hogs that sit around 80% of the day, but in people's minds they see endless waiting at bus stops, crowding into a smelly cramped bus (which I currently do so I know). Lead with a palpable alternative first, if you can. Cars epitomize freedom and the first world living. You need to do a better sell job on this.
13. EROEI. Nuff said.
Ok maybe not...because the concept of abundant energy seems to be a non sequitur for your movement. "We can build wonderful things, don't worry, energy is plentiful". Yes, logically you can build wonderful things and yes logically energy is all around. But one does not follow the other logically because you need energy accessible to do the work and you need energy and material inputs to build the toys, neither of which is plentiful or accessible.
You are constrained by the laws of thermodynamics, and thus constrained by EROEI, when it take 1 barrel of oil to extract 1 barrel of oil (or whatever energy equivalent you'd like to use) it is game over.
Oil is the most flexible, energy dense substance we've ever discovered. There is not another energy source that has all three attributes that made our current society possible, scalability, energy density, and flexibility. Some may have one element or two but not all three.
14. Playing to the singularitarians.
Yes technology is growing exponentially, but so is everything else, resource depletion, population, ecological destruction, extinction. Seems to me we are putting our foot on the gas, headed for a cliff, with the hopes of catching the singularity as we fall off, like in an action movie, and rise like the Phoenix.
15. You call us techno skeptics but you haven't given us skeptics anything other than to poo-poo our apparent lack of common sense. You have shiny new toys, but these have to come from somewhere and that takes energy.
You got boundless enthusiasm in your hand, I see that and raise you some realism.
16. Marahall (even my iPhone autocorrects to Marshall)
Take some time with your editing. I was sitting watching Moritz's speech and he had on the big screen spelled "Marshall" as "Marahall" not once but twice. It is one thing to have something spelled wrong but when it is a name it is worse. Of course the irony is not lost on me that this was during the "Competent Communications" section. It comes off as lazy and sloppy.
17. Canadian stereotypes.
I realize this was played for humor, but the underlying subtext is that people are generally fearful and ignorant, and are fearful because they are ignorant. True or not, this approach lacks tact. If you are going to use humor, self-deprecation holds the audience and those external to your tenets, harmless. If you are going to hold the system accountable, don't make fun of people's ignorance. These are the people you want to reach.
Conclusion:
In the final analysis I was heartened that people showed up, even if not in overwhelming numbers, because it shows that these people are looking for a better way. I suspect, however, there are far more people out there like myself, who have grown disillusioned with magical thinking and have move on, looking for more realistic solutions.
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