The Oil Drum

But I agree, there is a growing demand for healing...

Your correct--I cannot encourage newbies enough to study, study, study Dieoff.com, and anything else written by Jay Hanson--He is all over the WWWeb.  I am terribly sorry he has withdrawn from the public, but I understand his reasons why, yet his legacy of thought remains for all to read.

Bob Shaw in Phx,Az  Are Humans Smarter than Yeast?

Or about people who live in other places, where the planning for dealing with that ongoing energy crisis has been part of the social/political matrix for a generation. Whether that planning is realistic, adequate, whistling in the dark, or simply going through the motions is another debate, but it is truly a fact based one - and yes, I have tried to be as restrained as possible concerning war, because war would certainly cause all of the problems you feel inevitable. But again, that same sort of war was equally likely in the late 1970s - and equally due to Soviet and America oil production peaking, leading to a war in the Gulf (Iraq I was Carter's war, by the way, using Carter era strategies to retain control of the oil, with stealth technology, prepositioned equipment, and cruise missiles.)

Or people who looked around America between 1976 and 1986, and could see the writing on the old historical blackboard? (There is some Bismarck quote about God protecting drunks, fools, and America, but likely even Bismarck couldn't imagine the drunken fools running America in the name of God these days.)

This is one of the reasons I find so much of this debate a problem - what happens when you have considered this issue part of your entire adult life, change where you live to reflect that fact, and try, as much as possible (and very imperfectly), to live morally? (Yes, I find the profit impulse so more often on display here human - earning large amounts of money for listening to Simmons about American NG around 2000-1 seems to be much more part the problem of an attitude about getting something for nothing, but now, we are in Kunstler territory.)

I will admit, one reason to read all of these comments is to get some sort of feel for what will happen to America.

Before peak oil awareness - drive car, flip switches. After peak oil awareness - chop wood, carry water. I don't know whether that will catch on - but it is already a false statement. Most people living in the world today do not drive a car, and I would bet the majority have no switches to flip. And from your persepective, the chop wood part will be false for most people too.

A large number of people (most non-Americans) think climate change much bigger than peak oil - not that the issues aren't connected, but truly, Cat 5 hurricanes hitting the Eastern Seaboard every summer as a regular occurence is much more likely to make an impact on people than oil production at 'only' 40 mbd.

In a way, that peak oil is so important in America, while the rest of the world seems much more concerned about the weather is just another sign of how uniquely Americans live. Most of humanity actually experiences the weather around them, unlike Americans living in their seemingly perfected cocoons. (All of the public schools I attended lacked air conditioning - these days, I would assume that would be worth an instant lawsuit, to keep the students from dying like flies in the unbearable heat.)

I was not naive, but I had been distracted for some years in starting a family and having children, especially during the 1990's - which may end up being the peak of US luxury, wealth, and power.  Damn - I turn my back for a couple of years and everything goes to hell!

The combination of these 4 issues causes stress when I try to decide how to respond, amplified by my responsibilities to my family.  It's all in trying to guess the rate at which change will occur, because meaningful actions will require significant changes in lifestyle.  Making such moves at the wrong time could be a real problem, which in turn can lead to paralysis.  

I'm presently fascinated by the speed in which cultural institutions that seem so unassailable can disappear.  The Roman period in Britain (and the centuries afterward) is a good example.  Partly it is because what we recognize as the symbols of those institutions are just the external veneer - we don't see the foundation crumbling underneath.  And we don't like change.  Also, we tend to think of times in the past as periods when things were constant, but this was rarely true.  So we fool ourselves into thinking that change is unusual, when in fact it is the norm, and we cannot imagine the things we've grown used to being swept away.

I believe that if one were to live for a few more decades; in looking back one will see massive changes in the world, beginning about now.  We cannot know how it will play out, but I believe that most important thing to "do" is to keep an open mind, be alert, and be ready to embrace change.