The Oil Drum

303 comments on XTL: Promise and Peril

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odograph on May 19, 2006 - 3:11pm

The disproof is easy. More people hold the door open for the person behind them, than slam it in their face, let alone attempt to kill them with it.

We will (chances are) never see that person again, but we do a little 'tit for tat' or 'golden rule' or 'game theory' behavior that we think will, indirectly, benefit us in the future.

I realize that is only 'energy' in the most primitive, muscular sense, holding the door open, but it all flows from there. ;-)

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PhilRelig on May 19, 2006 - 3:24pm

But do you see the United States "holding the door" open for anyone when it comes to energy? Or China? Japan? Russia, India, Iran, Venezuela? Are any of these places "holding the door" open for other countries when it comes to energy? [Actually, as it happens, the Venezuelans are....]

Are the Saudis and other profligately rich Middle East producers going to start giving away some of their oil for free to very poor countries who desperately need it? Are the Russians going to "play nice" and stop their energy-related bullying of the Europeans? Is the United States going to desist from hypocritically bullying the Russians for bullying the Europeans? Are the US and Venezuela going to desist from calling each other the "New Hitlers?" Are China and Japan going to start "playing nice" in the East China Sea anytime soon? Are all of these countries, and others besides, going to desist from their self-serving wrangling about where to build new pipeline routes across Eurasia? Are the rebels in Nigeria going to desist from their terrorism, and is the government of Nigeria going to "play nice" and give in to their legitimate demands? And so on and so forth....

Where is anyone "holding the door" for anyone else here - other than as relatively minor matters in the grand scheme of things? [And those who do "hold the door" for others, like Venezuela, are denounced for doing so on top of it all!!]

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odograph on May 19, 2006 - 3:40pm

Yes, Venezuela is an example of a country using apparent altruism arguably in its own self interest.

I think we've ended up in a different place than we started. Altruism and cooperation exist in societies. In times of national emergency we have had national energy programs (up to including rationing) to deal with it.

If we are sticking to the core, and expectation of human response to peak oil, I'd say that is primarily a national "let's pull together" issue. I expect a mix of competition and cooperation on the international scene, as we have seen throughout the last century. Sometimes that competition is quite unpleasant, as history shows.

I don't expect nations to lie down like lions and lambs, but neither to I expect nations to fall apart uniformly around the world (there is always the unfortunate, isolated, case: Northern Ireland, Lebanon, ...).

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xuewen on May 20, 2006 - 3:42am

I wouldn't like to see "human nature" confused with "societal nature".

Humans, and the societies that emerge when you have a bunch of humans in a group, are quite different beasts. Humans can be, and are, altruistic towards each other but it's not clear that the same is true of societies, nations, corporations etc.

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pianoguy on May 20, 2006 - 7:59pm

"Madness is rare in individuals - but in nations, peoples and ages it is the norm." - Nietzsche

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klee on February 9, 2007 - 1:50pm

See Reinhold Niebuhr's Moral Man and Immoral Society

"It may be possible, thought it is never easy, to establish just relations between individuals within a group purely by moral and rational suasion and accomodation. In inter-group relations this is practically an impossibility. The relations between groups must therefore be predominantely political rather than ethical, that is, they will be determined by the proportion of power which each groups posesses at least as much as by any rational and moral appraisal of comparative needs and claims of each group."

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Franz on February 10, 2007 - 12:07pm

Odograph, I'm not in any way taking issue with your general point, but the example you gave is culturally limited, and I thought you might like to realize that. For example, in Hong Kong, people never hold doors open for others, and they are quite glad to shut the doors of the evelator in your face as you charge towards it (I once managed to enter an elevator that had been shut thus once - they couldn't go anywhere, my foot was stuck in the outer door - and I then greeted everyone present therein with the loud appellation 'Sh*theads!'. Yeah, it was a cultural thing. That's the point.)

The irony is this: re lifts, you are on the receiving end more often than otherwise, so it would actually be rational to hold open the lift door for strangers. You lose one second, but on balance you gain up to five minutes, if everyone behaves otherwise. Of course, no one behaves otherwise, so everyone spends their lives quickly shutting the elevator doors in strangers' faces for the benefit of one or two seconds.

In Hong Kong, you are told this sort of behaviour results because people are 'busy'. In fact, it is simply a form of rudeness or indifference, cultivated because everyone is generally subject to the same sort of behaviour.

Again, nothing to do with your general point. But something to remember for any of you who are headed East. Hold the lift door open for a lady and you will be greeted with (a) very profuse thanks or (b) the sort of indifference reserved for the obviously insane.

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