Sadly, I don't really believe in a "technological solution" to the problem of Peak Oil. I really wish I did, but I don't. I'm actually biased in favour a tech-fix. I want this to happen and be true; but, but, but.
From where we stand now, given timescale contraints, we should be planning to actually reduce our consumption of oil and gas "substantially" in the coming decades. However, we are going to do the opposite, basically use far more, and save a bit. It's rather like our other great problem, global warming and forced climate change. Without drastic cuts in our consumption of fossile fuels, all we can hope for is to reduce the level of increase in our carbon emissions, not reverse it.
Our fundamental problem, bigger than the two above named, is our model of social organisation, which is literally killing us and the planet. We won't deal, we actually can not deal with these challanges without confronting the elephant in the room, social organisation. I don't actually have an answer to this "problem", but I do think that relying on the "market" and this "invisible hand" thing to save us, is both a recipe for disaster and delusional.
Yeah, I've read the poem. I sort of identify with the Dreamer rather than the man who knew. Is that the right answer?
I too think we need to dream and hope and work for solutions. I think we need Utopias as well, something to we can strive for. Today, for example, we could, if we wanted to, eliminate hunger and desease on world wide basis, and most of us wouldn't even notice the cost. We have the resources, the know-how and the money. It's a problem that do-able, for perhaps the first time in history. All we'd need to do is transfer around two trillion dollars we collectively waste on military expenditure a year to eradicating poverty. Taking the historic lead, the United States could choose to transform itself from a war-economy, into a peace-economy. It's prefectcly feasable and it's not exactly cutting-edge thinking is it? Only problem is, I don't see us doing it, inside the confines of our current socio-economic paradigm. And if we can't do something as relatively "easy" as this, then I'm sceptical about us dealing with far larger and fundamental problems like Peak Oil and Global Warming.
Does this make me a Doomer? I hope not. Intellectually, in my head, I don't see us changing our ways. Emotionally, in my heart, I feel we have to, we must, we don't have a choice, and I'm doing everything I can to bring on the "revolution."
I'm struck by the fairly common (but false) belief both on this forum and others, that we (humanity ) are at the peak of evolution, and therefore should strive to retain the status quo in terms of the Western worlds level of comfortable civilization, and also spread that level to all other people on the planet. Having spent some time studying a variety of disciplines,including cultural anthropology and what's commonly termed "Chaos Theory" (not the movie version, the real deal ) in the last 62 years, it's my considered opinion that a complex system that stops evolving will inevitably die. Lots of historical, and experimental, evidence for this if anyone cares to do the research.
Briefly, and in very simplistic terms, progress in terms of adaptation to a changing environment(evolution)requires stress. That stress is nearly always violent and unforgiving, but results in a species and/or cultural norm that is suited to the new physical and cultural environment.
I think what bothers most people is that they (we) cannot envision what that new species will be, even tho we are partially responsible for it's evolution. We are currently Homo Sapiens. What we will become is unknown, but we can be certain it will be something different than what we are now.
Even if we were at the peak of evolution, it would probably be irrelevant, since there is no way we are going to survive in the numbers we have under any scenario. The main thing that need to evolve, and pronto, is our brains, which are totally unsuited for long term survival on this planet.
Transformation through stress, pain, and devouring. In nature, everything gets eaten by another. Life evolves. There's something extraordinarily beautiful in this, which is why I'm a short-term pessimist and a long-term optimist.
Thank you. In the same vein, I've often wondered why it is that people tend to view themselves as somehow apart from "nature". I suppose it's because "people are shmart"? (re: the Geico commercials ) :)
I would not say that we have stopped evolving its simply that we have reached a dead end route with the western/oil economy.
It ends when oil ends. I think you have to split the concept of evolution and refinement from the extinction of a species.
I general outside of generic calamities a species goes extinct when it becomes so refined that a destruction or changes in the condition of of the niche it is filling result in the collapse of the species while less specialized species continue. Obviously continued evolution that refines a species also lead inexorably to its own extinction. We have reached this point in a sense if peak oil had happened in the 1920's when we where less dependent on it the effects would have been far less dire. As we have continued to specialize and refine (pun intended) the oil economy we only ensured that the effects of peak oil will be that much more difficult to handle.
I think this is a better model since I don't think its correct to say evolution has stopped in the western/oil economy. SUV's and McMansions today are larger and more luxurious than any time in history :(
I generally agree. Would you agree that your comments regarding species refinement would also apply to cultural evolution/extinction ( an example might be the Mayan culture or any number of "dead" cultures )as opposed to biological?
I think so. The evidence would be we rarely see a earlier culture that dies. This may be simply because of lack of evidence but I'm talking about 100's and even thousands of years of stability before cultures seem to take a route that leads to a dead end. Anecdotal evidence seems to indicate that they refine a farming practice or trade method that maximizes resources and this becomes highly refined and enables a complex culture similar to today. And its suffers exactly the same complexity feedback breakdown mechanisms. Within reason esp over longer time periods cultures seem to follow the laws of evolution. Eventually dead ending in a complex society that fails when conditions alter on of the basic foundations of the society. These same problems would not have cause the society to fail at lower complexity levels. Extinction at least of culture is in my opinion tightly linked to cascading failures caused by feedback loops that become undamped and the complexity of the culture causes it to freeze or worse take actions that make the problem worse. Biological extinction seems to behave the same way. I'm fairly outspoken but on this issue a massive amount of knowledge backs my position that we will suffer massive systematic failure post peak oil and their is nothing we can do about it outside doing a controlled collapse.
China and India seem unique in that they never seemed to lose most of their technology despite multiple collapses. My best guess is that these are fairly large regions and fragmentation allowed something like ELP to be practiced through each collapse.
Close scrutiny of cultures that fared best through collapses might help use understand how to do WT ELP protocol.
With what I'm saying about China and India they must have practiced some sort of controlled collapse to achieve ELP I think with what I know about both regions and the incredible amount of diversity in language and culture that exists the trick is when the empires collapsed all the provinces simultaneously broke away into small kingdoms.
Both countries maintain this rich diversity today and I think it was critical to success in the past when the empires collapsed. Clans in Iraq are a similar protection system. In areas that where more homogeneous collapses where much deeper and longer. If I'm right this diversity in culture acts the same as biodiversity to prevent mass extinctions. And of course as usual just about anything that would make peak oil less painful has been lost and much of it in the last 20 years.
Hopefully someone who disagrees will be willing to present a well balanced and thought out rebuttal not the technology will save us drivel I've seen. Very few even present a reasonable way to even introduce this saving technology.
Technology post resource peak actually tends to hasten the collapse by diverting energy from replacement solutions into attempts to maintain the status quo. So in my opinion I suspect that cultures that took the tech route in attempt to maintain business as usual probably crashed even harder since they would have had to take resources from viable new approaches that laid the ground work for the birth of a new culture.
Outside of that I'm convinced massive collapse is now not only possible but must happen because of the basic math/dynamics of the system. Protected ELP incubators however do seem to allow post collapse revival to happen quickly although they do not avert he collapse itself. For ELP I think monasteries of the dark ages make a excellent model for preserving knowledge and eventually reapplying it to the new situation when cultures start growing again. I think you have to look at a Monastic like system if ELP is going to work. I suspect many where far looser than is portrayed today and doubt all the super strict rules they had where essential for success but you certainly need a strong covenant between several hundred people with a very clear and obvious set of rules to make monastic approaches viable.
I cannot see many Americans making this transition. The more modern Israeli Kibbutz is probably closer to what we would at least tolerate and they are successful.
It effectively impossible to prevent and I know of no example where either biological or cultural extinction was averted when a complex system went into feedback implosion.
Not one.
I would love to be proved wrong.
I have absolutely no desire to right if someone knows of a realistic way out of this vortex time to speak up.
You put a lot of thought into this. My brain says you're probably correct, my gut hopes you aren't. Ever read "Cannibals and Kings" by Marvin Harris? If not, it's worth a read. A little dated, and I don't totally agree with all of his conclusions, but he does offer some insight.
"Protected ELP incubators however do seem to allow post collapse revival to happen quickly although they do not avert the collapse itself."
Along with your same vein thoughts above, I suggest the closest ELP culture we have in this country to be had as a guidepost is the Amish.
The only "way out of this vortex" that I imagine requires an acceptance of the harsh realities we've dug ourselves into while relinquishing the illusion of control and techno-fixes we keep trying to exert over them. In short: a paradigm shift of our cultural myths. However, this is not particularly "realistic" given our stubborn and egocentric adherence to unrealistic myths (and commercialization) of power and reliance upon applying mops & buckets instead of simply reviewing how best to shut off the taps to our problems.
As Rene Dubos foresaw in Reason Awake: "Developing countertechnologies to correct the new kinds of damage constantly being created by technological innovations is a policy of despair. If we follow this course we shall increasingly behave like hunted creatures, fleeing from one protective device to another, each more costly, more complex, and more undependable than the one before... while sacrificing the values that make life worth living."
Rings a bell, doesn't it.
Still, in the US the Amish culture best exemplifies one sane way out. To whit: "Only a people serving an apprenticeship to nature can be trusted with machines. Only such people will so contrive and control those machines that their products are an enhancement of biological needs, not a denial of them." (Herbert Read, "The Grass Roots of Art")
But quite obviously we are not going to voluntarily relinquish the myth of control and take lessons from the Amish.
I'm not anti technology I think technology can be very useful more so post peak oil. Technology != Energy.
Technology is neither good nor bad nuclear reactions don't have feeling for example. In general the way we have used technology in general is pretty bad but you have to separate the way we have applied technology from the mere existence of technology. For example a light weight powered tiller could easily tremendously increase the productivity of a farm for the energy used. My parent actually sent me to live with the Amish when I was a kid.
They would send me anywhere they could find in the summer.
My dad caught me with a five pound coffee can of fertilizer diesel fuel and black powder earlier that summer so the Amish who don't use chemicals looked like a safe bet :)
In any case back on track they would use horses and mules to pull standard 3 point hitch farm implements some groups would use small motors to power the farm equipment but use horses to pull. This is actually a very sensible mix of technology and common sense. I'm sure given the chance we could create some fantastic technologies that are clean and environmentally friendly and allow us to not fall back to the old problems of masses of farm labor with little real output. Overall the technical solutions presented are generally interesting in building a new society. But that means nothing about saving our current one.
And even though they did not use fertilizer I worked on manufacturing black powder since the old horse manure/hay from the stalls contained lots of urea. I just could not figure out where to get the dang sulfur. Sulfur from natural sources seems to be a pain. The Amish are lucky people :)
My Amish point was not anti-technology, but rather about how they manage to make wise judgments about what, when, and how to use it so that it doesn't get out of control. In this sense it is very much about scale of use, and for what end. Does it enhance their life and needs without causing greater disruption to their settled lives and long term sustainability. All of which involves a level of humility, responsibility, and respect for nature or creation that is totally lacking in our culture and use of technology.
We have too much 'know how' power and too little 'know why.' Our mythical control over life on earth is a deeply ingrained cultural one that all our vast array and feats of technological prowess only aggravates.
With respect to PO or GW, most all the technological solutions proposed are not true solutions to our underlying dilemma of how to live a sustainable life. They are manifest quasi-solutions tied to trying to maintain the unsustainable, which only paints us into a tighter dead end.
When it comes to technology I am all in favor of those which are of:
the right scale
design simplicity
make efficient use of resources (preferably local ones)
offer a close fit between means and ends
durable
redundant and resilient
Further more, they are, in John Todd's words, "elegant solutions predicated on the uniqueness of place", and, I would add, the people and other creatures living in such places. In this way technology is an enhancement of:
human competence instead of addiction and dependence
sound regional economies
social resilience
and long term ecological sustainability
To the extant that the Amish decently manage to get these qualities right in their use of technology is why I think they have some insight of wisdom to offer.
To the extant that our culture, our educational system, and scientists of all stripes brought up in the same tend to see no sense of obligation, limitations, or responsibility to the qualifications above that I am resolutely against.
Although I have no direct experience with the Amish of Pennsylvania, my area of rural western NY has a fairly large population of a similar community of Mennonite/Amish. I'd suggest pause before romanticizing the connnection of such people to the earth.
From what I've seen, the phrase 'long term ecological sustainability' appears to have little room in their practice. I've visited many small sawmills and generally see a willingness to take down every tree that can be sawn and milled into another dollar. Apart from this they remain quite dependent on the wider economy within which they live.
Low tech does not mean sustainable your correct.
In some ways if you move to depend on too much human labor you may actually require more resources than a high tech approach.
You could point to their use of modern medicine also as a strong dependency to the external economy.
For sure within the various amish/mennonite communities there is a latitude of practices, some not as good as others. They are after all human.
I certainly didn't mean to "romanticize" them, which is why I said: "To the extent that the Amish decently manage to get these qualities (of my list above) right in their use of technology is why I think they have some insight of wisdom to offer."
Some do more so than others. Does this make them perfect? Absolutely not, as human perfection is not attainable. None the less, the better Amish communities make do with less over-industrialized technology (and all the imbalances that involves), and this self-imposition from within effectively results in much less hard to reverse or irreversible harm than our high-tech limitless non-negotiable way of life ever does.
I have little doubt that in the initial post peak crisis a lot of Amish or Mennonite communities will not suffer any where as badly a shock to their livelihoods as you or I will. It's worth considering why. How ever this PO crisis plays itself out, any practical guidepost is better than none, and I do suggest the Amish have a better one than any of us have going.
I'm sure we can all think of a few other existent cultures that may well initially survive PO better than ours, but I mention the Amish type as it is most closely akin to our western heritage and exists right under our noses.
Nice list. Hopefully you or someone can post a nice article on sustainable technology. And refrain from tying it to a prediction that it will save us. I think but the basic dogma if you will is important. And the approach should be from the viewpoint of if we had a chance to do it all over again and no oil but a reasonably complete technology base and esp information base.
Electric cars for example don't in my opinion make a lot of sense trains are far better. Solar powered blimps or zeppelins should also be revisited. Sail technology is already getting a revival but I think that the types of ships i.e sizes designs may be different for sail. A cargo catamaran or trimaran may be more viable for sail (solar hydrogen) powered ships.
We have very efficient airplane designs that are slower than today's aircraft do the need to remain slow? Flying wings make better sense for things like hydrogen or vegetable oil based jet engines since its much easier to keep the fuel lines warm.
I think we may be discounting air travel esp if slowing down just a bit will give big gains in efficiency.
Maybe the oil drum would be willing to start a solutions to peak oil targets discussion area that can focus on post peak issues. The core concept would be WT ELP but we can explore exactly what that means. My on thoughts on the political implications comes to startling conclusions.
One thing I'd like to see is a classic posts/article support. We need this for the current site also way to much valuable information is now buried in the Oil Drum.
Thanks. As to any article on sustainable technology I think is putting the cart before the horse. First we have to decide and agree upon what it is we absolutely need to sustain! Trying to even imagine what we hope/want to keep and what we'll be able to is IMO slipping faster and faster from our grasp.
As for predictions, I only predict that the vast technological cart we have hog tied ourselves to and attempt to control - with ever dimishing results - will not save us. In fact, I predict the longer our deaf, dumb and blind reliance upon it continues to fly in the face of earthly reality will only lead us to greater destruction, well before any mythical salvation arrives this way. There is just way too much negative feedback already in place thanks to our missapplied technology that can not be avoided by the increased application of more of the same.
Anyway, whatever solutions and technologies do survive the fall will arise from within the wreakage of particular places and the people therein. I try to remain hopeful there will be enough such viable places to understand and then not forget to place the horse well in mind before the damn carts they'll build.
Individuals don't evolve, nor do species. Only the offspring of some members of a species being slightly different from their siblings or forbears effects evolution.
We will never evolve into anything else. This is it. However, given humankind's apparent ability to suppress all selection pressures, it may well be that no future species will arise from human offspring. Although a drastic crash may well kick-start the process again.
Considering we are now effectively the masters of our genome and regardless of what the near term future brings genetic modification is not energy intensive. Its beyond ironic that science has created real intelligent design. So from a technology standpoint we are on the cusp of a whole new era in evolution beyond our comprehension.
I'm not quite sure what you're getting at. Are you suggesting that we can evolve ourselves, via some kind of genetic manipulation? I'd say we are a long way from being master of our genome. We may have sequenced it but we probably have a clue about the effect of each "gene" for only a tiny fraction of that genome.
However, this is a bit off track. I was merely pointing out that we are not evolving in the Darwinian sense. Whether some of our species find a place in a future evolutionary branch, or not, is also an open question.
Yes we now have the the ability to do directed evolution or manipulate the genome in a controlled way. We lack the knowledge to do it precisely but the technology is in place now.
I'm suggesting that we don't know enough about evolution to decide if this is common or not. It would be a looong time before we would know if evolution naturally leads to a species intelligent enough to modify its own genome for further evolution. Or better the ability its not clear that intelligence is the only way this could happen. I happen to think that if a species can use "thought" to effect its genome that a pretty powerful evolutionary trait. We already know that complex behavior is somehow encoded in the genome a spiders web for example not learned so the bridge between neural patterns and genome exists now.
Somewhat off topic but don't dismiss technology I don't dismiss it in the least I think that as long as reasonably stable regions exist we will continue to advance technically at a fast pace so thinking about where we are going is not that far off topic. The only issue is I don't see technological advancement somehow saving our current culture and allowing a easy transition from oil into a similarly wasteful lifestyle. This is just not going to happen. Wind is about the only solution that been developed to the point that its feasible and it still has a number of problems. And finally its better suited for a electric train solution and this half is not being worked on.
Well, without "knowledge to do it precisely", then we don't have the ability to do "directed evolution".
I don't think we'll ever be able to say that evolution naturally leads to species able to modify its own genome. As evolution has no target, as such (I'm not suggesting you're saying it does), and leads only to species well adapted to their environments, I don't envisage an environment where the ability to modify one's own species' genome could be advantageous, especially as it is a learned ability, not an instinctive ability.
As far as technology, itself, is concerned, although a big fan of technology, I think we tend to delude ourselves about what is and what isn't technological progress. There is no intrinsic scale of goodness for technology and so no way to tell if we are "advancing" or not. Whether one views the direction of technology as forward or backward is a subjective assessment, even though many may come to the same subjective view about some technologies. Consequently, I think it's impossible to say objectively whether, given enough stability or time or resources, technology will "advance".
Well, without "knowledge to do it precisely", then we don't have the ability to do "directed evolution".
We do have this knowledge for many organisms just not humans yet or more precisely it would not be socially acceptable to start mucking extensively with the human genome with our current knowledge base not that we technically cannot do it.
As to the rest of your comment in general I agree its not obvious and I think that thats because we use the wrong metrics. I've also been in third world countries and find that despite the problems the people tend to be generally happier than the more technically advanced nations some of this is of course related to the age profiles but a simpler life seems to have some big advantages.
Hopefully after oil peaks and our crazy system winds down we will finally start taking a serious look at where we want to go next why and especially how. The current goal of a SUV and McMansion for the world seems to have become a lot less desirable thank God.
I for example think that really going into Space but prudently is a worthy goal we should continue to pursue.
Getting the world religions to accept population control etc etc.
I won't dispute the technical point of biological evolution, since you are quite obviously correct on that score. However, I think you will concede that individuals and species - as well as societies - do evolve in terms of their world view and behavior. Sometimes quite dramatically and that a failure to evolve (adapt ) behavior often leads to the extinction of the individual or culture. That is really the point I was trying to make.
I'm skeptical of at least some parts of the technology proposed in this particular post.
First, the hydrogen car? VERY skeptical after reading Joseph Romm.
Second, "mining" oil wells like the tar sands pits? That would only work on relatively shallow, land-based wells. Nobody's mining 20,000-foot-deep wells, let alone offshore ones, today, tomorrow or the day after.
Gadfly:
I said electric cars and hydrogen buses - the latter because they can cope with the storage issue better. In regard to the mining issue I was relating to the transition from surface mining of the sand to the deeper layers that are currently being produced by SAGD, and similar sorts of depths. I have seen the oil sand around Bakersfield being hydraulic mined from the underground and then the cleaned sand pumped back, as an example. This type of approach could be expanded. And it might work - depending on the rock type - down to some depth, though I would hesitate to try it in a really deep well yet. (But with the right rock it might be viable down several thousand feet).
The point is, however, that sceptic or not, someone had better come up with some better ideas than these or we face a whole host of grim options which usually show up along with four horsemen.
All I've really done is write some stuff that was designed to get the readers to think for themselves, and the rest was sort of up to them.
I'm not really sure what I'm talking about regarding a new form of social organization. It might not be new at all. Really, I don't know the answer. If I did, or had loads of really profound and great ideas, I'd be a politician instead of a guy who writes.
I don't advocate Fascism or totalitarianism as an answer to Peak Oil. I suppose, I believe we should try a radical overhaul and rejuvination of democracy. Trying to replace the consumer society for the democratic society. A kind of trade-off, one gets real power over ones life, but pays for it by having less stuff, junk, crap. I'm actually rather a fan of the principles of liberty and anarchy. Devolving power to as many people as possible and decentralizing the functions of the state. This will of course bring one into direct conflict with the massive concentrations of economic and political power we see all around us today.
In an American context, I think the Founding Fathers would turn in their collective graves in absolute horror to see what's become of their beautiful republic. On the other hand I'm not really sure how "democratic" these guys really were. I think they sort of saw "democracy" as being something for guys pretty much like themselves, rather than something for the "masses", which seems to be why they built the Republic the way they did. On the one hand they hated Kings and on the other they were afraid of power of the majority. One could perhaps argue that real, true, funcitoning democracy is just not possible in huge countries with vast populations and empire, war and democracy don't really mix.
It would be helpful if there were a good historical model of a society that rapidly reorganized itself in a successful and positive manner.
One can think of plenty of models to dread and avoid: USSR, Nazi Germany, China Great Leap Fwd/Cultural Revolution, Cambodia, etc. Authoritarian systems give the initial appearance of responding effectively to major crises. However, by being too rigid and not open to critique and debate, they inevitably drift into uninformed and incorrect decisions. Also, as they tend to secure the support of a majority of the population by demonizing and persecuting a disliked minority, as that minority dissapears new enemies must be identified, and the majority gradually wises up and becomes disillusioned.
It is more difficult to think of good examples. Britain during WWII is one thought. They did implement a more or less effective rationing scheme to deal with severe resource shortages, and did assure that everyone was dealt with equitably. The Israeli kibbutzim are also worth studying. FDR's New Deal and mobilization during WWII are probably the most relevant US models worth studying.
Unfortunately, I see little evidence that the US political system is capable of producing the quality of leadership that is necessary to implement an effective response to the crisis. This does not bode well for the future. Absent a competent governing regime, it is likely that in the US things will not only be bad, but worse than they would really have to be. Many good ideas will not be tried and implemented to mitigate the worst of the impact of the crisis, because the necessary government leadership will be lacking. "Too little, too late" is what we seem destined to hear over and over again.
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Sadly, I don't really believe in a "technological solution" to the problem of Peak Oil. I really wish I did, but I don't. I'm actually biased in favour a tech-fix. I want this to happen and be true; but, but, but.
From where we stand now, given timescale contraints, we should be planning to actually reduce our consumption of oil and gas "substantially" in the coming decades. However, we are going to do the opposite, basically use far more, and save a bit. It's rather like our other great problem, global warming and forced climate change. Without drastic cuts in our consumption of fossile fuels, all we can hope for is to reduce the level of increase in our carbon emissions, not reverse it.
Our fundamental problem, bigger than the two above named, is our model of social organisation, which is literally killing us and the planet. We won't deal, we actually can not deal with these challanges without confronting the elephant in the room, social organisation. I don't actually have an answer to this "problem", but I do think that relying on the "market" and this "invisible hand" thing to save us, is both a recipe for disaster and delusional.
If you haven't, I suggest that you go back up to the story and click on the link to the poem "The Man Who Knew." Answers you better than I can.
Yeah, I've read the poem. I sort of identify with the Dreamer rather than the man who knew. Is that the right answer?
I too think we need to dream and hope and work for solutions. I think we need Utopias as well, something to we can strive for. Today, for example, we could, if we wanted to, eliminate hunger and desease on world wide basis, and most of us wouldn't even notice the cost. We have the resources, the know-how and the money. It's a problem that do-able, for perhaps the first time in history. All we'd need to do is transfer around two trillion dollars we collectively waste on military expenditure a year to eradicating poverty. Taking the historic lead, the United States could choose to transform itself from a war-economy, into a peace-economy. It's prefectcly feasable and it's not exactly cutting-edge thinking is it? Only problem is, I don't see us doing it, inside the confines of our current socio-economic paradigm. And if we can't do something as relatively "easy" as this, then I'm sceptical about us dealing with far larger and fundamental problems like Peak Oil and Global Warming.
Does this make me a Doomer? I hope not. Intellectually, in my head, I don't see us changing our ways. Emotionally, in my heart, I feel we have to, we must, we don't have a choice, and I'm doing everything I can to bring on the "revolution."
I'm struck by the fairly common (but false) belief both on this forum and others, that we (humanity ) are at the peak of evolution, and therefore should strive to retain the status quo in terms of the Western worlds level of comfortable civilization, and also spread that level to all other people on the planet. Having spent some time studying a variety of disciplines,including cultural anthropology and what's commonly termed "Chaos Theory" (not the movie version, the real deal ) in the last 62 years, it's my considered opinion that a complex system that stops evolving will inevitably die. Lots of historical, and experimental, evidence for this if anyone cares to do the research.
Briefly, and in very simplistic terms, progress in terms of adaptation to a changing environment(evolution)requires stress. That stress is nearly always violent and unforgiving, but results in a species and/or cultural norm that is suited to the new physical and cultural environment.
I think what bothers most people is that they (we) cannot envision what that new species will be, even tho we are partially responsible for it's evolution. We are currently Homo Sapiens. What we will become is unknown, but we can be certain it will be something different than what we are now.
Does a tadpole know it will become a frog?
Even if we were at the peak of evolution, it would probably be irrelevant, since there is no way we are going to survive in the numbers we have under any scenario. The main thing that need to evolve, and pronto, is our brains, which are totally unsuited for long term survival on this planet.
Nicely said.
Transformation through stress, pain, and devouring. In nature, everything gets eaten by another. Life evolves. There's something extraordinarily beautiful in this, which is why I'm a short-term pessimist and a long-term optimist.
Thank you. In the same vein, I've often wondered why it is that people tend to view themselves as somehow apart from "nature". I suppose it's because "people are shmart"? (re: the Geico commercials ) :)
I would not say that we have stopped evolving its simply that we have reached a dead end route with the western/oil economy.
It ends when oil ends. I think you have to split the concept of evolution and refinement from the extinction of a species.
I general outside of generic calamities a species goes extinct when it becomes so refined that a destruction or changes in the condition of of the niche it is filling result in the collapse of the species while less specialized species continue. Obviously continued evolution that refines a species also lead inexorably to its own extinction. We have reached this point in a sense if peak oil had happened in the 1920's when we where less dependent on it the effects would have been far less dire. As we have continued to specialize and refine (pun intended) the oil economy we only ensured that the effects of peak oil will be that much more difficult to handle.
I think this is a better model since I don't think its correct to say evolution has stopped in the western/oil economy. SUV's and McMansions today are larger and more luxurious than any time in history :(
I generally agree. Would you agree that your comments regarding species refinement would also apply to cultural evolution/extinction ( an example might be the Mayan culture or any number of "dead" cultures )as opposed to biological?
I think so. The evidence would be we rarely see a earlier culture that dies. This may be simply because of lack of evidence but I'm talking about 100's and even thousands of years of stability before cultures seem to take a route that leads to a dead end. Anecdotal evidence seems to indicate that they refine a farming practice or trade method that maximizes resources and this becomes highly refined and enables a complex culture similar to today. And its suffers exactly the same complexity feedback breakdown mechanisms. Within reason esp over longer time periods cultures seem to follow the laws of evolution. Eventually dead ending in a complex society that fails when conditions alter on of the basic foundations of the society. These same problems would not have cause the society to fail at lower complexity levels. Extinction at least of culture is in my opinion tightly linked to cascading failures caused by feedback loops that become undamped and the complexity of the culture causes it to freeze or worse take actions that make the problem worse. Biological extinction seems to behave the same way. I'm fairly outspoken but on this issue a massive amount of knowledge backs my position that we will suffer massive systematic failure post peak oil and their is nothing we can do about it outside doing a controlled collapse.
China and India seem unique in that they never seemed to lose most of their technology despite multiple collapses. My best guess is that these are fairly large regions and fragmentation allowed something like ELP to be practiced through each collapse.
Close scrutiny of cultures that fared best through collapses might help use understand how to do WT ELP protocol.
With what I'm saying about China and India they must have practiced some sort of controlled collapse to achieve ELP I think with what I know about both regions and the incredible amount of diversity in language and culture that exists the trick is when the empires collapsed all the provinces simultaneously broke away into small kingdoms.
Both countries maintain this rich diversity today and I think it was critical to success in the past when the empires collapsed. Clans in Iraq are a similar protection system. In areas that where more homogeneous collapses where much deeper and longer. If I'm right this diversity in culture acts the same as biodiversity to prevent mass extinctions. And of course as usual just about anything that would make peak oil less painful has been lost and much of it in the last 20 years.
Hopefully someone who disagrees will be willing to present a well balanced and thought out rebuttal not the technology will save us drivel I've seen. Very few even present a reasonable way to even introduce this saving technology.
Technology post resource peak actually tends to hasten the collapse by diverting energy from replacement solutions into attempts to maintain the status quo. So in my opinion I suspect that cultures that took the tech route in attempt to maintain business as usual probably crashed even harder since they would have had to take resources from viable new approaches that laid the ground work for the birth of a new culture.
Outside of that I'm convinced massive collapse is now not only possible but must happen because of the basic math/dynamics of the system. Protected ELP incubators however do seem to allow post collapse revival to happen quickly although they do not avert he collapse itself. For ELP I think monasteries of the dark ages make a excellent model for preserving knowledge and eventually reapplying it to the new situation when cultures start growing again. I think you have to look at a Monastic like system if ELP is going to work. I suspect many where far looser than is portrayed today and doubt all the super strict rules they had where essential for success but you certainly need a strong covenant between several hundred people with a very clear and obvious set of rules to make monastic approaches viable.
I cannot see many Americans making this transition. The more modern Israeli Kibbutz is probably closer to what we would at least tolerate and they are successful.
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Society_&_Culture/kibbutz.ht...
It effectively impossible to prevent and I know of no example where either biological or cultural extinction was averted when a complex system went into feedback implosion.
Not one.
I would love to be proved wrong.
I have absolutely no desire to right if someone knows of a realistic way out of this vortex time to speak up.
You put a lot of thought into this. My brain says you're probably correct, my gut hopes you aren't. Ever read "Cannibals and Kings" by Marvin Harris? If not, it's worth a read. A little dated, and I don't totally agree with all of his conclusions, but he does offer some insight.
Cool book thanks !
memmel wrote:
"Protected ELP incubators however do seem to allow post collapse revival to happen quickly although they do not avert the collapse itself."
Along with your same vein thoughts above, I suggest the closest ELP culture we have in this country to be had as a guidepost is the Amish.
The only "way out of this vortex" that I imagine requires an acceptance of the harsh realities we've dug ourselves into while relinquishing the illusion of control and techno-fixes we keep trying to exert over them. In short: a paradigm shift of our cultural myths. However, this is not particularly "realistic" given our stubborn and egocentric adherence to unrealistic myths (and commercialization) of power and reliance upon applying mops & buckets instead of simply reviewing how best to shut off the taps to our problems.
As Rene Dubos foresaw in Reason Awake: "Developing countertechnologies to correct the new kinds of damage constantly being created by technological innovations is a policy of despair. If we follow this course we shall increasingly behave like hunted creatures, fleeing from one protective device to another, each more costly, more complex, and more undependable than the one before... while sacrificing the values that make life worth living."
Rings a bell, doesn't it.
Still, in the US the Amish culture best exemplifies one sane way out. To whit: "Only a people serving an apprenticeship to nature can be trusted with machines. Only such people will so contrive and control those machines that their products are an enhancement of biological needs, not a denial of them." (Herbert Read, "The Grass Roots of Art")
But quite obviously we are not going to voluntarily relinquish the myth of control and take lessons from the Amish.
I'm not anti technology I think technology can be very useful more so post peak oil. Technology != Energy.
Technology is neither good nor bad nuclear reactions don't have feeling for example. In general the way we have used technology in general is pretty bad but you have to separate the way we have applied technology from the mere existence of technology. For example a light weight powered tiller could easily tremendously increase the productivity of a farm for the energy used. My parent actually sent me to live with the Amish when I was a kid.
They would send me anywhere they could find in the summer.
My dad caught me with a five pound coffee can of fertilizer diesel fuel and black powder earlier that summer so the Amish who don't use chemicals looked like a safe bet :)
In any case back on track they would use horses and mules to pull standard 3 point hitch farm implements some groups would use small motors to power the farm equipment but use horses to pull. This is actually a very sensible mix of technology and common sense. I'm sure given the chance we could create some fantastic technologies that are clean and environmentally friendly and allow us to not fall back to the old problems of masses of farm labor with little real output. Overall the technical solutions presented are generally interesting in building a new society. But that means nothing about saving our current one.
And even though they did not use fertilizer I worked on manufacturing black powder since the old horse manure/hay from the stalls contained lots of urea. I just could not figure out where to get the dang sulfur. Sulfur from natural sources seems to be a pain. The Amish are lucky people :)
My Amish point was not anti-technology, but rather about how they manage to make wise judgments about what, when, and how to use it so that it doesn't get out of control. In this sense it is very much about scale of use, and for what end. Does it enhance their life and needs without causing greater disruption to their settled lives and long term sustainability. All of which involves a level of humility, responsibility, and respect for nature or creation that is totally lacking in our culture and use of technology.
We have too much 'know how' power and too little 'know why.' Our mythical control over life on earth is a deeply ingrained cultural one that all our vast array and feats of technological prowess only aggravates.
With respect to PO or GW, most all the technological solutions proposed are not true solutions to our underlying dilemma of how to live a sustainable life. They are manifest quasi-solutions tied to trying to maintain the unsustainable, which only paints us into a tighter dead end.
When it comes to technology I am all in favor of those which are of:
Further more, they are, in John Todd's words, "elegant solutions predicated on the uniqueness of place", and, I would add, the people and other creatures living in such places. In this way technology is an enhancement of:
To the extant that the Amish decently manage to get these qualities right in their use of technology is why I think they have some insight of wisdom to offer.
To the extant that our culture, our educational system, and scientists of all stripes brought up in the same tend to see no sense of obligation, limitations, or responsibility to the qualifications above that I am resolutely against.
Although I have no direct experience with the Amish of Pennsylvania, my area of rural western NY has a fairly large population of a similar community of Mennonite/Amish. I'd suggest pause before romanticizing the connnection of such people to the earth.
From what I've seen, the phrase 'long term ecological sustainability' appears to have little room in their practice. I've visited many small sawmills and generally see a willingness to take down every tree that can be sawn and milled into another dollar. Apart from this they remain quite dependent on the wider economy within which they live.
Interesting comment.
Low tech does not mean sustainable your correct.
In some ways if you move to depend on too much human labor you may actually require more resources than a high tech approach.
You could point to their use of modern medicine also as a strong dependency to the external economy.
Its not black and white by any means.
For sure within the various amish/mennonite communities there is a latitude of practices, some not as good as others. They are after all human.
I certainly didn't mean to "romanticize" them, which is why I said: "To the extent that the Amish decently manage to get these qualities (of my list above) right in their use of technology is why I think they have some insight of wisdom to offer."
Some do more so than others. Does this make them perfect? Absolutely not, as human perfection is not attainable. None the less, the better Amish communities make do with less over-industrialized technology (and all the imbalances that involves), and this self-imposition from within effectively results in much less hard to reverse or irreversible harm than our high-tech limitless non-negotiable way of life ever does.
I have little doubt that in the initial post peak crisis a lot of Amish or Mennonite communities will not suffer any where as badly a shock to their livelihoods as you or I will. It's worth considering why. How ever this PO crisis plays itself out, any practical guidepost is better than none, and I do suggest the Amish have a better one than any of us have going.
I'm sure we can all think of a few other existent cultures that may well initially survive PO better than ours, but I mention the Amish type as it is most closely akin to our western heritage and exists right under our noses.
Nice list. Hopefully you or someone can post a nice article on sustainable technology. And refrain from tying it to a prediction that it will save us. I think but the basic dogma if you will is important. And the approach should be from the viewpoint of if we had a chance to do it all over again and no oil but a reasonably complete technology base and esp information base.
Electric cars for example don't in my opinion make a lot of sense trains are far better. Solar powered blimps or zeppelins should also be revisited. Sail technology is already getting a revival but I think that the types of ships i.e sizes designs may be different for sail. A cargo catamaran or trimaran may be more viable for sail (solar hydrogen) powered ships.
We have very efficient airplane designs that are slower than today's aircraft do the need to remain slow? Flying wings make better sense for things like hydrogen or vegetable oil based jet engines since its much easier to keep the fuel lines warm.
I think we may be discounting air travel esp if slowing down just a bit will give big gains in efficiency.
Maybe the oil drum would be willing to start a solutions to peak oil targets discussion area that can focus on post peak issues. The core concept would be WT ELP but we can explore exactly what that means. My on thoughts on the political implications comes to startling conclusions.
One thing I'd like to see is a classic posts/article support. We need this for the current site also way to much valuable information is now buried in the Oil Drum.
Thanks. As to any article on sustainable technology I think is putting the cart before the horse. First we have to decide and agree upon what it is we absolutely need to sustain! Trying to even imagine what we hope/want to keep and what we'll be able to is IMO slipping faster and faster from our grasp.
As for predictions, I only predict that the vast technological cart we have hog tied ourselves to and attempt to control - with ever dimishing results - will not save us. In fact, I predict the longer our deaf, dumb and blind reliance upon it continues to fly in the face of earthly reality will only lead us to greater destruction, well before any mythical salvation arrives this way. There is just way too much negative feedback already in place thanks to our missapplied technology that can not be avoided by the increased application of more of the same.
Anyway, whatever solutions and technologies do survive the fall will arise from within the wreakage of particular places and the people therein. I try to remain hopeful there will be enough such viable places to understand and then not forget to place the horse well in mind before the damn carts they'll build.
People have been waiting for collapse since people started agriculture. Its less likely now than ever.
Hi m,
I second your suggestions here. I'm curious about the political implications you are thinking about, and I'd like to hear further.
A while back you did say you thought the "world" (population? don't know how you said it) could be saved - it's a matter of ...? (What *did* you say?)
To me, there are some obvious things to stop doing, and others to begin immediately. (And there's a lot of talent here.)
Individuals don't evolve, nor do species. Only the offspring of some members of a species being slightly different from their siblings or forbears effects evolution.
We will never evolve into anything else. This is it. However, given humankind's apparent ability to suppress all selection pressures, it may well be that no future species will arise from human offspring. Although a drastic crash may well kick-start the process again.
Considering we are now effectively the masters of our genome and regardless of what the near term future brings genetic modification is not energy intensive. Its beyond ironic that science has created real intelligent design. So from a technology standpoint we are on the cusp of a whole new era in evolution beyond our comprehension.
I'm not quite sure what you're getting at. Are you suggesting that we can evolve ourselves, via some kind of genetic manipulation? I'd say we are a long way from being master of our genome. We may have sequenced it but we probably have a clue about the effect of each "gene" for only a tiny fraction of that genome.
However, this is a bit off track. I was merely pointing out that we are not evolving in the Darwinian sense. Whether some of our species find a place in a future evolutionary branch, or not, is also an open question.
Tony
Yes we now have the the ability to do directed evolution or manipulate the genome in a controlled way. We lack the knowledge to do it precisely but the technology is in place now.
I'm suggesting that we don't know enough about evolution to decide if this is common or not. It would be a looong time before we would know if evolution naturally leads to a species intelligent enough to modify its own genome for further evolution. Or better the ability its not clear that intelligence is the only way this could happen. I happen to think that if a species can use "thought" to effect its genome that a pretty powerful evolutionary trait. We already know that complex behavior is somehow encoded in the genome a spiders web for example not learned so the bridge between neural patterns and genome exists now.
Somewhat off topic but don't dismiss technology I don't dismiss it in the least I think that as long as reasonably stable regions exist we will continue to advance technically at a fast pace so thinking about where we are going is not that far off topic. The only issue is I don't see technological advancement somehow saving our current culture and allowing a easy transition from oil into a similarly wasteful lifestyle. This is just not going to happen. Wind is about the only solution that been developed to the point that its feasible and it still has a number of problems. And finally its better suited for a electric train solution and this half is not being worked on.
Well, without "knowledge to do it precisely", then we don't have the ability to do "directed evolution".
I don't think we'll ever be able to say that evolution naturally leads to species able to modify its own genome. As evolution has no target, as such (I'm not suggesting you're saying it does), and leads only to species well adapted to their environments, I don't envisage an environment where the ability to modify one's own species' genome could be advantageous, especially as it is a learned ability, not an instinctive ability.
As far as technology, itself, is concerned, although a big fan of technology, I think we tend to delude ourselves about what is and what isn't technological progress. There is no intrinsic scale of goodness for technology and so no way to tell if we are "advancing" or not. Whether one views the direction of technology as forward or backward is a subjective assessment, even though many may come to the same subjective view about some technologies. Consequently, I think it's impossible to say objectively whether, given enough stability or time or resources, technology will "advance".
We do have this knowledge for many organisms just not humans yet or more precisely it would not be socially acceptable to start mucking extensively with the human genome with our current knowledge base not that we technically cannot do it.
As to the rest of your comment in general I agree its not obvious and I think that thats because we use the wrong metrics. I've also been in third world countries and find that despite the problems the people tend to be generally happier than the more technically advanced nations some of this is of course related to the age profiles but a simpler life seems to have some big advantages.
Hopefully after oil peaks and our crazy system winds down we will finally start taking a serious look at where we want to go next why and especially how. The current goal of a SUV and McMansion for the world seems to have become a lot less desirable thank God.
I for example think that really going into Space but prudently is a worthy goal we should continue to pursue.
Getting the world religions to accept population control etc etc.
I won't dispute the technical point of biological evolution, since you are quite obviously correct on that score. However, I think you will concede that individuals and species - as well as societies - do evolve in terms of their world view and behavior. Sometimes quite dramatically and that a failure to evolve (adapt ) behavior often leads to the extinction of the individual or culture. That is really the point I was trying to make.
I agree. A failure to adapt to a changing environment leaves one, by definition, poorly suited to that environment. That is usually bad.
Tony
I'm skeptical of at least some parts of the technology proposed in this particular post.
First, the hydrogen car? VERY skeptical after reading Joseph Romm.
Second, "mining" oil wells like the tar sands pits? That would only work on relatively shallow, land-based wells. Nobody's mining 20,000-foot-deep wells, let alone offshore ones, today, tomorrow or the day after.
Gadfly:
I said electric cars and hydrogen buses - the latter because they can cope with the storage issue better. In regard to the mining issue I was relating to the transition from surface mining of the sand to the deeper layers that are currently being produced by SAGD, and similar sorts of depths. I have seen the oil sand around Bakersfield being hydraulic mined from the underground and then the cleaned sand pumped back, as an example. This type of approach could be expanded. And it might work - depending on the rock type - down to some depth, though I would hesitate to try it in a really deep well yet. (But with the right rock it might be viable down several thousand feet).
The point is, however, that sceptic or not, someone had better come up with some better ideas than these or we face a whole host of grim options which usually show up along with four horsemen.
I'm not sure whose model of social organization you're referring to. Care to elaborate, since there are several currently popular ones?
It was a bit silly talkin' 'bout a revolution.
All I've really done is write some stuff that was designed to get the readers to think for themselves, and the rest was sort of up to them.
I'm not really sure what I'm talking about regarding a new form of social organization. It might not be new at all. Really, I don't know the answer. If I did, or had loads of really profound and great ideas, I'd be a politician instead of a guy who writes.
I don't advocate Fascism or totalitarianism as an answer to Peak Oil. I suppose, I believe we should try a radical overhaul and rejuvination of democracy. Trying to replace the consumer society for the democratic society. A kind of trade-off, one gets real power over ones life, but pays for it by having less stuff, junk, crap. I'm actually rather a fan of the principles of liberty and anarchy. Devolving power to as many people as possible and decentralizing the functions of the state. This will of course bring one into direct conflict with the massive concentrations of economic and political power we see all around us today.
In an American context, I think the Founding Fathers would turn in their collective graves in absolute horror to see what's become of their beautiful republic. On the other hand I'm not really sure how "democratic" these guys really were. I think they sort of saw "democracy" as being something for guys pretty much like themselves, rather than something for the "masses", which seems to be why they built the Republic the way they did. On the one hand they hated Kings and on the other they were afraid of power of the majority. One could perhaps argue that real, true, funcitoning democracy is just not possible in huge countries with vast populations and empire, war and democracy don't really mix.
It would be helpful if there were a good historical model of a society that rapidly reorganized itself in a successful and positive manner.
One can think of plenty of models to dread and avoid: USSR, Nazi Germany, China Great Leap Fwd/Cultural Revolution, Cambodia, etc. Authoritarian systems give the initial appearance of responding effectively to major crises. However, by being too rigid and not open to critique and debate, they inevitably drift into uninformed and incorrect decisions. Also, as they tend to secure the support of a majority of the population by demonizing and persecuting a disliked minority, as that minority dissapears new enemies must be identified, and the majority gradually wises up and becomes disillusioned.
It is more difficult to think of good examples. Britain during WWII is one thought. They did implement a more or less effective rationing scheme to deal with severe resource shortages, and did assure that everyone was dealt with equitably. The Israeli kibbutzim are also worth studying. FDR's New Deal and mobilization during WWII are probably the most relevant US models worth studying.
Unfortunately, I see little evidence that the US political system is capable of producing the quality of leadership that is necessary to implement an effective response to the crisis. This does not bode well for the future. Absent a competent governing regime, it is likely that in the US things will not only be bad, but worse than they would really have to be. Many good ideas will not be tried and implemented to mitigate the worst of the impact of the crisis, because the necessary government leadership will be lacking. "Too little, too late" is what we seem destined to hear over and over again.