"couldn't it in a way be our fault that the sun is heating the planet more?"
We can't be blamed for the sun's reactions heating the planet but yes, we are creating large, weather altering heat sinks and heat generators and we can be blamed for heat retention(I don't mean to be an ass, only clear). I consider that global warming as a whole could have the effect of adding to the overal mass temperature of the planet. Large land masses retain and conduct heat and that would naturally affect earth on a mass scale not just the biosphere. What would be the effect of a rising outer core temperature and more fluid magma. Might be a good thing overall. Less chance of cataclysmic eruptions but growing volcanic land masses and less ocean. not good either.
We should remeber that there are also things we do that offset warming. One fring article I read stated a study that may demonstrate the possibility that it was likely that cfc's actually may have mitigated global warming until they were banned.
Quite often the sun is neglected in the warming equation. What is it going to do in the future?
The sun will eventually burn out, but that's billions of years away. We don't need to worry about the sun's changing behaviour in calculating the effects of global warming.
2 articles and Very interesting links and discussion of nonconstant solar effect on warming and solar dynamics. The sun drives life and the cycles that bind.
I agree with saturnsc, and others here. I think anyone who becomes all starry-eyed over the "positive" side of oil scarcity is living in cuckoo-land. We need oil, and what's more, when it's taken away from us, it won't simply be a case of how do we get around, so much as what the $%#& are we gonna do with all the hulking remnants of this civilisation? We'll be left with a Mad Max style scenario, and only the crazy-mad engineering types will have any autonomy at all. Only they will know how to build vehicles, to power tools, and produce warmth for themselves...the rest will shiver in caves until they die out (or the space-pixies come to their rescue). There is no known alternative to oil. We will have to adapt to a more "natural" existence, with all the fabled trappings of environmental sustainability - local, organic farms and fisheries, no cars or other vehicles, using fire and wood to heat our homes, etc, etc. And that is the best case scenario...I hate to repeat myself, but can you honestly see humans being able to get along peacably in the face of such massive alterations to their lifestyle and landscape? Nah, we're heading for Mad Maxville, as sad a prospect as it is.
if u could take any one person, sit him/her down and tell them why we need to conserve and what changes will be made when we run out of oil, i believe that person would act rational and could adapt. but i agree with what u said to an extent. people in large numbers are irrational, easily scared, and dangerous as history has shown us many times... i agree that hard times are coming for civilization... but i do have faith that history has also created its share of heroes who lead and organize and calm the irrational masses.. i'm quite sure that 'we will not go quietly into the night, we will not give up without a fight'
as for those of us that go 'starry eyed' over a world without oil... i guess in away i am guilty of that... the idea of living off the land, farming, hunting, forming a balance with nature, alone or in a small community.. well, that dosn't bother me one bit. we have loss track of what life is about.. we worship money and objects.. we have cast away the moral ties of religion and made our own God out of material and power and selfishness... if a world without oil returns us to a time of morals and values, acts of giving and gratitude, a sense of community with each other... then i say good riddents to oil...
but that is simply my opinion!
dan
Last edited by workinman : 01-12-2007 at 12:48 PM.
Do you really think that the PTB's and all those hungry capitalists and producers are not going to do everything, and I mean everything to ensure the long term survival and profitability of the energy and all industry through diversification? I suggest that it would include the long term management of available oil reserves and reduction in use of oil for the long term availability. This says nothing about affordability. Lifestyles will change and must as you suggest become more "naturally" concerned and styled.
I don't dispute the idea that we could trend to mad maxville in typical natural entropy regardless of what we do but that is a numbers/population issue and nature may spare us the burden of willing sacrifice of any people by will or neglect.
Imagine too heavy a reliance on solar if Krakatoa goes off again or worse and the planet becomes volcanically, more active as a result of global warming and heat retention. Geothermal energy is a possibility for some and on the plains there's biogas or biodiesel. Windy regions use wind in the mix. I'm in a mining and forestry region and our local wood plant uses energy from woodchips.
Call me starry eyed over the positive benefits to the necessary reduction of fossil fuel consumption with the recognition that profitability before necessity will dictate and has spawned some change. Necessary change is not a good state. Willing is proactive. Then, I'm an optimist and damned to suffer it.
I think we get along as much as we need to for the sake of our own safety and interdependance. beyond that; it's the snake eating it's own tail.ie) the planetary system is closed for matter. Dog eat dog. and yeah! Solient green is people. If we will prey on our own we should be required to eat what we kill. Nobody gets off alive to date. Nowhere to go to date.
In fact; we would be better off to prepare to adapt to the worse case being a real possibility if.... rather than the current; we're too clever, technology will fix it. If change isn't complete change then; you'll be right on the money. Worse case scenario; continued economic, industrial and population growth under globalization in the current gain based paradigm.Our defined success.
Lynn Margulis says that as a species were done, period. The average life-span of something like us is around 3 million years, and we're about out of time. It would be OK to live "naturally" if there weren't three times as many people in the world as what is sustainable, but the truth is we're packed in and resources are running low. Like any living thing, including bacteria, we are drawn towards that which sustains us, and in the event of a major environmental catastrophe humans will surely end up clustered around certain distribution centres, and agricultural areas, where they will rapidly suck what remains down like an alcoholic run wild in a booze warehouse. Look at Hurricane Katrina. That was a teeny drop in the ocean compared to a truly massive event, and it went totally pear-shaped in New Orleans, did it not? Imagine a new dust-bowl hitting the grain, or a poison smog in NYC or London...these things are all possibilities, and we don't need to imagine a tsunami anymore, because one's just happened.
I don't mean to be a doomsayer, I just think we're faced with potential crises that far outweigh our human scale abilities for solutions. We're intelligent enough to size the situation up and to create forums like this in which to discuss it, but are we big enough to admit the hopelessness of the situation?
My cousin works for the biggest civil electrical engineers in the UK, and he regularly attends meetings in which "leaked" government documents are discussed. These documents, for the most part, view oil as a spent resource, and are concerned primarily with finding legitimate ways around the coming stiffer legislation as we enter the endpoint of fossil. This doesn't mean the (British, in this case) government is evil and driven by money, it means that we are entering a time that is going to be different and difficult, and until we see very clear evidence that we are truly on the way out as a species, we have to keep trying, trying to survive and grow as economies, growing as civilisatons. These people are the ones who control everything, and they're not about to throw the towel in just yet, but they are prepared to discuss the possibility that things are really changing.
Entropy is a fundamental component of our complexity metric. Without entropy you cannot have complexity. Without entropy there is no evolution, no growth, no progress. Entropy is the engine of the Universe. But there are some facts about entropy that escape not only the public. Most economists ignore it - in fact, modern economics is based on mechanistic Newtonian concepts that have polluted minds to such an extent that today almost everyone believes that sustainable growth is possible. Complexiy management, therefore, “includes” entropy management, something our society and economy need badly. “Entropy” is a book by Jeremy Rifkin. Read about it here: Jeremy Rifkin: The Foundation on Economic Trends: Books: Entropy: A New World View (with Ted Howard):
“Once in a great while an idea changes the course of history.
The Entropy Law–or the Second Law of Thermodynamics–is such an idea. It states that all energy flows inexorably from the orderly to the disorderly and from the usable to the unusable. According to the Entropy Law, whenever a semblance of order is created anywhere on earth or in the universe, it is done at the expense of causing greater disorder in the surrounding environment. This law was first propounded in the 19th century, but its full implications are only now being felt and explored. Entropy tells us that the world is winding down, and is to the future what the theories of Copernicus and Newton were to the 16th and 17th centuries-a concept both simple and earth-shattering. It is an idea that is already changing the values and goals of philosophers, politicians, scientists, businessmen, and economists. The Entropy Law is about to become an integral part of our world view.
Now Jeremy Rifkin presents this fundamental re-conceptualization for the general audience, in a book that speaks to every corner of the reader’s life, from driving to work in the morning and buying groceries at the local supermarket to grappling with inflation and debt.
After defining entropy in simple terms, he discusses how it applies to nuclear and solar energy, urban decay, military activity, education, agriculture, health, economics, and politics. Entropy explains why progress, science, and technology have not resulted in greater peace and order but in fact in their very opposites: crisis, chaos, pollution, and decay. The author looks to this basic law of nature for an understanding of where we’ve gone wrong and for a daring map of where we may-or perhaps must-head in the future. Many of the world’s most respected and influential thinkers are embracing this law as the single most important principle that affects the way we live, and as the new overarching frame for organizing the civilization of the future.
Entropy will strike a resounding chord for everyone who wonders why “nothing seems to work anymore” and why solving one crisis usually leads to another even larger crisis. It is a hard-hitting, accessible, impeccably credentialed, and absolutely essential primer to the world we live in and, more important, to the world as we will shape it in the decades to come.”
Linear Mode
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