The great silence: Just 4 in 10,000 galaxies may host intelligent aliens

[Gibsense]

Certainly!

But like sub-atomic particles, humans behave in predictable ways in the aggregate. Does this photon go through the right slit, or the left slit? It doesn't much matter, because 50% of all the photons will ultimately go through each slit.

Likewise with humans. Individual actions, but predictable in the aggregate — all the while, proclaiming their individualism through their brand-name conformity!

You and I may spend a lot of time thinking about the future. But in the aggregate, humans just don't. And the pseudo-democracy called "voting" brings out the worst of humans' short-term interests!

Oh, there will be a cultural change, alright!

But it will be imposed by nature, not voluntarily taken up by more than just a few. And it won't take long before humans accept that as the "new normal."

Indeed, it may well be that very complexity that brings down civilization.

Joseph Tainter (The Collapse of Complex Societies) claims that civilizations keep getting more and more complex until the maintenance of that complexity begins to use more and more of that civilization's resources, until there is little left for satisfying the basic needs of its citizens.

Similar is Peter Turchin's claims that the "overproduction of elites" is what collapses civilizations. Look at today's adoration of popular movie stars and sports figures and business leaders. Not to mention Convicted Felon Battery Shark!

In pre-agrarian society, there was near-zero difference between the well-being of the lowest and the highest in a tribe. Indeed, many indigenous peoples had a custom of requiring those who amass wealth to give it all away.

Today, Elon Musk gets about one million times as much as the person who cleans his toilets!

"Not able to cope?" I think we're there.

Perhaps my view that "lost knowledge" is a certainty is what makes you think my ideas are simplistic?

In a slow crash, I could keep a tractor running on vegetable oil until the tractor fell apart, perhaps decades. My calculation is that an acre of oilseed crops could run that tractor for mechanized agriculture on 6-8 acres of food crops. A 6:1 energy return on energy invested (ERoEI) is about twice as much as a modern fracked oil well!

But that doesn't include the embedded energy of replacing the tractor when it became "used up." That knowledge will be lost when the energy that supports it is no longer available. That is entropy.

Similarly, there may not be enough oil available to drill more oil wells. Fritjov Capra (The Systems View of Life, et. al.) thinks 3:1 ERoEI is the minimum necessary for civilization.

We're there.

I think human extinction is a toss-up in the next few decades.

Dr. Guy McPhereson (professor emeritus of Natural Resources, Ecology, and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Arizona) thinks near-term extinction is a certainty.

Going extinct is what species do when they can no longer adapt to their environment. They do it all the time. Of 1,000 species that ever lived, at least 999 are extinct.

If humans are reduced to subsistence hunting and gathering, well, we've extirpated 70% of the wildlife, and it is unlikely that what we've replaced wildlife with — livestock that are fed grain from far away — are going to survive for very long.

We've become detritivores, subsisting on 200,000,000-year-old dead things.

And those are soon to be in short supply, as we enter a vicious feedback loop. The current energy cost of producing a barrel of oil is about 1/3rd of a barrel of oil, so as oil production goes down, so does the ability to produce more oil. And no, windmills, solar panels, hydropower dams, and nuclear plants cannot be used to drill more oil wells. It's going to take diesel.

This is due to one of Tainter's complexities: we've become fixated on efficiency. But efficiency has an embedded energy cost — achieving 100% efficiency theoretically would require infinite energy, according to Claude Shannon!

There is a reason why, after some 2.5 billion years of evolution, most plants turn only about 1% of the sunlight that strikes their leaves into chemical energy. What is irrational is that we make solar panels that do twenty times better! How can that possibly continue? A reversion to the mean is inevitable.

There's a huge problem with that: a quarter-billion years of stored sunlight will not be available to a post-collapse culture that arises. We'll need that "Earth battery" to bootstrap a new technological society.

More likely is that sentient bonobos, cetaceans, or canids will evolve after we're gone. I hope their archaeologists discover our artifacts, and take them as a warning sign, rather than inspiration!

C. S. ("Buzz") Holling studied this in detail, calling it "Panarchy," or "the ruler of everything."

It seems that all things, from sub-atomic particles to galaxy clusters, go in cycles, ruled by connectivity, resilience, and capital.

Humans are a "K-selected" species, and it won't take much to push us into the omega phase of release. Such a cycle can repeat.

But if one cycle damages the capital or potential dimension, the next cycle cannot be as large as the previous cycle. Thanks to the one-time gift of fossil sunlight, we are using six planet's worth of resources, and are heavily into overshoot. (See William Catton.)

By using up all the easily-retrieved fossil sunlight, and by reducing future generation's ability to grow food due to domestication and climate change, it appears unlikely that a human technological society can reappear anytime soon — if at all.

See that "K" on the Panarchy diagram? You are here!

 

[Gibsense]

"And no, windmills, solar panels, hydropower dams, and nuclear plants cannot be used to drill more oil wells. It's going to take diesel."

Part of a super essay by a poster I can't find in time but question:

Why did you not include hydrogen? That sort of destroys much of your statement.

 

[Unclear Engineer]

It is interesting to watch Jan post about how we are doomed by 2030, while others are posting about mining asteroids in 2100.

Regarding diesel used for mining. Obviously, the people talking about mining asteroids are not thinking about powering that effort with diesel engines, because there is no oxidizing atmosphere to use for an internal combustion engine.

On earth, Jan is correct that most mining and drilling is currently accomplished using diesel powered equipment. But, that isn't unchangeable. For instance, Australia has been working on converting diesel engines to run on 90% hydrogen gas and 10% diesel, and Toyota is working on a pure hydrogen powered engine.

We are already using hydrogen for rocket propellant, and will probably settle on that plus methane, both of which can be made with sunlight and some technology. Even lubricants can be made from plant materials.

I think Jan's point is more that the costs and efficiencies of doing that are not good enough to support the current 8 billion human population at the levels currently "enjoyed" (with much complaining, never-the-less).

Trying to project human population into the future results in all sorts of "models" with results diverging widely after not much time. Most of the models seem to be biased towards wishful thinking that "everything will work out naturally" or "we are all doomed, and pretty soon, now".

Personally, my opinion is that both are too biased to be really useful. They both end up with people finding a way to not think about how we should be trying to control our population. Which strikes me as the main problem. We are avoiding the subject by assuming either that it will all work out or that it is too late for it to work out at all, so no reason to work on it.

So far as I have seen, only China has actually tried to control its own population in a planned manner. And, that attempt was met with horror from abroad, but was mostly successful because of the ability of the government to force compliance - up to a point. The internal effects have had foreseeable but unaccepted consequences on the Chinese individuals and economy. So, the policy was abandoned, but the residual effects are still that the Chinese population is slowly diminishing. It remains to be seen if that will continue, stabilize or reverse. But, most people do not want the government to control their family sizes. And most really do not think about the long-term effects on society as a whole as equal priority with the short-term benefits for themselves and their families.

 

[Jan Steinman]

Why did you not include hydrogen? That sort of destroys much of your statement.

Hydrogen is not an energy source. It is a energy storage medium.

There is some hydrogen in natural gas. And if separated from the majority constituent (methane), it could be burned cleanly. But that is still a non-renewable resource.

So hydrogen is really more like a battery. That means we must get it from somewhere.

The main proponent (Amory Lovins) says we will obtain hydrogen by disassociation of water, using renewable electricity. As an entropic energy-conversion process, that has some loss. So from an efficiency standpoint, we'd be better off simply using the renewable electricity.

Which brings us back to "Where does renewable electricity come from?"

It comes from ("ta da!") fossil sunlight!

There is not a single solar-powered solar panel factory on the planet. There is not a single wind-powered wind-turbine factory on the Earth. No hydro power dam has ever been constructed via a significant amount of hydro power. No nuclear power plant has ever been constructed using nuclear power.

Gail Tverberg (http://ourfiniteworld.com) quips that "Wind turbines are fuelled by a continuous stream of diesel trucks, bringing replacement parts." I used to think she meant delivery vans bringing circuit boards. Then, I drove east-west across North Dakota on US Highway 10.

We drove through mile after mile of inspirational wind turbines, making electricity from the seemingly boundless northern prairie winds. But then I noticed something else. I glanced at my watch numerous times, so I could establish a count.

Every thirty seconds or so, we'd pass a huge diesel-powered, 30-wheel trailer, containing one wind turbine component. One blade each. One-third of a tower each. 80 metric tonnes (175,000 pounds) for each trailer, pulled by a truck that gets 6-8 miles per gallon of diesel fuel.

This continued for almost all of North Dakota, until we finally left the wind farms behind. That's roughly six hundred semi-trailer loads! Of course, I have no idea if that was a special event, or if it was routine. But it made the point with me: no diesel, no wind power.

"But, but, but, Tesla is making electric semi-tractors!"

Not so fast. They have a demonstration project. They are short-hauling potato chips from a depot to grocery stores. (The potato chips arrived at the depot on diesel-powered trucks.) They are travelling under 150 miles, with a load that is perhaps 1/8th of a normal truck capacity. Electric semi-tractors are simply not capable of crossing big states with 30-wheel loads!

Believe me, I wish it were different. If this were even 20 years ago, there might be a chance of creating a "renewable energy economy" before the fuel goes into decline.

But today, it's far too late. Our economic growth is absolutely tied to energy growth. At present, fossil sunlight production is flat, and renewable energy, as much as others can produce glowing figures about it's "growth," is not displacing any fossil fuel energy. Rather, it is supplying the "growth" that is keeping the economy chugging along, kicking that can a bit further down the road.

In essence, so-called "renewable energy" is simply a fossil-fuel amplifier. You put one barrel of oil in, you get a bit more than one barrel's worth of energy out. But not really much more.

And oil is going away. We are currently balanced on the precipice of US fracked oil. Once that goes into decline, world oil production goes into decline. Once oil goes into decline, total energy goes into decline. Once energy goes into decline, the economy goes into decline. Once the economy goes into decline, capitalism and modern civilization goes into decline.

Permanently.

This is going to make the Great Depression look like a stroll through the park. Hold on to your seat! It's a rocky road ahead.

And by the way, take personal control of your food supply, by whatever means you can. Modern industrial agriculture is utterly dependent on fossil fuel. It uses some 17% of the total. It's going to start declining in an increasingly hungry world, any year now. Where do you see yourself on the green curve, below?

I hope you can see I've spent considerable time and research on this topic. It's sort-of consumed my life for a couple decades, now.

 

[Atlan0001]

I much prefer E. E. "Doc" Smith's views of life, particularly intelligent life . . . that our very narrow bedrock base for life and intelligence and the existence of life and intelligence isn't the only bedrock base for them in the universe(s)! After all, even on Earth and in our intelligent species (YES! intelligent!) we have matter charged humans and (in every way self-similar but one) we have anti-matter charged humans and never shall the self-similarly intelligent species twain meet to embrace without annihilating each other!

 

[Dave]

The amount of comments concerning this one article is staggering. We all deserve some recognition and appreciation for contributing some truly wonderful comments and ideas. When we all work together on something it becomes something more. This has turned into an article that is tenfold, better than the original.

So , it is the same with humanity. The ISS would have been a little bit better if China had been involved. We will always have problems, but embracing our own will lead to solutions. Those who think the glass is half full, need those who think the glass is half empty, and vice versa. We need each other. We are one race, the human race. We are capable of the extraordinary.

We are not alone. Intelligent lifeforms are observing us. They do not wish to contact us. They do not wish to be discovered.

 

[Classical Motion]

I remember things a little differently. It wasn’t long after WWII that our oil wells began to go dry. And our oil companies drilled and harvested foreign oil for us. Then economic embargo.

Then the peak oil scare. And we opened up vast coal reserves. To eventually replace our oil.

Billions was invested by our oil companies against this bleak future. And they came up with fracking.

And now, again, we have plenty of oil. And of course the same data showing peak oil again.

With fracking we still leave 60% of the product in the ground. Even with fracking we still leave over half……. in the ground.

If a true competitor shows itself to big oil, big oil will invest billions to find a way to get that left over oil. You can be sure of that.

What do we do with that fossil fuel? We super heat water with it. We make steam to turn turbines.

How much would it cost to drill a 10 mile hole? A hole that never goes empty of super heated water.

Each hole we drill will be cheaper to drill.

Wind and solar our fantasies. Expensive, ground raping, high processing, in-efficient fantasies.

The only green solution is bore holes. It’s only downside is that it is the cheapest and cleanest of all energy. This source can not be peaked.

And probably never used. Controlling energy is power. In an electric world, it is supreme power.

Governments would have controlled rain long ago if it was possible. They will use any reason to control electricity and fuel.

Just watch them.

 

[Questioner]

Yes,
While there is very much to not like about the heavy handed controlling Chinese government their population management is to be lauded by anyone
who is concerned about sustainability of the planet's biosphere.

The most ecologically useful thing anyone can do is to have one less child.

Life always disrupts its environment.

Human beings, collectively are by far and away the most resource consuming and environmentally destructive species on the planet.

If everyone was a little less thrilled with 'humanity/people' and greatly more circumspect and rational about it/them,
maybe we could think, communicate and act more rationally and reasonably.

The trouble is nervous systems are driven by hyperbolic invectives, sensations.

Politics and religion favor the most savage hyperbolic narcissistic beliefs.

Finding rational stability that can predominate amid the hyperbolic social chaos is a task i am not sure we are up to.

It's all so easy to see from the heights of the imperium. ;P

 

[Unclear Engineer]

Although Jan Steinman has put together some pertinent economic data, his conclusions seem to depend on things not being done differently in the future than before, and he seems to be somewhat pessimistic about how much fossil energy is actually remaining. I am just not seeing an economic collapse due to energy insufficiency by 2030.

And, the bit about

There is not a single solar-powered solar panel factory on the planet. There is not a single wind-powered wind-turbine factory on the Earth. No hydro power dam has ever been constructed via a significant amount of hydro power. No nuclear power plant has ever been constructed using nuclear power.

seems to say there cannot ever be any renewable resources tapped by using renewable resources to increase the energy harvesting capacity. That is not true. There has already been a solar powered plant for making solar cells. Yes, it did go bankrupt. But, part of the reason is that there were, and still are, cheaper means to make the same product using fossil energy.

The actual issue is how much renewable energy we need for a given population size and lifestyle. Clearly, there is a limit on how much population can be supported at a given per capita energy use level using the finite amount of available renewable energy used with a specific conversion efficiency. But, we can improve our conversion efficiency to some degree -not just solar cell efficiency, but the associated physical resources use efficiencies, too. The question is can we keep the population from exceeding a number that forces a lifestyle that leads to the collapse of technological society?

I agree with Jan that, if we collapse our technological society, the path to recovering it would be much harder without the "easy" use of fossil fuels. It might take millennia, or might even be impossible.

So, with all of the other articles on Space.com about finding the "building blocks of life" swirling is space and the apparent possibility that life has already emerged on other planets and moons of other planets, the question for Drake's Equation parameters seems to be getting more and more focus on how often does life get a chance to develop to the technological stage and how long does that stage last.

And, the last is not just an academic question for people with a nice life and a lot of spare time to contemplate - it may be the question we all must address to effectively extend our technological lifestyle, if not even our own species survival.

 

[Gibsense]

The main proponent (Amory Lovins) says we will obtain hydrogen by disassociation of water, using renewable electricity. As an entropic energy-conversion process, that has some loss. So from an efficiency standpoint, we'd be better off simply using the renewable electricity.

Not so. Hydrogen is offered as a solution for heavy work. Electric-driven power is not up to the job. Currently. Let's hope winter roads are not icy.

 

[Gibsense]

Whilst it is a fun debate it is largely IMO irrelevant. We should be discussing how to defend ourselves. New York will be drowned. Many cities also. What will we/you do?

If Jan is correct, we should be looking to bury CO2. Maybe genetically change some selected plants to fix carbon faster than trees (?)

 

[Unclear Engineer]

Gibsenese, it isn't irrelevant, but you are correct that it isn't the only pressing issue.

In fact, the issues compound. We will certainly lose a lot of infrastructure to rising sea levels, because so much of our infrastructure is built near coasts. It will take a lot of energy to build it elsewhere or protect some of it where it currently stands. So, along with the demands for more energy to improve the lifestyles of "the poor" we have today and the additional poor we will have in the future, we also will have to replace much of the infrastructure that supports the desired lifestyles.

It is really a matter of how much the CO2 and other gases already emitted (plus other human caused changes) have changed the equilibrium temperature of our planet and how fast the planet will change its climate to the new equilibrium. Just not emitting more gases doesn't stop this change to the new equilibrium. Removing gases would help lower the new equilibrium and slow the rise of temperatures and sea level in the future. But, we don't think we can do that quickly enough to just freeze the status quo of climate. Natural removal processes would take far too long to save much of our infrastructure investments on the coasts.

Still, there is a very wide range of uncertainty about how high the sea level will be in 2100. Just in my local area, the difference ranges between about 1.5 feet and 6 feet higher than right now (and that involves some land sinking).

 

[Gibsense]

Jan has researched massive amounts of material concentrated in his area of expertise and he makes his position clear and forceful. However, he is a silo like most of us. It is not a criticism, but many skills are needed to complete the discussion. That is what this forum enables and the level of the contributions to the debate is imho impressive. It is time to get serious.

Missing, in no particular order (mostly):

• The acceleration of impact due to feedback
• Preparation of defence/mitigation
• Education of the public - full disclosure + explanation
• Timescale
• Countries to use a war footing basis to counter climate change - can it be done?
• Defensive dwellings
• Full economic disclosure
• A reality check e.g. per capita China is doing the most(?)
• Do we need a war first?
• World Government after the war (WW3)
• Plan for the redistribution/location of Earth's population
• Can democracy survive (?)
• Is it all a waste of time: Survival of the Fittest?
• All science and knowledge silos to state their opinion
• Media education: Substitute Science knowledge for social waffle and change the producers
• Dedicated Super Computer Fact checker (hopelessly naive I know but there might be a way)
• The silencing of political opinion on whether or not it is happening and our part
• A world plan for food
• ration sunlight
• Fill the low-lying Sahara desert from the Med
• Paint Australia white
• Use airships
• Appoint a greater intelligence (bio or not) to take control
• Increase tax on oil and coal x 100 worldwide
• Forget Mars terraform Earth
• Is this list of points stupid fantasy? Yes, of course!

We tumble along like the rest of nature - a favourable environment opens up (after the ice age) and we replicate until a tipping point where it collapses and a few survive. Will the survivors learn the lesson? Perhaps they have already once before...

 

[Jan Steinman]

Hydrogen is offered as a solution for heavy work.

I'm skeptical, mainly because the economical energy density storage is low.

During busy planting and harvest seasons, a farm tractor operates sixteen hours a day. That diesel tractor can run longer than a farmer can hold his bladder, and can be refilled in the amount of time it takes to empty that bladder.

Perhaps I'm missing something, but it seems hydrogen will have the same disadvantages as batteries: relatively short run-time, and complicated source swapping, since "re-charging" either batteries or high-pressure hydrogen will take too much time.

The more you compress it, the less net energy you get out of it. High compression must be combined with heat recovery to avoid some of this loss, but that is expensive and complicated.

I'm not saying hydrogen absolutely will not work. I'm just skeptical, based on the evidence I've seen. It seems to have all the complications and drawbacks of electric storage, with no compelling up-side.

 

[Gibsense]

I'm not saying hydrogen absolutely will not work. I'm just skeptical, based on the evidence I've seen. It seems to have all the complications and drawbacks of electric storage, with no compelling up-side.

ok, that's disappointing

 

[Unclear Engineer]

"No compelling up sides" - well at least it is lighter than batteries.

Hydrogen does not take as much infrastructure to store in large quantities, compared to batteries to store the equivalent energy. And, it seems to be able to accomplish "refueling" with canister swaps much faster than recharging batteries.

But, that part about taking more time away from driving the tractor through the field just seems to be one of those issues about things getting harder in the future, but not impossible. More people driving more tractors solves the problem. Yes, it adds to costs, but it also reduces unemployment, which is also a cost if you model the whole economic system.

 

[Jan Steinman]

Just a few quick notes…

• Preparation of defence/mitigation
• Defensive dwellings

Live on an island. Or at least a "virtual island," a place that takes more than a half-tank of gasoline to get to. Be a small target. Join with others.

• Education of the public - full disclosure + explanation
• Full economic disclosure
• Media education: Substitute Science knowledge for social waffle and change the producers
• Appoint a greater intelligence (bio or not) to take control

Yea, that's a tough one. I don't see any way to do this, given the pop-culture enthrallment of most people. Those who want the story can at least find it!

I have zero hope that either government, industry, education, nor culture will come around on this. Humans are just too distractable, and the predicament is too huge.

Instead, various "hail mary" approaches will promise "solutions." And the sheeple will go back to their TV screens, exclaiming, "I'm glad someone is doing something about this!"

I think that's the situation with hydrogen energy storage. It's just a way to distract the masses, to make them think their life-style need not change, and that "someone" will "do something."

• Countries to use a war footing basis to counter climate change - can it be done?
• Do we need a war first?
• World Government after the war (WW3)

Hasn't that been tried? Over and over? How's that "war on drugs" going?

Jimmy Carter called for a "moral equivalent of war" to face the last major energy crisis, in the 1970s. Yea, that worked! NOT!

I never like even bringing up war in connection with non-warlike activities. It gets people thinking in the wrong direction. They then think of competing and getting an edge.

In ecology, high-energy biomes (tropics) foster competion, while low-energy biomes (arctic, alpine) foster cooperation.

During the Great Depression, people worked together and helped each other out more than they do today.

Perhaps I'm delusional, but I prefer to think that, as energy goes into decline — and as people accept and internalize that — we'll enter a era of increased cooperation. But like I said, perhaps that's just delusional.

• Plan for the redistribution/location of Earth's population
• Dedicated Super Computer Fact checker (hopelessly naive I know but there might be a way)
• A world plan for food
• The silencing of political opinion on whether or not it is happening and our part
• Paint Australia white
• Fill the low-lying Sahara desert from the Med
• ration sunlight
• Use airships
• Increase tax on oil and coal x 100 worldwide

Joseph Tainter (Collapse of Complex Societies) demonstrates that collapse of civilization happens when they increase their complexity to the point than all their resources go into maintaining that complexity, rather than serving the needs of their citizens.

Howard Odum demonstrates that complexity (and thus, technology) is simply a form of embedded energy, or "emergy."

So I don't give "grand schemes" much hope. Nothing resembling a world government will exist. Existing large countries will break down into simpler, regional governments.

The wold is about to get much simpler. "Solutions" that involve increased complexity aren't going to have enough energy to cover the overhead of that complexity.

• Can democracy survive (?)

Is there even democracy?

"Voting" is not democracy.
We may be able to return to elder-led consensus in smallish groups, or sortition in larger groups.

But I don't see large government surviving, at least, not in its present form.

• Is it all a waste of time: Survival of the Fittest?

Darwin never really claimed that. It's always been "least survival of the least fit."

That sounds dismissively similar. But it is a huge difference!

Will the survivors learn the lesson? Perhaps they have already once before...

I see hope in aboriginal people. Many of them still have the needed practical skills. Many more of them know how to implement the needed social structures.

I recall hearing a British Columbia First Nation leader on the radio. The interviewer asked him something about the approaching poly-crisis and possible collapse.

His answer was enlightening. He said, "We've been there. We know what to do."

Unlike most of us!

However, he is a silo like most of us.

I'm not sure what this means.

If by "silo," you mean, "Purposely ignores or minimizes things outside of one's realm," that's not me at all.

But if you mean, "Examines evidence from a wide range of sources and domains, finds it lacking, and remains skeptical of mainstream approaches," I'll gladly wear that badge!

 

[Unclear Engineer]

There are fewer and fewer "natural" aboriginal cultures left. North American "Indians" on reservations are really not living off the land with Neolithic tools. Most are living in non-aboriginal housing and wearing non-aboriginal clothing, hunting with rifles and driving automobiles and using canoes with outboard engines. And, a lot of the "lore" about how good things "used to be" has some serious nostalgic bias. I am not expecting these tribes to be so much better off than rural "white" people if technological society disintegrates. There would be too many people hunting and gathering and fighting for the crumbs to support anybody in the long term.

There are still some "uncontacted" tribes in the Amazon, but few and "uncontacted" means by the government, not no contact with illegal loggers, etc. See this article and note the fact that they are aiming arrows at the airplane from where the picture was taken: https://www.reuters.com/pictures/rare-photos-uncontacted-amazon-tribes-2024-07-18/ . So long as these people and their habitat remains undamaged, they would probably survive the extinction of the rest of humanity. And, there is really not anything about them that is inferior in their intelligence. So, if they survived, they would make a good seed population for later territorial expansion. But, the knowledge of the technological societies would be completely lost.

But, even their survival is not guaranteed, because the habitat that their natural lifestyle depends on is under assault by technologically superior groups. See https://survivalinternational.org/tribes/amazonuncontactedfrontier . If the technological society crash is an extended decrease in the availability of resources, the natural habitat that is still remaining in the Amazon basin would likely be thoroughly plundered before the "techies" die out. So, even these tribes are not immune from extinction if the rest of us are not able to avoid it for ourselves.

 

[Jan Steinman]

ok, that's disappointing

Well, I could be wrong about hydrogen.

I just heard about Geoffrey Ellis on the Canadian science show, Quirks and Quarks.

He mentions the possibility of something called "geological hydrogen," that is formed from water and certain sedimentary and metamorphic rock, rather than fossilized life or electrolysis.

Not much is known about it. Estimates run from tens of megatonnes to tens of billions of megatonnes, and Ellis cautions that perhaps only 1% of it could be economically exploited.

It's largely unknown, because the conditions for forming it are unlike the conditions for forming petroleum. So petroleum geologists have not really run across it.

Ellis also cautions that it will take an entirely new bunch of geologists, and completely different extraction technology, not to mention a huge investment in storage, distribution, and usage. So he says it may be "decades off."

I don't know that we have decades. But it was interesting to learn of this.

I would still be concerned. We have extirpated most of the wild animals of the world. We are extinguishing species even before they can be discovered. Could adding a new, presumably cheap, energy source solve these problems?

And if something seems "too good to be true," it usually is. Remember when nuclear power was going to be "too cheap to meter?"

Giving society cheap, abundant energy at this point would be the equivalent of giving an idiot child a machine gun. — Paul Ehrlich

 

[Unclear Engineer]

There are many ways that hydrogen can be produced or even extracted. See

The hydrogen colour spectrum| National Grid Group

From green to pink hydrogen, we reveal the rainbow of hydrogen colours and the different types of technology used to produce each. Here’s our guide to unlocking the current hydrogen colour code.

www.nationalgrid.com

 

[Unclear Engineer]

Giving society cheap, abundant energy at this point would be the equivalent of giving an idiot child a machine gun. — Paul Ehrlich

I think we children already have that analogous machine gun, and have hit most of the vulnerable targets at least once already.

One of the (many) things we do need right now is green energy that we can afford. It doesn't have to be "cheap" by today's standards, but we need to be able to use it, so it has to be affordable. There is then some hope that it can be mandated by governments. Otherwise, mandates will produce revolts - either at the ballot boxes or in the streets with real machine guns.

 

[Gibsense]

I'm not sure what this means.

If by "silo," you mean, "Purposely ignores or minimizes things outside of one's realm," that's not me at all.

But if you mean, "Examines evidence from a wide range of sources and domains, finds it lacking, and remains skeptical of mainstream approaches," I'll gladly wear that badge!

First, thanks for your response, I found it really interesting. Not that I agree 100% but it provides greater depth. I hope others agree.

By Silos: This in the UK was Consultant language as part of best practice to improve Company structure and management. Companies are organised by departments - Technical, Human Resources, Planning, Production, Sales, Purchasing etc. Whilst specialisation is necessary to utilise expertise it is essential that the focus of all is to achieve benefit for the Company. Too often the objective is to enhance their specialisation at the expense of the company
A holistic inclusive approach often provides unexpected positive results

All of this you already know of course (not everyone does). My point is that Silos produce both of your statements and we need to remind ourselves of their potential effects.

 

[Gibsense]

And if something seems "too good to be true," it usually is. Remember when nuclear power was going to be "too cheap to meter?"

Giving society cheap, abundant energy at this point would be the equivalent of giving an idiot child a machine gun. — Paul Ehrlich

Wow, that's a quote and a half; I had not heard!

 

[Jan Steinman]

By Silos: This in the UK was Consultant language as part of best practice to improve Company structure and management. Companies are organised by departments - Technical, Human Resources, Planning, Production, Sales, Purchasing etc. Whilst specialisation is necessary to utilise expertise it is essential that the focus of all is to achieve benefit for the Company.

I haven't been involved in hierarchy in decades.

I've been involved in several co-ops with egalitarian structures.

Once energy declines, control will decline. When control declines, hierarchy will decline.

With a bit of luck, the co-op model will be dominant in the future. Certainly, in my future!

 

[Unclear Engineer]

It is hard to believe that a coop model will dominate in a large population. Humans seem to find ways to split into groups to contest each other for limited resources. Other social animals also split into groups when the populations are large. With the history of group conflicts in humans, it is hard to see how once waring groups would decide to act together to share dwindling resources.

On thing that does bring groups of people together is a common enemy. But, that enemy is usually other humans, or sometimes other immediate destructive forces such as storms or fires. Slower problems like famine do not seem to bridge ethnic gaps, especially if one side has the more advantageous situation.

So, before a population collapse has resulted in isolated groups that happen upon each other and see opportunity for collective cooperation to enhance the conditions of both, I do not expect hardship to lead to egalitarian cooperation.

I think a more probable course to that end is through governmental structures that are capable of some long-term planning and intentional consensus development, before everybody is so overwhelmed by the efforts to just survive that they are only thinking of themselves and the immediate future.