Originally Posted by Copperfield

Indeed I do, having worked very hard over the years to develop the talent. Alas in this case, I am being completely serious.



Don't forget misanthrope.



Why wouldn't it be? Do you really think reality will prove to be otherwise? What example in the short span of human history leads you to believe that mankind will unite, sing kumbaya, give up all of their pretty lights and baubles, stop reproducing and start sharing? Hell, if being a skeptic on that one makes me "anti-social" then I guess I had better get started on that "suckers only" tree fort. I think you are going to need the space more than I will.

Shit, most of you are still playing the game, rooting for your team, cheering when they score, reveling in your pathetic political group identity. These are not the actions of people ready to evolve. Just a couple of packs of semi-conscious neo-monkeys following a few alphas around. I haven't seen a single one of you attempt to address the actual problem. I haven't even seen it mentioned. Until you are willing to address that, any C average high school biology student can tell you what the end-result will be.

Allow me to be the bearer of bad news. You aren't special, you don't live in special times, and you certainly have yet to come close to conquering nature. I don't say that to be insulting regardless of what you may think. I say it because it's the truth. Nature isn't impressed by buildings or poems or sonnets. Not by music, cars, computers, the internet, pollution, clean air, clean laundry, your sex life, your ability to be a good parent, Lindsey Lohan, the royal family, global warming, global cooling or who is going to win the next election. One is just as insignificant as the next and that is something that science has proved quite true. We live and die here at the mercy of nature and the universe and you should learn to be fucking happy with that. Be happy floating on that breeze because if you ain't.... Well you are going to see some pretty heavy shit over the next century.



Not to derail the thread with a tangent but, saying you "hate nihilistic types" is easy. I want you to dig deeper than that. Why do you hate them Odin? Why does it upset you?

As a matter of fact, nature *does* care about your sex life and your ability to be a good parent, as much as it cares about your ability to find or create food and shelter, defend yourself and your young, to find a mate with good genes and a talent for co-parenting, and to have and rear the optimum number of children for your situation. "It's all down in Darwin's book."

Originally Posted by Copperfield

Shit, most of you are still playing the game, rooting for your team, cheering when they score, reveling in your pathetic political group identity. These are not the actions of people ready to evolve. Just a couple of packs of semi-conscious neo-monkeys following a few alphas around. I haven't seen a single one of you attempt to address the actual problem. I haven't even seen it mentioned. Until you are willing to address that, any C average high school biology student can tell you what the end-result will be.

Allow me to be the bearer of bad news. You aren't special, you don't live in special times, and you certainly have yet to come close to conquering nature. I don't say that to be insulting regardless of what you may think. I say it because it's the truth. Nature isn't impressed by buildings or poems or sonnets. Not by music, cars, computers, the internet, pollution, clean air, clean laundry, your sex life, your ability to be a good parent, Lindsey Lohan, the royal family, global warming, global cooling or who is going to win the next election. One is just as insignificant as the next and that is something that science has proved quite true. We live and die here at the mercy of nature and the universe and you should learn to be fucking happy with that. Be happy floating on that breeze because if you ain't.... Well you are going to see some pretty heavy shit over the next century.

I'd quibble. That we are going to see some pretty heavy stuff over the next century does make it a special time. We have to act soon for anything approximating a soft landing. I'd agree, though, that few if any of our alphas are looking at 'The Problem.'

I would expand the nature of 'The Problem' beyond showing the simple graph. To increasing population I'd add limited resources, environmental damage and an increasing productivity that will make it harder to include the full population in the economy. I've long been saying that ecological problems underlie the economic problems which manifest as ethnic / religious strife and then security problems.

Perhaps the limited resources and environmental damage can be presented as byproducts of increasing population. This is to a great degree true. However, if one is to seriously address The Problem one has to look for solutions rather than just rant. I believe the above headaches have to be addressed holistically rather than simply focusing on one aspect or another. Population might be the core underlying issue underneath much else, but we'll have to deal with much else.

I'm not thinking The Problem is going to be solved by the Union of Concerned Misanthropes. I do see too many people dedicated to dated world views focused on the wrong goals. The hidden assumption is that there will always be enough resources and room to go around, and that the objective is to acquire a greater share of these resources. The objective is to cling to the life style to which we have been accustomed. The notion of creating a sustainable life style is understood in abstract, but when abstract reason collides with values which justify hoarding resources, abstract reason loses.

I'm not sure your approach is entirely correct. Argue and insult until everyone joins The Union of Concerned Misanthropes? There seems to be a flaw there somewhere. Can't quite put my finger on it. I understand the temptation, though.

Originally Posted by pbrower2a

Do you remember the steam radiators in buildings of a certain age? Steam heat was a relatively-cheap way of heating buildings. You didn't want to touch the radiator, and it was ugly, but it was a heck of a lot cheaper than using electricity or burning natural gas to heat a building. The University of California at Berkeley relied almost entirely upon steam heat for buildings on its campus, and got away with it. Sure, the area has a mild climate, but it can be chilly at any time.

Power companies used to transmit pressurized steam to houses and businesses. Maybe that was when the power generation was less centralized than it now is. Today much of the steam from giant coal-burning and petroleum-burning power plants simply goes into the atmosphere as waste heat. Too bad!

Living in the midwest rust belt I've spent many years around steam radiators. Grew up with them, as we often lived in old houses. Most of my apartments had them. Now I live in a condo with the silliest heating-ac units I've ever seen. They're like the ones in hotels. The place was built in the late 70s and I'm pretty sure somebody's brother-in-law got the contract for my neighborhood. These things use TONs of electricity.

Originally Posted by The Grey Badger

As a matter of fact, nature *does* care about your sex life and your ability to be a good parent, as much as it cares about your ability to find or create food and shelter, defend yourself and your young, to find a mate with good genes and a talent for co-parenting, and to have and rear the optimum number of children for your situation. "It's all down in Darwin's book."

Actually it doesn't. Natural selection is served by both those that survive and those that don't. Evolution doesn't make selections based on emotion. It isn't an active, benevolent process. It's simply the side effect of life adapting to extinctionary pressure. Any living creature that fails enough tests doesn't grow up to have kids of its own.

The full Newshour series on autism with Robert MacNeil is available here:
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/?cc=1234

Originally Posted by pbrower2a

Do you remember the steam radiators in buildings of a certain age? Steam heat was a relatively-cheap way of heating buildings. You didn't want to touch the radiator, and it was ugly, but it was a heck of a lot cheaper than using electricity or burning natural gas to heat a building. The University of California at Berkeley relied almost entirely upon steam heat for buildings on its campus, and got away with it. Sure, the area has a mild climate, but it can be chilly at any time.

Power companies used to transmit pressurized steam to houses and businesses. Maybe that was when the power generation was less centralized than it now is. Today much of the steam from giant coal-burning and petroleum-burning power plants simply goes into the atmosphere as waste heat. Too bad!

Excellent point. We don't hear much about that alternative these days. I gather you are saying it's more efficient. What was the source of the steam?
It is certainly true that we need to localize energy sources more, including home-scale.

Population is a huge problem. It is silly to deny that it not only contributes to global warming (as Al Gore also pointed out in IT, as so many others have pointed out), but to other serious environmental and social/political concerns. Global warming is not the only environmental problem, either; just the most serious one. But both the population bomb and global warming are being denied too often by complacent folks in the capital of complacency, the United States of America, and by its Republican half especially.

But population alone, of course, is not the sole cause of global warming. It is primarily caused by the way we use energy. We can stop and reverse global warming by using alternative forms of energy. The obstacles are not technical, although innovations are still needed. The problem is political. Changing the way we use energy requires violating the tenets of trickle-down free-market tea-party religion, and disagreeing with the pronouncements of its Saint Ronnie. THAT is the primary obstacle to dealing with global warming; that, and no other.

Originally Posted by Copperfield

Why wouldn't it be? Do you really think reality will prove to be otherwise? What example in the short span of human history leads you to believe that mankind will unite, sing kumbaya, give up all of their pretty lights and baubles, stop reproducing and start sharing? Hell, if being a skeptic on that one makes me "anti-social" then I guess I had better get started on that "suckers only" tree fort. I think you are going to need the space more than I will.

Shit, most of you are still playing the game, rooting for your team, cheering when they score, reveling in your pathetic political group identity. These are not the actions of people ready to evolve. Just a couple of packs of semi-conscious neo-monkeys following a few alphas around. I haven't seen a single one of you attempt to address the actual problem. I haven't even seen it mentioned. Until you are willing to address that, any C average high school biology student can tell you what the end-result will be.

Allow me to be the bearer of bad news. You aren't special, you don't live in special times, and you certainly have yet to come close to conquering nature. I don't say that to be insulting regardless of what you may think. I say it because it's the truth. Nature isn't impressed by buildings or poems or sonnets. Not by music, cars, computers, the internet, pollution, clean air, clean laundry, your sex life, your ability to be a good parent, Lindsey Lohan, the royal family, global warming, global cooling or who is going to win the next election. One is just as insignificant as the next and that is something that science has proved quite true. We live and die here at the mercy of nature and the universe and you should learn to be fucking happy with that. Be happy floating on that breeze because if you ain't.... Well you are going to see some pretty heavy shit over the next century.

Not to derail the thread with a tangent but, saying you "hate nihilistic types" is easy. I want you to dig deeper than that. Why do you hate them Odin? Why does it upset you?

I think what you are saying is that civilization is screwed because we've been depleting our resources and overshooting our population and therefore, a whole lot of us are going to die.

That may very well be true. However, please recognize that would be a horrible outcome and try to appear dismayed about that prospect. It appears to me (and probably others) that you are taking the attitude that we deserve our comeuppence so let the die off begin! It's offensive to many of us.

Originally Posted by Copperfield

We live and die here at the mercy of nature and the universe and you should learn to be fucking happy with that.

I have. I made a decision when I was around 15 or 16 (it was before coming here) that I would accept whenever nature decided that I would die due to the consequences of my species, and that I would enjoy life as it was with the people that I care about until then. I do not think that you have. Misanthropy kind of contradicts that.

Originally Posted by Bob Butler 54

Perhaps the limited resources and environmental damage can be presented as byproducts of increasing population. This is to a great degree true. However, if one is to seriously address The Problem one has to look for solutions rather than just rant. I believe the above headaches have to be addressed holistically rather than simply focusing on one aspect or another. Population might be the core underlying issue underneath much else, but we'll have to deal with much else.

I presented a solution. While it may not be one you prefer it is the most likely solution from what I have observed. Would you not also admit to being biased in your desire for "other" solutions? Wanting to live and live comfortably is understandable (all living creatures have this desire) however the definition of human comfort today is completely unsustainable. The chart I linked displays the problem as efficiently and succinctly as possible. You see the same thing with any species that has ample resources and few extinctionary pressures. Eventually though, the population swings out of balance, once-ample resources become depleted and spread out and that species suffers a die-off. Balance is returned.

Its a system that isn't good, it isn't evil, it just is. There is no benevolence or malice in this process. It's just nature. In fact, without it you or I wouldn't even be here. That said, what makes you think that natural law no longer applies to you or I? What makes it "horrible?" Death? Everyone dies. Our attachment to others or our instinct to survive doesn't change the simple fact that each one of us is going to break down, die and become food for something else. We all will be recycled by nature. The planet Earth too is going to die someday as is our solar system. Our Sun will die too and all of the atoms that used to be us will get shuffled around countless times. Our Galaxy will die and all of the stars in the universe will eventually burn out. Even the black holes will someday evaporate and everything will be completely uniform. Nothing escapes entropy (at least in this universe).

None of that is particularly desirable to most people, but our desire won't change the way the universe works. It is what it is and I can find nothing evil or malicious in it.

Stop and think about all of human history for a minute. From the moment a couple of monkeys fucked and out popped some dude named Urrrrgh or Larry or Adam if that is your religious preference. For most of our history we were tribal and agrarian. It's really only the last one hundred and fifty years (since we began to harness and exploit electricity) that human society changed to what it is today. Harnessing electricity after all led to an artificial lifting of those oh-so-important extinctionary pressures on us. This also corresponds to the massive population spike and rapid depletion of resources.

So let me ask you, which human society (agrarian or modern) is the anomaly and which is our natural state? Which society is balanced and which one is unbalanced? Which is more sustainable; a smaller population of tribal farmers or a giant population of nation-states (or a global-state) requiring more and more resources to survive and expand?

Look at it this way. My solution at least has the benefit of being all-natural and completely organic. How's that for a sales pitch to our lovely consumer-driven culture?

Originally Posted by Rose1992

I have. I made a decision when I was around 15 or 16 (it was before coming here) that I would accept whenever nature decided that I would die due to the consequences of my species, and that I would enjoy life as it was with the people that I care about until then. I do not think that you have. Misanthropy kind of contradicts that.

Actually being a misanthrope just means I have a general dislike of the human species. It has little bearing on my enjoyment of life. I have a great fascination with the universe around me, have great friends, a wonderful family and I have an awful lot of fun. I would suggest to you that there is a significant difference between hating the people and hating the person. But think what you will.

Originally Posted by Copperfield

So let me ask you, which human society (agrarian or modern) is the anomaly and which is our natural state? Which society is balanced and which one is unbalanced? Which is more sustainable; a smaller population of tribal farmers or a giant population of nation-states (or a global-state) requiring more and more resources to survive and expand?

Look at it this way. My solution at least has the benefit of being all-natural and completely organic. How's that for a sales pitch to our lovely consumer-driven culture?

I would say were were bred to a hunter-gatherer environment, but hunter gatherers could not compete head on with agricultural empires, agricultural empires could not compete with industrial democracies, and industrial democracies are currently on the ropes. There is the possibility of forming some next stage culture which some might call information age.

You are giving a false choice between two past systems, one failed, the other failing. If you want to talk about nature through the lens of evolution, you might ask what might survive the upcoming environment rather than looking to restore old steady states.

There seems to be a disconnect in the public discourse between gas prices and global warming, when in fact they are one issue. This is what I wrote to Washington Week, whose reporters entirely avoided the issue:

"I couldn't make out the name of the young lady who reported on gas prices, but boy did she not have even a clue! And noone else on the panel said a thing about it! What's it coming to when even on a PBS program the reporters are so beholden to oil companies that they can't even talk straight? There's nothing that can be done about gas prices? What a load of bunk. The politicians are not willing to do what needs to be done.

#1, get us off of oil right away. Require the car companies to go electric now. The government still owns part of GM, for God's sakes. They owned a majority of the stock a while back. They did nothing to make GM build electric cars. There needs to be competition with the oil industry from other sources. That would cause the price to go down. The government, if it had a clue, could get America off of oil and onto electric cars and solar and wind energy. It has been dragging its feet on this for decades already. And now PBS puts its head in the sand in the face of Republican nonsense.

And #2, the price of gas is entirely caused by speculators and traders. And yet your young lady reporter says the politicians are rushing to favor oil drilling. Supply is NOT the issue; that is the fact. Don't the actual facts have any bearing on your discussion? Why not? The government if it chose could require that gas prices be charged directly by suppliers and companies, not by futures traders. Why do gamblers have the sole ability to determine gas prices, and with them, the fate of our whole economy? Who gave them this authority? Can't the government step in and stop this? Not with investigations, but with action? Or price controls? Of course it could. But you pundits take it off the table. You guys are shirking your responsibility, big time!"

Originally Posted by Copperfield

I have a great fascination with the universe around me, have great friends, a wonderful family and I have an awful lot of fun.

And all these wonderful family and friends had better be careful around you, because you have a loaded gun under your bed!

You sorta realize the problem, partially and, well, sorta. And your solution is to do nothing. I disagree.

Originally Posted by Copperfield

Actually being a misanthrope just means I have a general dislike of the human species. It has little bearing on my enjoyment of life. I have a great fascination with the universe around me, have great friends, a wonderful family and I have an awful lot of fun. I would suggest to you that there is a significant difference between hating the people and hating the person. But think what you will.

Just curious -- are you a parent?

Originally Posted by Copperfield

Actually being a misanthrope just means I have a general dislike of the human species. It has little bearing on my enjoyment of life. I have a great fascination with the universe around me, have great friends, a wonderful family and I have an awful lot of fun. I would suggest to you that there is a significant difference between hating the people and hating the person. But think what you will.

It's a phony distinction. If you're capable of loving anyone outside yourself, you're certainly capable of loving all of creation. It's a simple choice.

Originally Posted by Eric the Green

There seems to be a disconnect in the public discourse between gas prices and global warming, when in fact they are one issue. This is what I wrote to Washington Week, whose reporters entirely avoided the issue:

"I couldn't make out the name of the young lady who reported on gas prices, but boy did she not have even a clue! And noone else on the panel said a thing about it! What's it coming to when even on a PBS program the reporters are so beholden to oil companies that they can't even talk straight? There's nothing that can be done about gas prices? What a load of bunk. The politicians are not willing to do what needs to be done.

#1, get us off of oil right away. Require the car companies to go electric now. The government still owns part of GM, for God's sakes. They owned a majority of the stock a while back. They did nothing to make GM build electric cars. There needs to be competition with the oil industry from other sources. That would cause the price to go down. The government, if it had a clue, could get America off of oil and onto electric cars and solar and wind energy. It has been dragging its feet on this for decades already. And now PBS puts its head in the sand in the face of Republican nonsense.

And #2, the price of gas is entirely caused by speculators and traders. And yet your young lady reporter says the politicians are rushing to favor oil drilling. Supply is NOT the issue; that is the fact. Don't the actual facts have any bearing on your discussion? Why not? The government if it chose could require that gas prices be charged directly by suppliers and companies, not by futures traders. Why do gamblers have the sole ability to determine gas prices, and with them, the fate of our whole economy? Who gave them this authority? Can't the government step in and stop this? Not with investigations, but with action? Or price controls? Of course it could. But you pundits take it off the table. You guys are shirking your responsibility, big time!"

Build an electric Car for under $25,000 dollars and can travel over 300 miles without more than one charge, You got yourself a deal? Only reason Hybrid will be the next big thing as people ween themselves off big bad oil. This is also why in December I will buy a Hybrid car.

Charge taxes based upon weight of the vehicle instead of recreation/ truck classifications and things will change pretty fast.

Originally Posted by Copperfield

Not to derail the thread with a tangent but, saying you "hate nihilistic types" is easy. I want you to dig deeper than that. Why do you hate them Odin? Why does it upset you?

Such attitudes just lead to debauched behavior, wasted lives, and whiners that don't get much positive done.

The last couple of pages of this thread in a comic

Originally Posted by Eric the Green

And all these wonderful family and friends had better be careful around you, because you have a loaded gun under your bed!

My, you really are a 1-trick pony Eric. I find it chuckle-worthy that the gentleman who not only has his full name in his forum signature but also posts his location, is making comments about family security.

Originally Posted by The Wonkette

Just curious -- are you a parent?

Nope. As I have said before, I am a proud member of the VHEMT. I really do believe we have enough people on this planet. Like, for real. Little would be served by me helping to produce more.

Originally Posted by Child of Socrates

It's a phony distinction. If you're capable of loving anyone outside yourself, you're certainly capable of loving all of creation. It's a simple choice.

Actually it's an important distinction. The most important distinction. A person can be reasoned with, bargained with, persuaded. Casual conversations may be had, laughter exchanged. "How is your mom doing? Mine is doing well." A person is likely to be honest, sincere, friendly and cordial.

Or perhaps not in which case you simply walk away.

But something very important happens when a person becomes people. That reasonable person you were speaking with starts to mingle with the herd. People are panicky, easy to stir up, egging each other on. People create bureaucracy, authoritarianism and violence against the weak. People create rumor, gossip, conspiracy, betrayal. They lie, they cheat, they become thieves for reasons other than personal survival. People consume, they take from others, become arrogant, annoying, obnoxious, breed, burn, rape, pillage....

I could go on.

Understand the distinction yet?

Loving some doesn't mean loving all.

I just wanted to juxtapose these two statements, from two very different posters with two very different tones, who are saying similar things. It is frightening.

Originally Posted by Copperfield

I presented a solution. While it may not be one you prefer it is the most likely solution from what I have observed. Would you not also admit to being biased in your desire for "other" solutions? Wanting to live and live comfortably is understandable (all living creatures have this desire) however the definition of human comfort today is completely unsustainable. The chart I linked displays the problem as efficiently and succinctly as possible. You see the same thing with any species that has ample resources and few extinctionary pressures. Eventually though, the population swings out of balance, once-ample resources become depleted and spread out and that species suffers a die-off. Balance is returned.

Its a system that isn't good, it isn't evil, it just is. There is no benevolence or malice in this process. It's just nature. In fact, without it you or I wouldn't even be here. That said, what makes you think that natural law no longer applies to you or I? What makes it "horrible?" Death? Everyone dies. Our attachment to others or our instinct to survive doesn't change the simple fact that each one of us is going to break down, die and become food for something else. We all will be recycled by nature. The planet Earth too is going to die someday as is our solar system. Our Sun will die too and all of the atoms that used to be us will get shuffled around countless times. Our Galaxy will die and all of the stars in the universe will eventually burn out. Even the black holes will someday evaporate and everything will be completely uniform. Nothing escapes entropy (at least in this universe).

None of that is particularly desirable to most people, but our desire won't change the way the universe works. It is what it is and I can find nothing evil or malicious in it.

Stop and think about all of human history for a minute. From the moment a couple of monkeys fucked and out popped some dude named Urrrrgh or Larry or Adam if that is your religious preference. For most of our history we were tribal and agrarian. It's really only the last one hundred and fifty years (since we began to harness and exploit electricity) that human society changed to what it is today. Harnessing electricity after all led to an artificial lifting of those oh-so-important extinctionary pressures on us. This also corresponds to the massive population spike and rapid depletion of resources.

So let me ask you, which human society (agrarian or modern) is the anomaly and which is our natural state? Which society is balanced and which one is unbalanced? Which is more sustainable; a smaller population of tribal farmers or a giant population of nation-states (or a global-state) requiring more and more resources to survive and expand?

Look at it this way. My solution at least has the benefit of being all-natural and completely organic. How's that for a sales pitch to our lovely consumer-driven culture?

and

Originally Posted by ASB65

You are so right about this, James...Our planet is overpopulated. We are almost to the tipping point when we will no longer be able to sustain life on our planet and we will get to the point where something must happen to correct the balance. I can't remember the actual year that scientists predict we will reach that point but I do believe it is sometime within the next 100 years or so if we continue at the rate we are going. I do know the population of the world remained rather flat until the industrial revolution and then it began to explode. What will happen when we do reach the tipping point is anyone's guess.

But that really isn't our immediate concern. Our biggest threat to humanity is the depletion of natural resources. Specifically oil. The leaders of the world are very aware of this even if most of the population seems to asleep when contemplating this matter.

Recently I've been stepping back from the forum because I was finding myself becoming more and more negative as we discuss all the horrible events going around the world. So for my own peace of mind, I kind of decided I needed to stop focusing so much on the problems of the world for a while. But this morning I had a conversation with a friend about the oil shortage problem and this has brought my focus back to this subject today...When you think about it, a lot of the tragic events that have occurred over the past few years eventually led back to the problem of our depletion of oil...The oil spill in gulf, the rising gas prices which helped bring on economic troubles back in 2008 and are now threatening to dampen our recovery today. One could even link the nuclear problems in Japan with oil as they looked for other solutions to power their country. And of course, we have been fighting wars in the middle east for 10 years now, which is where most of the oil is. We don't know how to live with out it. We don't really have the technology to replace it at this time. And we will run out of oil in our lifetime.

There are very few things we touch that don't have oil in them. Even if oil is not in the substance of the product like plastics, we need oil to produce food and it get to the grocery store. We need oil to keep our manufacturing plants running and to ship our goods. Hell, there is even oil in the tires of the trucks that are transporting the goods. We need oil in order to extract other natural resources from the ground or cut down trees. We can't even produce clean water without oil being somewhere in the equation. We need oil to produce electricity or ship the materials to make solar panels and wind turbines. There is not much we do in life that isn't dependent on oil...We can't produce other energy without oil. Take electricity for example. We use coal to produce electricity. Where do we get the coal? Out of the ground. How do we get the coal out of the ground? We use machinery which runs on oil to extract it...Now think about what happens when you suddenly lose electricity at your home or office because of a storm or other factors. We are paralyzed until it comes back on.

As I have stated before, Saudi Arabia has the largest deposit of oil in the ground in the entire world, yet they are drilling off shore which is much more expensive and harder to get to. They are extracting oil from sand way up in northern Canada which is another very expensive and difficult process. Why are we doing this? Because we are desperate. That's why. And again, I repeat, we don't have the technology at this point to replace oil. Even the electric drive mining trucks my husband's company manufactures need oil to make them run. They aren't running on just electricity. They still need oil and lots of it every time they turn one of the those trucks on. If the engineers knew how to make machines which run solely without the help of oil, they would be on the market now. It's not that they are withholding technology. It's just not there.

It's not a matter of the government not spending enough to produce more on green types of energy or not focusing hard enough on solutions. The powers that be know we can't even produce these things without oil and we just don't know how to do it.

I like I said, most of our problems link back to this one issue. Yes people, the sky really is falling and we are just going about our daily lives pretending like it's not happening. We have no solutions other than to try to extract every drop we can find and to go to war trying to get our hands on it. This is not a resource that can be regenerated in our lifetime. It can't be regenerated in a 100 lifetimes. It takes of millions of years to produce oil and we have just about used up our supply. We are living in very interesting times. One day soon (in our lifetimes) it will be gone and our world will change forever. Many people will die because of this because we won't have the ability to produce massive amounts of food anymore and ship it out to them.

On other threads we talk about the elephant in the room, but this is really the elephant in the room. And it effects every living sole on the planet. And we only have ourselves to blame to for this. We did this to ourselves. We allowed ourselves to become so dependent on this one irreplaceable resource.

Sorry to be so grim...Aren't you glad I'm back...

Last edited by ASB65; Today at 12:29 PM.

Originally Posted by Copperfield

But something very important happens when a person becomes people. That reasonable person you were speaking with starts to mingle with the herd. People are panicky, easy to stir up, egging each other on. People create bureaucracy, authoritarianism and violence against the weak. People create rumor, gossip, conspiracy, betrayal. They lie, they cheat, they become thieves for reasons other than personal survival. People consume, they take from others, become arrogant, annoying, obnoxious, breed, burn, rape, pillage....

I could go on.

Understand the distinction yet?

Sure. You're scared of the "big bad" plural, the "evil" collective. And they are indeed capable of great harm. As individuals, we don't have a lot of control over them. But institutions and cultures do change. Slowly, but they do. And if you take the time to understand them, they become less threatening.

It's all about spiritual evolution.

Originally Posted by Copperfield

My solution at least has the benefit of being all-natural and completely organic.

How's this a benefit?

Originally Posted by Odin

Such attitudes just lead to debauched behavior, wasted lives, and whiners that don't get much positive done.

Hmmm, well lets see. I live a pretty normal life (many would consider it a moral life). I am highly educated (science and mathematics). I have a steady job and manage 30 people. I am well paid, pay my taxes and pay my land-lady on time every month (a very sweet old lady). I live with a girlfriend of 5 years whom I care about very deeply and who seems to tolerate me pretty well.

That is generally a similar story for other nihilists I have met over the years. Perhaps that broad brush you like to paint with is missing a few bristles...

Originally Posted by The Wonkette

I just wanted to juxtapose these two statements, from two very different posters with two very different tones, who are saying similar things. It is frightening.

"Frightening" is subjective. It's a matter of perspective. I don't consider it to be frightening at all.

Originally Posted by Child of Socrates

Sure. You're scared of the "big bad" plural, the "evil" collective. And they are indeed capable of great harm. As individuals, we don't have a lot of control over them. But institutions and cultures do change. Slowly, but they do. And if you take the time to understand them, they become less threatening.

Scared of? No. Disgusted by, yes.

Euphemisms change. Institutions and cultures and the underlying human behaviors mostly do not.

Originally Posted by Child of Socrates

It's all about spiritual evolution.

Oh please. Spare me more euphemisms. Spiritualism as most of America defines it, is a mechanism to hide shame and guilt, not evolve. If a 50% rate of return on prayers is proof of God and that is all it takes to impress people, then count me out of such a system. I have seen nothing to believe that spirituality is evolving in the human race. Take the example of this country. Those who had a real connection with the universe around them were nearly annihilated by more powerful, more "spiritually evolved" Europeans. Those that are left are offered indignity and scraps.

It's a neat system when it acts as an aid to your betterment.

Originally Posted by Mikebert

How's this a benefit?

A benefit to whom? To people or to the ecosystem? Who or what are we trying to benefit? What gives us the right to benefit at the expense of something or someone else?

I received this little gem in my email inbox today:


There's no such thing as evolution. There's no such thing as climate change. And that's the law.

Outrageous as it sounds, this is the situation that thousands of science teachers find themselves in as more and more states pass radical laws promoting the teaching of creationism and climate-change denial in public classrooms.

But in Louisiana, one high school senior is fighting back.

Zack Kopplin is just 17 years old, but he knows what's right: He wants his science teachers to teach him science, not religion. Zack is spearheading a campaign to repeal the Louisiana law that pushes science teachers to deny evolution and climate change.

Zack wrote a letter to the Louisiana state legislature, and 42 Nobel Prize winners have signed it, too. Now, he's asking you to join his fight on Change.org.

Zack's campaign is working: On April 15th, Louisiana State Senator Karen Carter Peterson introduced a bill to repeal the repeal the recent legislation, but Zack still needs help to keep the pressure up.

Please sign the petition today to tell the Louisiana legislature to let science teachers teach science:

http://www.change.org/petitions/tell...-change-denial