77. DOOMER TYPE #2: THE FULL THROTTLE "SURVIVOR"
We seem to have ferreted out the next specimen in our ongoing study (#74) of the effects of the "peak oil message" on humans:
It is also common amoungst many forum members that if we conserve the energy the decline will be more gradual and perpetuate the problem of peakoil on the enviroment and prolong human suffering. If we go Full Throttle which will happen anyway, the decline will be instantious and the energy production will decline much faster causing a quick dieoff which would benifit the enviroment for the people left who were prepared than a gradual dieoff which would decimate most of the natural ecosystems making it much harder for the people left to live. --Dukat. (Source: see the comments for #75.)Isn't it interesting how the doomers craft these elaborate excuses for wasting fuel? Yet again, "peak oil awareness" doesn't seem to be having the intended effect. PO awareness doesn't lead to conservation and sustainable local agriculture. It leads to insane little schemes for massacring humanity, which (conveniently) can be furthered by making as many useless trips to Taco Bell as you can in your SUV.
posted by JD @ 7:20 AM
4 comments
4 Comments:
Peak oil argument: No energy source can replace oil, especially in X time. Conservation won't work because it makes the decline worse.
Rational argument: Conservation will cut overall energy take for a given nation, therefore making alternatives not only more economically viable (you get more bang for each buck) but scalable too. This is especially true as oil will decline over 100 years or more, giving plenty of time for any switch. After all you only need 1% of desert land to fuel the world's electricty from solar.
Thankfully people will naturally seek out alternatives to save themselves money. All except #2 who will be enjoying Double whopper with cheese, extra large milkshake, fries and apple pie until his liver curdles into carpet fluff. It should be pointed out, Lawyers especially like #2s (excuse the pun) because these foot heavy turnips enjoy after dinner litigation and media swan songs.
In conclusion, Doomer type #2 is more dangerous than type #1. Not only does he possess an ostrich like tendency, but is highly irrational and even more prone than type #1 to get extremely naughty with red buttons and direct debits to the legal profession. Never a good thing.
The lives of 70% of my countrymen, of 4/5th of the world, of people even in Europe or America less than 200 years ago was far less certain than ours are now. If history has taught me anything it's that, in the end, there is no real certainty at all. The 'rational' and 'scientific' evidence can point either way. The world can be getting better, technology can save us, economic prosperity can keep going. Or it can get worse. We've been so spoiled by prosperity that minor glitches, fractional percentage points in GDP, or spikes in oil prices (and other concepts we don't really understand) suddenly provoke huge outbursts of doom and gloom.
Even apocalyptic visions are still middle-class attempts at asserting control. By stating with great conviction that the world is DOOMED, no matter what, you're still trying to create certainty in your head. This is why, I note, that most doom and gloom-the West will go down-oil will run out-terrorists will destroy the world-naysayers take perverse glee in their pronouncements and strut around with the illusion of control, when, in the end, even they would have little clue how to handle a real situation.
Also, like my friend said, pronouncing doom and gloom is a way of giving up. It's the lazy, frightened answer to an unfamiliar situation. It's the response of somebody who doesn't want to change, or work, but just wants to quit. Like those three types you pointed out.
Ironically, if these people really are fascists, then giving up and pronouncing death on everybody in the self-centered belief that the world has failed you is exactly what Hitler and the Nazis did.
Fascinating arguments dukat, truly. I love the Internet, it allows you to argue with half-educated people halfway around the world.
If and when the world experiences a die-off it'll be fascinating watching fat Americans drop like flies. Countries like mine, or like China or any other Third World China are hit by hurricanes every year. They're not as bad as Katrina, but given relative resources and the relative status of a Third World country and America, the effect is about the same. But it's only in New Orleans that social order breaks down. That's a tragedy? What does it say about the average American's ability to deal with a crisis? A typhoon struck China just recently. The social order there didn't collapse. What does that say about them?
When the die off happens, I'm going to start learning Chinese.
If anyobody here wants to attack the PO believers you should stick to the main issue: Is oil running out, yes or not?
Individual PO believers have diverse ideas. Some believe we should encourage waste, some promote conservation to give us a few decades to prepare better, some already are learning how to make stone arrowheads and others think breeder nuclear reactors will save us.
So dont attack all of them by focusing on marginal ideas irrelevant to the central point.
BTW, i have not yet seen a single doomer that believes that conservation will make the problem worse, seriuously. Technology can, indeed, but conservation? I dont see how.
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