[Pops]

Newf mentioned he had started a thread about the biggest problems we face and I thought I should bump it up - but I couldn't find it to bump. So here it is reincarnated.

Newf said:
1. Overpopulation
2. Water depletion
3. Fragility of the global financial market
4. Resource depletion
5. Attacks on our natural world[/quote]

My thought is the global economy is numero uno simply because nothing good has changed since '08.
The bad juju the banks ate that caused them to croak or be taken over has not gone away, it is either festering in Uncle Sugar's gut or it is resting uncomfortably in the bigger - takeover bank, which is now even bigger and less likely to be allowed to fail.
The dark and shadowy world of derivatives continues to grow apace and IOUs outstanding have increased another 25% to the neighborhood of $200 trillion dollars.
Equities have gorged on all the free credit and are fit to bust.
China has a RE bubble that makes the US version look like a hubba-bubba fail.

But enough of that.
My number dos is where the finance markets meet the energy market. It doesn't seem strange to me in the least that $100 oil happened at exactly the time that $57 Trillion of new credit was flooding the market. (any more than easy gov guaranteed credit has blown a tuition bubble, or repeal of Glass-Steagall allowed commercial banks and overzealous Fannie Mae officials to blow the US RE bubble)

And that $100 oil price did exactly what I was worried about way back, which is suck production up to the plateau that might have happened later, farther down the down the decline a ways where we would have been able to get a little more utility out of it. In fact I think LTO is really $150 or $200 oil that would have been produced after the initial decline in production had weened us off a little, and allowed the price to rise. As it is, we are pumping 5-6mmbopd of LTO that is barely staving off decline but we get it at a discounted price so we just burn it up as if nothing is happening.

Two things will happen as a result, first the plateau is extended,imagine an overhanging river bank, second because LTO declines fast, when it stops, it really stops. so when we walk off the edge not only will there be nothing but air, we will have already used up some of what would have ben the first step down - so be careful, that first step is a doozy.

--
So nombre troi...
I don't really have a next big one, I guess these all are a three:

Population will slow as birth control habits spread to the countries still growing - or not. But the problems will be mostly there, I hate to sound callus but it is what it is.

Climate Change, AGW makes sense to me but the rate and magnitude are open to speculation and I don't put a lot of faith in models - the more the modelers and their faithful shout "denier" the less I listen. The upshot is I don't see anything being done anywhere close to the scale the most rabid shout for and really on the low end of expectation I figure PO will take care of it as well as anything we volunteer to do. I'm happy to be surprised otherwise but half the US senate just voted AGW down so I'm not holding my breath.

Limits in general I'd put here. I think we still don't know what the actual limiting resource is. Could be fresh water, phosphorus, social cohesion; I think it is oil but we'll see. So far by increasing scale and efficiency we have beat most limits. Modern passenger cars are a marvel, 200-300-500hp vehicles - the Shelby Mustang makes 665hp and gets 28 Highway, LOL!
Or for you EV fans: "Insane Mode"


In summation kiddies, if you look around at where the powers that be are putting their effort I think it is clear that they are worried about deflation and oil, - otherwise we wouldn't have spent a few trillion in Iraq and another few on desperately trying to get some inflation going.

[GregT]

I'm going to have to go with the global financial markets as the number one biggest problem facing humanity.

The longer they continue on without collapsing, the worse all of our other problems will become.

[vtsnowedin]

Population will slow as birth control habits spread to the countries still growing - or not. But the problems will be mostly there, I hate to sound callus but it is what it is.

I sadly have to agree with you here. Once we step off the cliff and oil becomes both scarce and expensive the overpopulated third world will be the first to have to make do with less oil. As they are more efficient using oil to produce food this will have an immediate effect on food supply. Meanwhile the west will be stressed enough that there will be no excess produced here to give to the third world. Starvation and disease will then begin to "solve" the population/ food/water problem.
We will find ourselves closing our borders and turning back starving people trying to escape certain death or shooting them outright.

[GregT]

Meanwhile the west will be stressed enough that there will be no excess produced here to give to the third world. Starvation and disease will then begin to "solve" the population/ food/water problem.
We will find ourselves closing our borders and turning back starving people trying to escape certain death or shooting them outright

Hmmm vtsnow,

Assuming that by the West you mean the US? If so, the US is the second largest IMPORTER of oil in the world.

Also, if current trends continue, you might want to rethink closing your borders and shooting escapees. We have plenty of water in Canada, and our climate is also changing. If anything, there will be a mass exodus to the North, as has already been predicted.

[vtsnowedin]

No No NO! Excess food not excess oil. Due to economic chaos the US will not be able to pay for any imported oil (even Canadian) and will have to make do on it's own declining production. After the Canadians shut there ports to refugees the only border we will have to police will be the southern one. The border with all the shooting will be the Italian coast and around Istanbul.

[dashster]

I'm going to have to go with the global financial markets as the number one biggest problem facing humanity.

The longer they continue on without collapsing, the worse all of our other problems will become.

Financial collapse is part of the solution?

[vtsnowedin]

Financial collapse is part of the solution?

It is akin to having a finger infected with gangrene. You can amputate the finger today or wait a week and have to amputate the whole arm.

[Shaved Monkey]

The first and major biggie that will come quickest is collapsing economy.
Money/jobs, being able to pay for food and shelter makes us happy not having money makes us hungry, cold, desperate and angry.
I just cant see, even if there is no collapse(which I doubt) were the well paying jobs of the future will be,we cant all be servicing the 1%ers and expect to have a decent standard of living.

[sparky]

.
That's an interesting discution but I would say a pointless one
....because there is no point ,
all the problems are solvable on their own
but all the problem are the same in various forms

population , resources depletion , financial crisis , the instability of politics
all those things and many more under the radar are the same thing

We have reached a crisis point in the Human span , and there is .....NO SOLUTIONS
things will sort out eventually , but civilization will go on a crash diet willy nilly
the ones which will come out will be the hard edged bastards , the good guys and galls will be lunch

[Ibon]

I'm going to have to go with the global financial markets as the number one biggest problem facing humanity.

The longer they continue on without collapsing, the worse all of our other problems will become.

Financial collapse is part of the solution?

This touches on my views. The Intractable momentum (inertia) which keeps the status quo stuck and resilient to change in the end means that the problems that arise (from financial to ecological collapse) are actually the solutions. When we decided some 40 years back not to address the issues of overpopulation, consumption culture and the yuppie glorification of wealth we baked these "problems" into the cake.

So all of these best of 5 problems we are presenting are all symptoms of The Problem.

1) Collective willful delusion
2) Collective willful delusion
3) Collective willful delusion
4) Collective willful delusion
5) Collective willful delusion

[Ibon]

the ones which will come out will be the hard edged bastards , the good guys and galls will be lunch

Oh no!..... on the other side of overshoot natural selection will leave the gene pool of surviving humans to resemble Hyenas.

[sparky]

.
@ Ibon , it always was thus , human evolved not as top predator but as somewhat successful scavengers

[GHung]

Ibon gets it: Our #1 problem is us; our behaviour. It's clear that even if population is reduced, humans will continue to use whatever resources are available to better their lot. The US is a fine example; <5% of the human population using around 25% of resources/energy; mostly an accident of geography and history. "Standard of living" correlates nicely to resource use, and ever-improving that standard of living seems hard-coded into our species. If we don't make the evolutionary shift to Homo Conservationist, we're marked for extinction.

[Newfie]

My wife just bought ...

MOTHER NATURE IS TRYING TO KILL YOU.

Which is much better than the title suggests.

It has introduced me to the concept of the "meat robot."

I find it disturbingly accurate.

Then there is this bit which seems to sum up our human problem nicely.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news ... s-science/

[Newfie]

Stating the X biggest problems implies one has done some risk analysis so as to weigh one problem against another.

Here is a little book that applies risk analysis to climate change but could as easily apply to almost any facet of our lives or work. These principal are common practice in engineering and operations.

http://www.amazon.com/Whats-Worst-That- ... 0399535012

Truth be told I haven't done the analysis either.

To some extent the ones who have are the World Economic Forum who come out with an annual risk assessment. I don't completly agree with their methodology and I find it downplays the various risks and it's really just a wider scale gut check on what we are doing here. But it is a start.

[Newfie]

WEF risk analysis link and Sample risk analysis form.

http://www.weforum.org/reports/global-risks-report-2015

[Pops]

The added factor for individuals is mitigation or ability to mitigate.

So the probability of a meteor strike is not only unknowable much in advance but also pretty much impossible to mitigate even though it rather hazardous.

Whereas the possibility and severity of say, a local power outage is pretty well knowable and also easily prepared for in advance.

[Newfie]

Pops,

That presupposes we are sufficiently intelligent to act upon information provided. I don't see the evidence to support that. Sure some people run, when things get sufficiently intolerable, as a last resort.

But look at the São Paulo water crisis. One of the problems they are having is large INmigration in the face of the drought. Once the water is gone, then they will flee, or die.

We hear of migration issues in the US and the Med, but I contend that these issues, as large as they are, are really small potatoes, insignificant In the face of the overall population.

The things that make us move or stay are too often not the result of serious analysis of what is smart, but heart strings.

[GHung]

Newfie: "That presupposes we are sufficiently intelligent to act upon information provided."

I reached the conclusion years ago that most folks aren't paying attention to much of anything. Following their noses they are.

[Pops]

The things that make us move or stay are too often not the result of serious analysis of what is smart, but heart strings.

Don't I know it. LOL

Lord, give me the strength to mitigation the problems mitigable.
the Game Boy to forgeddabout the things not,
And the message board to ask the difference.