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PeakOil is You

PeakOil is You

Any kind of Soft Landing will worsen the end result.

General discussions of the systemic, societal and civilisational effects of depletion.

Unread postby MonteQuest » Mon 17 Jan 2005, 19:08:03

tmazanec1 wrote: Montquest, you have just flatly stated Drexler doesn't believe something which he clearly stated in his book. When I see such deception, all your credibility went out the window. If you will so misrepresent an author's views to debunk him if he disagrees with you, than you are on a par with creationists who distort what evolutionists write to make them look ridiculous. Maybe you do not want human extinction...I was simply carrying out what seemed your viewpoint to its logical conclusion. I would be interested in what kind of a world you would set up if you could.


Quite the contrary, he clearly states that Jeremy Rifkin's book on entropy is bunk, which is about human's use of energy, the environment and 2nd law. His lack of understanding of the 2nd law leads him, like most others, to think it is wrong because it seems contrary to the way the world works. The problem is the Newtonian world view, which he holds, is contrary to the way the world works.

I have never in my life misrepresented any author, or anybody else to win a point or an argument. I am quite capable of defending my position without reverting to lame tactics. You go out on a limb with insulting remarks like that. You do not know me. I have no hidden agenda, I am merely stating the law as it is, and what limits it sets upon us. As to what kind of world I would want is not the question, it what kind of world can we have, given the limits of nature. If you read my threads, you will readily see what kind of world that is. Richard Heinberg has the same mindset.
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Unread postby MonteQuest » Mon 17 Jan 2005, 19:09:51

Tyler_JC wrote:Don't try to argue with MQ, he's basically always right :P .


I do my homework.
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Unread postby MonteQuest » Mon 17 Jan 2005, 19:22:27

tmazanec1 wrote:MQ says he has been studying this for thirty years. Drexler has been studying technology for thirty years. They both seem very smart, and they disagree. I don't KNOW which one is right, I am in a gray area. I know that if we don't work on nanotechnology and other such technologies, it will get a darker gray. We are working some, I wish we would work more. But MQ said Drexler said the opposite of what he said, and unless MQ explains this, I cannot trust anything he posts.


Let's not get in a pissing match. I resented your remarks, but I'm past that now. Read what Drexler says about Rifkin. Rifkin's first book has been out since 1980. It got heralded reviews and was not bashed as nonsense. I haven't read the newest book by Rifkin on entropy, so I can't really defend it.

I believe, and I've yet to see anyone prove me wrong, that 2nd law applies to everything we do, no exceptions. Anytime energy is transformed from one form to another, we lose energy as waste. The more complex our technology, the more waste. But we gain efficiency, you say. Only a short-term utility is all, as there is no gain or even exchange, we always lose. You can't win the battle over entropy with technology, you insure your defeat. Seems like a cruel joke, doesn't it? Well, that's reality.

So, in a world soon to be hit with some major shortages, it seems rather foolish to eat your food faster to avoid starvation. What does that mean? It means that it will waste more energy to create nanotechnology than it will save. Why? 2nd law.
Last edited by MonteQuest on Tue 18 Jan 2005, 02:22:18, edited 1 time in total.
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Unread postby tmazanec1 » Tue 18 Jan 2005, 02:12:38

Tyler_JC:
I never said give up farming. We do farming, industry, services, science and technology. We can walk and chew gum at the same time. Personally, I expect both. Your trees are prettier, and global warming won't be a crisis as soon as oil shortages anyway.
MonteQuest:
The second law applies to everything. Drexler writes (page 158) "Entropy is a standard scientific measure of waste heat and disorder. Whenever activities consume useful energy, they produce entropy; the entropy of the world therefore increases steadily and irreversibly. Ultimately, the dissipation of useful energy will destroy the basis of life. " So he does NOT deny that entropy affects humamity just as well as anything. Entropy manifests as waste heat. That is why I used the limit as when our waste heat becomes a significant factor in the Earth's climate. Our useful energy comes from the sun. The waste heat radiates into space. By your reasoning, all technolgy is hastening the end of everthing, since all technology produces waste heat. There is a limit on the ultimate level of population the earth can sustain at a reasonable First World standard of living before waste heat begins affecting climate significantly. It is somewhere above the present population, but not greatly above it. Drexler knows we cannot grow forever, or even for a historically long period of time.
If the planet must show increasing disorder, either you are a Creationist, or you must explain how the planet went from a lifeless ball of steaming rock to the Pleistocene level of biodiversity (I assume you do not consider Holocene society as an improvement) without violating the second law. Either the Earth has been running down since Eden, or it somehow got to its present state from a protoplanetary nebula. Life is nanotechnology, it proves that nanotechnology works by using sunlight as its power source. At some point, we will have to pave over a sizable area of our tropics with solar cells (more efficient with nanotechnology) to run our civilization. 10 billion will likely need a small enough percentage (depending on your value system) to do this. 100 billion likely could not . Throw fusion into the mix? You have just effectively made the Earth a tiny star, which will warm up the more people you have. Drexler knows EXPONENTIAL GROWTH WILL SOON STOP ON THIS PLANET. Nanotechnology will raise the carrying capacity to maybe 10 billion, but not 100 billion...unless you want the planet to start resembling a New York in August, which I do not. And Drexler's book has been well received too.
Rifkin thinks the area to consider is the planet. The system in which entropy increases is the UNIVERSE. The energy source is the sun, the energy sink is the black darkness of space, As long as the sun burns, we can use it for energy, until we use enough to directly affect the planet's climate. And global warming is caused by greenhouse gases, not thermal pollution. If we level out at c9 billion as we seem headed to, and improve efficiency with nanotechnology while getting decent solar power, we can still sustain our world at a good standard of living for everyone. But we will not grow orders of magnitude, and Drexler knows this (I am talking about Earth now, not his long term hopes for space).
Drexler does not just call Rifkin bunk...he does his homework. The Salt-Water Bottle Experiment is a demonstration of why the fourth law of thermodynamics is not a law, for example.
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Unread postby Ludi » Tue 18 Jan 2005, 09:03:37

At some point, we will have to pave over a sizable area of our tropics with solar cells (more efficient with nanotechnology) to run our civilization. 10 billion will likely need a small enough percentage (depending on your value system) to do this.


I can only assume you're kidding, living in a fictional reality, or very confused about life systems. What will happen to the critical life systems of the area you have "paved over?" How will you protect your solar cells from the hurricanes and typhoons endemic to the tropics?
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Unread postby tmazanec1 » Tue 18 Jan 2005, 10:26:17

Ludi:
Maybe I should have said sub-tropics. That is where the deserts are, right? Death Valley, Sahara, Saudi Arabia (not again :roll: ) for example. Another good place for nano-solar-cells would be the roof and driveway of your house. They are already covered up, why not (shrug)? The point I was making, in total, is that even with nanotechnology there comes a point where the whole planet is paved over., then growth HAS to stop. I would prefer it do so well before then. Population seems to be leveling out at about 9 billion. Give those billions a lifestyle like Sweden, for example. Nanotechnology can do this. But I am not an economist, and I want growth to stop before we destroy the biosphere. Even with nanotechnology lightening the impact, that will occur with just a few more doublings. And it is a cliffhanger if we will even get the nanotech in time. A stable society with nanotechnology and 10 billion people would be both nice and possible. One with 100 billion people may be possible, but I would not want to live there. One with a trillion is very doubtful.
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Unread postby Ludi » Tue 18 Jan 2005, 10:36:15

A stable society with nanotechnology and 10 billion people would be both nice and possible.


You haven't explained how nanotechnology will help prevent the collapse of the Earth's life systems under this enormous human population.
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Unread postby tmazanec1 » Tue 18 Jan 2005, 15:31:44

Ludi, google "engines of creation". The text of the book should be your first hit. Drexler spends a good part of his work explaining just this. You don't even have to pay a penny. I especially recomment Chapter 8 "Long Life in an Open World", in particular sections "Healing and Protecting the Earth", and "Long Life and Population Pressure", pages 120-125 of the "dead tree" edition. I would copy and paste them, but that is getting dangerously close to copyright problems.
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Unread postby tmazanec1 » Tue 18 Jan 2005, 16:00:24

MonteQuest said:
Flat earth economists and he have a lot in common: they don't believe in the limits of a finite world.
Drexler said (page 124):
This will open room enough for an era of growth and prosperity far beyond any precedent. Yet the solar system itself is finite, and the stars are distant. On Earth, even the cleanest assembler-based industries will produce waste heat. Concern about population and resources will remain important because the exponential growth of replicators (such as people) can eventually overrun any finite resource base.

(and here he was not talking about just the Earth, like I am, but the Solar System. That is an issue for the 22nd Century, if we make it, if not the 23rd. I am concerned about the early 21st).

He also said (page 58):
Regular doubling means exponential growth. Replicators multiply exponentially unless restrained, as by lack of room or resources. Bacteria do it, and at about the same rate as the replicators just described. People replicate far more slowly, yet given time enough they, too, could overshoot any finite resource supply. Concern about population growth will never lose its importance. Concern about controlling rapid new replicators will soon become important indeed.

Finally he said (page 163):
Steady expansion will open new resources at a rate that will increase as the frontier spreads deeper and wider into space. This will result not in linear growth, but in cubic growth. Yet Malthus was essentially right: exponential growth will outrun cubic growth as easily as it would linear. Calculations show that unchecked population growth, with or without long life, would overrun available resources in about one or two thousand years at most. Unlimited exponential growth remains a fantasy, even in space.

This is the ultimate, he is talking about near-light-speed interstellar travel. IMHO we are in the 24th Century now at soonest. But even this is not enough to make him a flat earth economist. It may be MonteQuest's misinterpretation of Drexler's view on limits that is causing the problem.
I belong to a forum called the Fourth Turning Forum. We hold (or at least discuss) a theory which holds that American society goes through upheavels about every 80 years for reasons to complex to go into here (think circa 1780, 1860, 1940). About five years ago, a poster on that site had a long running debate with my opinion that the "Crisis of 2020" would feature an extreme energy crunch causing a "recession" rivaling the Great Depression. He derided me as a "doommonger". Since that time, my estimates of the approximate date of the Cruch have moved to c2010 and my estimates of our getting out of it have gone from "almost certain" to "it's a toss-up". Yet on that site, DEDICATED to a near term cultural Emergency, I was called a Cassandra. I have grown more pessimistic since then, and am now decried as a Pollyanna on this site. Interesting observation.
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Unread postby tmazanec1 » Tue 18 Jan 2005, 16:02:59

Apologies, the middle quote was from page 58.
Gotta learn to preview, not just read over quickly.
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Unread postby MonteQuest » Tue 18 Jan 2005, 16:04:39

tmazanec1 wrote:By your reasoning, all technology is hastening the end of everything, since all technology produces waste heat.

Since technology is an energy transformer, and the more complex the technology, the more energy transformations, it is 2nd Law that dictates that increasing the use of technology increases entropy by definition. My reasoning is that energy cannot be converted from one form to another without an increase in entropy. Classic 2nd Law.

tmazanec1 wrote:If the planet must show increasing disorder, either you are a Creationist, or you must explain how the planet went from a lifeless ball of steaming rock to the Pleistocene level of biodiversity (I assume you do not consider Holocene society as an improvement) without violating the second law.


This shows your ignorance of non-equilibrium thermodynamics, which is how livings things avoid heat death. Living systems can never obtain an equilibrium state while they are alive because that would entail death. They maintain this "steady state" by feeding off the available energy around them. Matter and energy must continue to flow through them or they die. Fee flow of energy, rather than entropy is the primary concern. While nonequilibrium systems are not explained in the same way as equilibrium systems, they do conform to the broad imperative of 2nd Law. The rate of entropy is just different. Splitting hairs does little to take away the import of the message does it?

tmazanec1 wrote:There is a limit on the ultimate level of population the earth can sustain at a reasonable First World standard of living before waste heat begins affecting climate significantly. It is somewhere above the present population, but not greatly above it. Drexler knows we cannot grow forever, or even for a historically long period of time. At some point, we will have to pave over a sizable area of our tropics with solar cells (more efficient with nanotechnology) to run our civilization. 10 billion will likely need a small enough percentage (depending on your value system) to do this. 100 billion likely could not.

10 billion? I’ve asked you this before and you didn’t respond: Show me one credible study that says the earth can support 10 billion people much less 2 billion. I rather doubt it exists anywhere.


tmazanec1 wrote:Rifkin thinks the area to consider is the planet. The system in which entropy increases is the UNIVERSE. The energy source is the sun, the energy sink is the black darkness of space,


Drexler wrote:Rifkin is right in saying that "it's possible to reverse the entropy process in an isolated time and place, but only by using up energy in the process and thus increasing the overall entropy of the environment." But both Rifkin and Barnet make the same mistake: when they write of the environment, they imply the Earth - but the law applies to the environment as a whole, and that whole is the universe. In effect, Rifkin and Barnet ignore both the light of the Sun and the cold black of the night sky.

According to Rifkin, his ideas destroy the notion of history as progress, transcending the modern worldview. He calls for sacrifice, stating that "no Third World nation should harbor hopes that it can ever reach the material abundance that has existed in America." He fears panic and bloodshed. Rifkin finishes by informing us that "the Entropy Law answers the central question that every culture throughout history has grappled with: How should human beings behave in the world?" His answer? "The ultimate moral imperative, then, is to waste as little energy as possible."

This would seem to mean that we must save as much energy as possible, seeking to eliminate waste. But what is the greatest nearby energy waster? Why, the Sun, of course - it wastes energy trillions of times faster than we humans do. If taken seriously, it seems that Rifkin's ultimate moral imperative therefore urges: "Put out the Sun!"

This silly consequence should have tipped Rifkin off. He and many others hold views that smack of a pre-Copernican arrogance: they presume that the Earth is the whole world and that what people do is automatically of cosmic importance.

In the context that Rifkin employs entropy here, what is being recognized is that all things tend to move from a state of "order" to a state of "disorder." Although this is neither the primary nor precise definition of entropy, it is an acceptable extrapolation of entropy's influence in nature and on our environment. It is evident that virtually everything in nature does tend to "run down"; things do tend to move from a state of order to a state of disorder. All life on Earth ages over time; the sun is slowly consuming its fuel by radiating energy; the universe disperses its finite energy as it continues to expand. To say, that just because the earth as a whole seeks equilibrium with space, that the consequences of entropy are not felt or observed here on earth is foolish. This is what I mean when I wrote that Drexler says 2nd law doesn’t apply to man’s activities vs the environment.

tmazanec1 wrote:As long as the sun burns, we can use it for energy, until we use enough to directly affect the planet's climate. And global warming is caused by greenhouse gases, not thermal pollution.

That’s like saying the gun doesn’t kill you, it’s the bullet. Global warming is caused by the greenhouse gases that accompany the thermal pollution. And for anyone to say that all the waste and disorder produced by technology just dissipates into the vacuum of space as waste heat, hasn’t looked at the environment lately. The consequences of increasing entropy in our environment here on earth are quite apparent. And from your above statement, it seems you feel that global warming and climate change have yet to be realized. Since the earth is all we have, what people do is, without question, of cosmic importance.
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Unread postby tmazanec1 » Tue 18 Jan 2005, 17:27:21

Credible studies seem to mean that you agree with them. Fremlin (IIRC) once did a study where the Earth was covered by a couple miles of crowded people surrounded by a couple more miles of machinery. I am sure he was wrong...if he was right, I would consider that as Hell on Earth. I have seen a number of estimates several times the present human population with present technology. With present technolgy I do not see those as credible, but they are defensible by their proponents at least. With nanotechnology and a stable population of 8-10 billion we can have a pleasant living standard. We could not have 1 billion without modern science and industry, but we could have a couple billion with it. But we overshot that and we must have "post-modern" technology to have that livable c9 billion. That is why I am pushing nanotech so hard. If we were hunters and gatherers we could not even have 100 million, much less a billion...we needed agriculture for that. And energy flow is what will ultimately limit human impact on the planet no matter what technology we produce. Yes, we have climate problems...not from our waste heat, but from our waste gasses. That is why solar power is so important, and it can be made practical with nanotechnology. But with scores of billions, we will have those problems no matter how we get the energy. I would rather have the 9 billion and nanotechnology to end destitution, moderate and reduce relative poverty ("the poor you will always have with you") and start at least partially, if not mostly, healing the Earth.
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Unread postby Ludi » Tue 18 Jan 2005, 18:02:57

Why don't you know your subject well enough to tell us about it? You keep making these claims for nanotechnology, but you don't explain how nanotechnology will support all those people without disrupting Earth's life systems. I don't care what Drexler has to say, he's not on this forum, I want to know what you have to say about it, tmazanec.
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Unread postby MonteQuest » Tue 18 Jan 2005, 18:20:24

tmazanec1 wrote:Credible studies seem to mean that you agree with them. Yes, we have climate problems...not from our waste heat, but from our waste gasses. That is why solar power is so important, and it can be made practical with nanotechnology. But with scores of billions, we will have those problems no matter how we get the energy. I would rather have the 9 billion and nanotechnology to end destitution, moderate and reduce relative poverty ("the poor you will always have with you") and start at least partially, if not mostly, healing the Earth.


I told you you could not show me any credible studies,because they don't exist. If they did, you would have provided a link to them. Credible means that they have been done by a scientific study with realistc parameters, not whether I agree with it. LOL!

And even though I show you the gun and the bullet are connected, you continue your rhetoric that they are not. If you think by any stretch of the imagination, that nano technology will cure the ills of the inequity in our civilization, then you don't have a grasp of why povery exists in the first place.

Furthermore, I would suggest a look back at history as a indicator of just how long it takes to bring new science into the mainstream. We are talking about scalability, capital costs, lead time, infrastructure, training, and to do it on a scale to not only meet exisiting demand, but to provide for at least another three billion people, not to mention the growing per capital demand of China and India. Then after that is done, and you have all this saved energy, you find yourself facing Jevon's Paradox. Ludi is right, show us the math, shows us the plan.
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Unread postby tmazanec1 » Tue 18 Jan 2005, 18:53:51

I admitted (and quoted) that the poor will always be with us. Our threat right now is PO, not global warming. Even if we go to a post-carbon fuel technology, we will hit global warming from waste heat eventually if we do not stop growing...and sooner rather than later. Then cleaning up Greenhouse gases will no longer be enough. The only countries which have stopped growing are some European ones and Japan...the destitute ones in Africa, Latin America and southern Asia are the very ones which are growing fastest. I once read (on paper) a review of the history of carrying capacity estimates...they were all over the map. If history is anything to go by, the only way to stop population growth is education of women combined with a decent standard of living, or else the collapse scenario. I prefer the first. And nanotechnology can provide these. And nanotechnology can spread itself with unequaled speed...my view of history is that new science enters the mainstream faster and faster as change accelerates. If not for this, my estimate of our chances would be bad indeed. But this is why I am pushing for nanotech so hard...we DON"T have much time left.
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Unread postby MonteQuest » Tue 18 Jan 2005, 19:14:56

tmazanec1 wrote: ...we DON"T have much time left.


Then stop dreaming. I'm done here. I, and others have given you the opportunity to back up your views with hard data. We have gone wanting.
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Unread postby tmazanec1 » Tue 18 Jan 2005, 19:25:21

We are altering carrying capacity in two ways. We are lowering it through such means as soil erosion, and raising it through such means as wireless communication freeing up copper (examples) Nanotech can shift the balance in our favor.
I have seen references to carrying capacity all over the web, but not links to the actual studies (high OR low). For example, Revelle is cited as estimating 40 billion. Others as 1 or 2 billion. But in neither case can I find the math. Cohen wrote a book whose reviews say the estimates tend to fall between something like 6 and 16 billion. I thing this was the paper study I referred to. He goes back to Leuwenhoekk (sp?) the discoverer of microbes, who attempted the first calculation (I think it was 13 billion). I have a layman's knowledge of nanotechnology, and the historical background to know technology is changing faster and faster, and that affluence tends to lower and eventually stop population growth. I will attempt to find someone who can explain these issues clearer than I can.
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math & comment

Unread postby Guest » Tue 18 Jan 2005, 19:33:01

It seems Tmazanec1 is pushing for nanotec for photovoltaic powergeneration. Current state-of-the-art solar panels are 30% effishient, so lot's assume that these nanobot-made ones are 20%.

240 watts fall on the average m^2 when averaged over a 24 hour cycle. So, let's say that it comes down to 100 watts when you count wheather. The energy usage of the U.S. is 10^13 watts ( including everything - oil, coal, wood, ect. )

This means that you need 5*10^5 kilometers^2 just to power the U.S.
That's 10^6 kilometers for the current standard of living for 6 billion.

So, to do this, you need a 1,000 kilometer by 1,000 rectangle of desolate grey pavement some where. That's big, man.

Actually, the bots will be better at capturing carbon than any plant, other than possibly well-tended algie (30%)
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Ah! mistake!

Unread postby Guest » Tue 18 Jan 2005, 19:37:10

That's um... actually 10,000*1,000 kilometers for the planatery usage.

Woops - I need to proofread better... :(
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Unread postby tmazanec1 » Tue 18 Jan 2005, 19:53:52

We will not have it in a 1,000*10,000 Km strip. We will have it on rooftops, driveways, and in places like the Empty Quarter of the Saudi peninsula (why do those guys ALWAYS luck out?). And we should be able to improve the efficiency somewhat. But our changing the Earth's albedo and the waste heat from using that solar panel will eventually overcome the savings in greenhouse gasses. We WILL have to stop growing in the near future, at least as fast as we are slowing down now. And we will have to stop being as materialistically wasteful as Americans currently are, and arrange our lifesyles for conservation along with reasonable affluence and a minimum of wealth inequality. I am not as optimistic as Drexler (I think he has the right idea, he just pushes it too far) and I am not as pessimistic as MonteQuest. Maybe that is a good sign? :lol:
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