[Ibon]

China is playing a long-term strategy and the US can't stop thinking short-term. So that gives China the edge economically, like a chess player who can think several extra moves ahead. The problem is that China hasn't properly factored in limits to growth, which has the potential to derail their plans, high-speed-rail or no high-speed-rail. So China's top-dog status is likely to be short-lived.

I would agree especially the part about China not factoring in the limits to growth. See my following post. What China is modelling for their countries future is a copy of the west in terms of consumption and also to a certain extent in the evolution of their capitalism. The robber barons that laid the railraods in the late 19th century, the Rockefellers', Morgans etc. have their counterparts in todays China.

But as they out maneuver the US economically they are checkmating themselves because there is nothing really novel being offered in their trajectory.

Same old same old, just some role reversal.

From where will we see any significant shift in the unsustainable model that is checkmating the world?

Keeping with the chess analogy the US and China are sitting at a park bench playing this chess game. But just as China is out maneuvering the US along comes a wind and blows all the pieces off the board.

What and from where originates that wind?

That is a far more important and interesting question.

Does the wind come out of existing ideologies or policies from an existing nation or country or is this wind perhaps extra human. External forces?

Welcome to the age of consequences

[Ibon]

Just to add a thought or two. China of course is not an exact copy because they have two differences which makes them more adaptive to the 21st century of increasing resource constraints.

First they have a central government which can dictate priorities and control their citizenry and fortunately for them and unlike the US their citizenry is socialized toward collectivism and are in sync with the objectives of their central government.

Secondly China is ascending while the US is descending. Both materially and psychologically. Wealth is to a large extent a perception and relative from where you have recently been. Why is that important? Just consider how the psychological perception of wealth affects the citizenry of a country to support or go against its government. What are the chances for Americans, who perceive themselves as losing wealth, to unify behind a strong central government? How does this compare with the Chinese citizenry and their relationship with their government?

China can maneuver the tsunami of constraints and consequences with better efficiency and social cohesiveness than the US for the above reasons.

While the US disintegrates from cultural wars and internal political fighting China is efficiently executing the expansion of its domestic infrastructure .

The most grotesque irony of this is that the latest incarnation of American individualism is being expressed by this tea party movement wanting to dismantle the central government and even has secessionist inclinations. Obama, by far a right of center head of state is being called a communist while the Chinese are eating our lunch.

What the tea party advocates and anti government advocates in the US don't realize is that we are all being pulled toward the efficiency of China's government model. This will be reinforced by natural resource constraints which will result in less liberal democracy and more central government control.

Now here is the big question. If China does not see the wind of consequences about to blow the pieces off the chess board then it is lights out for the planet since there is no way foreseen to handle another 500 million conspicuous consumers emerging out of Asia.

There is nothing at the moment to indicate that China will do anything except copy the west but with a more authoritative hand. When we see how the US government works in conjunction with Wall street and the federal reserve and we scream conspiracy what we don't realize is that faced with China we really have no choice.

The US will increasingly be drawn into a model of strong central government control. Increasing consequences of resource constraints will reinforce this. It might be fascism but it will be increasingly authoritative.

China can change course but only if there is an environmentally benevolent patriarchy in control of their central government.

What are the chances of that?

Conclusion? Humans in the 21st century are very unlikely to engineer a way out of their overshoot through existing political, economic or cultural assets.

That leaves us with external consequences.

So once again, welcome to the age of consequences.

Are we beginning to see the light?

[Ludi]

Authoritarianism isn't "efficient" though - it takes enormous bureaucracy, complexity, and energy to have such a hierarchical system.

[mos6507]

The Obama administration chose to waste our limited resources on highway pork projects and propping up GM and the UAW rather then looking to the future by converting auto plants to build light rail and high speed rail.

It's not like we aren't going to fund high speed rail at all, though.

[mos6507]

The most grotesque irony of this is that the latest incarnation of American individualism is being expressed by this tea party movement wanting to dismantle the central government and even has secessionist inclinations.

What I find more ironic is the percentage of doomers here who have lost sight of limits to growth and bought the tea party kool-aid, swept up purely in the angry scapegoating of "banksters" and TPTB. There is a melding of the truck-nutz quotient with the doomer quotient into one seething mass of blind anger--anger that fist-pumps over Joe Starks and bricks getting thrown through windows.

Conclusion? Humans in the 21st century are very unlikely to engineer a way out of their overshoot through existing political, economic or cultural assets.

Which is something the tea-party types don't get. They hinge their hopes on the restoration of "morning in america". What they'll discover is if they do manage to mount successful secession movements or topple the US government that they are no better qualified to get us through this than the old regime, only this time they won't have anyone left to blame but themselves.

What's more likely is the tea-party movement will just funnel their votes to the GOP and we'll have Romney or Palin for president in 2012, after which things will deteriorate even quicker.

[Ibon]

Authoritarianism isn't "efficient" though - it takes enormous bureaucracy, complexity, and energy to have such a hierarchical system.

You know Ludi I agree with you when I consider as you are doing an ideal organization for a society living efficiently and within carrying capacity. But I'm looking at the dynamics from where things are on the ground and how the next steps will unfold. These 7 billion humans are going to transition due to consequences and transition will come not from an optimum idealized solution but from the imperfect place from where we are departing from. This will make any transition inherently imperfect.

How much imperfection can solutions be to still work. In other words how much inefficiency will the biosphere tolerate?

I don't know who could answer that question????

[Ibon]

What I find more ironic is the percentage of doomers here who have lost sight of limits to growth and bought the tea party kool-aid, swept up purely in the angry scapegoating of "banksters" and TPTB. There is a melding of the truck-nutz quotient with the doomer quotient into one seething mass of blind anger--anger that fist-pumps over Joe Starks and bricks getting thrown through windows.
.

Myopia has no party, cultural, political, ethnic, racial, or regional affiliation

Similarly, when an issue dissolves previous polarized positions than you know it has the power to be transcendent. In this case the odd convergence of doomers and tea party activists.

Remember Mos in a previous thread recently I mentioned that the real origin of the doomer sentiment, underneath all the rhetoric, is a wish for things to stay the same and a self entitled angry reaction to being forced to deal with pain and discomfort. In this they are very very much aligned with the tea party movement.

Whining is not adaptive during the age of consequences

[Ludi]

In other words how much inefficiency will the biosphere tolerate?

I think the infrastructure of our globalized civilization might collapse slightly before the biosphere does - that is, this enormous complicated house of cards we've built may be too delicate to handle diminishing resources. This is the argument "civilization must either grow or collapse" that Jason Godesky makes. Others have argued (here on po.com for instance), that our globalized civilization is basically "too big to fail" and the sheer size and interconnectedness of it all will save it indefinitely, even in the face of biosphere collapse.

[Plantagenet]

The Obama administration chose to waste our limited resources on highway pork projects and propping up GM and the UAW rather then looking to the future by converting auto plants to build light rail and high speed rail.

It's not like we aren't going to fund high speed rail at all, though.

Actually, its EXACTLY like we aren't going to build any high speed rail at all. High speed rail is defined as trains that go faster then 120 mph. In the EU and Japan trains go 150 mph and faster. We aren't getting that ----we're getting maintainance on legacy tracks and more of the same moderate speed 80-110 mph trains we've had since the 1930s.

The Obama administration put 60 BILLION dollars into propping up GM, and only a fraction of that into high speed rail. Even tiny SPAIN spends more on high speed rail then this administration.

If you read the link you posted to, you'll find that the stimulus money being allocated in that area won't build even an inch of high speed rail----instead, its going to:

"$1.1 billion to construct tracks, install signals, build stations and buy some locomotives and passenger coaches for 110 mph service between Alton, Ill., near St. Louis, to Dwight, Ill.
$133 million to build the Englewood flyover bridge near 63rd Street in Chicago. The flyover is intended to reduce delays by separating Metra Rock Island commuter trains from Amtrak and freight trains on one of the most congested rail junctions in the U.S.
$1.25 million to conduct an environmental impact study on a proposal to build a second set of tracks between Chicago and St. Louis to accommodate 110 mph trains."

[Carlhole]

A brilliant new Chinese train innovation - get on & off the bullet train without the train stopping.

No time is wasted. The bullet train is moving all the time. If there are 30 stations between Beijing and Guangzhou , just stopping and accelerating again at each station will waste both energy and time.
A mere 5 min stop per station (elderly passengers cannot be hurried) will result in a total loss of 5 min x 30 stations or 2.5 hours of train journey time! How it works (view the movie - in mandarin though!):

[anador]

Thats really cool.

Unfortunately won't help rail in the US that much.

Most of our rail delays come from having to yield to freight trains, and slow going over poorly maintained track.

[danieljones2006]

"The Train That Never Stops At A Station", really awesome way to reduce carbon footprint. Bravo!!!

[eastbay]

You will never see a train like that in North America. South America either, for that matter.

[Carlhole]

You will never see a train like that in North America. South America either, for that matter.

I predict that Eastbay will never be more than 40% accurate about the future.

[eastbay]

In fact, I would be surprised if this train ever rolls in China.

HEY! 40% right ain't bad! It's better than most....

[dolanbaker]

Seeing this story just reminded me of the old mailtrains picking and dropping mail bags without stopping at the stations.

[Carlhole]

Looks like a very workable machine to me. Not a tough engineering challenge or anything.

[dolanbaker]

Looks like a very workable machine to me. Not a tough engineering challenge or anything.

There are two minor things I can think of right from the start.

raising all the bridges and complete reconstruction of every station on the route.

[eastbay]

Looks like a very workable machine to me. Not a tough engineering challenge or anything.

Piece of cake. Lol.

[litesong]

What a cool idea. I wrote a paper for an architecture class in 1971, where my design had a continually running train. But this design is much more feasible & hopefully, less prone to electronic or mechanical failure. Any train decrease in velocity at the station junctions for safety considerations would be acceptable, considering that it is the complete stoppage & transfer of passengers at the station that is the major schedule & energy efficiency factor.

One possible improvement to safety.....

A crushing ramp should be placed in front of the lead cab of the cabs already on the moving train to reduce the impact from a possible failure of the mechanism to accelerate the stationary cab to the train's velocity.