[PhilBiker]

Healthy humans tend to be over-optimistic. We believe we have more control over our lives than we actually do. The only realists among us are the clinically depressed.

I agree with this assessment. Today I'm as sad and depressed as I've been in weeks.

[Soft_Landing]

To be honest, I don't don't think the difference between our positions is all that significant, particularly with regard to the more general message that may be learned from studies of Polynesian peoples, other complex societies, or indeed, ecology in general. That being, that should we proceed upon our present path, a die-off of some sort becomes at some point inevitable.

And it may not have been a resource crunch.

Yes, yes, most certainly. Having an ethic that is concordant with nature does not provide sufficient evidence that a resource crunch has occurred, and never could. I'm just suggesting that it may constitute indirect, circumstancial evidence to support the notion. I think it becomes harder to explain the adaptive function of those 'harmonious with nature' ethics in the absence of extreme resource pressure.

I think all the races on Earth have experienced serious resource strife in the past. It's been a dominant effect on our evolution, physical and cultural. The current period of relative plenty is what's odd.

Very much so. Considering the adaptive function of various ethics, you might then propose, as a general heuristic, that pro-growth ethics should be more prevalent in cultures who have been devoid of resource constraint for a long time, whilst pro-sustainability ethics should be more prevalent in cultures who have experienced harsh resource constraint in the relatively recent past.

But did they? Polynesians generally divided up islands into chiefdoms, and you didn't have free reign to go wherever you wanted. It was a complex society, and life in complex societies is often constrained. Indeed, the statues seem to be evidence of an "arms race" of sorts, between vying chiefdoms. They may have hidden their resources, just as the Saudis are hiding theirs.

All things are possible, but are they likely? In any event, one imagines a relative freedom in shipping around the island, allowing for at least a cursory appraisal.

I think that's arguable.

true... but let's not.

I don't think that makes a difference. Most people can't really grasp numbers that large, anyway. Moreover, I think the main issue is not the scope of the problem, but simple human denial. Which seems to be somewhat hard-coded into us. Healthy humans tend to be over-optimistic. We believe we have more control over our lives than we actually do. The only realists among us are the clinically depressed.

I don't dispute the tendancy for humans to self delude, but I do think that the phrase "hard-wired into us" is too often used to betray the complexity of our self-delusion capacity. We do not self-delude at all times or an equal amount in all things. Rather, I am suggesting here that by increasing the order of magnitude of the numbers several times, the capacity for someone to self-delude could only increase, even if that increase would turn out to be insignificant under inspection. Presumably, you refer to the theory of depressive realism? As I understand it, this theory was popular for a time, but later experiments have failed to replicate the expected findings, and have brought the theory into question. Somewhat ironically, I suggest that the theory of depressive realism may be an example of the abilty of humans to self-delude. . .

While in my view, all the information in the world isn't going to help.

Ok. It all depends what you mean by information. Should you believe that action is related to belief, and that beliefs are a kind of information, then you might consider information of some kind to be a sufficient cause for action. With the appropriate action, at the appropriate time, a crisis caused by resource depletion becomes avertible.

Now, while I'll accept in advance the criticism that the above is tautological, this is exactly what I meant when I described resource depletion as an challenge to ignorance. Had the Club of Rome been able to overcome the tendancy for people to self-delude, and managed to propagate the beliefs they held successfully in the 1970's, successful management of a transition to a sustainable society may have been possible.

Further, if the Lynch mob are correct, and peak oil doesn't occur for another, say, 25 years, this means that we might still be able to avert most of an uncontrolled die-off by urgently changing course today [For the record, I don't believe the 25 years figure is remotely likely, but it must be at least possible]. However, just as universal acceptance of the urgency of resource depletion eluded the Club of Romers, the same challenge presents itself today. Perhaps I would have been more precise had I said that peak oil represents a challenge to the timely overcoming of ignorance. Because ignorance will be overcome. It is just that I expect it will be too late.

So I guess the main point of disagreement here is how much we know about past collapses. I don't think the evidence of complex societies is easily destroyed. Ordinary Americans may not know much about them, but that's more a reflection of our U.S.-oriented education system than of scientific evidence.

You are probably right here. What I've been trying to argue is a precautionary stance against a negative bias, and against an overconfidence in the certainty of the outcome. If you can't say anything nice, then don't say anything at all, as my mother used to say. So what I will say, in lieu of anything more definite (or nice), is that it still may be possible to avoid catastrophe.

[Canuck]

You are probably right here. What I've been trying to argue is a precautionary stance against a negative bias, and against an overconfidence in the certainty of the outcome.

I think this is fair ball, point well taken. Easter Island is a cautionary tale, and not certain foreshadowing.

Further, if the Lynch mob are correct, and peak oil doesn't occur for another, say, 25 years, this means that we might still be able to avert most of an uncontrolled die-off by urgently changing course today... However, just as universal acceptance of the urgency of resource depletion eluded the Club of Romers, the same challenge presents itself today.

The most interesting word in the paragraph is "uncontrolled", a word that implies that some sort of die-off is inevitable. I can't see a way around that either, barring an urgent course of action change and a technological miracle or six. Even then, I don't believe we will have more than 6 billion people on the planet at the turn of the next century.

I see either a "gradual" reduction to, say, two billion people as one possibility and a massive crash to, say, one billion over a relatively few years as another. Over the course of the rest of the century, we grow from there back to two billion. It represents two different ways to the same spot.

For the sake of my children, the species, the next civilization and the planet, I choose the second over as the first. A horrible century or an unimaginarily horrible decade seem to be the options.

If we accept for the sake of the argument that those are indeed the options, then I think we will be hard wired to ignore all warnings. We want to hit that brick wall as hard as we can because there is an evolutionary advantage to overshoot and crash. That may not be best for us as individuals or best for us as a generation, but it is very probably best for the DNA. The smartest, strongest, brightest, most adaptable and luckiest would survive.

Why did the Club of Rome fail? That report had a lot going for it. It had credibility. It had a large constituency, an anti-war faction that was anti-establishment and ready to fight for change. It had the President of the United States wearing cardigan sweaters, declaring the "moral equivalent of war" on the problem and warning the American people that the American way of life was unsustainable. It had the media or at least a lot more of the media than is available now.

The American population chose Ronald Reagan, "voodoo" economics and more - much more - of the same. Why? I think the best explanation for such an irrational choice is that we are not programmed to be rational when the expense is less reproduction.

[Leanan]

The most interesting word in the paragraph is "uncontrolled", a word that implies that some sort of die-off is inevitable. I can't see a way around that either, barring an urgent course of action change and a technological miracle or six.

Exactly.

However, I'm not sure I agree with you that there's an evolutionary advantage to overshoot and crash. I don't think evolution works that way. I think it will be "the tragedy of the commons" again. What's good for the individual conflicts with what's good for the group, and it will likely be selfishness that wins out.

[gary_malcolm]

From the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rapa_Nui:

Easter Island at one time supported a relatively advanced and complex civilization. Westerners found about 2,500 inhabitants on the island, but it appears that there were as many as 15,000 residents in 17th century. The civilization of Easter Island had degenerated drastically during the 100 years before the arrival of westerners, owing to the overpopulation, deforestation and exploitation of the extremely isolated island with its limited natural resources.

Modern Easter Island has few trees. The island once possessed a forest of palms, but it is thought that the native Easter Islanders completely deforested the island in the process of erecting their statues, as well as constructing fishing boats and buildings. There is evidence that the disappearance of the island's trees coincided with the collapse of the Easter Island civilization. Midden contents from that time period show a sudden drop in quantity of fish and bird bones as the islanders lost the means to construct fishing vessels and the birds lost their nesting sites. Chickens and rats became leading items of diet. There is also some evidence of cannibalism, from human remains.

The small surviving population of Easter Island eventually developed new traditions to allot the few remaining resources.

When we talk about alternate fuels, conservation, etc., we forget that in the past there was always a hill to walk over... a neighbor to steal from, well sometimes you just have to take your medicine!

[EnviroEngr]

Leanan?

[Leanan]

Yes, we living on Easter Island.

http://members.aol.com/leanan7/rapanui.htm

http://members.aol.com/leanan7/pitcairn.htm

[gary_malcolm]

Thanks Leannan,

After almost being convinced that we can invent ourselves out of the looming energy problem, I ran into that article and my mood got a lot gloomier. Economics, supply and demand, looks good on paper but it's hard to make a silk purse from a sow's ear.

[julianj]

Hi Gary,

Welcome. Like you, several peak writers have noted the similarity between Planet Earth and Easter Island, and their overdependence on one critical resource (oil, wood) with nowhere else to go...

Google Jared Diamond as he has written about Rapanui/Easter Island as a possible (grim) model for how we are headed.

[Dvanharn]

And many of us feel that it is a good analogy for the current global situation with respect to resource depletion and environmental degredation, and the possibility of a hard crash vs. a soft landing. One key point in the discussions was the inability of humans to deal with what should be an obvious impending disaster as resources become extremely limited. The population of Rapa Nui hit the wall hard, and the worst happened shortly before the first European explorers arrived.

The signs of a global disaster are flashing like the red lights on a thousand fire engines right now, and even though educated people in modern nations have access to alarming information, they refuse to accept it as important.

When the global western press starts to realize that IEA and OPEC data is extremely optimistic and flawed, we may see panic. And, like after the last giant palm tree was cut down on Easter Island, it may be to late.

And of course, anyone with a basic understanding of population dynamics, realizes that humans are in a serious overshoot situation now, and a population crash is iminent. The sad thing is, that unlike Easter Island and other collapsed civilizations from the past, we have the ability to recognize what is happening, but those of us who do understand the situation, are powerless to do anything about it.

Any politician (like former U.S. President Jimmy Carter) who recognizes the situation and calls for restraint, sacrifice, and conservation, will be defeated and replaced with blind optimists like Reagan and G.W. Bush, who tell us everything will be fine if we just follow their lead. And I do see Bush as a blind man leading us over the cliff. (I don't believe that Kerry would have done much better in this regard.)

(I wonder if there were any wise men on Rapa Nui who recognized the impending disaster, and were ignored or punished for their views?)

Dave

[holmes]

It will be Easter Island like. archeology has recently discovered the shallow layers are full of signs of savage brutality and cannibalism.
yes by 2020 our population will have nearly doubled. thats close to 600,000,000. Easter Island is inevitable unless we have major die offs soon.
Thats about 500,000,000+-crazed starving people. There probably will be about 50,000,000 who will be living sustainable. like myself.
if the trend of drugs holding off death, over compassion, folks under 35 having multiple kids, ecological destruction, exponential immigration, 200,000,000 acres of open space disapearing each year and the caring for the unborn of today instead of the unborn 7 generations down the road continues. Cannibalism is not out of the question.
industrialized food production is keeping it concealed.
If u argue with the above facts you are not in reality.

[holmes]

I mean 2,000,000 acres are lost each year.

[Terran]

Yup we are, earth is like Easter Island, theres' not really much of a means to escape. The only way out if space, but we lack resources to get out now.

[holmes]

Forge on. consider it a challenge. There is alot to live for and do to save something.

[backstop]

As I understand the archeology the profligate use of the critical resource, Easter Island's annual production of wood, was largely squandered in warfare between competing clans.

By contrast, the use of wood as rollers for transporting the statues a/. is disputed by the islanders whose traditions tell of them being 'walked' to position, (which technique they have recently demonstrated) and b/. would not begin to account for forest-loss given the period of the stautues' erection.

The moral of the tale is none the less clear: beside abiding by international law to preclude imperial wars, we need to plant one hell of a lot of trees, preferably yesterday, but tommorrow will do.

So how exactly do we make that tree-planting profitable in its own right, rather than waiting in vain for taxes on the profits of fossil fuelled industry to pay for anything more than gesture-projects . . . . ?

regards,

Backstop

[0mar]

Unfortunately, we are living on Easter Island. And it seems more and more likely we will end up like the inhabitants of Easter Island. Contary to what most people believe, human nature is fickle, irrational, and above all dedicated to the short-term. Any one person maybe rational or comitted to the long-term, but an aggregate of people will usually become the ill-characteristics I have posted.

The current War in Iraq is what we are more likely to see than a rational assessment of the current supplies of oil. In my eyes, the only way out is a system-wide crash. There seems no other way to get out. As it stands, we could pump hundreds of billions of dollars into renewables, and still only make up a small fraction of total energy usage. And much of oil's propeties are lost in renewables. And the second Law prevents us from getting something for nothing.

Looking at the world today, most countries are concerned with their national interests and abuse of the commons rather than a global cooperative effort. Why help someone you will go to war with in 20 years? And it is becoming fairly clear to many people that 1.2 billion rich people (USA, Canada, EU, misc. countries) are taxing the global ecosystem. What would happen if we had 3-4 billion rich people? Or 3-4 billion well-off people, something akin to the middle class in europe or cananda? IMO, the entire global system would collapse.

[PhilBiker]

Should have included a poll. Yes is my vote.

[tmazanec1]

The islanders created a new, smaller society based on, IIRC, birds. What will be our "birds"?

[backstop]

Trees.

[Specop_007]

Easter Island should be looked at as a very extreme example of what could happen. Most continents have seen the rise and fall of multiple civilizations throughout time. Romans, Vikings, Egyptins, Mayans etc etc. History is litered with the ruins of once great civilizations.
The major difference between Easter Island and Earth is size. Take the Mayans or Aztecs. They had great civilizations which fell, and another civilization came along. One reason live could continue to flourish was due to the abundance of materials and land. Easter Island was very, very small. Additionally, the food chain there was closely interconnected. A very small change in one area could have a very large effect. An example would be a volcano. Whereas a volcano in Mexico poses very little danger to a culture, a volcano (Were it to have happened) on Easter Island would have had total and utter devastation.
We should look at Easter Island as a very, very extreme example of what could happen but certinaly not as a reference to what will happen. Rather, we should think of Easter Island as a warning to not absolutely plunder everything we have to the very last drop.
My opinion on it anyways.