Saving the Internet from the NSA

[Jason]

1.21 uberwhats.

[Seth]

To rEvolutionist

Your comments are just one more in a long litany of doomsday prophecies.

The reason I am optimistic about the future is simply that humanity has a long record of solving problems. Note that I am not denying problems exist. Just that there are solutions, and these will be implemented. Not necessarily the best way, but in a way that works.

The last 50 years has seen a long list of people predicting global catastrophe. From pesticide disaster, to nuclear war, to nuclear winter, to famine from overpopulation, to pandemics, to Y2K, to ozone depletion, to resources running out, to global warming. What all the predictors of disaster have in common is that they all, always, turn out to be wrong.

The reason they turn out to be wrong is, of course, that humans are not totally stupid, and we can see the writing on the wall, and take appropriate action.

On resources.
These are always, and I do mean always, more abundant than is predicted. That is because more get discovered. Also new technologies get developed that do not depend on the scarcer resources.

As an example, take phosphorus. Vital to agriculture. Up until about 5 years ago, the known reserves were 80 years, after which we would be in trouble. However, recently it has been discovered that there are massive loads of phosphate on the sea bed. The biggest found so far is off south west Africa. But they are present off the USA and Canada, and even off NZ. That 80 years now looks very, very pessimistic.

Another recent discovery is fresh water under the sea floor. Well, to be exact, it is slightly saline. But it is much fresher than sea water, requiring much less purification, and there is enough to supply the world for a long time to come.

As far as economic growth is concerned, there is still great potential, especially for third world nations. The global economy grows almost every year, with the exception being those periods of recession we all know so well. However, the long term over the past 200 odd years is growth. That long term growth is showing no signs of easing.

Wow! We actually agree completely on something. What a concept.

I spent much of my young life as an ecozealot because I believed everything I read from the doomsayers, who told me that the planet would have Venus-like temperatures by now and all life would be extinct and that we would run out of oil by 20 years ago.

After about two decades I finally figured out that I was being lied to by the ecozealots, who had ulterior motives in mind when they pandered their alarmism.

Now I'm a hard-core skeptic when it comes to environmental alarmism.

[Seth]

No Seth, you are the deluded one.


The free market doesn't exist any more than Santa and the Tooth Fairy.

The "free market" that you say doesn't exist doesn't exist because it only exists in the fevered and deluded recesses of your mind.

That's your problem, not a deficiency in the free market economic theory.

[Blind groper]

To Seth

I am not quite that hard core. I believe that responsible environmentalism is important. But it must be based on good science and rational thinking. Too much of the modern environmental movement is based on a form of religious faith, rather than on hard data.

[Seth]

On economic growth and resources.

Of course resources are needed for economic growth. However, what resources?

The late, great economist, Professor Julian Simon, said that the only real resource needed is human ingenuity, and that is a growth resource. Every year, it porduces more ideas and technologies.

Most of the economic growth of the past few decades has, however, been in the service sector. Manufacturing has tended to move to using less material resources. A modern car, compared to its equivalent of the 1960's, weighs half as much, and uses a lot less mined metal, and more materials like plastics, which can be made from biomass.

However, what is even more important, is that we have not even scratched the surface when it comes to the Earth's resources. The vast bulk of the mined minerals, for example, come from the top 1 km of the Earth's crust. Yet the crust over the continents averages 40 kms thick. Not to mention the oceans. For example, the oceans contain 50 million tonnes of uranium 235, and another 10 billion tonnes of uranium 238. Japan has a pilot project to extract this resource.

Longer term, there will even be asteroid mining. A bunch of robots land on an asteroid which has an orbit taking it close to Earth. When the asteroid next (many years later) comes close to Earth, the robots flick pure and precious metals into near Earth orbit, from where they can be retrieved. Google "Planetary Resources", and check out the high powered brains behind this scheme. A single 20 km diameter asteroid, according to New Scientist, contains $80 trillion of precious metals like platinum.

I do not know (and neither do any of the doomsday nutters here) how long, or how much economic growth can continue, but I do know that there is potential for very, very substantial growth beyond what we already have without any disasters.

And then there's the simple fact that 70 percent of the earth's surface has not been explored for mineral resources, much less exploited.

Oh, also, it's a closed-loop system. What is extracted from the earth eventually returns to the earth as the earth's tectonic plates recycle every single damned thing.

That being said, the argument that unending economic growth will doom the planet falsely assumes that the needs that drive economic growth will unendingly continue. It's far more probable that at some point in the future the quality of life all over the earth will be high enough and the technology for creating consumer goods will be sophisticated enough that everyone's needs are met with a relatively steady-state ecosystem. This after all is the condition of the earth's ecosystem over the vast majority of its existence. An example is the Great Plains prairie ecosystem prior to man's arrival in North
America some 15,000 or so years ago. The balance of nature kept things chugging along for millions upon millions of years as species evolved and died out and ecosystems adapted to changing climate conditions. The same thing will happen with human ecosystems eventually. One might view the emergence of technology as the Darwinian equivalent of the Cambrian explosion of life. Our human ecosystem is very, very young in the geological sense and it will oscillate from extreme to extreme over time, but the pendulum will eventually return to the center because of the friction of evolution and resources.

At some point humanity is likely to change its behavior and rather than overpopulating the earth and causing a catastrophic population reduction it will simply ship its surplus population off-planet to begin the ecosystem modification elsewhere.

Not that you or I will live to see it...

[Seth]

To Seth

I am not quite that hard core. I believe that responsible environmentalism is important. But it must be based on good science and rational thinking. Too much of the modern environmental movement is based on a form of religious faith, rather than on hard data.

Again we agree. I've been a responsible environmentalist for my whole life. More so than most other people because I had direct management and control responsibility for a large part of the local ecosystem that I took very, very seriously and managed with the overall health and durability firmly in mind at all times. Responsible environmentalism is about making careful, rational, well-conceived plans and executing them in ways that do not produce undesirable unintended consequences. Such planning and implementation is not amenable to hysterics or knee-jerk propagandistic bombast, which is what the typical econut and ecozealot organization engages in because they want their particular obsession to be placed higher on the list of things to do than anything else merely because they are in a panic about it...mostly without any credible evidence that the doom and gloom predictions they are so fearful of have or will actually come to pass even if nothing is done.

[piscator]

That being said, the argument that unending economic growth will doom the planet falsely assumes that the needs that drive economic growth will unendingly continue. It's far more probable that at some point in the future the quality of life all over the earth will be high enough and the technology for creating consumer goods will be sophisticated enough that everyone's needs are met with a relatively steady-state ecosystem.

...Yet with economic growth?


It's pretty clear presuppositional fantasies aren't limited to religious spheres...whoops! You are talking eschatology...

[Blind groper]

It is definitely kinda weird finding myself agreeing with Seth.

Economic growth does not mean more and more environmental despoilation. Give you an example.

In 1960, to buy a Morris 1000 car took (here in NZ) exactly one year's pre tax income for the average working man. Today, to buy a far superior car, but with a similar engine capacity, will take 6 months income. Since the worker can buy more, that is major economic growth. But the modern car weighs half what the old Morris 1000 weighed (it was a clunker) and carries vastly more features. It drives further on less gas, and produces less pollution. It is safer, faster, more acceleration, and more comfortable. Because it weighs half of the old Morris 1000, it requires a lot less in the way of the Earth's resources to make, and because it uses less fuel, it consumes fewer of the Earth's resources over time.

Economic growth can be defined in simple terms as increasing people's spending power. We are doing that in many ways without increasing resource consumption. Think of old time computers versus today's, or even newer cell phones. Think of LED lights instead of incandescent. Heat pumps instead of electric bar heaters. Smaller, lighter, less energy consumption, and more features. Doing more with less.

Future developments include robots, self drive cars that will be even safer, even smarter and smaller computers, and so on. All without increasing resource consumption. In fact, reducing it.

[Blind groper]

Here is a challenge for those who are pessimistic about the future. I do not expect too many to take up this challenge, of course, since it will threaten their fallaceous ideas. Most will chicken out.

Go to TED.com
Use the search function and look up "abundance is our future". This is a 16 minute talk by Dr. Peter Diamandis, the man behind the X Prize, and who is now behind Singularity University.

[Jason]

[Ian]

I read his book "Abundance" earlier this year. DiAmandis is the man.

[pErvinalia]

It is definitely kinda weird finding myself agreeing with Seth.

You should be more than a little concerned with that.

Economic growth does not mean more and more environmental despoilation. Give you an example.

In 1960, to buy a Morris 1000 car took (here in NZ) exactly one year's pre tax income for the average working man. Today, to buy a far superior car, but with a similar engine capacity, will take 6 months income. Since the worker can buy more, that is major economic growth. But the modern car weighs half what the old Morris 1000 weighed (it was a clunker) and carries vastly more features. It drives further on less gas, and produces less pollution. It is safer, faster, more acceleration, and more comfortable. Because it weighs half of the old Morris 1000, it requires a lot less in the way of the Earth's resources to make, and because it uses less fuel, it consumes fewer of the Earth's resources over time.

Economic growth can be defined in simple terms as increasing people's spending power. We are doing that in many ways without increasing resource consumption. Think of old time computers versus today's, or even newer cell phones. Think of LED lights instead of incandescent. Heat pumps instead of electric bar heaters. Smaller, lighter, less energy consumption, and more features. Doing more with less.

And yet pollution and resource use continues to grow. If only you could see the bigger picture. Resource efficiency is without doubt improving, as is energy efficiency. But that means squat to a closed system biosphere. The only thing that matters in that context is gross amounts, not rates. Wake up.

Future developments include robots, self drive cars that will be even safer, even smarter and smaller computers, and so on. All without increasing resource consumption. In fact, reducing it.

When is this miraculous future going to get here, dear priest?

[pErvinalia]

Here is a challenge for those who are pessimistic about the future. I do not expect too many to take up this challenge, of course, since it will threaten their fallaceous ideas. Most will chicken out.

Go to TED.com
Use the search function and look up "abundance is our future". This is a 16 minute talk by Dr. Peter Diamandis, the man behind the X Prize, and who is now behind Singularity University.

The problem for you is that the SCIENCE of the current state of the planet, and the data concerning the burgeoning debt load of the west, doesn't rely on "ideas". It relies on FACTS. You're a peddler of faith. People like that are usually (and rightly so) derided around here.

[Blind groper]

To rEvolutionist

Correction.
I am a peddler of facts.
The world has been getting better for humanity for the last 200 plus years. Lifespans now are more than twice what they were 100 years ago. In my country, average lifespan is now 80.9 years. Versus 30 years 150 years ago. Wealth is increasing. I gave the clear cut factual example of buying a car. We are getting healthier. Smallpox is extinct. Polio nearly so. Infectious illnesses, which were the biggest killer by far are declining dramatically.

I have stated that we are on the verge of a revolution in robotics. This is based on the fact that robots are already being designed and introduced into many fields. New Scientist described a robot now in use clearing sewer pipes and using "organic material" as its energy source. Robots are already in the consumer society in the form of vacuum cleaners and lawn mowers.

It is a simple fact that technology has improved dramatically and continues to release innovations every year. Moores Law has been true for 50 years, and shows no sign of becoming less true. Exponential growth in a number of other technologies is happening.

When I quote economic growth, like just under 5% per year average for Africa, and 8% for the last year for China, these are facts. I do not deal in faith. Faith is for those people who believe in doomsday. Because doomsday prophets come and go all the time, and are always wrong. To believe in doomsday requires faith, since the facts deny that belief.

[pErvinalia]