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@Mark Robinowitz: The energy resources that people are extracting today were unimaginable a few years ago. For example, only the dreamers considered wind farms on the astounding scale that now dominates Indiana. It does take much mental energy to suggest that the future will hold similar marvels.

Went to a talk today about ocean wave energy: this is close to commercialization. There are immense volumes of methane clathrate offshore, comparable to all the oil energy has been produced in over the past 100 years. These are completely untapped resources; mostly only ingenuity is needed to get the energy out. And of course, there is nuclear energy, which is currently limited by safety concerns -- if we wanted to, this could be expanded by many orders of magnitude.

BTW, in contrary to your pessimism, Rachel Carson's warnings have indeed been heeded, as laws have been passed to reverse the environmental damage from industrialization.

The Malthus theory has has been refuted over and over -- people have a very successful track record at overcoming technical obstacles. But your Malthusian nightmare seems to be immune to both technical argument (e.g., the number of patents) and history (Malthus suggested the world human carrying capacity of around a billion). I can only conclude that your attachment to this theory is based on nihilistic belief over anything else. I am betting on human toughness, which also has the advantage of being much less of a downer.

by goldfish on Jun 8, 2012 2:28 am • link • report