Blatantly political rant

[pshrynk]

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

Maybe we need a poll: How soon will the Onuissance happen?

• Within 10 years
• Within 50 years
• Within 100 years
• After the radioactive fallout has settled and the dolphins take over
• In the year 2525, if Man is still alive, if Woman can survive
• On the twelfth day of Never
• Try the next alternate dimension over

I'm amazed at how rapidly things are accelerating. I know I'm quoting from the standard Future Shock Text, but my Mom remembers taking lunch out to my Grandpa while he was plowing the fields. With a two team and single. She's only 72 years old. Now my cousin plows his fields with a 500 horse John Deere, and a plow that is about as wide as a two lane highway.

So, I feel that the dawn of the Collapse is very near, since things just happen faster in this age. Then, of course, the re-birth will occur just as rapidly. Hopefully in an Onuissance sort of way.

So put me down for in my lifetime, 10 years.

[RickyMaveety]

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

Maybe we need a poll: How soon will the Onuissance happen?

• Within 10 years
• Within 50 years
• Within 100 years
• After the radioactive fallout has settled and the dolphins take over
• In the year 2525, if Man is still alive, if Woman can survive
• On the twelfth day of Never
• Try the next alternate dimension over

Well, in any event, you just convinced me to give one of your novels a read.

[Greg Anos]

Originally Posted by RickyMaveety

If we fry them in metaphors ... will they taste as good??

Only the northern ones. Tradition requires the southern ones being B-B-Q'ed in molasses.....

[slayda]

Originally Posted by pshrynk

I'm amazed at how rapidly things are accelerating. I know I'm quoting from the standard Future Shock Text, but my Mom remembers taking lunch out to my Grandpa while he was plowing the fields. With a two team and single. She's only 72 years old. Now my cousin plows his fields with a 500 horse John Deere, and a plow that is about as wide as a two lane highway.

So, I feel that the dawn of the Collapse is very near, since things just happen faster in this age. Then, of course, the re-birth will occur just as rapidly. Hopefully in an Onuissance sort of way.

So put me down for in my lifetime, 10 years.

And if all farmers still used the two-mule-teams to farm, there would much more starvation in the world. It's kinda a "Damned if you do and damned if you don't" type situation. I.e. die of pollution poisoning or die of starvation.

[pshrynk]

Originally Posted by slayda

And if all farmers still used the two-mule-teams to farm, there would much more starvation in the world. It's kinda a "Damned if you do and damned if you don't" type situation. I.e. die of pollution poisoning or die of starvation.

Oh, I am in no way advocating going back to the old two and single. It's just the rate at which things have changed. My cousin sits in the cab of his tractor and gets wireless internet futures streaming and can calculate whether or not it is worth the fuel to harvest his field today. (In a metaphoric sense, since he's planting right now.) In just two generations we've gone that far.

What I was trying (badly) to make a point of was that Steve's book Onuissance is all about what will happen after then next fall and rise up cycle and how soon it will happen.

The rate at which change happens contniues to accelerate and we are quite possibly looking at the end of this age. Which then leads to the question of how quickly the new age will occur.

[Greg Anos]

Sorry, I don't buy the pessimism. I watched the "survivalists" of the late seventies. We went onto 25 years of overall good times. (Overall. I rode the Texas banking debacle all the way down to the bottom in the 1980's as a bank programmer.)

We've been in an energy squeeze for the last 7 years. It'll last another 7-10 years. Then we'll be out for another 25 year good times run. Shucks, we're all e-book readers here. Look how much resources that saves. Wind is already at the inversion point, solar will be there in another 5 years. Battery technology is slowly but steadily improving. We'll make it thru this valley....

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by Ralph Sir Edward

Sorry, I don't buy the pessimism. I watched the "survivalists" of the late seventies. We went onto 25 years of overall good times. (Overall. I rode the Texas banking debacle all the way down to the bottom in the 1980's as a bank programmer.)

That reminds me of a joke that James Burke related, in his video "After the Warming," about a man who falls off of a 100-story building.

On the way down, a man sticks his head out of a window on the 15th floor, and shouts out to the falling man, "How's it going?"

To which the falling man replies: "So far, so good."

Originally Posted by Ralph Sir Edward

We've been in an energy squeeze for the last 7 years. It'll last another 7-10 years. Then we'll be out for another 25 year good times run. Shucks, we're all e-book readers here. Look how much resources that saves. Wind is already at the inversion point, solar will be there in another 5 years. Battery technology is slowly but steadily improving. We'll make it thru this valley....

We might... if it all happens in the next fifteen floors...

[DixieGal]

I agree, things will cycle around and the good times will come back. Yes, sure, I sold $1000 of stock in a failing ethanol company for $33 just this morning, but it's not the end of the world for husband and me. What really bothers me is that for the past decade, again and again we were told that in the best case scenario, oil was running out more quickly than predicted and that we were quickly approaching the point of diminishing returns. Now we seem to be at that point and we do not have a Plan B. It's embarrassing to be such a powerful nation and to find ourselves at the mercy of oil-rich tribal warlords (although usually one generation removed).

And still, we have no coherent plan for the future.

[WDecraene]

Originally Posted by DixieGal

And still, we have no coherent plan for the future.

You really think so ?? I think America's richest are preparing for dour times by just amassing a bigger and bigger fortune at the cost of all the rest of the population. And they seem to be getting away with it. And things are not going to change, no matter who's in the white house ...

[pshrynk]

Originally Posted by WDecraene

You really think so ?? I think America's richest are preparing for dour times by just amassing a bigger and bigger fortune at the cost of all the rest of the population. And they seem to be getting away with it. And things are not going to change, no matter who's in the white house ...

Well, that's certainly one plan...

[slayda]

Originally Posted by Ralph Sir Edward

Sorry, I don't buy the pessimism. I watched the "survivalists" of the late seventies. We went onto 25 years of overall good times. (Overall. I rode the Texas banking debacle all the way down to the bottom in the 1980's as a bank programmer.)

We've been in an energy squeeze for the last 7 years. It'll last another 7-10 years. Then we'll be out for another 25 year good times run. Shucks, we're all e-book readers here. Look how much resources that saves. Wind is already at the inversion point, solar will be there in another 5 years. Battery technology is slowly but steadily improving. We'll make it thru this valley....

Saw a program recently where a new solar collection ink had been developed that can be applied with a standard ink-jet printer to a thin mylar film. This was purported to be much more efficient than existing solar collectors as well as much cheaper to make and was flexible to boot. Looked very promising.

If we could slow the population growth and speed the development cycle, maybe there will be several more generations before we run out of energy. It's a race to see which wins.

[DixieGal]

Originally Posted by WDecraene

You really think so ?? I think America's richest are preparing for dour times by just amassing a bigger and bigger fortune at the cost of all the rest of the population. And they seem to be getting away with it. And things are not going to change, no matter who's in the white house ...

I prefer to think that the richest are a small minority, and that no matter how much they have, they also have to live moral lives or deal with the consequences of an amoral life.

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by slayda

If we could slow the population growth and speed the development cycle, maybe there will be several more generations before we run out of energy. It's a race to see which wins.

I believe we really need global-wide negative population growth. In fact, we really ought to lower our numbers out of the billions, and back to the millions, though I know nothing short of a complete catastrophe will accomplish that.

(Which means we just might have to wait a little longer...)

[slayda]

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

I believe we really need global-wide negative population growth. In fact, we really ought to lower our numbers out of the billions, and back to the millions, though I know nothing short of a complete catastrophe will accomplish that.

(Which means we just might have to wait a little longer...)

A coworker puts out a daily "fortune" randomly from a long list he has. I liked a recent on that said, "The world is 98% full. Delete anyone you can."

Of course I'm sure I would be one of the first to go. Adventurous spirit - don't you know.

[jamesdmanley]

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

I believe we really need global-wide negative population growth.

lol you first


pass the kool aid