apples and oranges and corn

APPLES AND ORANGES AND CORN


Before we get to today’s pearls of wisdom inexpertly disguised as the inane rantings of a mere mortal, two items of business. First, I wish to fall to my knees in ecstatic joy and thank the not one but two separate worthy minions that sent me cash money. Jack, you can bet I’ll use the proceeds on more hair supplies. And Charles, you can bet I’ll declare your donation as income so the Handmaiden Of Lucifer gets more money. Bitch be getting another five grand as it is but I wouldn’t want the forces of evil to align against me any more than usual. Which brings me up to an observation I had earlier today. Normally the months of November and December are balls to the wall ( Balls to the Walls ) here, what with massive legions of Yuppie Scum trying to appease their guilt over unearned wealth ( I know I’m an ass but I can’t help but think of the mine labor as Union-like extortionists. Not to say I’m not grateful for the extra graft that circulates in town ) by donating food to the Food Bank. I’m not trying to appear that I don’t appreciate it, just being cynical. But, as nothing is free in life, it is a lot of work trying to stay on top of the extra donations. But this year, almost as if they smell looming disaster in the wind, the legions have stepped up their campaign a month early. I’m running around like crazy trying to figure out how I’ll keep my sanity for the extra time. My observation is: they be agin me. Everyone is agin me. They ain’t afor me, their agin me. These donations definitely came in the knick of time as they will sooth my insanity. Generosity disguised as a means of eliminating me. I’m on to everyone.

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My second order of business is an observation. I’m not saying for sure my conclusion is correct, it’s just something I bring up for you to think about. Notice how gold ( Rich Dad's Advisors: Guide to Investing In Gold and Silver: Protect Your Financial Future ) has followed a pattern recently? It shoots up drastically and then eases on down slowly. It bottoms out at the previous high level and then eases on up to the last high. It waits there, then repeats the process all over again. If I didn’t know better I would say this is a way of fooling people. Everyone either panics or soils themselves in glee ( such as the gold bugs [ The Gold-Bug and Other Tales (Dover Thrift Editions) ] forecasting five grand gold ). Then it eases down and everyone relaxes. This way, it isn’t a steady advance. Plenty of idiots can conclude things are getting better. Now, I’m not saying that high wizards of the bankers are sitting behind a curtain pulling strings, but there has to be some kind of manipulation with either/or the Plunge Protection Team and the holders of e-commodities ( those using derivatives to “hold” far more bullion than they physically process- far more than is in existence if you believe the hype ). Who might be one and the same. Again, I’m only spitballing here. But the pattern is curious.

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Today’s article was inspired by my reading this weekend. I was bored or done with my library books and so I just started flipping through Greer’s decline book ( The Long Descent: A User's Guide to the End of the Industrial Age ). I’ve already read it two or three times so I just reread a few chapters. I like Greer ( The Ecotechnic Future: Envisioning a Post-Peak World ). He seems a very smart fellow. And I’m eternally in his debt for pointing out his bible ( and now mine ) “Overshoot”( Overshoot: The Ecological Basis of Revolutionary Change ). We draw drastically different conclusions from the book however. He sees a nice slow centuries long decline, peaceful transition interrupted by spats of violence. A stairway decline. I see a slow long decline measured in years followed by a sudden collapse. As I’ve said before, the universal lack of records following every collapse suggests to me that society was totally destroyed. But that is of course a rather flippant answer to the age old question, slow or sudden collapse. So let’s explore a bit more on the “slow” side.

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Slow collapse is premised on the historical record. From the Romans to the Mayans ( A Forest of Kings: The Untold Story of the Ancient Maya ) to the Anazasi and more, the average decline lasted centuries. From the height of empire to the emergence of a few scattered villagers scratching in the dirt a few hundred years passed. Now, one could argue with that interpretation. After all, a consensus doesn’t mean the truth has been discovered ( contemporary example is when finally after decades of ridicule by his fellows the guy that proposed continental drift was vindicated. Near future example might be looking back from an Ice Age and wondering what the heck Gore thought he was talking about [ why anyone believed Al “I invented the Internet” Gore in the first place is unbelievable ] ). But let’s not quibble about that and assume most agricultural societies in the past did collapse slowly. The question then becomes why we are comparing apples to oranges ( and to corn in the case of the Mayans )? Why are we comparing the Oil Age ( The Age of Oil: The Mythology, History, and Future of the World's Most Controversial Resource ) to the Agricultural Age? For ten thousand years man lived on the soil. For the last two hundred years ( and that is pushing it to include a lot of coal use ) man has lived off of oil. The soil uses the energy it just received from the sun ( and also last years if you include fallow fields and green manure and compost ). That is a very diffuse form of energy. The oil we use is a highly concentrated form of millions of years of the earth forming hydrocarbons. You obviously can’t overpopulate with the surplus of solar to anywhere near the extent that you can with the surplus of oil. If you deplete the soil trying to feed extra people you run into a famine very quickly and with fewer surplus people.

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Feeding people with oil lasts a few years. And you allow quite a few generations to breed like rats. Let’s assume people are smarter than rats and can figure out a few ways to slow the die-off. In an agriculture economy this can go on for some time. You can plow forests, steal the neighbors land, centralize irrigation. Because you have a small surplus these steps giving small increases all work. For a time. But when you have multiple generations breeding off the surplus of oil in the end there is such a huge increase of people that once the oil decline sets in the food production rapidly decreases and a lot of people can’t eat. Collapse ( Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed ) happens quicker because so many more surplus mouths are involved. The stampede to the next years seed, the decimation of the fisheries, the total scorched earth warfare allowed by mechanization, all are a result. This doesn’t even touch pollution or nuclear war ( The Cold and the Dark: The World After Nuclear War ) or genetic modification or global drought. It just says that unlike the past, we now have such a surplus of people that things will collapse quicker. And remember, we have already seen a slow build up of problems. The seas are already depleted and polluted. Oil production is already declining. We have already had several years of drought. Etc. And we’ve been in slow decline since 1979 when we reached our global peak in per capita energy. How much longer will slow collapse happen before the waterfall?

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My e-mail is jimd303@netzero.com
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