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[Hitokage]

You mean countries like Canada and Argentina, who are already net exporters of oil and who's oil supplies are much more costly to extract than say Saudi Arabia or Iraqs? Because those countries stand to gain significantly from higher oil prices.

Look at what happens to the TSX S&P 500 when the price of oil goes up.

*sigh* The stock market doesn't mean a damn thing when the base natural resources themselves become affected. Sure, some countries might gain more control, but the situation I described isn't significantly affected... because the world economy is more than fucking Canada and Argentina.

 

[DarienA]

I'll tell you what's wrong with suburbia. It's wasteful. I have NOTHING against the idea of you owning your own house, car, shopping at the local market etc etc... the problem is that to do that, you feel that you can't live within 20 miles of your workplace. You burn up ridiciulous amounts of resources to live the way you do. Which you would KNOW if you had watched the documentary. But apparently you just want to try and score points on me. Poor effort, too.

Jealous bastard. Don't hate me cause I live in a county whose average house price is over half a mil(man if we ever sell this puppy... yummy). Don't hate me cause I wanted to get away from the craziness of the city.

Most of the reply is half-hearted jokingly.... well I think it is.... but maybe not...

I say DRAIN THIS PLANET OF IT'S RESOURCES BEFORE THE ALIENS COME!!!!

That way we won't have anything they want... unless they come for humans.... or water... hmmm gotta poison that water while we're at it....

 

[Triumph]

Also, men with guns > stock market. Haha, I can't wait until towns start invading each other because they hear that "Springfield has oil. OIL I TELL YOU!". I will be laughing heartily up in the Blue Ridge mountains, sipping on home brewed whiskey and tending my farm as society degenerates into something out of a bad Chuck Heston movie.

Where will your precious "free markets" be then, eh?

 

[DarienA]

Also, men with guns > stock market. Haha, I can't wait until towns start invading each other because they hear that "Springfield has oil. OIL I TELL YOU!". I will be laughing heartily up in the Blue Ridge mountains, sipping on home brewed whiskey and tending my farm as society degenerates into something out of a bad Chuck Heston movie.

Where will your precious "free markets" be then, eh?

Soylent Green is PEOPLE! Soylent Green is PEOPLE!

 

[brooklyngooner]

Also, men with guns > stock market. Haha, I can't wait until towns start invading each other because they hear that "Springfield has oil. OIL I TELL YOU!". I will be laughing heartily up in the Blue Ridge mountains, sipping on home brewed whiskey and tending my farm as society degenerates into something out of a bad Chuck Heston movie.

Where will your precious "free markets" be then, eh?

I really don't mean this in a bad way: you have lots and lots of conversations with yourself, don't you.

 

[909er]

time to rape and pillage the rest of the solar system.

 

[Foreign Jackass]

Foreign Jackass.... well I guess nothing else needs to be said....

For the umpteenth time, I CHOSE THAT HANDLE. It wasn't put on me like some sign that I am not to be trusted. I even chose an avatar which made it clear. I AM A LEFTIST PERSON WHO LIVES IN ANOTHER COUNTRY.

 

[Crow]

I think you will find that running out of oil affects absoloutly everybody.

Oil is used in just about everything, from plastics to pesticides to the durable metals we use for building construction. No country is total self sufficent. Lack of oil will crush industries in every country with no acception...when this happens the stock market will plummet and then begins another world wide depression...only this time, there is no oil boom to pull you out because the oil is gone.

With no oil is no pesticides as already mentioned. Food supplies go down and the price goes up. Joe Bloggs who has just lost his job when the play swing company closed down can't find a new job and won't be able to afford enough food for his family.

A common proposed 'solution' that people come up with is "we'll use solar panels" or "How about Nuclear power". Well, that's not going to happen...It actually takes oil to make solar panels and solar panels only have a certain life span. Nuclear power plants take a huge amount to maintain...you need to use oil to mine for the Uranium to begin with, then you need to building materials to build it, which requires oil to make the materials strong enough to build with on the scale needed for a nuclear power plant. You then need to maintain the electronics powered by silicon chips which use OIL. Then there is the issue of supplying the generated power to the masses...yep...more OIL required.

When we run out of oil, things are going to get real ugly...and it's not a matter of if, it's a matter of when. We have already hit peak oil and prices are only going to go higher. It's true we really haven't seen the effects on consumer goods yet because our goods are needing less oil then they did before due to better manufacturing techniques. But within the next 10 years you are really going to start feeling it. Your probably already feeling it when you fill up your car.

However the above is just too much for some people to accept. Some may even dwell on it for a few days trying to comprehend the ramifications but normally it's pushed to the back of their minds as they enjoy their burger from an animal shunted through metal gates, cut up in a mechnical processing line, processed and packaged, grilled using vegatable oil from vegatables grown with peticides, placed within a bun also from dusted crops, while the processed tomato sauce drips from their bun onto their plastic tray on the metal table in the steel enforced building before hoping in their car and home to watch the formula 1 on their TV.

 

[Warm Machine]

There are alternatives to oil or other methods of creating it. Until the cost effective and standard methods of getting it become too much trouble we won't see wide expansion into those areas.

By the time oil does become a problem industry will be seriously forging ahead into those areas as the bottom line needs to be maintained. Only in panic do things get adopted and only with competition do they moe ahead quickly.

 

[Ill Saint]

As long as the sun shines in their backyards, people will be apathetic.

 

[Fatghost]

I think you will find that running out of oil affects absoloutly everybody.

Oil is used in just about everything, from plastics to pesticides to the durable metals we use for building construction. No country is total self sufficent. Lack of oil will crush industries in every country with no acception...when this happens the stock market will plummet and then begins another world wide depression...only this time, there is no oil boom to pull you out because the oil is gone.

With no oil is no pesticides as already mentioned. Food supplies go down and the price goes up. Joe Bloggs who has just lost his job when the play swing company closed down can't find a new job and won't be able to afford enough food for his family.

A common proposed 'solution' that people come up with is "we'll use solar panels" or "How about Nuclear power". Well, that's not going to happen...It actually takes oil to make solar panels and solar panels only have a certain life span. Nuclear power plants take a huge amount to maintain...you need to use oil to mine for the Uranium to begin with, then you need to building materials to build it, which requires oil to make the materials strong enough to build with on the scale needed for a nuclear power plant. You then need to maintain the electronics powered by silicon chips which use OIL. Then there is the issue of supplying the generated power to the masses...yep...more OIL required.

When we run out of oil, things are going to get real ugly...and it's not a matter of if, it's a matter of when. We have already hit peak oil and prices are only going to go higher. It's true we really haven't seen the effects on consumer goods yet because our goods are needing less oil then they did before due to better manufacturing techniques. But within the next 10 years you are really going to start feeling it. Your probably already feeling it when you fill up your car.

However the above is just too much for some people to accept. Some may even dwell on it for a few days trying to comprehend the ramifications but normally it's pushed to the back of their minds as they enjoy their burger from an animal shunted through metal gates, cut up in a mechnical processing line, processed and packaged, grilled using vegatable oil from vegatables grown with peticides, placed within a bun also from dusted crops, while the processed tomato sauce drips from their bun onto their plastic tray on the metal table in the steel enforced building before hoping in their car and home to watch the formula 1 on their TV.

OK. I must admit I'm a sucker for hopeless doom and gloom.

So how do we know we're at the peak of oil production? And why are we sure that even if oil prices go up significantly, there are no alternative technologies we could shift to or exploit?

I'd like some more info.

 

[Crow]

I'm a little reluctant to link to this site because it uses quite a bit of sensationalism, but it holds a great deal of information so once you get pas the 'World will end as we know it' part, it actually tells you quite a bit. -

http://www.lifeaftertheoilcrash.net/

 

[OpinionatedCyborg]

I'm wary to believe that peak production of oil will occur within the next 10 years, simply because we've been wrong so many times before, but it certainly doesn't hurt to make conservative estimates. Anyways, I have faith in humanity's ingentuity. Sure, we're pretty lazy once we've found a cash cow to milk, but when worst comes to worst, we get off our asses and innovate. Potential for a severe blow to the world's economy certainly exists, but don't write off alternative forms of technology replacing oil incrementally over a series of years just yet.

 

[Chony]

Once all is said and done (mass oil depleted) I am up for starting a scooter (Vespa and the alike) gang, siphoning gas from abandoned cars. We should get 60 mpg in them, maybe more. We will start in seattle, raiding convenience stores for AA batteries (for sony discmans), which we we will store in Alaska for the winter, and take them in the summer when needs be. Also I was thinking of living in Mexico for the winter months, followed by the trip back Seattle in spring, and Alaska in the summer (Freezing the batteries will prolong their lives). Only problem is fresh water. Since seattle is rainy, we will have to make do with this semi polluted rain (possibly heading up to the mountains for 'cleaner' air, which are not too far off).

This doesnt seem to bad to me. Entertainment will consist of original GBA (AA batteries) and discmans, possibly hookers and booze as well, though eventually decades passing, we will need to make our own booze.

 

[ToxicAdam]

what are your sources? if you don't have any, then leave please.

My sources are watching the news in the 1980's and reading TIME and NEWSWEEK, that had articles every other month about our impending energy crisis.

So, if you expect me to go through a thousand old magazines to win an internet debate .. you are barking up the wrong fucking tree.

Liu Kang Baking A Pie I think the world has an issue that goes way beyond our limited resources: everyone's inability to sense ToxicAdam's obvious sarcasm.

At least someone got it right. Although there is some personal grains of truth in my outlandish example ... it is more indicitive on how Americans go through life. Not just a small minority ... but a large majority. That's what you people fail to realize. So insulated in your intellectual bubbles of denial.


So sitting here spouting off equally outlandish doomsday predictions isn't affecting ANYTHING or ANYBODY. Because people have been consuming resources for 30 years now, inspite of all the outlandish hyperbole.

I won't whine when gas prices raise ... because they are low to begin with. Since my family only consumes about 20-30 gallons of gas a week, a dollar jump in the price is only 30 dollars out of my pocket. Not breaking my bank. I understand the fact that gasoline prices also effect all consumer goods ... but due to emerging global markets, most consumer goods have never been cheaper.

Your problem is not with oil or consumption ... your (speaking generally) problem is with PROSPERITY.

 

[capslock]

Shit, after reading the oil crash site I am more prone to support Darien and Adam's viewpoints(as much as it sickens me to agree with Darien), there seems to be no fucking hope at all.

 

[Uter]

We're not going to use up ALL of our fossil fuels by 2010. However, more likely than not, we will have reached the peak of oil extraction and production by then. The effects won't be noticeable immediately, probably not for several years. I guarantee you though, the way that you live in 2020(if you're alive at all) will be different than the way that you live today.

http://www.endofsuburbia.com/ for those who aren't going to dismiss this out of hand.

Well, at least you sent us to a definitive source for facts and not just to some site promoting a little known documentary... *cough*

 

[Uter]

Also, men with guns > stock market. Haha, I can't wait until towns start invading each other because they hear that "Springfield has oil. OIL I TELL YOU!". I will be laughing heartily up in the Blue Ridge mountains, sipping on home brewed whiskey and tending my farm as society degenerates into something out of a bad Chuck Heston movie.

Where will your precious "free markets" be then, eh?

Yeah, and your brilliant alternative is what? oh wait, we are chatting with someone who actually sports an avatar of Karl Marx... genius

 

[Triumph]

Wow. You're real bright there, Uter. So... have you seen the film? Yeah. What I thought. Oh and look. More bright ad hominem attacks.

I'll say this though: modern capitalism is just as fatally flawed as 20th century communism. The markets are not "free", they are held in thrall by mega-corporations that will not allow any competition to their monopolistic practices. Failure on your part to admit this does not make it untrue. America's economic system, and the one thus being foisted off upon the world at large, is nothing more than cronyism.

 

[Uter]

Wow. You're real bright there, Uter. So... have you seen the film? Yeah. What I thought. Oh and look. More bright ad hominem attacks.

As I pointed out previously, your only apparent definitive source for facts is in fact a little known "documentary". A documentary which can only be seen in very small limited public screenings or by purchasing the vhs tape or dvd itself. Again, this is your ONLY listed source for information. Anyone who hasn't seen it is apparently dismissed out of hand by you, and you apparently are too "busy" or simply unwilling or unable to provide a single other legitimate source to back up your claims.... yeah...

ad hominem attacks? And my comment about your little Karl Marx avatar followed what exactly? Could it be a question about your strangely missing alternative to free markets? Again I seem to have to explain the obvious to you..

I'll say this though: modern capitalism is just as fatally flawed as 20th century communism. The markets are not "free", they are held in thrall by mega-corporations that will not allow any competition to their monopolistic practices. Failure on your part to admit this does not make it untrue. America's economic system, and the one thus being foisted off upon the world at large, is nothing more than cronyism.

"Failure on your part to admit this"??? I did not realize I had been asked a question pertaining unto this topic. I did not realize that this was even being specifically raised anywhere within this thread. Bravo sir, thank you for holding me accountable for not responding to some as of yet unknown topic. Clearly I failed to admit to or acknowledge this specific point in this as of yet unmentioned topic. Feel free to correct me for making any other mistakes concerning topics never mentioned before.

...

"modern capitalism is just as fatally flawed as 20th century communism", ridiculous. Please list the facts supporting this inane claim. Please show how "modern capitalism" has comparable failings to "20th century communism", especially economically. That would be great...

Apparently interventionist governmental policies aren't worth mentioning in respect to how free the market is. It is all the fault of "mega-corporations" alone... Please support your little mega-corporation centric rant with some data please. I would love to see the evidence showing the absence of influence from interventionist governmental policies and the sole impact coming merely from "mega-corporations".

And as a final fun little sidenote, it is quite obvious that you made specific reference to "20th century communism" instead of simply "communism". So, what is it then? From the use of the Karl Marx avatar to your specific choice of words is seems apparent, at least to me, that you are most likely some kind of communist. So, are you? And if so, wth is Marx's little theory of historical inevitability now????

 

[Fresh Prince]

Wow. You're real bright there, Uter. So... have you seen the film? Yeah. What I thought. Oh and look. More bright ad hominem attacks.

I'll say this though: modern capitalism is just as fatally flawed as 20th century communism. The markets are not "free', they are held in thrall by mega-corporations that will not allow any competition to their monopolistic practices. Failure on your part to admit this does not make it untrue. America's economic system, and the one thus being foisted off upon the world at large, is nothing more than cronyism.

Subsidies, tariffs etc. Governments are left meandering to multinationals so the population has employment etc. Even China needs multinationals so parts of their population doesn't starve to death.