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[Clansgian AT wmconnect.com]

> Okay, so I am still not sure where this is going...
> 
> 
> James, you are using too fancy of words for me...I might have gone to
> Emory like you, but I'm getting old and I've been dumbed down...
> What exactly do you mean by cornucopian mind?
> Fruity ideas??
> 

Sorry, it's an odd head space I occupy of late and I'm not always aware that 
everyone isn't fluent in doom-speak.

A cornucopian  is one who cannot accept that the basis of our society (that 
is, oil and energy) are finite and so thinks that there just HAS to be a 
forever source somewhere, somehow.  The idea that you could mine all the oil 
out of 
the ground and then have nothing with which to replace it is just not 
acceptable and is not to be entertained.   We *always* find a way, we 
*always* find a 
solution.  After all, we put a man on the moon, by God!  The cornucopian 
thinks that the source of our energy intensive society is like a great Horn 
of 
Plenty (Cornucopia) and there's no reason to think that we are burning a 
finite 
candle at both ends.

Where this is leading is that faced with the notion of moving past Peak Oil 
and into the post oil world (post CHEAP oil world)  the cornucopian will say, 
Oh, that's why we need more technology, all we need is more techology and we 
can get more and more and more oil out of the ground. Or we need do research 
to 
come up with a car that gets 200 mpg.  

Often the cornucopian muses:  I bet that have a car like that, I bet they 
could build a car like that.  Sure, when oil gets short enough they will 
reveal 
all along that they can make a car that gets 500 mpg.

In order to harbor notions like this, the cornucopian has to become willfully 
ignorant of physics.  

For someone who understands that our transportation and energy intensive 
culture is rapidly using up a one-time finite resource and who says that we 
will 
be in severe oil crisis in three years .... and then is reminded that 
technology might improve the rate of oil extraction or gas mileage .... the 
reply is, 
"Fine ... five years then."