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["Marie McHarry" <mmcharry AT gmail.com>]

 On Nov 15, 2007 8:30 PM,  <Clansgian AT wmconnect.com> wrote:
>
 >   In another formum touching on Peak Oil,
> I explained all the whisling past the graveyard like this:   Proof that oil
> will not always be as cheap and abundant is  more disturbing and more 
> shocking
> to people than would be proof that there is no God.  They cannot, will not
> accept it nor even entertain it.  It just can't, can't, can't be so.

You nailed the problem right there, James. That which we have with us
always -- even if always amounts to the last 20, 30, or 40 years (as
opposed to hundred years for oil) -- seems to be eternal. We humans
can have great imagination, but for most of us, particularly regarding
elements of our everyday life, about 99.9 percent of us have no
imagination whatever. That's why we abuse the 0.01 percent and then
end up calling them heroes if they soldier on.

And another thing. The older generation (and suspect that dips into
the baby boomers) have seen incredible technological innovation -- and
improvement -- in their lifetimes. My grandmothers drove horses and
then, regularly, flew on airplanes (one grandmother, flying to her
sister's funeral in a private plane -- she was not the pilot --
enjoyed an emergency landing on a Texas highway when the plane's
engine failed). People who have seen that kind of change imagine that
anything is possible.

My very own mother always poo-pooed peak oil because she was sure that
the next best thing would come right along.

Me? I'm not all that unhappy to be 60 years old and unlikely to live
too far into the bad times to come. The only thing that worries me a
bit is that reincarnation may actually occur. Well, perhaps a soul can
choose to wallow in paradise for a millenium or two before coming
back....

I can only hope.

Marie