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  • From: Clansgian AT wmconnect.com
  • To: homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [Homestead] The answer, my friend, may not be blowing in the wind.
  • Date: Fri, 15 Aug 2008 15:32:36 EDT


> >That the 'oil age will not end because we ran out of oil' follows
> >'the stone age did not end because we ran out of stones' is a non
> >sequitur

That indeed is a tired old saw. In thinking about wood to coal to oil, it is
not useful to talk about the waning of the predominance of those fuels
because we did or did not run out of them, but rather the urge to use
something even
more energy intensive.

Coal did not rise in popularity because wood was scarce, but rather becuase
of the desire to use more energy intensive machinery and processes. Likewise
oil did not replace coal becaue coal was scarce but rather it gave rise to
yet
more energy intensive machinery and processes.

The things wood was betters suited for continued to be fueled by wood (bread
ovens, for example). And the things that worked better with coal continued
to
employ coal, as they do to this day.

But this is a very different situation from the one in which we find
ourselves. The current "demand destruction" in oil isn't because a new and
better and
more efficient and more powerful energy is emerging to replace it, but rather
the uses for oil continue unabated while the availability declines all the
while.

At the onset of the age of coal, people weren't dashing about madly trying to
find something to use for the wood they could no longer obtain. Likewise at
the advent of the age of oil, people weren't scrambling about trying to find
something to use because they could no longer afford nor obtain oil.

But now we are indeed dashing and scrambling. This is different.


James </HTML>




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