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We have been told that intermittent electricity from wind and solar, perhaps along with hydroelectric generation (hydro), can be the basis of a green economy. Things are increasingly not working out as planned, however. Natural gas or coal used for balancing the intermittent output of renewables is increasingly high-priced or not available. It is becoming clear that modelers who encouraged the view that a smooth transition to wind, solar, and hydro is possible have missed some important points.
Let’s look at some of the issues:
[1] It is becoming clear that intermittent wind and solar cannot be counted on to provide adequate electricity supply when the electrical distribution system needs them.
Early modelers did not expect that the variability of wind and solar would be a huge problem. They seemed to believe that, with the use of enough intermittent renewables, their variability would cancel out. Alternatively, long transmission lines would allow enough transfer of electricity between locations to largely offset variability.
In practice, variability is still a major problem. For example, in the third quarter of 2021, weak winds were a significant contributor to Europe’s power crunch. Europe’s largest wind producers (Britain, Germany and France) produced only 14% of installed capacity during this period, compared with an average of 20% to 26% in previous years. No one had planned for this kind of three-month shortfall.
In 2021, China experienced dry, windless weather so that both its generation from wind and hydro were low. The country found it needed to use rolling blackouts to deal with the situation. This led to traffic lights failing and many families needing to eat candle-lit dinners.
In Europe, with low electricity supply, Kosovo has needed to use rolling blackouts. There is real concern that the need for rolling blackouts will spread to other parts of Europe, as well, either later this winter, or in a future winter. Winters are of special concern because, then, solar energy is low while heating needs are high.
[2] Adequate storage for electricity is not feasible in any reasonable timeframe. This means that if cold countries are not to “freeze in the dark” during winter, fossil fuel backup is likely to be needed for many years in the future.
One workaround for electricity variability is storage. A recent Reuters article is titled Weak winds worsened Europe’s power crunch; utilities need better storage. The article quotes Matthew Jones, lead analyst for EU Power, as saying that low or zero-emissions backup-capacity is “still more than a decade away from being available at scale.” Thus, having huge batteries or hydrogen storage at the scale needed for months of storage is not something that can reasonably be created now or in the next several years.
Today, the amount of electricity storage that is available can be measured in minutes or hours. It is mostly used to buffer short-term changes, such as the wind temporarily ceasing to blow or the rapid transition created when the sun sets and citizens are in the midst of cooking dinner. What is needed is the capacity for multiple months of electricity storage. Such storage would require an amazingly large quantity of materials to produce. Needless to say, if such storage were included, the cost of the overall electrical system would be substantially higher than we have been led to believe. All major types of cost analyses (including the levelized cost of energy, energy return on energy invested, and energy payback period) leave out the need for storage (both short- and long-term) if balancing with other electricity production is not available.
If no solution to inadequate electricity supply can be found, then demand must be reduced by one means or another. One approach is to close businesses or schools. Another approach is rolling blackouts. A third approach is to permit astronomically high electricity prices, squeezing out some buyers of electricity. A fourth balancing approach is to introduce recession, perhaps by raising interest rates; recessions cut back on demand for all non-essential goods and services. Recessions tend to lead to significant job losses, besides cutting back on electricity demand. None of these things are attractive options.
[3] After many years of subsidies and mandates, today’s green electricity is only a tiny fraction of what is needed to keep our current economy operating.
Early modelers did not consider how difficult it would be to ramp up green electricity.
Compared to today’s total world energy consumption (electricity and non-electricity energy, such as oil, combined), wind and solar are truly insignificant. In 2020, wind accounted for 3% of the world’s total energy consumption and solar amounted to 1% of total energy, using BP’s generous way of counting electricity, relative to other types of energy. Thus, the combination of wind and solar produced 4% of world energy in 2020.
The International Energy Agency (IEA) uses a less generous approach for crediting electricity; it only gives credit for the heat energy supplied by the renewable energy. The IEA does not show wind and solar separately in its recent reports. Instead, it shows an “Other” category that includes more than wind and solar. This broader category amounted to 2% of the world’s energy supply in 2018.
Hydro is another type of green electricity that is sometimes considered alongside wind and solar. It is quite a bit larger than either wind or solar; it amounted to 7% of the world’s energy supply in 2020. Taken together, hydro + wind + solar amounted to 11% of the world’s energy supply in 2020, using BP’s methodology. This still isn’t much of the world’s total energy consumption.
Of course, different parts of the world vary with respect to the share of energy created using wind, hydro and solar. Figure 1 shows the percentage of total energy generated by these three renewables combined.
As expected, the world average is about 11%. The European Union is highest at 14%; Russia+ (that is, Russia and its Affiliates, which is equivalent to the members of the Commonwealth of Independent States) is lowest at 6.5%.
[4] Even as a percentage of electricity, rather than total energy, renewables still comprised a relatively small share in 2020.
Wind and solar don’t replace “dispatchable” generation; they provide some temporary electricity supply, but they tend to make the overall electrical system more difficult to operate because of the variability introduced. Renewables are available only part of the time, so other types of electricity suppliers are still needed when supply temporarily isn’t available. In a sense, all they are replacing is part of the fuel required to make electricity. The fixed costs of backup electricity providers are not adequately compensated, nor are the costs of the added complexity introduced into the system.
If analysts give wind and solar full credit for replacing electricity, as BP does, then, on a world basis, wind electricity replaced 6% of total electricity consumed in 2020. Solar electricity replaced 3% of total electricity provided, and hydro replaced 16% of world electricity. On a combined basis, wind and solar provided 9% of world electricity. With hydro included as well, these renewables amounted to 25% of world electricity supply in 2020.
The share of electricity supply provided by wind, solar and hydro varies across the world, as shown in Figure 2. The European Union is highest at 32%; Japan is lowest at 17%.
The “All Other” grouping of countries shown in Figure 2 includes many of the poorer countries. These countries often use quite a bit of hydro, even though the availability of hydro tends to fluctuate a great deal, depending on weather conditions. If an area is subject to wet seasons and dry seasons, there is likely to be very limited electricity supply during the dry season. In areas with snow melt, very large supplies are often available in spring, and much smaller supplies during the rest of the year.
Thus, while hydro is often thought of as being a reliable source of power, this may or may not be the case. Like wind and solar, hydro often needs fossil fuel back-up if industry is to be able to depend upon having electricity year-around.
[5] Most modelers have not understood that reserve to production ratios greatly overstate the amount of fossil fuels and other minerals that the economy will be able to extract.
Most modelers have not understood how the world economy operates. They have assumed that as long as we have the technical capability to extract fossil fuels or other minerals, we will be able to do so. A popular way of looking at resource availability is as reserve to production ratios. These ratios represent an estimate of how many years of production might continue, if extraction is continued at the same rate as in the most recent year, considering known resources and current technology.
A common belief is that these ratios understate how much of each resource is available, partly because technology keeps improving and partly because exploration for these minerals may not be complete.
In fact, this model of future resource availability greatly overstates the quantity of future resources that can actually be extracted. The problem is that the world economy tends to run short of many types of resources simultaneously. For example, World Bank Commodities Price Data shows that prices were high in January 2022 for many materials, including fossil fuels, fertilizers, aluminum, copper, iron ore, nickel, tin and zinc. Even though prices have run up very high, this is not an indication that producers will be able to use these high prices to extract more of these required materials.
In order to produce more fossil fuels or more minerals of any kind, preparation must be started years in advance. New oil wells must be built in suitable locations; new mines for copper or lithium or rare earth minerals must be built; workers must be trained for all of these areas. High prices for many commodities can be a sign of temporarily high demand, or it can be a sign that something is seriously wrong with the system. There is no way the system can ramp up needed production in a huge number of areas at once. Supply lines will break. Recession is likely to set in.
The problem underlying the recent spike in prices seems to be “diminishing returns.” Such diminishing returns affect nearly all parts of the economy simultaneously. For each type of mineral, miners produced the easiest-t0-extract materials first. They later moved on to deeper oil wells and minerals from lower grade ores. Pollution gradually grew, so it too needed greater investment. At the same time, world population has been growing, so the economy has required more food, fresh water and goods of many kinds; these, too, require the investment of resources of many kinds.
The problem that eventually hits the economy is that it cannot maintain economic growth. Too many areas of the economy require investment, simultaneously, because diminishing returns keeps ramping up investment needs. This investment is not simply a financial investment; it is an investment of physical resources (oil, coal, steel, copper, etc.) and an investment of people’s time.
The way in which the economy would run short of investment materials was simulated in the 1972 book, The Limits to Growth, by Donella Meadows and others. The book gave the results of a number of simulations regarding how the world economy would behave in the future. Virtually all of the simulations indicated that eventually the economy would reach limits to growth. A major problem was that too large a share of the output of the economy was needed for reinvestment, leaving too little for other uses. In the base model, such limits to growth came about now, in the middle of the first half of the 21st century. The economy would stop growing and gradually start to collapse.
[6] The world economy seems already to be reaching limits on the extraction of coal and natural gas to be used for balancing electricity provided by intermittent renewables.
Coal and natural gas are expensive to transport, so if they are exported, they primarily tend to be exported to countries that are nearby. For this reason, my analysis groups together exports and imports into large regions where trade is most likely to take place.
If we analyze natural gas imports by part of the world, two regions stand out as having the most out-of-region natural gas imports: Europe and Asia-Pacific. Figure 4 shows that Europe’s out-of-region natural gas imports reached peaks in 2007 and 2010, after which they dipped. In recent years, Europe’s imports have barely surpassed their prior peaks. Asia-Pacific’s out-of-region imports have shown a far more consistent growth pattern over the long term.
The reason why Asia-Pacific’s imports have been growing is to support its growing manufacturing output. Manufacturing output has increasingly been shifted to the Asia-Pacific Region, partly because this region can perform this manufacturing cheaply, and partly because rich countries have wanted to reduce their carbon footprint. Moving heavy industry abroad reduces a country’s reported CO2 generation, even if the manufactured items are imported as finished products.
Figure 5 shows that Europe’s own natural gas supply has been falling. This is a major reason for its import requirements from outside the region.
Figure 6, below, shows that Asia-Pacific’s total energy consumption per capita has been growing. The new manufacturing jobs transferred to this region have raised standards of living for many workers. Europe, on the other hand, has reduced its local manufacturing. Its people have tended to get poorer, in terms of energy consumption per capita. Service jobs necessitated by reduced energy consumption per capita have tended to pay less well than the manufacturing jobs they have replaced.
Europe has recently been having conflicts with Russia over natural gas. The world seems to be reaching a situation where there are not enough natural gas exports to go around. The Asia-Pacific Region (or at least the more productive parts of the Asia-Pacific Region) seems to be able to outbid Europe, when local natural gas supply is inadequate.
Figure 7, below, gives a rough idea of the quantity of exports available from Russia+ compared to Europe’s import needs. (In this chart, I compare Europe’s total natural gas imports (including pipeline imports from North Africa and LNG from North Africa) with the natural gas exports of Russia+ (to all nations, not just to Europe, including both by pipeline and as LNG).) On this rough basis, we find that Europe’s natural gas imports are greater than the total natural gas exports of Russia+.
Europe is already encountering multiple natural gas problems. Its supply from North Africa is not as reliable as in the past. The countries of Russia+ are not delivering as much natural gas as Europe would like, and spot prices, especially, seem to be way too high. There are also pipeline disagreements. Bloomberg reports that Russia will be increasing its exports to China in future years. Unless Russia finds a way to ramp up its gas supplies, greater exports to China are likely to leave less natural gas for Russia to export to Europe in the years ahead.
If we look around the world to see what other sources of natural gas exports are available for Europe, we discover that the choices are limited.
The United States is presented as a possible choice for increasing natural gas imports to Europe. One of the catches with growing natural gas exports from the United States is the fact that historically, the US has been a natural gas importer; it is not clear how much exports can rise above the 2022 level. Furthermore, part of US natural gas is co-produced with oil from shale. Oil from shale is not likely to be growing much in future years; in fact, it very likely will be declining because of depleted wells. This may limit the US’s growth in natural gas supplies available for export.
The Rest of the World category on Figure 8 doesn’t seem to have many possibilities for growth in imports to Europe, either, because total exports have been drifting downward. (The Rest of the World includes Africa, the Middle East, and the Americas excluding the United States.) There are many reports of countries, including Iraq and Turkey, not being able to buy the natural gas they would like. There doesn’t seem to be enough natural gas on the market now. There are few reports of supplies ramping up to replace depleted supplies.
With respect to coal, the situation in Europe is only a little different. Figure 9 shows that Europe’s coal supply has been depleting, and imports have not been able to offset this depletion.
If a person looks around the world for places to get more imports for Europe, there aren’t many choices.
Figure 10 shows that most coal production is in the Asia-Pacific Region. With China, India and Japan located in the Asia-Pacific Region, and high transit costs, this coal is unlikely to leave the region. The United States has been a big coal producer, but its production has declined in recent years. It still exports a relatively small amount of coal. The most likely possibility for increased coal imports would be from Russia and its affiliates. Here, too, Europe is likely to need to outbid China to purchase this coal. A better relationship with Russia would be helpful, as well.
Figure 10 shows that world coal production has been essentially flat since 2011. A country will only export coal that it doesn’t need itself. Thus, a shortfall in export capability is an early warning sign of inadequate overall supply. With the economies of many Asia-Pacific countries still growing rapidly, demand for coal imports is likely to grow for this region. While modelers may think that there is close to 150 years’ worth of coal supply available, real-world experience suggests that coal limits are being reached already.
[7] Conclusion. Modelers and leaders everywhere have had a basic misunderstanding of how the economy operates and what limits we are up against. This misunderstanding has allowed scientists to put together models that are far from the situation we are actually facing.
The economy operates as an integrated whole, just as the body of a human being operates as an integrated whole, rather than a collection of cells of different types. This is something most modelers don’t understand, and their techniques are not equipped to deal with.
The economy is facing many limits simultaneously: too many people, too much pollution, too few fish in the ocean, more difficult to extract fossil fuels and many others. The way these limits play out seems to be the way the models in the 1972 book, The Limits to Growth, suggest: They play out on a combined basis. The real problem is that diminishing returns leads to huge investment needs in many areas simultaneously. One or two of these investment needs could perhaps be handled, but not all of them, all at once.
The approach of modelers, practically everywhere, is to break down a problem into small parts, and assume that each part of the problem can be solved independently. Thus, those concerned about “Peak Oil” have been concerned about running out of oil. Finding substitutes seemed to be important. Those concerned about climate change were convinced that huge amounts of fossil fuels remain to be extracted, even more than the amounts indicated by reserve to production ratios. Their concern was finding substitutes for the huge amount of fossil fuels that they believed remained to be extracted, which could cause climate change.
Politicians could see that there was some sort of huge problem on the horizon, but they didn’t understand what it was. The idea of substituting renewables for fossil fuels seemed to be a solution that would make both Peak Oilers and those concerned about climate change happy. Models based on the substitution of renewables for fossil fuels seemed to please almost everyone. The renewables approach suggested that we have a very long timeframe to deal with, putting the problem off, as long into the future as possible.
Today, we are starting to see that renewables are not able to live up to the promise modelers hoped they would have. Exactly how the situation will play out is not entirely clear, but it looks like we will all have front row seats in finding out.
I think someone has posted here before
Sam Brinton : https://twitter.com/sbrinton/status/1480600201782083592?cxt=HHwWkIC-mb-Ck4wpAAAA
https://seekingalpha.com/instablog/131469-david-pinsen/5696784-meet-bidens-new-department-of-energy-hire
Meet Biden’s New Department Of Energy Hire
The new head of nuclear waste disposal is non-binary drag queen.
The US population is clearly being trolled by the Biden administration. See also openly transgender Rachel Levine as Assistant Health Secretary.
Miles Mathis recently outlined the controlled demolition of liberalism:
“More Proof This is a Planned Fail of the Left”
“You have to understand history if you are ever to understand how you have been flipped. All the original definitions have been turned upside down, and they want to turn you into a conservative. To do that, they have to create their own fake liberals and make them look as awful as possible… So they have created these people for you to hate on. First they poll you, to find out what you find most disgusting, then they put together these people like Kershnar to push all your buttons. I tell you they are laughing about it right now. They think they have you so tied up in knots. They think they can make you dance like a marionette, because they always have.
“In this screw the psyops have gone into overdrive, with Intelligence taking over the entire Democratic National Committee and the Party itself and filling it with planned-fail agents, all the way to the President himself. In this big fake the Democratic Party would be pushed far far left, then exploded on purpose. It is hoped this explosion will permanently destroy what is left of liberalism in this country. After the 2020-22 period, liberalism will be seen as toxic and radioactive. Literally toxic, since in the literature liberalism will be tied to the fake pandemic and the toxic vaccines. Your children will be taught that the crime against humanity of 2021 came out of a diseased Democratic Party, one that had been corrupted by its own principles. The Phoenicians will do their best to get the blame off Pfizer and big Pharma, off Gates, off Fauci, off the corporations, and onto liberalism itself. In this way they hope to rewrite the history of the Enlightenment and the American Revolution, or bury it completely. They won’t want you learning or remembering that liberalism had once been the founding principle of this country. They will prefer you think of Critical Race Theory, blacks rioting, tranny swimmers, and pedophile-promoting professors anytime you think of liberalism. Will you? Well, that is up to you. I can tell you what is going on, but I can’t make you believe it.”
http://mileswmathis.com/updates.html
FE will be pleased with them taking care of nuclear ponds.
All the world’s a stage. Sometimes it’s a comedy, sometimes a tragedy, sometimes a farce, sometimes a charade, and occasionally a fiasco.
Miles Mathis has pointed out something truly profound several times in recent years, and he pointed it out again this month:
I have been saying for several years now that this rebranding of the left and the Democratic Party is a planned fail, manufactured to blackwash liberalism and drive everyone to the right, right into the waiting arms of the Republican Party.
http://mileswmathis.com/pedo.pdf
“Blackwashing” is something we all need to be more aware of. If you don’t know what it means, Google it, or better still, Duck Duck Go it.
I can’t think of any better reason for the Biden regime to be putting on this particular charade than to destroy the credibility of the Dems, the progressives, the left, the woke, in order to drive American voters into the waiting arms of the Repubs, the conservatives, the right, the fast asleep. Corporatism will run the show in the US and the workers will be squeezed like wet clothes through the wringer, and will own precious little and be even less well off than they have been up to now, but they will be happy and relieved that they escaped from the social-justice and thought-police crazies and avoided the prospect of owning nothing and being happy under Santa Klaus and the WEF.
Tim, this is right, was coronacircus says:
https://coronacircus.com/2022/02/11/season-of-sacrifice/
that cat is much more aware than Miles ever hoped to be; plus he doesn’t polish his halo every other sentence.
Agreed! But nobody’s perfect. And I’ve learned a lot and been entertained a lot by Miles over the years. So I try to overlook the egotism, while observing that with some people, it’s all about them, all the time.
Basically, same here Tim. Miles has hit a few good ones out of the park, so worth checking out and yes, entertaining. But he waffled the Covid-ball as bad as LaRouche waffled the 911-ball. Out-of-the-loop obviously, and both not so nimble at finding a plausible-niche.
And to think that Miles claims to have jettisoned LaRouche et.al., even before wising-up on Alex Jones. Couldn’t make any sense of that at the time so I gave up trying.
So you also measure his output with a grain of salt, but appreciate his entertainment value. Cheers bro, and I do like the part you quoted from his recent piece.
Among the various ways one could critique his style and message; his “Phoenicians” thing reads like Robert Welch’s “Insiders” for all intents and purposes. At least Welch didn’t drag anyone through a genetic blood-line labyrinth where everyone and their brother is a “Phoenician” N’th-removed. One might even surmise that his “Phoenicians” exist in the hundreds-of-millions by now, after so many thousands of years of being in control of everything, including I presume all the census-apparatus across the globe.
I really think he misinterprets the ancient world in any case, and has not read widely enough, a problem encountered by spending too much time at Wiki??; and even then only sampling carrier-waves for those peculiar wavelengths he’s tuning the dial for.
And for as much as he says he doesn’t read anyone else’s work, he’s paying increasingly close attention to ZeroHedge and Mike Adams. Talk about ‘kettle-black’; he tells us to ignore the “fakes” and “agents” – whatever! – that is, until he outs them.
And with as many “fake courtrooms” as he’s pointed out exist, what gives with his advice for us to rely on a functional legal-system to bring the “Phoenicians” to heel. He wants to have his conspiracy-cake and eat it too. His old Team A versus Team B family-squabble thing was wearing thin, so now it looks like he’s placing his hopes on the military. I keep wondering if Miles is just some kind of I.Q. Test for us guppies swimming upstream.
Tellingly, perhaps, he’s had no comment I’ve seen on Ken’s work at RedefiningGod.com or Hexane527 or Christopher Jon Bjerknes or Chris Bollyn or BannedHipster or many other even more obscure light-shedders along the way. Might it just be an ego-thing and maybe that Ken’s having a lot more fun than Miles; describing the theater in his uniquely creative and plausible manner? Who knows, they could be next-door neighbors at the Cube-Farm and one of them eats too much chili.
I really do like what @coronacircus has to say and the way it’s put together over there. Sitting this out is the only way to go; nice to hear that loud and clear and consistent – contra Miles in his Ivory Tower leading the “revolution” like some Don Quixote caricature.
Lake Superior’s charms are looking better every day around here.
Thanks a lot to @el mar.
Thanks hillcountry for that critique of MM. And thanks el mar for introducing us to Coronacircus. It’s good to get some fresh perspective on what’s going on with the pandemic, and so I’ve bookmarked that site.
The Phoenicians are far enough back in history that people can make up a lot of plausible-sounding stories about them without including a single solid fact and the listener is riveted.
The fact that, at least to English ears, “Phoenicians” sounds a lot like “Venetians” and both people’s ruled the waves had mercantile and financial clout at one time or another, makes it very tempting for us to try to link them. It’s a shame we can’t hear Robert Firth’s opinion on them. He would have had something to say, I’m sure.
Tim, yes the behavior of the dems is self destructive of both dems and American and western civilization and culture. With that I agree. I can not agree that there is an organized repub party doing it. The repubs are as ineffective and clueless as the dems.
Could just be the “world” wants to weaken an overbearing arrogant power. The world being everybody with money who is not a dem or repub of the US. Without a goal of a new system just the goal of weakening and destroying an oppressive force.
For that scenario of MM’s to be viable, both parties would need to be puppets or tools in the hands of the real powers, who work through them to exert political, economic and social control over the lower orders. So I would agree with you: most politicians across the spectrum are ineffective and clueless.
The “world”—that would be “the real powers”. They obviously don’t want to have to deal with a recalcitrant superpower that considers itself “the indispensable nation” any longer. It’s time to take the US down a peg or three.
Surely that cannot be real????? It can’t be….
Your fuel pools are in good hands, Eddy.
Well-manicured hands, with impeccably trimmed cuticles, at least.
If NZ had spent fuel ponds mike would be put in charge
hahahaha… fell off a cliff…. hahahaha… keeled over… and fell off a cliff ….
Nice way to end her special day hahaha
There were 2 main limits of the Roman Empire: the cold areas in the north, where water freezes, and the dry areas in the south, where water evaporates. When these 2 limits were reached, the empire collapsed.
With the advent of the fossil fuels and nuclear, it was possible to heat the cold areas and create a new empire, called The West. China is dry in the north, so no such modern empire is possible in Asia, also due to the mountain areas constraints.
What is the main difference between the human and the natural environments? It is the presence of the concentrated chemical elements:
Baby
https://icl-sf.com/ie-en/products/ornamental_horticulture/2041-universol-blue/
The industry allows for the concentration of these chemical elements.
The main condition needed for the existence of the human civilization is the agriculture. That is why the largest religion is Christianity, represented mainly by the Catholicism and Orthodox churches, which worship food industry products: bread and wine.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Christian_denominations_by_number_of_members
The Protestantism is a bridge to atheism, i. e. the complete loss of the faith in the ability of the humans to survive here on Earth, represented by the notion of the “Rupture”. That is why the Protestantism does not worship bread and wine, it is a complete loss of faith in the possibility of the existence of the human civilization here on Earth.
What’s the difference between the “Rapture” and the “Rupture”?
My guess is that in the event of the former, you are taken away to heaven, while in the event of the latter, you are taken away to hospital.
Thanks, obviously, a spelling mistake. Rapture = vychvatenie in Slovak.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TQCzW0ZFowc&w=560&h=315%5D
Actually, I guessed you meant “rapture”, but I was not certain, because the term “rupture” is also used in Church history as a synonym for “schism”, such as when the Protestants broke with the Catholics at the time of the Reformation.
The much more common use of “rupture” is, of course, as a medical term meaning a break or tear in an organ or soft tissue.
Immunological Science (TM) at work in a CDC Vax Advisory Committee. No data? No problem. We can always monitor the effects in the post-marketing period, right? Right. Yea.
“The CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) voted unanimously to recommend adding a new Hepatitis B vaccine to the schedule despite the trial showing 14 myocardial infarctions (heart attacks) and having zero safety data on administering it simultaneously with other vaccines. This new Hep B vaccine is the first vaccine to target the innate immune system.”
https://www.bitchute.com/video/YtMe9J5eLjDi/
A really good article by Chris Martenson
“When False Narratives Break”
https://www.peakprosperity.com/when-false-narratives-break/
It seems to me as if all of these narratives are brought to us by our self-organizing economy. It is the fact that there is not enough energy of the right kinds to go around that pushes the economy to act strangely. Politician shut down their economies partly because they want to save on fuel, and partly as an excuse to borrow more money. Leaders of pharmaceutical countries were desperate enough for a profitable product that convincing everyone that the poorly tested product should be used on everyone made sense.
Chris Martenson isn’t going to tell us what happens “when false narratives break” in Part 1. The answer, for those who subscribe, is in Part 2.
It seems to me that the false narratives may be necessary to get people angry enough to rid of the current leadership of quite a few major countries. It probably will get people very angry with the pharmaceutical industry and the big doctor/hospital groups that have been pushing the vaccines.
Has anyone read Part 2? What does Chris say happens when narratives break?
“Feb. 2022 – Market ALERT
Markets, Russia, Covid…something wicked is on the way
by Chris Martenson
Friday, February 11, 2022, 8:49 PM”
part 2 is a “Market ALERT” so perhaps it’s just a guess about the near term future of markets.
part 1 was spot on, a more real counter narrative that seems to be common knowledge at OFW and some other places but is mostly unknown to the MSM.gov sheeple.
What breaks is the notion of a “Narrative”
Let alone the word “Narrative” to me applies for a hog house.
If you need a hog master for your daily narrative, I have no problem with that.
Can I give you a differet narrative ? No.
In the end, you die or you multiply.
A “narrative” never fed me well for my work of the day.
I enjoy understanding many details of reality.
off topic, it was quite fun last year to learn that for a human visitor to Mars, there is no possible way to escape the gravity of Mars and make a return to Earth.
little things, but sometimes fun.
CM above is giving his own narrative in part 1, and to me it’s very compatible with the standard consensus OFW narrative, though of course that is debatable.
there is more to life than just food and basic shelter, obviously.
if the internet fails soon and I lose these many sources of information that allow me to fill in a narrative that closely resembles reality, that would be quite devastating to me, at least I think so NOW, even if I still had a source for those basics such as food and shelter.
why are you here? Is this not food?
“off topic, it was quite fun last year to learn that for a human visitor to Mars, there is no possible way to escape the gravity of Mars and make a return to Earth.”
Yeah this is interesting to learn, but it should have always been obvious since there are no fossil fuel reserves on Mars to fuel up with.
And no liquid water, no air to breathe, no food to eat…. but it’s absolutely a viable place to “colonize” to these people apparently.
> And no liquid water, no air to breathe, no food to eat…. but it’s absolutely a viable place to “colonize” to these people apparently.
As I have said before, very expensive sightseeing.
“it may thus even involve “aliens” as its final act.”
Good enough for me. Is she sweet as sin and fits inside a sleeping bag together with me? Better even, a sweet smart ass robot broad.
I’m a simple man.
Simple needs.
Even simpler thoughts.
“why are you here? Is this not food?”
To inform “humanity” about the inevitable seven stages of grief. Knowledge is power. And as we know it is Will to Power that rules the day.
I say let “them” dwell in their fantasies of whatever utopia circulates in and out of the mouth spouting trite drivel, absurd brains mostly full of shit as guided by the fantasies of the archaic regions, and eyes blinded by the myopia of ordinary.
Some people might consider that as contempt and resent. Which of course is true. The rapacious primate simply doesn’t know anything else than climb status hierarchies and fantasize about perpetual utopianisms that is diametrically opposed to evolutionary alignment.
It is best to just leave them alone in their suffering because there’s fundamentally nothing that can be done about the primate psyche and collective (sub)conscious. However, that doesn’t exclude compassion, simply because the suck is real.
If it doesn’t manifest in one particular embodiment (person), it surely will in future generations and thus the wheel of folly spins forever and ever as the cravings of the archaic regions will dictate the neocortex and its successor AGI’s to employ unfair advantage to realize the suffering it seeks to avoid through insatiable satisfaction at the detriment of everything else.
That is the crux, predicament, of the Rapacious Primate™.
Signing off.
/K
The atmosphere of Mars is 95% CO2 there we have the needed carbon. Water ice is available there we have the hydrogen and oxygen. We can made rocket fuel, breathe, drink, and grow (water). Yes some smaller components of dirt for farming may need to be imported not sure.
The road block current is the fed gov blocking the test launches. We may need to wait until after the November elections to get going again.
Thank you for suggestion of this article.
Succinct; in my experience.
‘So I was fortunate in one regard, but also, and readers here know this well, consigned to a life of isolation. I have had to decide to be happy living among automatons, as I cannot change them. Sometimes in my mind, on long drives or falling asleep, I imagine conversations with them wherein I am allowed to make my points and people even listen. Those conversations never take place in real life. It is like this, and will always be like this. We have to endure. It is a wacky and insane planet run by evil monsters, and populated by good and caring zombies.’
https://pieceofmindful.com/2021/07/30/living-among-good-and-caring-automatons/
Wow! I can relate to this.
I do too. But much to my surprise, I found that in Russia I was in the 95%, not in the 5%.
Maria del Carmen Yanez, mayor of the larger Lobios council, of which Aceredo is part, blamed the situation on the lack of rain in recent months, particularly in January, but also on what she said was “quite aggressive exploitation” by Portugal’s power utility EDP, which manages the reservoir.
On Feb. 1, Portugal’s government ordered six dams, including Alto Lindoso, to nearly halt water use for electricity production and irrigation, due to the worsening drought.
Contacted by Reuters, EDP said the low reservoir levels were due to the drought, but that it was managing water resources “efficiently” and that these were above the minimum requirements, including Alto Lindoso.
Questions over the sustainability of reservoirs are not new. Last year, several Spanish villages complained about how power utilities used them after a rapid draw-down from a lake by Iberdrola in western Spain. The company said it was following the rules.
Environment Ministry data shows Spain’s reservoirs are at 44% of their capacity, well below the average of about 61% over the last decade, but still above levels registered in a 2018 drought. A ministry source said drought indicators showed a potential worsening in the coming weeks, but did not yet detect a generalised problem throughout the country.
Jose Alvarez, a former construction worker from Lobios, felt a mix of nostalgia and fatalism at he remembered his working days in Aceredo.
“It’s terrible, but it is what it is. That’s life. Some die and others live,” he said.
(Additional reporting by Emma Pinedo, Andrei Khalip and Sergio Goncalves; Writing by Emma Pinedo; Editing by Andrei Khalip and Alison Williams
This seems to be a fairly common situation with hydroelectric power. Just when you need it most, it doesn’t seem to be available.
That, too, will happen in (geo) politics. Just when they need it the most, it will fail. The Neanderthal could be fooled once, twice. The informed can be fooled only once. And that part seems to be behind us.
Stupidity and war for dinner. Not in that order.
What is the situation with that new dam in Ethiopia, and the squabbles downstream with Sudan and Egypt not getting the water (from the Blue? Or White Nile) they need as Ethiopia “diverts” the Nile to fill the reservoir? And how about the Three Gorges Dam? Any updates on that?
Three Gorges Dam is “hanging in there.” It delivered a record amount of electricity in 2020, with the heavy rainfall.
https://www.waterpowermagazine.com/news/newsthree-gorges-dam-sets-new-annual-power-generation-record-for-2020-8435712
The greenwise Portuguese government decided to close the country’s two coal-fired power plants in 2021 (global worbling y’ know) and so the hydros were called upon to fill part of that gap. But as there has been little rainfall and most of the dams are today, in this sunny middle winter nightmare, at between 50 and 80% of their storage capacity, their energy production has to be suspended, since the main use of this water is for human consumption (including agriculture and cattle raising).
And what’s the greensmart solution? To buy from Spain/France/Argelia energy produced with coal/gas/nuclear! Such are the joys of living in a denial-socialist paradise.
Denial-Socialism should be recognized as one of the categories of contemporary politics. (OTOH isn’t it just the last link of the old progressive chain, launched with the Enlightenment? Of course they are.)
I will stand up for the enlightenment. The enlightenment stands for logic and reason and planning. I would say it is the discovery of mass communications and mass propaganda that has lead to the use of fantasy in politics and social planning. The lie because they can and it makes money in the short term for them.
Buying coal/gas/nuclear from someone else is like buying indulgences from the church. If we do not directly burn the coal we are free of sin. hahahahahah
Personally, I’m all for logic and reason, Ed, and the ideals of the Enlightenment (freedom, democracy, etc.) do sound excellent. The problem is that since humanity in general is devoid of logic and reason, the planning part always necessarily falls into the hands of the elite, whose plans of course never include us except in the role of servants.
I would say that despite their beautiful libertarian rhetoric, the Enlightenment ideals only served, ultimately, a strategy of social division and atomization, as national sovereignty and independence were eroded for the benefit of the financial globalists. In short, we exchanged the tyranny of kings and priests for that of financiers and social engineers.
Not that any of this was a matter of choice (at least by ordinary people). In fact, liberalism and capitalism spread because they were the theories best suited to dissipating the energy manna of fossil fuels. And we all benefited from both as long as growth was possible.
The thing is…
People believe in democracy …hahahahahahahahaahaha….. hahahahahahaahahahahaha…
Imagine if we tried that hahahahaha…the f789ing MOREONS would all be voting for free everything hahahahaahahahaha…
stoopid f789ing DUNCES… must be controlled … because they are dangerous… they must be kept in pens… and smacked if they get out of line..
Stooopid beasts…
Sheeple would believe in talking tomatoes if tomorrow the news were to report the sensational findings of a recent study led by Oxford’s most eminent tomatologists. Nothing to be done about it.
is that to-may-tologists?
or to-mah-tologists?
In his book “De fructibus non existentibus”, Pliny the Elder states that, since tomatology is not an exact science, the name can be pronounced as one pleases (“Verbum pronunciari potest ut placet”), with which I absolutely agree.
Corporate price hikes are not root cause of soaring US inflation
Claire Savage, AFP USA Facebook Twitter Email Published on Friday 11 February 2022 at 16:43
Facebook posts claim that the rising cost of goods in the United States is due to price gouging rather than inflation. But experts rejected the idea that corporations are the main culprit and said the spike in prices follows big federal spending, heightened demand, and supply problems, all of which have accompanied the pandemic.
“Can we stop calling it inflation and start calling it what it really is? Price gouging and corporate greed,” says a January 25, 2022 post on the Occupy Democrats Facebook page that has been shared more than 45,000 times
The latest government figures show US prices rose 7.5 percent over the 12 months to January. The cost of essential goods such as food, gas, clothes, and housing have all experienced large increases. Wage costs have also risen markedly, with the pandemic partly to blame as workers have been able to demand higher pay for vacancies that employers have been struggling to fill since the economy began to rebound in 2021.
Desmond Lachman, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute think tank, said that blaming current price increases solely on corporations is “very far fetched.”
“If they’ve got the power to push up prices, to gouge, why didn’t they do it before the pandemic?” said Lachman, a former deputy director of the International Monetary Fund. “You might find instances where people are taking advantage of the situation to jack up prices, but that’s not really what’s driving the inflation.”
Instead, high prices are more likely the result of big budget federal spending, low Federal Reserve interest rates and overseas supply problems, he said.
Northwestern University economics professor Mark Witte agreed that corporate price hikes are an unlikely culprit for inflation. “Logically, it takes a change to explain a change. You see something happen that hadn’t happened before,” he said.
He attributed the current inflation to “a run-up of demand” and “a constriction of supply.”
People are buying “much more stuff than we did pre-Covid,” which is putting pressure on the system, he said, noting that it would not make sense to conclude that corporations were not greedy before, as “that is sort of a constant.”
The Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center’s Benjamin Page said: “The pandemic shifted a lot of demand from services, like people going out to restaurants and movie theaters, to goods, like buying home office equipment and cars. And that shift represented a big, big increase in demand for certain types of goods.”
Like Lachman, Page also mentioned government spending, such as pandemic relief programs, as a cause for inflation.
The theory that firms suddenly became more greedy “doesn’t pass the smell test,” said Page.
“There are a lot of things that go on in the economy that impact inflation, but I do think that… that argument of corporate greed is pretty much a red herring.”
” high prices are more likely the result of big budget federal spending, low Federal Reserve interest rates and overseas supply problems, he said.”
Exactly! This is what happens when every country tries to issue more debt directly, and overspend its income, to when there really isn’t enough to go around.
I don’t think that this is really true: “People are buying “much more stuff than we did pre-Covid.” Maybe a few people, in some rich countries. But they still are not taking as many vacations in far away lands. They still aren’t going to as many concerts. Quite a few older people are still spending a lot of time hiding inside.
Price guging does not matter as long as you do not need to “buy”.
Inflation does not matter when you do not need to “buy”
Diesel shortage does not matter when you do not need to fuel
Goods shortage does not apply whan you are not short of goods (essentials)
Buy Gold and Silver and eat that for breakfast!
Washington Post
Booster effectiveness wanes after 4 months, but showed sturdy protection against hospitalization, CDC study shows
Lena H. Sun
February 11, 2022, 3:01 PM·5 min read
Booster effectiveness wanes after 4 months, but showed sturdy protection against hospitalization, CDC study shows
Booster shots of the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines lose substantial effectiveness after about four months – but still provided significant protection in keeping people out of the hospital during the omicron surge, according to a study published Friday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Researchers found the booster shots remained highly effective against moderate and severe covid-19 for about two months after a third dose. But their effectiveness declined substantially after four months, suggesting the need for additional boosters, the study said.
Subscribe to The Post Most newsletter for the most important and interesting stories from The Washington Post.
The vaccine was 91% effective in preventing a vaccinated person from being hospitalized during the two months after a booster shot, the study found. But after four months, protection fell to 78%.
Protection faded more in preventing trips to urgent care and emergency departments, falling from 87% in the first two months to 66% after four months. After more than five months, vaccine effectiveness fell to roughly 31%, but researchers noted that estimate was “imprecise because few data were available” for that group of people.
Protection from the two-dose vaccine regimen has declined since omicron became dominant, but a third dose revs the immune system back up to robust levels to prevent moderately severe and severe disease, an earlier CDC study found.
But how long that third shot’s protection lasts is a critical question facing public health officials because many people received their third dose months ago. Waning immunity after a third shot of mRNA vaccine during omicron has been observed in Israel and in preliminary reports from CDC, the study said. But Friday’s report represents the first real-world data in the United States of what is known as the durability of that protection during delta and omicron.
During a White House covid-19 briefing Wednesday, Anthony Fauci, President Joe Biden’s chief medical adviser on the pandemic response, said officials will base booster decisions on real-world “efficacy in preventing, for example, hospital visits, as well as hospitalizations.
HEALTH AND SCIENCE
EU investigates reports of menstrual disorders after mRNA Covid shots
PUBLISHED FRI, FEB 11 2022 10:18 AM EST
UPDATED FRI, FEB 11 2022 5:33 PM EST
Reuters
KEY POINTS
The European Medicines Agency’s safety committee said on Friday it was reviewing reports of heavy menstrual bleeding and absence of menstruation from women who had received Covid-19 vaccines from Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna.
The assessment was in view of reports of menstrual disorders after receiving either of the two vaccines, both based on messenger RNA technology, and it was not yet clear whether there was a causal link, the agency said.
Israeli already know this very well.
“…the most common symptom reported in the study is irregular menstruation… In addition, neurological and allergic reactions were found to be much less common than with previous COVID-19 vaccines.
Overall, the study found that most of the symptoms reported by the participants were less severe compared to previous vaccines.”
(the last phrase indicates implicitly that with previous doses the disturb was stronger..)
https://www.jpost.com/health-and-wellness/coronavirus/article-695964
Syncitin called is this and was the first concern by Dr. Wodarg in Germany after reading about the lipid Nanoparticles.
Unfortunately Dr Wodarg is just a lunatic Nazi wanting to establish white male supremacy.
Noting to see here.
Where are the academics making models like the LTG model now a days? They must exist but I am not aware of them. Can anyone point me to some? Thanks.
have LTG models been “rerun”, or are they still close enough to 2020s reality that they don’t need to be rerun?
I like Dr. Tim Morgan and his attempt at his SEEDS model, Surplus Energy Economic Data, where he takes the data from recent decades and is trying to model the near future.
his latest article posits PXE, which to me is kinda cool, it’s Prosperity (E)Xcluding Essentials, which he calculates to be overall prosperity declining even as costs of essentials are rising, so the prosperity “above” essentials is being squeezed relentlessly.
otherwise, I don’t care much for modeling of pollution and population numbers.
the relentless squeeze on PXE eventually will collapse IC and make pollution a non-issue, and population will collapse in its own timing.
it is what it is.
bye bye PXE.
I am not sure.
Before the book 2052: A Global Forecast for the Next Forty Years was published, Delores (Doly) Garcia in the UK was working on a supposedly updated model of the LTG model. She would write about the model on The Oil Drum.
Jorgen Randers, the author of 2052 decided not to use it when he prepared his forecast for the book. We can debate whether her version of the LTG model was any good; what Randers came up with showed rapidly growing renewable energy being very helpful, but there was no LTG model to support the assertions of the book.
I suppose it is now 10 years later, and someone could be looking for another update. I don’t think that the Club of Rome wants a gloomy forecast, however. It has become a very “green” organization.
UK actuaries have been interested in the general idea, but they have preferred to look at EROEI-based models, rather than models following the LTG approach. EROEI-based models can be used to support the assertion that insurance companies can be expected to pay their claims, indefinitely. My impression a few years ago was that they didn’t understand that there was a lower bound for EROEI that was different from 1:1. Thus, any resource that seemed to be available, we could expect to use. It seemed to produce results pretty much like the reserve to surplus ratios for calculating expected future quantities of minerals.
http://theoildrum.com/node/5145
Her article in the oil drum: europe
figure 4.2.1 show natural gas use peaking in 2027. Interesting.
I think she over estimate the recoverable amount of coal with its use growing fast out to 2067.
She concludes
“The main conclusion of the results of the New World Model is that, if the world continues behaving as we have so far, decline is inevitable in the long run. This isn’t a surprise and the fact that we are on an unsustainable path can be deduced from much simpler and reliable calculations. What this model provides is some slightly more refined ideas about how this could happen and, more importantly, it’s a tool where we can experiment with our ideas on how to solve this problem.”
here is a version of the world3 model in python3 that can be installed in windows
https://towardsdatascience.com/exploring-the-limits-to-growth-with-python-674133874eed
sadly lacking in documentation
Ed, searching for LTG today will only bring up Bill Gates.
There was a presentation by scientists not many years ago that showed that we are EXACTLY on the path as the model described.
If you just fire up Wikipedia you will see that there have been numerous updates on the model and the underlying data.
It happens right here right now!
“Turkey’s president announced a significant reduction in taxes on basic food supplies Saturday as the country faces rampant inflation and numerous protests over eroding living standards.
“President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said the value-added tax would be lowered to 1% from 8% on food purchases.”
https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/turkey-lower-taxes-basic-foods-fight-high-inflation-82844588
“Fitch downgraded Turkey’s sovereign debt and issued a scathing verdict on president Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s plan to tackle soaring inflation…
“Fitch issued a negative outlook for Turkey’s debt, meaning that it could face further downgrades, and said that the financial system had been made more vulnerable by frequent and intense episodes of financial stress that it said were driven by policymakers.”
https://www.ft.com/content/d6799877-7bae-4f78-b53d-8d1828a41c82
His beloved vision of a new Ottoman Empire can perhaps be shelved.
One could pay taxes then, to the great Sultan, using one’s children – now that could be revived!
Just as open slavery popped up again in Libya.
Correct analysis.
Sort of like adding more debt to try to make the system work.
“…the planet continues to build up heat at a rate of 4 Hiroshima bomb detonations worth of heat every second.”
Wow, scary. Meanwhile you, I and everyone else depend on fossil fuels to eat, clothe ourselves, drink clean water and heat our homes. If we stop using them, we will die.
1) We will all die anyhow. Just give it some time and nature will have its way with us.
2) We will stop using fossil fuels because we will run out of the stuff. Simple as that.
What is your problem?
not all. we will mostly die.
Ed – At 10c average earth temp we all die. Add in all the massive feedback mechs and most life on the planet dies. Add in the 450 Nuke plants not being maintained and total melt down due to collapse and even the cucaracha will have a hard time. Add in the near absolute certainty of nuclear war when it becomes clear that we are all phucked and the planet is toast.
I for one am doing everything I can to try and make sure this all does not happen.
Everything?
You have a computer… you just posted on OFW — do you know how much energy is used to power a server farm?
Are you living in the bush … hunting and gathering?
Ah right you have a home … and you spend money … and you buy stuff… but I know I know … what you buy is essential … if others buy stuff they are being wasteful..
Tell us more about how you are doing everything.
He needs the computer so he can convince everyone else online to stop wasting resources and energy on computers and online activity.
Our own Greta.
Notice he has zero suggestions about what exactly we should do about climate change.
He also gave a link to The Guardian. Guardian readers tend to think climate change is caused by other people who don’t read The Guardian and that it can be stopped without any major inconvenience to their lives just by shutting down all the oil companies.
Ey Fast, why not have fun on OFW while going down the drain.
I like it and I must admit that probably 1753 Wh of energy being wasted on each post here is pure fun.
Fun is all we wanted here in the fist place, no ?
So, honk for posts on OFW!
Errr… ya… just burn the f789er to the ground …
I think everybody should do their own little wastrel calculation.
Say compute the oil equivalent of the weight of their ‘stuff’. For example multiply the weight of your “shit” by 10. Now, there’s the weight in oil equivalent. Then google the resources and CO2 generated by spawning another progeny and add that to it. Electricity, water, housing, etc.
Yes indeed do that and post your oil equivalent.
Sure Nuclear Electric is an option🤪😆.sarcasm
Came across this on YouTube about the incompetence and flagrant cover up concerning Chernobyl from recent declassified Documents.
My gut feeling is humans basically are half🐴🙈 mediocre moreons at best and really can see too far ahead of them.
Wisioner
2 weeks ago
The second part (The KGB Archive on Chernobyl has been declassified. Horror), see the link: https://youtu.be/HeiqP93qz9Y
Pinned by Wisioner
Wisioner
2 weeks ago
See the first part (CHERNOBYL. Declassified KGB archives. They lied for 33 years!) at the link: https://youtu.be/35EdBUmK1V4
Anyway..Par for the Course
“Canadian police moved in Saturday to remove protesters who have disrupted Canada-US trade at a major bridge border crossing, though several trucks remained blocking traffic…
“The demonstrators are protesting against Canada’s Covid-19 mandates and restrictions. There is also an outpouring of fury toward the prime minister, Justin Trudeau.”
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/feb/12/canada-ottawa-protest-police-us-border-bridge
“French police fired tear gas at demonstrators on the Champs Elysees avenue in Paris on Saturday shortly after a “Freedom Convoy” protesting against COVID-19 restrictions made it into the capital.
“Cars carrying protesters managed to get through police checkpoints in central Paris to snarl traffic around the Arc de Triomphe monument.”
https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/police-stop-50-vehicles-heading-paris-protest-convoy-2022-02-12/
“Days-long rallies against COVID-19 vaccination mandates picked up in numbers in New Zealand and Australia on Saturday, with protesters blocking roads and disrupting the life of the countries’ capitals.
“Several thousand protesters gathered at Canberra’s major showgrounds… In New Zealand’s Wellington, hundreds of demonstrators gathered for a fifth day despite drenching rain… Inspired by truckers’ demonstrations in Canada, the protesters have occupied and blocked several streets…”
https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/new-zealand-australia-vaccination-mandates-protests-gain-numbers-2022-02-12/
Several thousand??
Good old MSM. Try a few hundred thousand, maybe more. I was there.
Did you do a count while you were there?
Clown
Hmmmm… been out all day trying to incite violence at the Wellington protests… it’s not working …anyway – I’ve got 300 comments piled up from OFW…..
Hey mike — take a guess at what I am about to do to reduce the back log hahahahaha
I’ve seen video – it’s massive.
Here in NZ the most we get is maybe 10,000…. Wet Beak — can you explain why so few are supporting this….
There is no disruption here in Wellington. The streets on the perimeter of parliament are clogged with vehicles but otherwise you would not know there a protest happening.
If you want to understand why there are relatively few NZers here … consider that mike is considered an insightful person by NZ standards… consider NZers voted in a DJ for PM…
And now you know
I suppose these protests replace the 2019 protests regarding reductions to the pension system.
When there are not enough goods and services to go around, the self-organizing system seems to make certain that the people in charge know that there is a problem.
“The Bank of England has begun talks with the U.K. Debt Management Office and the Treasury over how to handle active sales of bonds held in its quantitative easing portfolio, according an official with knowledge of the matter…
“…while the BOE’s intention to wind down its massive holdings has been well publicized, the speed at which the matter needs to be considered has likely come as a shock to officials.”
https://www.bloombergquint.com/global-economics/boe-said-to-begin-talks-with-debt-office-on-sales-of-qe-bonds
“The £100bn QE timebomb about to hit Britain’s struggling finances. Higher public debt costs are coming as rates rise…
“Since the middle of December… the price of a 10-year UK gilt has fallen by nearly 8pc… for government bonds it is a major move, and quite a shock to pension funds required by regulatory dictat to match burgeoning liabilities with assets which are supposedly completely bullet proof – by which regulators mean mainly top rated government bonds.
“One of those looking on with a growing sense of panic will be the Chancellor, Rishi Sunak, and not just because the effect of falling gilt prices is to greatly increase the costs and challenges of financing the deficit on government spending.
“What it also does is dramatically increase the losses likely to be sustained on the Bank of England’s £895bn stockpile of government debt, built up over more than 10 years of so-called “quantitative easing”.”
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2022/02/12/100bn-qe-timebomb-hit-britains-struggling-finances/
That sounds like it could be a ‘boof!’
Government responses to covid may have piled untold pressure onto an already precarious financial situation (do not ask me about how that all works).
Were government responses to covid proportionate? We can be fairly sure that states would never admit if they were not.
I am not going to harp on, but we knew early on what (Neanderthal) genes produce the severe response to covid, and it would have been simple enough to target measures at the vulnerable.
“That sounds like it could be a ‘boof!’”
Etymology 2 or 3, Mirror?! Could be painful either way. 😆
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/boof
Definitely 3. It is an English onomatopoeia. 🙂 Onomatopoeias are susceptible to double entendres.
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Category:English_onomatopoeias
bong
bonk
boo
boo hoo
boof
boom
boom-boom
I’ll take the top two in that order, please.
A bong and a bonk – sounds good!
Popular names for hunting dogs in the 19th century were:
Biff
Bang
Bong.
But, alas, not ‘bonk’, which really was a very 1980’s term for vigorous carnal intercourse, if I recall my student days correctly.
Much nicer, I suggest, that that sordid word ‘shag’.
Boom-boom has also entered the slang lexicon.
‘She has a gorgeous boom-boom.’
‘She is a nice bit of boom-boom.’
‘I would not mind a bit of boom-boom with her.’
(Usually understood as nevertheless to imply frontal relations, with the hinder part simply attractive.)
Im afraid the boom-boom we are soon to experience will be the literal meaning rather than some of the much more desirable inferred meanings.
“I would not mind a bit of boom-boom with her*.”
Damn right. No risk of perpetuating the humanoid folly and chauvinism while together with her* inside the sleeping bag.
(* my hottie robot broad)
Back to contemplating upon the failure of the species** I’m a specimen of.
(** the rapacious primate)
🤣👍👍
If you are going to ‘do’ 19th c. (Schopenhauerian) pessimism, then you are supposed do altruism, music, art and philosophy as ways to negate (or lessen) the organic drives that lead to ‘suffering’. Unnatural s/x is a particularly degenerate misunderstanding of pessimism, and it is liable only to inflame the drives. Also interpersonal strife and wind ups are a big ‘no’. If you are serious then you need to drastically change your behaviour. Your best bet is probably to read some commentaries on Schopenhauer as it was all ‘worked out’ in that context – and then maybe go off to India or China or somewhere and join a Buddhist monastery, maybe a silent one. You most certainly would not want to be hanging around in web discussions.
Some people are good with words. But they choose to never express what is in their soul directly. The whole world is a crossword puzzle and their tongue and pen a sword used without compassion. They never ever start a sentence with the word I. Meaness is meaness. Meaness is a expression of unhappiness that can not be expressed directly because that would entail honesty and vulnerability. Those that use words in this manner are pretenders. They use the supposed sophistication of their arguments to create a unassailable wall to hide behind. So much energy just to be mean. If that energy was used to discover the source of their unhappiness and fear it is possible solutions could be found. Why is that unthinkable? I will never understand.
one of the first things one was taught in English primer lessons was that a sentence in the narrative form, should not begin with ‘I’ if it could be avoided.
Maybe that is a bit ‘old school’ now, but I guess it just ‘sticks’, much like multiplication tables, up to x12, endlessly chanted at about 7-8 yrs old, but they are still ‘stuck’ in my head and can be recalled faster than any calculator.
@jj:
“They should….”
or
“I will…”
uuuh, far way to go here…
Young people who go to huge dance parties and fornicate to DJ music must be raving bonkers!
“one of the first things one was taught in English primer lessons was that a sentence in the narrative form, should not begin with ‘I’ if it could be avoided.”
Language is a very powerful thing. It is so powerful that it creates both problems and solutions.
To some extent uttering or writing a word is always a artificial representation. In itself the word is just a model. A individual always is the creative force that selects the words groups them together and asserts the relationship has meaning.
Great problems are created by humans including myself being unable to realize emotionally that groupings of words are not real. someone says “your mom wears army boots” . You punch them in the nose.
Humans are motivated by many things. As silly as the like dislike choice is it is fundamental to our perception. I for instance value what i consider honesty. Am I fundamentally able to identify it? thats debatable.
I just used I twice. Did you see what it does? It puts things in perspective . It returns my words to the reality that they are models I am placing together. The extent that they are truth is only based on my perception and the readers perception.
We may seek to portray truth with our words. We may seek effect. Often I believe people pretend to portray truth when they only seek effect. I denote those people as pretenders.
To some extent we are all pretenders. We pretend to ourselves as well. We form and create words pretending that we are capable of creating truth.
Its not just our words effect on others. We can place too much value on others words. If someone we value says creates words that destroy we believe. If they create words that affirm we believe. We can not separate our understanding of that humans value from their words. They may use words without skill or intent. Even if they do have skill fundamentally the words are not reality just a representation of reality.
Their are a lot of different nuances to this. Our words have power. They effect the world. You can witness people saying they are creating truth but really all they care about is effect. Because of this if I see that someone using words is trying to minimize their effect but doing their very best to portray the relationships they are creating I am more apt to be receptive. On the other hand we can not separate our words from our desire to effect.
None of this are we able to comprehensibly integrate with our emotions and perceptions. We wield power and have egos. Integral to every single word relationship we create is the fact that “i believe ” before every creation is appropriate.
I believe that when one witnesses someone judging another in a negative way whether they identify that opinion as opinion changes the communication in a major way. Citing unassailable references is one way to deny that their is motive to effect. This denial is often not just to the recipient of their communication but themselves as well. My belief is that the thing we regard as the truth is best served by acknowledging both the fundamental and significant flaws inherent to the representations we assert as truth denoted as words and also our lack of integration as human creatures. This means we return to “i” at frequent intervals in spite of our desire to reject it if it detracts from the effect and power of our words. If we find ourselves reluctant to identify our communication as opinion it reflects dysfunction both in our message and our work on ourselves. To a great extent i regard this dysfunction as dishonest on many different levels. The judgment I create and the emotions i feel upon witnessing it are mine however I own that and those no one else.
nicely put jj
enjoyed your summary very much.
my comment about using ‘I’ was not definitive though—just a generalisation
true, language is a very powerful thing. I try to learn from the masters of the art, but i recognise myself as a stumbling beginner by comparison.
i look on it in the same light as painting, music, sculpture—there are the true ‘greats’, –their work can stir emotion in ways we perhaps do not understand—
the rest of us are mere wishful thinkers.
jj, correct me if I understood you wrong.
People have an affinity for beating around the bush by using words and sentences they cobble together by whatever means necessary as to impose, will, on other people.
Disregarding Homo Sapiens Sapiens as an evolutionary hodgepodge of various misfit parts cobbled, evolved, onto the frame of a primate seem sensitive enough for the most human-chauvinistic of the lot.
No I don’t want to deal with the fantasies, desires, whims and wishes of the, quite frankly, boring collective (sub)conscious of human affairs. It is an tragedy in unfolding and it saddens and worries me.
It is just the same repetitions over and over and over again. All retch and no vomit. The only real thing going on is the advancement of complexity in the development of new technologies. Which is still in its infancy, but I’d rather have something than nothing.
It is clear that the sociological aspects of the primate brain clearly is maladapted to function within the context of rising complexity as its embodiments (“social” media) mostly is used as a reflection of the archaic collective (sub)conscious of a species with primate origins.
Yes, people want to impose. That is what primates do as they strive for social status, sex, monies and all the other stuff that makes a primate into a somebody instead of a nobody.
Isn’t existence and curiosity reward enough in and of itself?
Kow;
Not to cite a unassailable reference myself but much of my beliefs in this matter come from korzybskis work “science and sanity” that i read in my early twenties. It was a profound influence in my life and apparently I am not alone.
https://steven-gibson.medium.com/science-and-sanity-and-alfred-korzybski-a25ad01e1bad
“Isn’t existence and curiosity reward enough in and of itself?”
I am afraid I see it different kow. I see it as self evident that no badly how you fail according to your self created metrics you have a duty to try to love yourself that came with your decision to claw your way out of the womb. It may not be intuitive but that decision that is part of our essence effects many things around us. Any self created word relationships that contradict our duty are not what i regard as truth. I believe giving words value above self evident truth may keep us from expressing our essence to its fullest potential. While this could be viewed as “rose colored glasses” syndrome I believe that when words are arbitrarily given unchecked value without understanding their fundamental flaws and limitations it can and does create tremendous problems, unhappiness and enables what korzybski denotes as “unsane” not “insane”.
Yes words can be used to deceive but the greater issue is how they deceive by their very nature and how we are unaware of that deception.
In my opinion a aspect of what we call cognitive dissonance is a characteristic of words limitations manifesting and individuals being unable to identify what is occurring.
jj,
“I am afraid I see it different kow. I see it as self evident that no badly how you fail according to your self created metrics you have a duty to try to love yourself that came with your decision to claw your way out of the womb.”
Do not confuse scathing critique, contempt and irony for the species as evidence of self hatred.
If I’m to will something upon my (more sapient) brethren, perhaps some self critique would be in order before going for the “default” (boring) proclivities as defined by the insane collective (sub) conscious of the primate psyche leading to the self and species-destructive ‘tryhardisms’ of the egos in one form or another, say the conservatives “vs” the liberals. It’s just suffering at the end of the road for both fantasies of reality as it inevitably leads to overshoot and collapse and then it all repeats ad nauseum (as history proves).
The BS of the “elites” certainly trickles down to the hoi polloi in one form or another and that certainly shows in the current “events”. I mean, “vaxxing” the herd with god knows what because the world is “overpopulated” and we have run out of cheap resources, exactly because of the implications from crafting the collective (sub) conscious as their mirror image. Despicable.
How about leading by example, or are the “tryhard” “high IQ” princesses and princes of IC too fucking spoilt to accept some self-imposed suck instead of the default ones that manifests when lying to themselves about the necessity of their MOARonisms?
Unfortunately I sincerely think they are. However, I’ll change my mind in a hurry once I gather sufficient evidence of the contrary.
Quantitative tightening sounds like a disaster waiting to happen!
All these new tech being advertised won’t benefit today’s poor.
A social darwinistic pressure will eliminate most of the poor, quietly, as those with means will simply exclude them from everything.
The future will be gentrified. The energy they might use will be offset by their reduced population.
A world which could have been reached much earlier if a few idiots felt a little bit less dutiful in 1914.
“The pandemic ‘quickly eroded savings’ for Gen Z, millennials.
“Only about half of all Americans – 53% – say they now have more money in their emergency savings than what they owe in credit card debt — an unfortunate side-effect of the pandemic.”
https://www.cnbc.com/2022/02/12/the-pandemic-quickly-eroded-savings-for-gen-z-millennials-study.html
“U.S. consumer sentiment falls to ‘stunning’ decade low as inflation expectations hit 13-year high…
““…the recent declines have been driven by weakening personal financial prospects, largely due to rising inflation, less confidence in the government’s economic policies, and the least favorable long term economic outlook in a decade.””
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/u-s-consumer-sentiment-falls-to-stunning-decade-low-as-inflation-expectations-hit-13-year-high-11644592237
I’m waiting for gas prices to rise in the U.S. That will be the end. American s are so tied to their car and that’s a cost that they can’t escape…
Nothing will happen in Ukrainian war… not enough energy back door deals will be made . Both sides will declare victory.
These arguments that there is a deep state are sadly not true…. More like a deep stare of idiots! Why else would you have the Democrats putting up some homosexual that likes to walk other men on a dog leash into high office
I am sure that if the equivalent measure were made in other countries, say the Germany and Turkey, the consumer sentiment measure would have dropped even further.
I expect quite a few of the rich are better off, however. Stock prices and home prices are pretty high.
Sure but those largely represent assets that have no buyers at those overinflated prices. The truly rich are making out like bandits as they do during most periods of turmoil, especially when they have the real picture and fund disinformation on massive scales for the hoi poloi.
A lof of people who are “comfortably retired” are going to be quite shocked when they can’t actually convert their house and equity portfolios into the amount of liquid cash they need or are expecting, whether in actual value terms with massive inflation or actual deflation.
This is NOT about ME , but pointing out the What IS!
Professor Director McPherson latest on YouTube concerning the corrupt Court System
People who need to move now are pinched by rising mortgage rates, sky-high home prices and rising rents.
The estimated monthly mortgage payment for a typical home for sale rose 25% year over year—or $388—to a record $1,931. That’s based on the all-time high median asking price of $376,000 recorded during the four weeks ending February 6, and an average 30-year mortgage rate of 3.69%.
Pending sales were down slightly from the same period in 2021, but 34% higher than they were two years earlier, weeks before the pandemic began. Meanwhile, the number of homes for sale was down 29% from a year earlier and down 50% from 2020. This constricted supply is depressing home sales, as mortgage purchase applications fell 10% during the week ending February 4.
As a result, the market’s pace is accelerating. Over half (55%) of homes that found a buyer spent two weeks or less on the market—the highest rate on record for this time of year.
“Movers are feeling a big pinch. There is nowhere for them to run from increasing housing costs now that mortgage rates are rising and inflation has spread to the rental market,” said Redfin Chief Economist Daryl Fairweather. “Homebuyers feel uneasy making offers on homes with such high asking prices, but there is no better alternative. Would-be homebuyers who bowed out last year are kicking themselves, but delaying purchasing a home another year could be a costly mistake. My advice to buyers who are worried they will have to overbid in order to win a home is to make sure they can see themselves living in the home for at least five years. I expect home values to rise over that time horizon even if there are short-term fluctuations in the housing market. Given how tough the housing market is for movers, it makes sense that so many homeowners are staying put. It’s also contributing to the shortage of new listings and making the market even tougher for buyers.”
Data based on homes listed and/or sold during the period:
The median home sale price was up 14% year over year to $353,750.
The median asking price of newly listed homes increased 15% year over year to an all-time high of $376,000.
The monthly mortgage payment on the median asking price was up 25% from a year earlier to an all-time high of $1,931. This was up 28% from the same period in 2020.
Pending home sales were down 0.5% year over year, but sales were up 40% from the same period in 2020, just prior to the start of the pandemic.
New listings of homes for sale were down 10% from a year earlier. Compared to January 2020, new listings were down 12%.
Active listings (the number of homes listed for sale at any point during the period) fell 29% year over year, dropping to an all-time low of 440,000. Listings were down 50% from the same period in 2020.
55% of homes that went under contract had an accepted offer within the first two weeks on the market, above the 49% rate of a year earlier and 41% in 2020. This is the highest the measure has ever been in January, and the highest level since March.
43% of homes that went under contract had an accepted offer within one week of hitting the market, up from 37% during the same period a year earlier and 29% in 2020. This measure is at a record high.
Homes that sold were on the market for a median of 29 days, down from 38 days a year earlier and 59 days in 2020.
41% of homes sold above list price, up from 32% a year earlier and 19% in 2020.
On average, 2.8% of homes for sale each week had a price drop, up 0.3 percentage points from the same time in 2021, but down 0.6 percentage points from 2020.
The average sale-to-list price ratio, which measures how close homes are selling to their asking prices, was 100.2%. In other words, the average home sold for 0.2% above its asking price.
Other leading indicators of homebuying activity:
Mortgage purchase applications decreased 10% week over week (seasonally adjusted) during the week ending February 4. For the week ending February 10, 30-year mortgage rates rose to 3.69%, the highest level since January 2020.
Touring activity through February 6 was 3 percentage points behind 2021 and 2 points behind 2020 relative to the first week of January according to home tour technology company ShowingTime.
The Redfin Homebuyer Demand Index rose 1% during the week ending February 6 and was up 9% from a year earlier. The seasonally adjusted Redfin Homebuyer Demand Index is a measure of requests for home tours and other home-buying services from Redfin agents.
Housing Market Update: Homebuyers’ Monthly Payments Up 25% to Record High
February 10, 2022 by Tim Ellis
Redfin.com
This is called “landlocked”
Either by location, or debt.
Being a free man or woman was granted by fossil fuels
Whenever these cost too much, you will no longer be free if you depend on them
That is not rocket science.
Plan B anyone?
Burgers and Fries for everyone!
So, do not complain, my friend.
Wheeping may help here or honking or stomping or what ever you like.
Why wouldn’t TruDUNCE just kill those mandates? Everyone who is ever gonna abide by them has already been shot with the Poison Juice… what’s the point of digging in.
The sooner mandates end the sooner we can get back to normal.
‘The truckers have had their say now they should go home’
Several possible explanations. The one I favor just now is that his doctors have put him on a combo of alprazolam and betablockers. Popular for high-pressure jobs. No visible side effects but complete removal of all stress reactions. A pharmaceutical version of the “Joo Janta 200 Super-Chromatic Peril Sensitive Sunglasses”. The only drawback is that the user fail to perceive real danger and dont take proper caution.
“No visible side effects”
I wouldn’t be so sure of that Oddys.
https://twitter.com/CliffHippoppen/status/1491864384733392898?s=20&t=z4Da5nR17hJoZP_4sV-JQw
Hahaha!
🙂 🙂 🙂
Remember when Bernanke was making those droning speeches during GFC? I recall thinking … he looks as if he’s on something .. cuz it was important he not break down and display fear…
He was in a zombie like state… still functional but with zero emotion.
TruDUNCE and Donkey (just up the road from me)… are involved in the extinction of humans… this is easy for Lunch Bucket Joe because he’s in Wonderland and thinks it’s 1965… he has no idea what is going on … but for the other two — they surely are jacked up on xanax… and the really good stuff… otherwise they’d crack and bust and start bawling and wailing…
This is dirty business … necessary business… but it’s like working in a slaughterhouse.. with 8B humans lined up at the door waiting to be processed. I am surprised that they have not lost their minds… even if you know this is the only option … having a hand in exterminating 8B men women and children .. even though most of them are MOREONS … and Imbeciles… still it must be difficult…
“Almost 90 per cent of truckers in Canada are vaccinated,” Trudeau said, speaking to reporters in French.
“I regret that the Conservative Party and Conservative politicians are in the process of stoking Canadians’ fears about the supply chain. The reality is that vaccination is how we’ll get through this.”
https://globalnews.ca/news/8533779/truckers-convoy-canada-vaccine-mandate/
Really? At the time of publication (January 24, 2022) almost 90 percent of truckers in Canada were vaccinated? Why aren’t the pro-vax media talking heads patting themselves and the government on the back for an incredibly successful uptake? This is a victory for science and medicine, right? Rapid “vaccine” deployment in response to a novel coronavirus, relatively rapid uptake among the population – where’s the f&*$ing victory lap, eh?
Combine the “almost 90 percent” injection rate among Canadian truckers with those who’ve recovered from the virus and have developed natural immunity, as well as the most prevalent strain (Omicron) being the least severe strain, and you no longer have a genuine health emergency.
Ukraine has activated the mechanism of the “Vienna Document”. That is a request to Russia to make a written statement about troops positions and numbers and equipment with details about locations and purpose. Russia has moved some units but it may do so in it’s own countrry.
If the request is not answered in 48 hours (!) it will activate the OSCE and their mechanisms termed as “emergency meeting”.
https://osce.usmission.gov/meeting-requested-by-ukraine-under-vienna-document-chapter-iii-regarding-unusual-russian-military-activity/
Russia has made a statement that the request by Ukraine is diplomatically malformed because of usage of “wrong wording” for the Area commonly known as “Krim”…
Moving troops in Russia might be “cheap” for Russia. Moving troops by NATO to Ukraine is quite costly.
Oil up 4% yesterday. That is quite a jump!…
So perhaps Ukraine, as much as anyone, is responsible for ramping up tensions. Of course, Ukraine is in the middle of the Russia/NATO/US conflict. The pipeline that Europe is getting its natural gas from goes through Ukraine. If Russia cuts off natural gas to Europe, Ukraine will be left without natural gas as well.
There has been a long-running argument between Ukraine and Russia what price Ukraine will pay for the gas it takes from the pipeline as it comes through the country. I would imagine that now, with inadequate total supply, there may also be an argument about the quantity of gas that can be skimmed off of the top.
I don’t really understand all of the dynamics now. Clearly, there is not enough natural gas to go around. That ramps up tensions.
I just finished reading “Forgotten Soldier” a WWII memoir by a young teen aged German army recruit in the German army. In Dec of 1942 his first assignment was to take convoy of supplies from Minsk to Stalingrad to supply the 6th army in Stalingrad.
There were no railways and poor roads. They had to struggle to manually clear snowdrifts that occurred each day, while dealing with incredible subzero temperatures. Then Russian fighter bombers destroyed half their convoy. They managed to get within 400 miles of Stalingrad when they received news of the surrender of the 6th army.
Rest assured, there will never again be wars fought in the Ukraine during the period Dec-February. Now days soldiers would just give up and desert. Only the hard discipline of the German army and the pistol bearing Russian Commissars prevented that in the brutal winters of 1942-1945.
To add to the misery, in the April time frame spring melts all the snow and it becomes a quagmire if off road. The only vehicles that can move vehicles with treads.
Mechanized warfare and ground based infantry warfare will also cease in that timeframe.
So there seems to be a VERY small window- perhaps a month or so in March in which ground warfare is possible there, until the summer dries out the muck.
Having the experience of fighting the Germans in the winter and spring in this area it is absolutely nonsense that there is going to be a Russian invasion.
You forget the amphetamine – called Pervetin by the germans. Neither barbarossa nor the u-boats had been possible without amphetamine.
Airplanes and missiles and ship based artillery no stop for war in Ukraine. Possibly drones and space based lasers.
The Guy Sajer book is fake, the unit he claimed to serve with didn’t exist.
It did exist….and Sajer existed….an officer remembered a Sajer serving in his unit.
In the ongoing confusion of the retreating front, and the reassembling of ad hoc units consisting of soldiers from multiple companies, after defeats in battle, his unit could have and probably did exist.
Few records exist of this anymore except for those captured and archived by the Russians, and potentially never having again seen the light of day.
The exact memory of a soldier after the fact of all the details is not the point.
The book is not a historical detail account, but a literary account imparting the desperate life of an infrantryman to survive the disaster. and the desperate position of the German army.
I guess from your comments the brutal cold, lack of supply and impassable winter and spring roads really did not happen…..you must have been there to know better.
The Gross Deutschland regiment existed but the part of it he claimed to serve in didn’t exist. There are quite a few other errors as well such as not knowing the calibre of Wehrmacht rifles.
I have read books about the war such as Stalingrad by Anthony Beevor which is very good. I read the Guy Sajer book many years ago and enjoyed it, but its like Sven Hassel books, fiction.
The fog of war….of all the German troops retreating on the Eastern front from 1942 to 1945 scarcely 0.01 % lived to talk about it. Those who did, were, in the words of a German general, “scarcely recognizable as German soldiers”. Shell shock, starvation, lack of sleep, stress for 3 yrs, I am surprised they would remember anything.
Certainly there are inaccuracies. For one he mentioned a 4 barrel machine gun (Russian) several times…not sure about this one.
If the Russia are not freezing now on one side of the line in the dirt why would they freeze on the other side? The other factor you mention spring melt is real. If they are going to blitz they need frozen ground. If it goes down it goes down before the melt. I think it will. The groundwork has been laid. Russia has a problem with Kiev and visa versa. Why would Russia wait for Ukraine to join NATO if conflict is inevitable? NATO may end up participating anyway but it is assured if Ukraine joins.
IF russia doesnt go in then they lose face now. they knew that when they requested the talks that were never going to be real negotiations. The talks amounted to a declaration of a manifesto. A declaration of why they were going in.
If no one wants WW III it probably will not be. But if anyone wants WWIII it will be. You got warships in the baltic. If a NATO ship gets sank thats WWIII. You got the polish border. If Russians take fire from that borde or visa versa its WWIII.
Space based assets could be used to destroy russian assets. Does russia use s500s to neutralize them? Thats wwIII.
Its possible russia will back down. They didnt in Georgia. They didnt in Syria. If they back down now the west will continue to arm and train Ukraine. A year from now Ukraine will be a much harder nut to crack.
All of this ignores crimea. The russians will not give up their only cold weather port. As much as the Donbass is culturally and ethnically russian crimea is so even more so. All other factors aside this is a big fly in the ointment. Kiev says crimea is a occupied Ukraine territory. russia says its russian. I
If ukraine builds military capability they will try to take crimea. From a military standpoint who know what the calculations are. A fight with ukraine now or a fight with ukraine later.
It would be insane to let ukraine join NATO. The crimea issue is a undeclared war. NATO would be joining a country at war with russia.
All of this was much much much better before the maidan. russia operated their navy. kiev did what kiev did. Both propably cursing the other but BAU.
Now the lines are drawn. No one can back down. Is Kiev going to say uhh we decided russia is not a crimea occupier its all good? No. Is russia going to say oh whoopsie we are going to give up our only cold weather port where 99% of the people speak russia and are ethnically russian because a couple motoltovs got tossed in kiev? no.
russia wants to take care of it now not later. I think it will go down. If somone wants to assert power via authoritarian governments their is no better excuse than war.
The risk is the stakes are so very high. If NATO loses well thats it russia is the big dog in europe. My guess is the afganistan debacle is feigned/incompetance weakness. NATO has some big ass tricks up their sleeve. Russia has a few too. If any party starts to lose the temptation to use some of those tricks will be incredibly strong. Somone is going to bite a ear off. Which party is the party that goes oh well we lost its not worth wwIII? This assumes this is not all kabuki with goals of asserting authoritarian governments and no one gives a hoot about crimea. The trouble is at the end of the day russia is operating their navy out of crimea or not. Some ones gonna “win” and someones gonna “lose” and it cant be glossed over with bs this time. There is significant commerce out of Crimea too.
Its a interesting situation. Why did everyone back down in 2014? THe donald cook incident theories seems to make sense. For whatever reason it seems to be back on again. My WAG three weeks max it either goes down or doesnt. I say it goes down now while the ground is frozen. Russia goes in sacks kiev then pulls back taking on donbass with a nice little buffer around it and crimea. Water problem solved. If T72s start spontaneously falling apart through the path of most resistance it could get interesting.
“My guess is the afganistan debacle is feigned/incompetance weakness. ”
1st prize for the most delusional comment of the day.
Western media is just propaganda and fantasy about Russia and Ukraine.
http://www.thesaker.is is a good place to start educating yourself.
“The russians will not give up their only cold weather port.”
I think you mean warm water port, though even then the statement is not true.
When you mention 1942 here, yes: a bag with hand grenades really will bring the ugly russians down to their knees.
I will enjoy to watch the russian military industry sales fair coming up together with my “watch friend” Mr. Fast.
She ain’t lookin great hahaha
https://drdrew.com/2022/heather-mcdonald-live-onstage-collapse-skull-fracture-recovery-tour-update-ask-dr-drew/
hahahaha https://video.twimg.com/ext_tw_video/1491957241209053221/pu/vid/320×532/LWaT4zpCKOh6xS2s.mp4?tag=12
Great – block the roads … for everyone https://www.rfi.fr/en/france/20220212-france-deploys-strong-police-presence-to-block-freedom-convoys-in-paris-covid-vaccine-protests
“Rate Hikes Pose Bigger Threat Than Ever Before for Europe’s Debt.
“Investors in European bonds are heading into this rate-hike cycle more vulnerable than they’ve ever been before, suggesting that the painful selloff of recent weeks could be only the beginning.”
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-02-12/rate-hikes-pose-bigger-threat-than-ever-before-for-europe-s-debt
“Watchdog sounds alarm on financial risks of Europe’s property boom.
“Europe’s financial regulators are warning the region’s housing market has “decoupled” from the rest of the economy since the pandemic hit, increasing risks for banks due to soaring property prices, loosening lending standards and rising household debt levels.”
https://www.ft.com/content/02d474fb-0ec4-4994-93c4-25067e39d8ba
It is difficult to believe that buyers can really afford these higher prices.
Furthermore, if interest rate hikes push the world economy into recession, some of the buyers will likely lose their jobs, making it difficult or impossible to keep up debt repayment.
Not only do they afford the high prices, but they immediately gut the properties and spend many more thousands in renovating and extending – ceaseless building work here as the elderly die off and young families move in.
They believe the work will pay off, want houses as big as possible (British houses are very small indeed to start with) and assume that the desirability of the location will make it all good in the end.
Absolutely no foresight. I suspect most of them don’r even recall 2008…..
I purchase a fair and varied amount of building materials. Materials appear to be going up faster than most segments and yesterday I saw my first obvious shortage at Menard’s, the shelves normally full of insulating foam were somewhat bare, price was up, available, but not as much. Insulating board is up about $20/ sheet from say $28 a year ago.
Everyone needs a roof, it is an essential, maybe in the long term it goes down, cost of heating in MN is up, and up.
Very hard to make spending decisions now, liquidity vs cost and more and more maintainability. Modern farm machinery seems to be a lease now, it is impossible to maintain at any reasonable price, an oil change is $600 with all the extras and this is on smaller equipment which does not require a semi.
Morgan sees less capital available going forward, seems like it here.
Dennis L.
There really is a double risk to long term bonds:
1. The higher interest rates now being paid will significantly decrease the sales vale of bonds, if they are sold before maturity. This is why the price of long term bonds is decreasing. (Discounting at a higher interest rate.)
2. There is a higher risk of default on these bonds before maturity, because the governments cannot really operate in an environment of high interest rates, especially if they are coupled with inadequate supplies of commodities of all kinds.
“Pig culls and fertiliser shortages mean higher prices for British shoppers.
“You don’t have to look very hard to see major problems brewing in British agriculture. Farms are packed with 200,000 overweight pigs, glasshouses once laden with salad leaves now sit empty, exports are falling and costs are soaring at a pace not seen for decades.”
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/pigs-farming-brexit-food-pri-b2013332.html
“Tensions in Russia and Ukraine have revealed a risk to the UK’s food supplies with soaring costs and post Brexit in-fighting helping to create a “perfect storm”, a farming chief has warned…
“I cannot understand why you would not treat food security as importantly as defence,” Minette Batters, president of the National Farmers’ Union told The Independent. “The quickest way to create a serious issue [for a country] is if you have food shortages.””
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/uk-food-security-ukraine-russia-b2013302.html
With fewer commodities being produced worldwide because of energy shortages, the result has to show up somewhere. At first, pig culls add pork to the food supply. But once the extra porks is out of the supply line, there are fewer pigs and less pork available.
Now the UK’s exports are falling. This makes it harder for the UK to import goods.
The Dunce
https://twitter.com/Cernovich/status/1492247702683357184?s=20&t=U7blRmH-wxvRu2OzqEtqMQ
Western values for the win !
Biden’s choice for the new director of nuclear waste disposal tells me this is an issue which is going to be tackled with all the gravity it demands.
https://media.gab.com/system/media_attachments/files/098/443/719/original/8791c0cb283aaa91.png
“Let’s say you’re doing pup play around the house and the pup decides to pee on the floor. Obviously the pup is going to be punished for that…’
“I tell people that if you’re going to be a good handler, you have to listen well,” Brinton said. “I can hear when Pup needs something faster, because of the difference in the grunts or the moans.”
https://headlineusa.com/biden-drag-queen-nuclear-waste/
I think we’ll be hearing grunts and moans sooner than we would like.
Western values for the win !
Even Ancient Rome can offer little to equal his level of perversion and decadence: you may sleep soundly Yanks, you are in very safe hands!
I have to say, though, the ‘pup-play’ leather mask looks quite tempting to wear if ordered to mask-up: it covers both mouth and nose after all, and such delightful ears! I think I’ll make one from the book-binding off-cuts box.
It also comes with an anal-probe tail for convenient Covid-testing.
Well, FE is all worried about spent fuel pools, but… perverts to the rescue!
This is really strange. But it is a win for Biden, if he his trying to show the Woke crowd that he really is tolerant of all kinds of lifestyles.
Perhaps this fellow(?) can be transferred to some sort of director of education, after he fixes up the nuclear waste disposal problem.
Bravo, Gail. I am sure he has trans-ferable skills…….
One of the most troubling things is that hIs shoes with high heels never match the dress.
Talk about storage. The biggest battery in the world…the Oceans!
“Extreme heat in oceans ‘passed point of no return’ in 2014”
“Formerly rare high temperatures now covering half of seas and devastating wildlife, study shows”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/feb/01/extreme-heat-oceans-passed-point-of-no-return-high-temperatures-wildlife-seas
The battery charger;
“…the planet continues to build up heat at a rate of 4 Hiroshima bomb detonations worth of heat every second.”
And the oceans absorb 90% of that.
“That’s nearly 2 billion atomic bomb detonations worth of heat accumulating in the Earth’s climate system since 1998…”
https://skepticalscience.com/4-Hiroshima-bombs-worth-of-heat-per-second.html
Which is how a massive 2200 square mile iceberg can melt away in just a few years.
Well, that’s way below the temp in the comments section. So, there’s no need to panic.
You’re right. Nearly all including most regulars on this site are pretty much I n denial of this warming driven exponential extinction of life on this planet. This site is about human energy collapse driven events. You’re onto wider knowledge of energy issues. Gail is right talking of the end times.
Fighting over crumbs let the witch find me. You don’t want to know what she did to me.
I reported her to the DoJ, but they wouldn’t listen.
https://www.grimmstories.com/en/grimm_fairy-tales/the_crumbs_on_the_table
…” most regulars on this site are pretty much I n denial of this warming driven exponential extinction of life”… what drivel is this? Gail has said, over and over, for years and years: that there is little or nothing that we can do about it.
There is no ‘denial’ here.
But doesn’t labelling people as deniers smack of a good preparation for our current demonisation of Vax-deniers? What a nice segue.
Enough is enough.
I would say that if anyone is in denial, it is not so much about the extinction of wildlife driven by global warming, but rather by the loss of habitats, as more and more wilderness is captured for human use.
Man, there was virtually no life when the planet was 10 degrees warmer. we are doomed.
drb – don’t know if you are being sarcastic or not but the last time the planet heated up it took thousands of years to do it allowing some of the flora and fauna to adapt.
This time it is happening faster than ever before.
If you were to read history instead of ‘the news’ which is mostly fake – you would know that in parts of the middle east — in a period measured in decades huge areas were turned to desert by ClCh…and back to viable farmland after a few more decades…
That was because they were driving too many cars and burning coal for electricity…
Desert,eh? That sounds fantastic. Just what we need, a few decades of desert. That’ll sort the men out from the boys.
The planet has been through loads of abrupt climate changes that have irrevocably collapsed equilibriums. Species adapt and continue to evolve over thousands and millions of years. Many go extinct – 99.9% of all species already have – and that does not really ‘matter’. AGW would be just another inevitable ‘natural’ event in the history of the planet.
https://www.britannica.com/science/climate-change/Abrupt-climate-changes-in-Earth-history
> …. Abrupt climatic changes occurring before the Pleistocene have also been documented. A transient thermal maximum has been documented near the Paleocene-Eocene boundary (56 million years ago), and evidence of rapid cooling events are observed near the boundaries between both the Eocene and Oligocene epochs (33.9 million years ago) and the Oligocene and Miocene epochs (23 million years ago). All three of these events had global ecological, climatic, and biogeochemical consequences. Geochemical evidence indicates that the warm event occurring at the Paleocene-Eocene boundary was associated with a rapid increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations, possibly resulting from the massive outgassing and oxidation of methane hydrates (a compound whose chemical structure traps methane within a lattice of ice) from the ocean floor. The two cooling events appear to have resulted from a transient series of positive feedbacks among the atmosphere, oceans, ice sheets, and biosphere, similar to those observed in the Pleistocene. Other abrupt changes, such as the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum, are recorded at various points in the Phanerozoic.
Abrupt climate changes can evidently be caused by a variety of processes. Rapid changes in an external factor can push the climate system into a new mode. Outgassing of methane hydrates and the sudden influx of glacial meltwater into the ocean are examples of such external forcing.
As are of course Milankovitch cycles. But when we compare with the history of our world, right now CO2 levels are on the low side. And they will not be increasing all that much since more than 50% of the FF have been used.
First what do you mean by “rapid”
We talk 200 years here, that is more like a kT event than climate change.
Second the flora and fauna here are the ones that survived all cataclysms before so are the “fittest” already.
Third nearly all water and land is pretty contaminated with long term problems chemical and radioactive.
Fourth there is no guarantee that some sort of habitable environment might come back after millenia
Fifth in all cases the oceans were somewhat a refuge for life to spring back. Currently the oceans are pretty much polluted with long term garbage.
Sixth the gene pool and geographic sparsity of similar breeds is pretty shred to pieces. Difficult to “reinvent something completely different”
I do feel a responisbility for both: for the maintenance of spaceship earth and for it’s destruction.
The Human Conditon is quite difficult.
It is/was unknown in evloutionary terms if a huge brain qualifes as advantage…
That sounds like a lot of hysteria for a Sat night, so just a couple of points:
Fitness is adaptation, it is relative to the environment and to other species, so there is no such thing as ‘fittest’ in any absolute sense. Indeed it is argued that the overall fitness of species as a whole does not increase over time, their relative adaptiveness simply shifts as they all evolve. All adaptations are relative and therefore temporary, they are not ‘supposed’ to be permanent, and neither are equilibriums, species or ecosystems ‘supposed’ to endure forever. They come and go all the time.
The world is a flux and all things in it. How you ‘feel’ about it is completely irrelevant to the reality. The planet and the cosmos are not about to shift into some static state just because you value permanence and endurance. There is not really a ‘long or short’ time span, and the perception, of the species, of time is adapted to optimise the exploitation of the environment, so the cosmos is unfolding in an instant as much as in any other apparent ‘time span’.
It is also entirely predetermined, as everything is subject to causality, the principle of sufficient reason, without which nothing occurs, and that includes humans. So it is entirely an illusion that humans are ‘free’, and that they could have done anything different to what they actually will do. The entire chain of causality in the universe would have had to have been different from the beginning to have different outcomes, which would be an alternate, or imaginary, universe.
Your ‘feeling’ of ‘responsibility’ is also entirely imaginary along with all ‘merit’ and ‘demerit’. You can feel however you want about AGW, but that has got nothing to do with the reality, which in turn has got absolutely nothing to with any human feelings or value judgements. Your ‘concern’ with AGW is really a concern with yourself, and with your own feelings and value judgements, it is self-indulgence or ‘virtue-signalling’.
It has to be pointed every so often that this is an energetics forum, it is not directly related to concerns about climate change, and if people insist on going on about AGW then they are probably on the wrong website, as no one is here for that. We can all put on the TV anytime if we want to watch some emotional ‘nature’ documentary about how ‘awful’ AGW is. So, if you want to ‘campaign’ about AGW, then you should probably take it somewhere else.
@Mitrror:
You are free to think that you are just an automaton in an automaton.
We had this topic with CTG.
It is undeterminable by human reasoning.
From what I see in historical terms humans make decisions for example to kill all native peoples in the space currently known as the USA.
Have the peoples in the USA been extinguished by natural forces or by humans?
So obviously there exists something in humans that is different from natural forces.
We cannot alter the matter by an appeal to ‘immoral’ events. The idea is that it bears the force of ‘moral’ compulsion onto the matter of ‘free will’ by linking the two. In fact, all ‘morality’ is illusory, and it is relative to energetic, material, social and cultural conditions, which is why it is so variable and changeable across time and space. Humans get their ‘morality’ through their socialisation into a particular culture at a particular time, which is why people very much tend to agree with the ‘morality’ of whatever society they were conditioned into, and to ‘disagree’ with others.
The ‘principle of sufficient reason’, causality, is ‘transcendental’ ie., it applies universally to everything, everything is subject to causality and therefore determined. That is the basis of all human understanding. It presupposes that all things and events are intelligible only in so far as they are explicable and therefore predictable in terms of causality. Humans are simply objects in the world like any other, and they are subject to causality just like any other. Their behaviour would be 100% predictable if we had 100% understanding of the causative factors.
If that were not the case, if the principle of sufficient reason were not transcendental, if it did not apply universally to all objects qua objects, then all human understanding of the world would be impossible. The entire cosmos would be irrational and we would be able to understand nothing and to anticipate nothing. We would not be able to plot any course in our daily life, as nothing would be predictable, and the possibility of life would cease. All science and all practical attempts to understand the world and to improve it would end. Causality either applies to all objects or it does not.
Humans have convinced themselves that they are the one exception in the cosmos, the only object that is not subject to the principle of sufficient reason, to causality. And personal ‘freedom’ has come to be linked with notions of ‘guilt’ and to be a plank of social control. But it is dogmatic and entirely illusory. fMRI scans have repeatedly shown that human decisions originate in the brain behind consciousness and they appear in consciousness up to several seconds later. So the ‘free I’ of consciousness is an illusion, and ‘decisions’ are made by the material brain that is entirely subject to causality. That is what seems to be the case, which is exactly what we would expect given everything else in the cosmos.
“Many go extinct – 99.9% of all species already have – and that does not really ‘matter’. AGW would be just another inevitable ‘natural’ event in the history of the planet.”
Concerns about AGW often seem to be framed with a pre-modern thinking. To tease it out just a bit:
– Humans ‘values’ are just that. Nothing really ‘matters’. It seems difficult to see how anything can matter without a subject to whom it matters. The idea that AGW would ‘matter’ because some humans think that it would is to take humans and their values as the measure of the cosmos. One might say that it is a pre-Copernican view with man at the centre of the cosmos on the level of values.
Concerns about AGW are unavoidably anthropocentric and anthropomorphic. People imagine that they are talking about how much the planet ‘matters’ and how ‘awful’ AGW would be, but really they are talking about themselves, about their own values and feelings about the matter, and they are projecting their own subjective structures and motions onto reality.
– Humans are a part of nature, just like all other species. Biology tells us that humans have evolved with organs like large brains to facilitate the expression of the basic organic drives. They are self-reproducing biological ‘machines’. As such humans have no more ‘control’ over what they do than any other species. Their behaviour is more variable but that does not imply that it is any ‘freer’.
AGW is often discussed with a pre-modern ‘psychology’. It is imagined that humans are on a different plane of ‘being’ than the rest of nature, that they are ‘free’, and that they are ‘moral’, basically with ‘souls’ whose ‘virtues’ are ordered to some objective ‘good’. That is all entirely imaginary. Humans are biological machines that simply respond to internal and external stimuli. The outcomes of their behaviour are just as ‘natural’ and ‘inevitable’ as any other species.
Btw. I am not arguing that AGW is inevitable (although some people do argue that it is) but that it would be inevitable were it to happen. It would be ‘historically factual’. It would be just another episode of abrupt climate change, natural and inevitable, entirely ‘unavoidable’, just like many that the planet has gone through before, and it would not ‘matter’ in the senses that it is normal for the planet to go through that sort of thing, and nothing really ‘matters’ anyway.
I agree with you about
“Humans ‘values’ are just that. Nothing really ‘matters’. It seems difficult to see how anything can matter without a subject to whom it matters. The idea that AGW would ‘matter’ because some humans think that it would is to take humans and their values as the measure of the cosmos.”
Also,
“– Humans are a part of nature, just like all other species.”
In many ways, the discussion about “needing to stop AGW” are ridiculous. Dissipative structures dissipate energy. Sometimes some things heat up. There are feedback loops. The system will fix itself, however it is “meant” to fix itself.
“In many ways, the discussion about “needing to stop AGW” are ridiculous. Dissipative structures dissipate energy. Sometimes some things heat up.”
Exactly!
Humans are organic dissipative structures, with basic organic drives to expand, to grow, to dominate, to resist, to exploit and to assimilate to themselves. All species do that, from amoebas to humans, and everything in between. ‘Life’ and the operation of those drives are entirely the same thing. To live is to grow. All species, and persons and indeed states act in that way, driven by the basic organic drives, and they are constrained only by the drives and power of the others.
‘All life is will to power’ is not primarily an argument about what ‘ought’ to be, but an observation about how the cosmos as a whole, and species as a part of it in fact do act. All acts are reducible to it in some way, and it is not like they even could act in any other way. To live and to seek power is the same thing. Everything is ‘wired’ to it, whatever ‘appearances’ people may ‘put on’. Those structures succeed, and excel, that do that the best.
As you say, humans, and all organisms, are simply dissipative structures, much like all species, and like ecosystems, planets and stars. The cosmos simply tends to form dissipative structures that concentrate energy, order it to their own maintenance and expansion, and dissipate it. Everything is doing that and it not like they could stop and ‘do something else’. If some structures weaken then they give way and others expand in their place.
The ‘maximum power principle’ of energetics dictates that those self-organising structures prevail that maximise energy intake and transformation, and which reinforce production and efficiency. Human societies, states and economies are examples of dissipative structures, and they are basically compelled by physics (and biology) to compete to concentrate and to dissipate ever more energy – until the structures collapse and lots of people die. It is what it is, and without it there would be nothing.
That is not to say that it is in every sense ‘impossible’ for some eco-terr/rists to bring the whole thing down, much as someone in distress might burn down their house, but the dissipative structures (societies, states) tend to contain mechanisms to ‘prevent’ that – so it is not particularly likely. And the same thing goes for ‘degrowth’ agendas – societies and economies (eg. capitalism), are ‘wired’ to act for growth and the tendency is ‘built in’ to them, and otherwise they collapse if further growth has in any case already become impossible.
And, as you say, if structures are precisely dissipating energy, and indeed ever more, then sometimes things heat up!
“The system will fix itself, however it is “meant” to fix itself.” says Gail. Thus absolving us humans of any responsibility and of any need to actually try to fix any of the damage we’ve caused.
What are we gonna do about it? Sell carbon credits to each other?
It is really hard to read what you write Mirror.
There exists one homo sapiens. one . get it? This is a fact. even if it is an illusion.
If this homo sapiens is gone it is gone.
That will also be an Illusion.
We do not exist.
existing means, I am here talking to you, you know? If I am not, there is no talking between you and me, so also no existing thing in the first place.
But now it exixts. No?
So whatever reasoning you might apply I am noit here now not talking to you now. When I and you are gone there will be no difference.
I simply do not get why you writ pamphlets arguing about all of that when it was known that nothingness is not even existing at least 5000 years ago.
And these f*ing humans still run around this
f*ing planet in a preprtual illusion.
There exist bullets enough to stop this waste of time.
MM, thanks for that, maybe we should just avoid each other in the future as we have in the past. Thanks for the chat, anyway.
“The cosmos simply tends to form dissipative structures that concentrate energy, order it to their own maintenance and expansion, and dissipate it. ”
The cosmos outputs complexity as it transforms mineral into sophistication by the means of energetic inputs. For sure it is possible to sugar coat it in various forms of illusions, hopiates, dreams and delusions.
Yes; even the tryhard MOARons have a role in this as long as there is some net gain. And when those efforts inevitably eases over into negative domain…
You do the thinking what’s next…
Which usually happens when the primate ‘stench’ becomes overwhelming after some time of genetic cruft accumulation and exploitation of unfair advantage in the ‘game’ (of life).
Annnd, ITS GONE!
We’re all free to choose based on our genetic dispositions. The ‘choice’ (and bourgeoisie “freedoms”) delivers good signal strength.
In fact it is far superior to any other means of “guidance”. It is a system based on defacto observations, system identification, of input and outputs (causes and their effects).
Yes indeed; the truth of a species lies within its temptations and innate traits. Yes indeed, it should be played out, evolved, to its logical conclusion. I wouldn’t have it any other way myself.
Just fucking be that whatever which you are. And being smart implies adaptable to the situation at hand. If it just wasn’t so goddamned appalling and cringy in the cesspool of humanoid absurdities embodied as cliche acts (NPC’s) of the collective (sub)conscious.
It is tragicomic to observe from a distance though.
In the mean time:
🤷♂️
🪵🪓💧
🤣👍👍
Mirror – You seem to be channeling Spinoza’s view of an indifferent Cosmos and your logic is impeccable, elegant and true – but when you say it does “not matter” are you not making a very human value judgment? Does it not matter if we say it matters? I know I’m falling into the trap of man is the measure of all things but what else is there? Couldn’t the idea of the Will to Life have a larger meaning that encompasses our stewardship of life writ large? And would not the assertion that it matters change in someway, via the Principle of Sufficient Reason, the outcome (aka Sapolsky – a person’s awareness of a fact/ information can subtly change the wiring of their brain and consequently affect subsequent decisions) in a way that is favorable to the survival of life as we know it on the planet?
Trixie,
Mirror’s right. “We” don’t matter in a cosmic context. What does seem to matter is the process itself.
I simply understand it as the production of complexity through mineral and energetic inputs.
Complexity is manifested through many different aspects such as evolutionary fitness, technological progress and the thought processes that defines the path.
A failure of a species isn’t the end of the world so to speak. Basically all branches in the tree of life eventually ends. It doesn’t mean that there is something wrong with the tree or the branch that dies and falls to the ground.
Man is fundamentally incapable of finding meaning in existence itself. That is the crux, the predicament of our species.
Now go ahead and observe the cognitive dissonance of the collective (sub)conscious and ponder upon if we’re a failed species or not.
It is what it is.
“Hope is for suckers”
— Alan Watts
Actually, many people can find meaning it life itself. I was just looking at WSJ article called Harvard Wants M.B.A.s to Learn How to Be Happy at Work
To lead a happy team, you have to learn to be happy yourself, according to a Harvard Business School course that’s been popular in the pandemic
I remember one discussion I was involved in in which someone noted that historically, happiness has come from seeing the successful physical output of a person’s work. In the particular example the person was giving, it was something like making a cabinet or a table. It could also be making yarn from wool or baking a pie. Raising crops would be another type of successful output. My father, who was a general practitioner physician quite a few years ago, would talk about the satisfaction he received when a sick patient was able to get well, or a baby was successfully delivered.
Now, people are given a tiny piece of a large, complex task to complete. The way it is to be done is often at the whim of the supervisor. If a person’s finished product is coding hospitalizations by cause of hospitalization, or creating part of a computer program, it is hard to see the finished product and how it is made much better by what a person is doing.
Family and friends tend to get marginalized, if a person is spending too many hours working. Besides having too little time, another problem is often too little discretionary income. Having too little funds to spend can limit interaction with family and friends. In fact, if others of a person’s age group aren’t marrying because of too much work/too little income, then it is difficult to get dates with compatible other individuals, even if one individual has an interest. A person doesn’t have time or money for religious activities ether.
With respect to faith or philosophy of life, people have been encouraged to believe that religion is old fashioned; it is something for old people. The future will be dictated by governments and improved technology. Together, governments and improved technology can give people (in general) an ever-better life here on earth. In their view, our biggest problem is AGW. If we can only solve AGW, the economy can successfully grow endlessly in the future.
Unfortunately, it is increasingly clear that this philosophy is badly failing. It is fundamentally untrue; world conditions will get worse and worse, and governments are likely to fail.
Perhaps old religions aren’t quite right. Instead, we need to craft new religions and philosophies that fit with a changing world. There does seem to be a true Higher Power behind everything that is happening. Various religious writings give insight on how an economy, at a given time, can successfully dissipative more energy in the aggregate. In particular, taking care of the poor and marginalized citizens (widows and orphans) is helpful in dissipating energy, because these are people who are likely not to have their basic needs met. Having a philosophy of giving to others, and doing good to others, without demand for repayment, seems to be helpful for personal satisfaction and the overall system.
Even if the overall direction of the system is more and more dissipation of energy, until collapse occurs and new dissipative structures are formed, people can successfully live within this strange situation.
Gail,
I’m not rejecting the role of the family, relationships and work as a path to having a purpose in life.
“Meaning” is another beast altogether. My view is that the ‘meaning of life’ is a biological process that turns mineral into complexity using energetic inputs.
That doesn’t mean that ‘purpose’ is by default aligned with ‘meaning’. On the contrary. Most ‘purpose’ is directly destructive and counterproductive in the process of life and it is clearly evident from the destruction, chaos and collapses in history.
The primate psyche is unbound as it seeks validation and status through whatever means necessary to placate archaic primate desires and drives.
Of course climate can change abruptly. Such changes have huge consequences. All changes have a cause, or a combination of causes. When it’s possible to mitigate those causes, it seems stupid, in the extreme, to not try to do that. But humans are stupid and so will have to live with the consequences. It’s sad that so many people seem to think those consequences will happen to someone else.
The planet itself is not ‘aimed’ at any particular condition or state, it is a constant flux. In itself, it does not ‘matter’ if there is, again, an abrupt change in climate and loads of species go extinct, as that is simply what the planet periodically does.
From the human perspective, we are simply going through a cycle of boom and bust, which is what species do. There is nothing ‘stupid’ about it, that is simply what species do, it is how the planet ‘works’. Take away how the planet works, and how species behave, and there is not a ‘better’ world, there is nothing.
Humans are constantly evolving, as their environment and their energetic and cultural conditions change, and they will need to do that in the future. Post-modern humans in hundreds of thousands of years may well look back at us as ‘primitives’ or ‘archaic’ humans, just as we look back at pre-humans.
There is nothing ‘wrong’ with any of that, it is simply how the planet and how evolution work.
The species and the planet today are just a ‘snap shot’ of its development at a particular instant of time, it is not the ‘aim’ of planetary development. Humans can of course try to mitigate AGW, if they ‘feel’ to and if they are ‘up to it’, but that seems unlikely and it does not really ‘matter’ anyway.
I agree.
👍
“…if they feel to.”
I generally feel to. I mirror what can be done “out there” by what I can do within. I see that effort and imagination get me nearer to what I want than the absence thereof. It’s no problem. Just try not to do stupid things.
Surely with all the motion on the surface of the Earth seeds can be tracked into the tundra. No? and humans are always re-seeding the land.. and animals have legs. If they survived the near extinction event 70k years ago they will move again to greener pastures.
Prove that…IF the oceans are warming, that it is due to AGW. A more likely cause would be thousands of underwater volcanoes popping off….underwater….most volcanoes are pretty hot…
That cause is more likely to begin with and becomes the better theory by a greater margin when you account for sun spot cycles. Since we know that lower solar activity increases volcanic activity, warming oceans should be exactly what we expect to be seeing at present.
I’d be far more concerned about overall cooling with hitting a grand solar minimum around 2030 since that’s a mechanism we know actually happens and has happened within written human history unless unrealistic models of “runaway w@rming”.
Mark Tokarski writes:
Climate change has always been a Trojan Horse. This is easily seen by mere review if its “science,” none of it valid, no prediction made ever coming to reality. Further, it has achieved “consensus” by brute force. There are thousands of real scientists who know better about its nonsensical ideas, but who also know that if they speak up they will be cancelled. Climate change is totalitarianism. It cannot survive in an open and free environment of exchange of ideas. These people, the Michael Mann’s (“MM” = 1313, or 1133, surely a fake name) and Al Gore’s are sock puppets, the people behind them closeted. They know as much about climate as they do about representative government, which they label “democracy”.
There is a reason for brute force. Lacking hard data, lacking public support, they have to force their nonsensical ideas into place with a sledge hammer. They intend to impose totalitarian rule, the real objective. Climate is merely the stalking horse. These are fascists, communists, socialists, whatever “ist” you want to use. They are the public face of psychopathy, Lobaczewski’s “Ponerology”, or rule by evil forces, Mann’s “closeted friends.”
https://pieceofmindful.com/2022/01/04/the-other-shoe/#more-97942
The WSJ just this past week had an article titled, Climate Scientists Encounter Limits of Computer Models, Bedeviling Policy
Supercomputer simulations are running up against the complex physics of programming thousands of weather variables such as the extensive impact of clouds
This is the basic issue all modelers run up against. They have to pick one little piece of the system. They invariably assume the rest of the system will operate “normally.” If they try to add more pieces to the system, they discover that they are operating beyond computer modeling capabilities.
Modelers like to think in terms of linear outcomes, but the outcomes tend to be highly non-linear.
Computer models being “linear” is complete nonsense!
Computer simulations can run quite non-linear, that is known for a long time. There has even been a scientific method for description of non-linear systems been developed through discoveries that were only available using computers. This is called chaos theory:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaos_theory
Interestingly enough this field of science overlaps with information theory and thermodynamics, also not the field of lay people in the WSJ and others.
Scientists know perfectly well what non-liear means: small difference in input delivers wide range of output. That is a no brainer. That makes climate science a very sensible topic in the sense of “what do we put in here”.
Some scientists therefore are at on the position that a very cautious approach should be used (IPCC) and others are on the position that a more relaxed approach can be made.
The Idea of “consens” being tyrany is completely absurd. Consens in this field is VERY difficult to find and that is the reasons for “non-linear” events as science progresses. Hyping everything here as nonsense IS nonsense.
Of course climate change is being used for social engineerig as basically speaking everything on the internet is being used for this purpose.
I am not trying to say that computer models in general are linear.
It is strange that the output of recent climate change models seem to come out as if there is a linear relationship between the amount of carbon dioxide (and related molecules) in the atmosphere and the extent of global warming. This is the basis of “releasing less carbon dioxide into the atmosphere is essential.”
Gail, please read this and ask yourself who is the wag and who is the dog:
https://gizmodo.com/exxon-predicted-2019-s-ominous-co2-milestone-in-1982-1834748763
Let there be peace in OFW. We are just living in a simulation. Note that what we see, hear, touch and smell are all electrical signals that our “brain process” from our eyes, nose, ear and skin. We don’t “per say” fell it physically.
hahahaahahah
https://www.eugyppius.com/p/n95-basketball
https://cdn.substack.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ffe466ee8-4bde-4511-87fa-535f688c1037_947x595.png
That’s pretty ridiculous.
When Sodom and Gomorrah is blockaded the Rapacious Primate wakes up from the MOARonic fantasy.
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2022/03/why-we-are-never-satisfied-happiness/621304/
“The secret to satisfaction has nothing to do with achievement, money, or stuff.”
Oh really princess, how about dumping those little luxuries and start turning the cranks instead of writing pointless drivel? No?
“As we wind our way through life, I explained, satisfaction—the joy from fulfillment of our wishes or expectations—is evanescent. No matter what we achieve, see, acquire, or do, it seems to slip from our grasp.”
You’re a fucking primate. The chase for a higher social strata is encoded in your DNA. It never ends. It is what it is.
“So life is just a rat race, and we’re doomed to an existence of dissatisfaction?”
Yes, that is how you’re built. It’s nothing wrong with that. It is what you are, princess. Now go away and get vaxxed. Don’t forget those solar panels and a Tesla as your “green” status marker accessories.
But don’t worry, let’s have another spin in the perpetual wheel of folly. I’m sure it’ll work out just fine the next time. Or perhaps it won’t. Of course it won’t. Slapping some genetic lipstick on a pig won’t change the oinks.
HAND!
🤣👍👍
Very good! I would like to have your company by the campfire.
https://youtu.be/dsx2vdn7gpY
🔥
K
So life is just a rat race, and we’re doomed to an existence of dissatisfaction?”
No. The more brain cells, the more perception. Use them (brain cells) more carefully.
You might think you have many, it is mever enough.
I dunno about you being doomed.
Is another coal shortage crisis looming over India?
In December last year, the Federation of Indian Mineral Industries (FIMI) shot off a letter to the Prime Minister claiming that the coal crisis was still prevailing, and was affecting the profitability of non-power industries.
It came three months after several states were hit by power outages due to coal shortage. And two months after finance secretary TV Somanathan assured the nation that the coal shortage was temporary.
Now, India is again seeing the emergence of a complex demand-supply mismatch in coal. Both the power generation and the non-power sectors are claiming that the supply is below optimum levels. They have also alleged that the national miner, Coal India Ltd, has been supplying bad quality coal. Non-power sector consists of a range of manufacturing units.
This one you can easily mark as a tipping point.
https://worldedge.substack.com/p/daily-briefing-its-getting-dark-here
Some police were briefly seen carrying batons yesterday but Wellington District Commander Superintendent Corrie Parnell said officers had stopped doing so by early afternoon.
He said the officer in charge at the time made a misjudgment in terms of how they were reading the crowd and Parnell had ordered the batons be removed.
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/politics/covid-19-omicron-outbreak-protesters-stay-put-country-hits-new-record-nearing-500-daily-cases/KRZ3NHOVFXS2GNPMDAWZOQU2HA/
Or … the Messiah had arrived… all nobody dares to strike the Messiah….
Some good points:
“After the Chinese holiday, recovery will hit them (and the world) hard, therefore the need for energy will bounce back hard. I expect a minor repeat of last time, higher energy cost affecting industry and production.”
And, I expect, central banks will want to raise interest rates to get energy prices back down.
“India suspends operations of more than 1,000 miners of coal, tin and other minerals. Indonesia is the world’s top exporter of thermal coal and a major producer of nickel metals, copper and refined tin. We already have a shortage of nickel, copper.”
https://www.mining.com/web/indonesia-suspends-operations-of-more-than-1000-miners/
This sounds like a major problem.
” “This is a trend like 2008”. Anyone with a functional memory can put 2 and 2 together, even though circumstances are different.”
Up, and then a hard “down.”
“Worker strikes will become sort of a norm in certain industries, as economies face ever-growing inflation, central banks can’t control it, and see their wages going down the drain.”
I can believe this.
“the aluminum shortage goes strong, and by the article, it mostly affects small business, as everything else related to this pandemic, but soon it will affect big corporations prices too.”
Analysis: After oil, gas and coal, global fuel shortage spreads to diesel
Global supplies of diesel are dwindling as refiners struggle to keep pace with rapid post-pandemic demand recovery, exacerbating an acute global energy shortage which has already sent the prices of gas, coal and crude oil soaring.
At a time when global central banks are fretting over inflation rates not seen for decades, diesel shortages would push up fuel and transportation costs further and add more upward pressure on retail prices.
The U.S. and Asian diesel imports on which Europe relies have been limited in recent weeks due to higher domestic consumption for manufacturing and road fuel purposes.
“A repeat of that is not our base case, but it is notable that diesel prices have been tracking the 2007-08 period closely in recent months,” they said, adding that they expected crude prices to reach $100/bbl in the second half of this year.
Last week, a winter storm tested fuel availability in the U.S. with some utilities preparing to use more distillate fuel oil to meet demand, while South Korea and India have been unable to fill a supply gap left by China’s recent clampdown on refined product exports due to their own domestic needs.
https://worldedge.substack.com/p/daily-briefing-its-getting-dark-here
I agree that this is an article well worth reading.
It is grave enough that other people than Antonio Turiel from The Oil Crash notices it. He has been tracking diesel carefully for years.
I don’t like the data source that Antonia Turiel uses in his analysis. I think that it gives a false impression of shortages. BP reports do show diesel consumption by part of the world. The BP reports, in the aggregate, show much more diesel consumption than Turiel is showing. The EU’s problem is partly that it is getting outbid by others (Asia-Pacific, for example) in buying diesel.
Good point.
In the long run the question might be if European ingenuity can outcompete asian brute force methods on advances on civlisation.
Interestingly enough the Chines are much better in the terms of social credit system than the EU is in a digital rationing system called CBDC.
As Mr. Fast says: Will be fun to watch!
Also known as: who starves last on what resources?
Complex systems – musical chairs
Ugo Bardi ?
You read it here first.
Please do not take it personal. I really do not mean it.
🙂
One of the biggest supplier for restaurants, schools, now faces a worker’s strike. Already facing supply shortages, high prices, inflation lowering demand, this add fuel to the fire. And it is an angle national security people should keep in mind and be very aware. Any non-state or state actor could use this to disrupt an entirely brittle system.
Worker strikes will become sort of a norm in certain industries, as economies face ever-growing inflation, central banks can’t control it, and see their wages going down the drain.
https://worldedge.substack.com/p/daily-briefing-its-getting-dark-here
With oil up why aren’t gas prices budging??
1. Purchase prices locked in using options.
2. Competing gas stations aren’t raising prices. The higher oil prices will mostly translate to lower profits for refiners (“crack spread”). Some of these are separate from oil companies, some of them are part of oil companies. If the latter, the profits oil companies will be less than expected.
So are you saying that they (refineries) are taking a loss but for how long and can they continue to take these losses for long? Maybe refineries in the future will be government owned? Seems like a fragile system in the refineries region.
It is a possibility that the refineries are taking a loss on the low sales price of gasoline.
There is also a possibility that some refineries locked in a lower price for purchasing crude oil by hedging the price. In this case, it is the derivatives market will be hit by the big guarantees for sales at a lower price.
Of it could be a combination of the two.
Cooper for 3’days. Diesel shortage
Oilprice 93.4
Oil price is way up high, and likely going higher. It will likely push governments toward raising interest rates and getting the price back down again. These higher rates are likely to burst the debt bubble and cause a big debt default problem for banks.
GO FRANCE!!!
French President Emmanuel Macron announced on Thursday that the government will back the construction of six new nuclear reactors across the country. The first will enter service by 2035, according to the French leader.
“We must continue the great adventure of civil nuclear power in France,” Macron told the media on a visit to the eastern city of Belfort – the home of General Electric’s France-based turbine unit. He also announced the commissioning of a study to assess the feasibility for a further eight reactors.
https://www.rt.com/news/548958-france-macron-nuclear-reactors/
The dawn of sanity in Europe?
The year 2035 is a long way off. France needs to find out how China builds reactors more quickly.
Someplace along the line, the need for fuel needs to be addressed as well. I am not sure that the uranium supply can really be ramped up very quickly, either. Reprocessing plants also take a while to be built.
The world needs to re-think nuclear fuel. Currently a fuel rod is burned to about the 1% used level and then thrown away. My impression is that fuel reprocessing never took off, that no one actually does it. Too expensive working with highly radioactive material.
The right solution to my way of thinking it molten fuel that can be burned to 90% or more. The issue is the solid fuel rods expand as radioactive gas is produced by nuclear decay. The gas expands the fuel pellet and threatens to burst the fuel rod so stop at 1% used.
Perhaps we could start the “rethink” with dry casking all the spent fuel?
The World Nuclear Association seems to view reprocessing as the path to the future. This is a link to where they talk about how this will reduce the need for fuel in the future.
https://world-nuclear.org/information-library/nuclear-fuel-cycle/fuel-recycling/processing-of-used-nuclear-fuel.aspx
I agree with you. It is a hard process to make work. There are no reprocessing sites in the US. I am fairly certain that the US will not allow reprocessing–too much chance of the reprocessed material ending up in nuclear weapons, I believe.
Honk Honk
There is a car convoi going on in Vienna, Austria right now for the last 4 hours.
(It was officially registered but verboten happens anyhow)
I hope some people will “see it with their own eyes and hear it with their own ears”
FPL has been reading OFW,
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/florida-inches-closer-to-kneecapping-rooftop-solar/ar-AATHWTa?ocid=msedgntp
Only way out is for a homeowner to have batteries and not sell excess to utilities, complicated system.
Some years back at MREA an instructor was gloating over the utility company being his battery. I mentioned his using a neighbor’s oversized generator for this purpose and not paying for the additional capital costs, well, not the most popular guy in class.
Dennis L.
Every state and every country needs to do this.
They also need to make sure that there are high grid charges for using the grid part of the time.
Could not agree more! As someone using and involved with PV for three decades. The wholesalers would agree too. As it is PV will kill the grid.
High time what is essentially a givaway to the upper middle class to parade about in a frenzy of greenwashing ends.
I have sat in a retail/wholesale PV sales office for hours bsing. People come in. It costs what? I pay that in utilities in six months.l Rich get richer. And they dont need it. meantime those single mothers have no chance of doing anything but making ends meet most not all working their ass off.
Grid tied PVs true cost needs to be accurately reflected in any interaction with the utilities so the other consumers dont bear the cost of others greenwashing. Especially since oftentimes those consumers have the least finacial ability to pay. Grid PV relationship to the overall health of the grid needs to be reflected in the fees that SHOULD be charged for using the grid as batteries.
The fact is most wealthy will not be without the grid. Even with a good non grid tied system with $4k of batteries there are limits. You have to realize that energy is not infinite and has cost both in $ and in embodied energy. Wealthy are not willing to do that. Grid tied systems represent more of the electricity is magic that flows from a infinite source paradigm BS with greenwashing to boot.
The nice thing about non grid tied systems is it educates people. Take some good off grid folk thinking PV is free energy. It dont take long of running a system encountering its failures and limits to create a dawning understanding that the juice coming out of the outlets is not infinite. To rural working poor running PV batteries are just the same as gasoline or propane. Energy takes $.
Nooo!
I deserve my lusciously high feed in tariff ‘cos I’m saving the planet. Greenwash me baby.
Solar panel lives matter!
There is a company that offers just that, RaVolt. They do PV plus battery all stand alone.
and you can add propane generator backup. All the upscale folks will do it. Only the plebs use government regulated utilities.
California is also looking at rolling back the net metering advantages for homeowners solar power. With the huge amount of solar installed there, essentially destabilizing the power grid, they have to, and also to keep the utilities solvent. This will happen everywhere.
Here in Alabama, they are very hard on home solar…essentially paying me 1/10th the amount that they then turn around and sell to other customers. There is very little solar here, I have ti for future energy security. It does not pay economically here.
If you want the solar panels for future electricity security, I don’t think you want the solar panels connected to the grid. You want a stand-alone system with batteries. Usually, if the grid goes down, you lose the benefit of the solar panels. If you want enough electricity in winter, you likely will need to overbuild the system.
My rough estimate for a one family house in NY would be $20K for PV, $20K for battery, $40K for fixture to hold PV, $10K inverter and connection to house. So for a modest $90K you can have electric stand alone for most days 94% and stand alone at emergency 25% for 5% of days and possibly no electric 1% of days. Need to add propane generator for the 1% or for the 6% another $24K.
So $114,000 buys you a solid supply of electric for your house. Considering houses are now $400K this seems inline.
More like $200K if you want to power your heat pump and two electric cars. Still a bargain.
You also need a tall fence around your property to protect yourself from others who see that you have what they don’t have.
Maybe buy a castle? With a moat… and a drawbridge…
Battery will be more expensive, batteries that don’t degrade come from China, $29K some years back, not very efficient, but robust. the rest of the system is close to cost.
Propane generator works well.
The whole system becomes very complicated, almost need PLC to control it, if you can’t do it yourself, who do you call when there are problems? Ghostbusters?
Dennis L.
That sounds about right except for the $40k fixture to hold the PV?? What’s that? Mine is just a rack on a pole mount since I don’t have a south facing roof.
What are you going to do when your neighbors are suffering with lengthy blackouts and they see your house with the lights on?
Not going to have lights on. I have a warehouse cart for the batteries and inverter. When we have sunlight, I will wheel it out and connect solar panel if batteries need to be recharged.
Only needed for washing machine and pump for circulating hot water from roof panels.
You need a whole lot of batteries and solar panels to do more than recharge your phone.
I try to let it be widely known that flashlights in a firm base and pointed at ceiling gives a room a gentle but effective light. One in each room works well and can last without refill for months. In some cases it might be worth selling them at cost to neighbors. But without some form of neighborliness (and/or community organizations) we’re sunk anyway.
People have more $ than me. I would consider $15k a top notch system and dont know anyone with more than that in one. 24 rolls 6000 series 2 volt battteries say $14000. Thats freakin over the top. $3 k for a inverter. 4 kw of panels $2000. say $ 4 k for disconects wire mounts and the rest. Thats $23k and its freakin over the top!
You could power Nicolai with that.
I have battery backup and an extra solar array that can be used for charging a car, or dumping power onto the grid.
It will be noticed when the grid goes down…I plan to donate power to a mobile sheriff’s control located on my property, for security, in addition to providing power to neighbors fridges and freezers.
To fail to plan to to plan to fail
As countess Origo observed in her wonderful book on life in wartime Italy, making plans helps to keep the terror and despair at bay.
To be determined not to go down easily also preserves self-respect.
Once that has been lost, mere survival is meaningless.
Adverse reactions are underestimated 640 times according to the expert.
A potential nightmare for current and future health of people who had the experimental jab.
https://www.ilparagone.it/attualita/vaccini-le-reazioni-avverse-sono-640-volte-piu-di-quanto-riportate-dallaifa-lallarme-dellesperto/
Thx Gail!
It’s obvious from the coal production chart that Asia Pacific is one of the regions in the world that still has a future. Europe is depleted and dead.
The US and UK banks dominate world finances and they own the multinationals that own world trade. The US has a trade deal with China. The UK has left the EU and signed a trade deal with India. The Five Eyes is their core military alliance.
In a self organising system the US and UK should control Asia Pacific, India and the oil rich Middle East…and destroy China’s New Silk Road by destroying Europe. The coming war in Ukraine…
So very exceptional!
But that’s exactly how Nations and Empires behave when they run out of resources. We are at that point right now. It’s survival of the fittest.
I am not good at figuring this kind of thing out. It is hard for me to imagine long-distance control working very well, with ever smaller amounts of fuel for traveling long distance.
I can imagine some sort of grouping in the Asia Pacific working for a while and some sort of North America grouping working for a while.
Russia would mostly support the Asia Pacific Grouping. The Middle East might still support the US, if it can get food support and perhaps some other basics it needs in return for this support. Europe definitely has a problem. I am doubtful that the UK is better off than the rest of Europe.
Pre-fossil fuel empires could be enormous, but invariably collapsed.
When Spain controlled South America as part of its empire, the local authorities worked out that, given the long sea voyage (sail) which was the only way of sending troops and orders, they could mostly get away with doing things their own way.
A proverb summed this up: ‘We hear, but do not obey’.
Such empires inevitably fragment, even if they are not in an energy crisis.
the empire of the USA is held together only by the energy threads that stitched it together
when those threads come apart, America will cease to exist.
“Dishonesty Is A Bad Business Plan” by JHK
https://kunstler.com/clusterfuck-nation/dishonesty-is-a-bad-business-plan/
Jim Kunstler sums up what has been happening, and where we are headed, in a very interesting way. These are some excerpts:
“Dr. Fauci, of course, has an entire career of public health malpractice to cover up.”
“Remdesivir [Fauci drug, now being used for COVID] provokes renal failure in five days, leading to fluid build-up in the lungs, and the doctors were unable to discern the deadly side-effects from the supposed symptoms of Covid-19 itself.
“Henceforth, doctors will have to battle strenuously against being regarded as dangerous quacks, while the entire scaffold of conglomerate hospitals and group practices founders and falls.”
“The Democratic Party rode this public health fiasco into power in the USA and has abused its prerogatives exorbitantly in its quest for power without purpose… other than for more power to push people around.”
“Tens of millions heard the three-hour Joe Rogan interviews with Doctors McCullough and Malone, in which they laid out the shocking facts about the rise of medical tyranny, the propaganda campaign supporting it out of the old news media networks, and the obscene machinations of a rogue pharmaceutical industry drunk on profits.”
“Following the lame, coordinate campaign to discredit Joe Rogan, the Democrats and their accomplices in the news media went into a desperate pivot this week, attempting brazenly to pretend that they can walk away from what amounts to their abetting of mass murder. The midterm elections loom darkly. Not only can they be kicked out of legislative power, but there’s an excellent chance that their hapless, grifter president, ‘Joe Biden’ can be impeached and convicted by a new Congress for bribery and treason, and the vice-president along with him for high crimes, leading to the installing of a new speaker of the house (not a Democrat) as president.”
This isn’t a scenario that I had thought through, but it might make sense.
James is always saying the bad guys will get their come-up-pence. I think he is too optimistic. His first pass “A World Made by Hand” is spot on. It included a landed dictator, a violent biker gang, and a peaceful low tech town that no one attacked (go figure).
Pleasant fantasy.
As far as I know, the only towns which needed no walls for protection existed at the core of the Roman Empire at its peak, which was a very brief period historically – here in Cambridge about 200 years.
In fact they were even able to dismantle the legionary fort built after the conquest, until raiders made huge stone walls – probably with artillery – a necessity.
“Sri Lanka could face long power cuts, water shortages, grid failures from March…
“Sri Lanka could face multi-hour power cuts, blackouts in large parts of the grid and water shortages in Colombo if the current policy of avoiding one hour load shedding at any cost is continued.”
https://economynext.com/sri-lanka-could-face-long-power-cuts-water-shortages-grid-failures-from-march-90437/
“The last week of load shedding wiped R6 billion from South Africa’s economy: mayor…
“In a letter sent to president Cyril Ramaphosa ahead of his state of the nation address on Thursday evening (10 February), Cape Town mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis said that load shedding costs the national economy an estimated R500 million per stage, per day.”
https://businesstech.co.za/news/energy/557342/the-last-week-of-load-shedding-wiped-r6-billion-from-south-africas-economy-mayor/
Somehow, with all of the problems Sri Lanka has been having, this is not a surprise.
“Popular anger simmers in Turkey over ballooning electricity bills…
“A wave of protests has spread across Turkey over whopping electricity price hikes last month as millions struggle to pay the ballooning bills and many businesses face the threat of going broke amid already galloping inflation.”
https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2022/02/popular-anger-simmers-turkey-over-ballooning-electricity-bills
“Syria: Sweida protesters decry corruption, poor living standards.
“Hundreds of people in Sweida, a Druze-majority city in southwestern Syria, have taken to the streets for a fifth day to decry corruption and worsening living standards, according to activists.”
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/2/11/syria-sweida-protesters-decry-corruption-poor-living-standards
This is not a big surprise. People don’t like big increases in electricity costs and a reduction in their standard of living.
“Political Chaos In Libya Threatens Oil Production, Again.
“Libya’s Parliament based in the east named on Thursday a new prime minister, while the incumbent refuses to step down and was reportedly a target of an assassination attempt earlier today, in yet another political rift in the OPEC oil producer.”
https://oilprice.com/Latest-Energy-News/World-News/Political-Chaos-In-Libya-Threatens-Oil-Production-Again.html
“Algeria’s political prisoners go on hunger strike amid escalating repression.
“Since 28 January, some 40 political prisoners in Algeria have been on hunger strike, demanding their release from illegal and arbitrary detention and a halt to the increasing prosecution of democracy activists…”
https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/north-africa-west-asia/algerias-political-prisoners-go-on-hunger-strike-amid-escalating-repression/
“Tunisian magistrates and lawyers protest in Tunis.
“Tunisian magistrates and lawyers staged a demonstration outside Tunis’ Palace of Justice on Thursday, protesting the recent announcement by the nation’s president that he intends to dissolve the national judiciary body.”
https://www.africanews.com/2022/02/10/tunisian-magistrates-and-lawyers-protest-in-tunis/
“Nigeria’s Debt Sustainability at Risk, Cause for Concern, IMF Says…
“IMF’s Mission Chief for Nigeria, Ms. Jesmin Rahman… noted that the increase in public debt had grown rapidly in 10 years and was approaching a time when the country would spend all its income on servicing debts.”
https://www.arise.tv/nigerias-debt-sustainability-at-risk-cause-for-concern-imf-says/
A person can understand one of the reasons OPEC’s oil production isn’t doing well.
“The [UK] energy crunch is only going to get worse…
“…boy does there need to be investment in our energy industries if we are ever to see the back of inflated fuel prices. Big oil may today be making record profits, but a year ago, amid the economic hiatus of lockdown, it was making record losses.”
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/02/11/energy-crunch-going-get-worse/
“Inflation crisis: Diesel costs hit record high with petrol close behind.
“Industry data suggests petrol is about to join diesel at unprecedented price levels as inflationary pressures show few signs of easing for the UK economy.”
https://news.sky.com/story/inflation-crisis-diesel-costs-hit-record-high-with-petrol-close-behind-12539013
“More than 8,000 towns and cities across Italy will switch off the lights of their monuments on Thursday night in protest over a massive rise in energy prices.
“The symbolic blackout at 20.00 has been organised by the National Association of Italian Municipalities which estimates that bills will increase by around €550 million for local councils…”
https://www.wantedinrome.com/news/italy-blackout-protest-surge-energy-bills.html
What good does protesting high electricity prices do?
People, society, really have no idea how the world of energy works. This is going the Eddy route unless…
Yes, I agree.
And particularly in Italy.
People are well distracted with number of doses to do and app to download on their phones in order to be allowed to do things they simply did before without permission.
It is fantastic.
This protest reminds me this cartoon..
https://tenor.com/view/old-man-yells-at-cloud-yelling-old-man-news-the-simpsons-gif-17741451
In theory a global socialist paradise will own the energy system down to the mine “by the people” and thus the electricity would not need to “cost” any money besides people just working. Everything would be free of money.
Theeeeenn we go for the next discovery of human ingenuity….
People’s time is worth something. If too many of the are supporting the energy/electricity system, there won’t be workers for other systems, such as growing food and transporting it to where it is to be eaten.
are you saying that we all hoes yet we both can and should sell our wares directly to the head groundskeeper sans any MLM!?!? I will happily trade calories on a market. just imagine bears hibernating.
@Gail: To start with: 8B people can move a lot of top soil,., As you say: complex systems change in a strange way and equilibrium state will be achieved whatever “we the people ” want.
Symbolic of the end of civilization and the extinction of humans hahahaha
Generation D (for Deviant)
Like most things, porn seemed way simpler in my day. Hanging out after school with Paul and Ross, thumbing through the several issues of Penthouse that Paul’s dad tucked away inconspicuously on his bookshelf, right behind Winston Churchill’s A Gathering Storm.
Obscenity laws were loosening up and the lads could see close-up what a woman’s parts looked like years before we’d experience the real deal. Porn was, to quote an ad of the day, “the next best thing to being there.”
And then, along came the internet, which changed just about everything, including an explosion in the production, distribution and availability of porn catering to every imaginable taste.
https://www.cbc.ca/parents/learning/view/porn-canada-kids-viewing-habits
At my school, the one with the porn mags was a vicar’s son.
On the whole there wasn’t much interest, but he insisted on waving them under our noses in the library.
I mus look him up. maybe he also became a vicar.
If discretionary spending collapses, they won’t have the mass tourists who justified the flood-lit old buildings, when lighting was cheaper.
All the wonderful old architecture of Europe, superior despite the loses in to world wars to any other region of the world, has only stayed up thanks to cheap fossil fuels.
One only has to look at the repair costs to realise that – soon it will be unviable to maintain them at all, let alone light them up.
Maybe they can be repurposed for uses that don’t require exterior lighting. Hope so.
Hahaha… ain’t gonna happen… cuz it’s impossible to generate ROI unless oil is priced at well in excess of $100… maybe even closer to $200… note shale lost 300B… so that never should have happened.. but now that’s run it’s course… and now there’s nothing …
And soon … we die. Everyone dies.
As I wander through the tent city outside parliament … with the rain pouring down and turning it into a swamp… chatting with quite a few of the ‘terrorists’… I do feel for them.. I really do…
They can feel civilization unravelling … they don’t know exactly why — actually they have not the slightest clue… I’ve heard ever reason – except oil… the PR Team has done a fantastic job with that — these are the smart ones… and they have no idea…
When I look at them .. I see thousands of mice in a very big jar… struggling to stay above water… gasping for air so desperately… fighting to stay alive .. fearing for their children…
And one might tear up over what’s happening to them … but then … but then … one might also think about the industrial farming .. the torture of animals.. the brutality against fellow man… slavery … war … genocide… greed… pride.. Kim Kardashian.. Bieber…
And one might say .. f789 the lot of you… is it wrong not to feel empathy for a cancer? For an invasive weed? I think not… I know not…
It’s time. It’s so nearly over.
Fortunately we get to see what the struggling mice do … these truckers in Canada are dug in … and there are a lot of them… I understand when the govt announced harsh measures earlier today they responded by honking horns and digging in harder… and that more people are headed to that key bridge to support them..
Who would have thought that truckers would be the ones to pinch the Cartoid artery of a core nation.. in France armoured vehicles are trying to prevent a similar scenario..
The CEP is actually complete – we just have to wait for the dying… however that might not happen… we might get Ripping of Faces…
I would not be surprised to see the military come in and bull doze those trucks out of the way so that essential supplies can cross the border…
This is a good time to be alive .. for those who … like to watch hahaha
“Inflation shock threatens oil consumption and prices.
“Rapid inflation and the need for the major central banks to bring price increases back under control has emerged as the biggest headwind for oil consumption and prices later in 2022 and 2023.”
https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/inflation-shock-threatens-oil-consumption-prices-kemp-2022-02-10/
“Beware the algorithms driving up oil prices… amid all this nervous focus on spot oil prices, there is another issue that politicians and investors should watch: what robo-traders are doing with derivatives right now…
“… extreme robo-herding creates distortions across market niches that can suddenly unravel, causing wild volatility… Fifteen years ago, oil prices moved from $54 a barrel for Brent contracts at the start of 2007 to $132 in July 2008 — before collapsing to $40 in December that year, after the financial crisis.
“Today, a similar cycle might occur even faster due to automated trading, particularly if inflation fears undermine growth hopes.”
https://www.ft.com/content/6e24689d-679f-4b45-ac73-dc1ace2ff69e
Low prices will cut off supply! This would be a disaster.
Can you feel it in your bones now???
Somehow, this is not a surprise. This is why I have said that prices cannot stay very high for very long.
“‘Inflation is up, it matters’: high prices plague Biden’s presidency…
“As recently as August, 51 per cent of Americans approved of his handling of the economy, but that figure has fallen to just 37 per cent, according to a CNN poll released on Thursday that contained grim figures for the White House.”
https://www.ft.com/content/a13504ae-df8e-4de2-bf18-0003907cb741
“Surging Inflation Puts the Fed in an Impossible Situation.
“…the markets increasingly see the only way for the Fed to get inflation under control is to engineer a sharp slowdown in the economy, and perhaps even force a recession. This would be the hard landing that policy makers have wanted to avoid.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/surging-inflation-puts-the-fed-in-an-impossible-situation/2022/02/10/0236475e-8a9a-11ec-838f-0cfdf69cce3c_story.html
I doubt that the economy would ever completely recover from the recession. One possibility is that it would simply move in stair-steps down to greater and greater recession–“catabolic collapse.” Some steps might be much bigger than others.
“Traders crank up bets of aggressive Fed action to combat hot inflation.
““The Fed knows it has to hike rates,” said Gennadiy Goldberg… Two-year US government debt — which is highly sensitive to moves in short-term interest rates — suffered its biggest one-day sell-off since 2009 on Thursday…”
https://www.ft.com/content/7adf9e1a-84a2-46ba-b178-816d52bd41fc
“It appears the bond market is slowly increasing the odds of a recession hitting the US, and if the current inflation data keeps piling up, that recession may be coming faster than you can imagine.
“The big news on today’s CPI report was another month of real wages declining.”
https://seekingalpha.com/article/4486004-a-recession-may-be-right-around-the-corner
Wages can’t keep up with ever-rising prices. Pensions can’t either.
Thank you, helpful reminder of JMG’s ideas.
Dennis L.
Rates are up about 1/3 here in NZ… I’ve got a mate here who started a mortgage company and sold it to one of the big banks – he was telling me not long ago how much a 1% and 2% increase in rates would have on monthly payments and the overall economy.
It will be devastating … particularly now that inflation is ripping… people are gonna be feeding their kids cat food soon.
Where is that devil covid…
“China’s Zhenro Properties shares, bonds plunge on debt restructuring concern.
“Shares and bonds of Chinese property developer Zhenro Properties fell heavily on Friday before one of its yuan bonds was temporarily suspended from trading.”
https://www.reuters.com/markets/europe/chinas-zhenro-properties-shares-bonds-plunge-debt-restructuring-concern-2022-02-11/
“Debt fears swirl around another developer as China property woes deepen.
“Concerns over the financial health of Logan Group Co. have shaken investor confidence in what was seen as one of China’s stronger developers, deepening the turmoil faced by the crisis-hit industry.”
https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2022/02/11/business/financial-markets/china-new-debt-fears/
“Chinese developers selling off more London property to raise cash.
“One of China’s biggest developers [Shanghai-based Greenland Holdings] has sold a flagship London project, in the latest sign that Beijing’s squeeze on the real estate sector is triggering a sell-off of assets beyond the country’s borders.”
https://www.ft.com/content/09704e4c-d198-4350-b987-5743eae46c89
Selloffs from China start moving elsewhere. This is not a good sign!