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Will the internet survive energy contraction?

TFian said:
by the Great James Howard Kunstler.
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Kunt stler is only great at making an complete fool out of himself, and writing racist histrionic crap marketed as meaningful "predictions" of the future.

Kunstler has a deep seating loathing of suburban sprawl and modernity in general it would seem, so he sees peak oil as resulting in a semi-collapse that returns us to a future that resembles small town America of 150 years ago (plus wasted large cities and pirates ravaging the coasts of course).

Anything he says on the matter is so obviously biased that it seems more likely he's projecting some lurid fantasy of his, rather than an objective analysis on the future.

Oh yeah, he also made the same "return to small town America" predictions about a little other hysterical event that was supposed to destroy industrial civilization. You might remember it..it was before the year 2000....

http://peakoildebunked.blogspot.com/2006/05/305-kunstler-thought-y2k-was-end-of.html

Y2K is real. Y2K is going to rock our world.
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Lol.

Seems like he, among most other Peak Oilers I've come across, are projecting their fantasies on this issue, rather than any objective analysis.
 
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TFian said:
John Michael offered a spell — with the essential caveat that you have to know a good deal about handling such things deftly — to keep always at the back of your mind, when estimating what’s the most savvy way to get ready for what’s happening and what’s coming. It was:

“There is NO better future ahead.”

With the critically-essential caveat in mind too, that strikes me as a profoundly right estimate of where we’re going. And with that in mind, The Grand Archdruid's Green Wizard initiative seems to me to be right on the bullseye.
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However, as you've repeatedly failed to support your suppositions, and consistently ignored evidence to the contrary, why should anyone take notice of what seems right to you?
 
Garrison0fMars said:
Oh yeah, he also made the same "return to small town America" predictions about a little other hysterical event that was supposed to destroy industrial civilization. You might remember it..it was before the year 2000....
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Y2K was real, and it would have been a major problem, except that everyone knew it was coming and we fixed the problem. Hundreds of thousands of programmers worked like dogs those last 18 months, but we got it pretty much right and the event passed with barely a blip.

Which is of course exactly the kind of effort that TFian is insisting is impossible.
 
PixyMisa said:
Y2K was real, and it would have been a major problem, except that everyone knew it was coming and we fixed the problem. Hundreds of thousands of programmers worked like dogs those last 18 months, but we got it pretty much right and the event passed with barely a blip.

Which is of course exactly the kind of effort that TFian is insisting is impossible.
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No doubt Y2K was real, I most certainly wasn't insinuating it wasn't. I'm just stating that the particular individual she brought up made the SAME predictions about Y2K, and immediately jumped shipped after it became a non event, and found another "end times" event to place their fantasies onto. I wonder if the Arch Hassidic druid or whatever made any Y2K predictions of his own.
 
ben m said:
Perhaps you missed where I repeatedly, explicitly said that cars, air conditioners, refrigerators, and routine air travel are probably NOT in this category.
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I guess I did miss it. You do not believe cars, air conditions or refrigerators will survive?

ben m said:
Does "no cars, air conditioning, or air traffic" sound like Star Trek utopianism?
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No, it does not.
 
ben m said:
Explain. You seem to be arguing that it's impossible to build and maintain medium-sized infrastructures (like dams and turbines) without fossil fuels. The Erie Canal is an explicit counterexample---a large elaborate infrastructure project built without fossil fuels.
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No, I'm not arguing it's impossible to build medium, or large sized infrastructure without fossil fuels. Obviously the pyramids of Egypt and and the Aztecs show otherwise.
 
Roboramma said:
The fact that, as ben pointed out, energy is energy. It doesn't matter where that energy comes from, it's still energy. What's to stop us using the power produced by the hydro plant to do the repairs?
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True, it's still energy, but not all energy is created equal. Hydro is neither cheap, nor portable. Just because you can generate the energy, doesn't mean it's viable. Petroleum is not only damn cheap, but also extremely portable. Hydro is intermittent, and weak, and can't be transfered around the world to be used for repairs.
 
TFian said:
True, it's still energy, but not all energy is created equal. Hydro is neither cheap, nor portable. Just because you can generate the energy, doesn't mean it's viable. Petroleum is not only damn cheap, but also extremely portable. Hydro is intermittent, and weak, and can't be transfered around the world to be used for repairs.
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Stop cherry picking.
 
TFian said:
True, it's still energy, but not all energy is created equal. Hydro is neither cheap, nor portable. Just because you can generate the energy, doesn't mean it's viable. Petroleum is not only damn cheap, but also extremely portable. Hydro is intermittent, and weak, and can't be transfered around the world to be used for repairs.
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Why would hydro power need to be transfered around the world to be used to repair the plant that's producing the power?
It doesn't seem like you've answered my question at all.
 
TFian said:
Pyramids = Hydro electric plants :p
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I'm still having trouble determining if you're being intentionally dense or if you really are this dim. The most energy intensive part of a hydro plant is building the dam. Everything else is easy. A turbine isn't anything more than a magnet inside a coil of wire.
 
Roboramma said:
Why would hydro power need to be transfered around the world to be used to repair the plant that's producing the power?
It doesn't seem like you've answered my question at all.
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Well it's kind of like doing invasive heart surgery to oneself, doesn't it?
 
Roboramma said:
If we can build one form of large infrastructure without fossil fuels, why can't we build the other? What's the meaningful difference between the two in the context of fossil fuel scarcity?
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The meaningful difference is energy needed. The construction of the pyramids required only a tiny fraction of the energy a hydroelectric powerplant requires.
 
TFian said:
The meaningful difference is energy needed. The construction of the pyramids required only a tiny fraction of the energy a hydroelectric powerplant requires.
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And now you're back to blatant lying. Full circle.
 
TFian said:
The meaningful difference is energy needed. The construction of the pyramids required only a tiny fraction of the energy a hydroelectric powerplant requires.
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How do you know that? Have you actually looked at the numbers, or did you just make an assumption?
 
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