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Recent Posts
- Energy, Water, & Climate Change are interdependent
- Why fusion power is Forever Away
- Climate Change dominates news coverage at expense of other existential planetary boundaries
- Excerpt from “The Geopolitics of Resource Wars”
- Homes & Buildings
- Book Review “The Outlawed Ocean” by Ian Urbina
- Underestimating the Challenges of Avoiding a Ghastly Future
- Motherboards: too complicated to make after oil
- “More and More and More” one of the best books on energy ever written
- The staggering destruction of knowledge by Christians in the Roman Empire
- The staggering cost of Net Zero in Britain
- Why the R/P Reserves to Production ratio does not show when oil will run out
- Catton on Collapse “Bottleneck: Humanity’s Impending Impasse”
- Book Review of Grain Brain: Extraordinary claim not backed up by evidence
- Why did everyone stop talking about Population & Immigration?
Category Archives: 2) Overshoot
Energy, Water, & Climate Change are interdependent
Preface. This is a very long post with summaries of two GAO reports on interdependencies of energy, water, and climate change from 2014 and 2012, which are still true today. While cheap and plentiful oil remains, these problems can be … Continue reading
Posted in Climate Change, Energy Infrastructure, Energy Production, GAO Government Accountability Office, Interdependencies
Tagged climate change, energy, infrastructure, interdependency
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Climate Change dominates news coverage at expense of other existential planetary boundaries
Preface. Almost all environmental stories in the media are about greenhouse gases. Yet there are dozens of others in the meta/polycrisis and existential boundaries (Rockström 2009). Overpopulation is the driver, but the severity and magnitude is made possible by fossil … Continue reading
Book Review “The Outlawed Ocean” by Ian Urbina
Preface. This is a book review of Urbina’s “The Outlaw Ocean: Journeys Across the Last Untamed Frontier.” So many fishermen are enslaved for years, yet another reason to pay more for local fish at higher prices. Globally, so many fish … Continue reading
Posted in Fisheries, Fishery destruction, Natural History, Peak Food
Tagged fishery, peak fish, peak food, piracy, slavery
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Underestimating the Challenges of Avoiding a Ghastly Future
Preface. This is another “Scientists Warnings to Humanity” by many famous scientists, including Paul & Anne Erlich, John Harte, Peter Raven, and Mathis Wackernagel. Some of the challenges they point to are loss of biodiversity and consequent 6th mass extinction, … Continue reading
Posted in Biodiversity Loss, Extinction, Overshoot, Scientists, Scientists Warnings to Humanity
Tagged biodiversity, overpopulation
5 Comments
The staggering destruction of knowledge by Christians in the Roman Empire
Preface. Ever since reading Gibbons “The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire” I’ve been fascinated by the complexity of reasons for why the Roman Empire fell. But so many books and writings were lost that much remains unknown. Mainly … Continue reading
Posted in Preservation of Knowledge, Roman Empire
Tagged book burning, Christianity, collapse, preservation of knowledge, roman empire
1 Comment
Book Review of Grain Brain: Extraordinary claim not backed up by evidence
This is my book review of David Perlmutter’s (2013) Grain Brain: The Surprising Truth about Wheat, Carbs, and Sugar–Your Brain’s Silent Killers. At the New York Times, this book was the #1 best seller in the Dining list and #9 … Continue reading
Posted in Critical Thinking, Farming & Ranching
Tagged critical thinking, diet, Dr Oz, grain, MAHA, quackery
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What would happen if trucks stopped running?
Preface. In “Why You Should Love Trucks” I showed that essential supply chains depend on trucks nearly completely. Because of little inventory and dependence on just-in-time deliveries, our civilization would almost immediately feel the repercussions of trucks stopping. In fact, … Continue reading
Posted in Cascading Failure, Dependence on Oil, Electric & Hydrogen trucks impossible, Infrastructure & Fast Crash, Oil Shocks, Transportation Infrastructure, Transportation Supply chain, Trucks, When Trucks Stop Running
Tagged civilization, electric trucks, life without lorries, trucks, trucks stop running
2 Comments
The insect apocalypse will kill billions more people than climate change
Preface. Below are excerpts from two articles on why and how the extinction of insects could lead to our own extinction and many other species. Although climate change is more deadly now, an insect apocalypse will kill far more … Continue reading
Posted in Biodiversity Loss, Extinction, Scientists Warnings to Humanity
Tagged biodiversity, climate change, extinction, insects, pollinators
6 Comments
The war on drugs. A book review of “Chasing the scream”
Preface. The founder of the War on Drugs in the U.S., Harry Anslinger, wanted to build as large a bureaucracy as possible. But a war on narcotics alone—cocaine and heroin, outlawed in 1914—wasn’t enough. They were used only by a … Continue reading
Posted in Corruption, Drug wars and the prison system
Tagged anslinger, cocaine, corruption, drug wars, heroin, marijuana, prison system, prohibition
4 Comments