Comments Dan Dixson has made
Societal Changes and Peak Oil
After following the issue of peak oil for about 5 years, I have yet to find anyone of authorithy discussing the societal ramifications of the peak oil phenomenon. Matt Simmons comment of there being "No Plan B" is consistent with all of the research I have done. However, this is not the first time a society has collapsed from losing the primary resource on which it was founded. Mankinds history is filled with failed attempts at civilization. Each failure being marked by its own roadsigns just like the residue of its cultural apex. As a society is forced to switch from one paradigm to another, as will be required in the switch from a petroleum based civilization to the post carbon world, a new social order must be created as well. One would think that this transition phase must be marked with somewhat predictable impacts upon all social systems. The known "social and economic indicators" would seem to be relatively predictable in their interaction and lend themselves to predictions regarding the progression of the events in the transition. In like manner as the Federal Reserves modification of the interest rates effect the economy in known predictable ways.
In reality there is a "Plan B", but we humans are not currently the ones formulating the plan. Plan B will happen to us, whether we like it or not. The course we have currently selected virtually insures us that it will be one that we definitely do not want. For all of the prognostication and opinions ranging from the wildly optimistic to the most depressing doomsday scenarios, surprisingly little attention has been paid to the potential sequence of events as the transition unfolds. The world as we know it will not come to an end overnight. The transition will take time. Granted, not much time. But it will not happen instantly. As we begin the transition to the post carbon age, each successive year will see the fundamental structural dynamics of society altered from the year before. Each step down the energy ladder will bring a new world order. Just as the the upside of the ladder did, where we devised ever more and more clever uses for the slave labor we call oil. However, in the case of powering down just the reverse will be true. The continual question we will all face on a day to day and year to year basis is - "What modern convenience am I able and willing to eliminate at this time". Followed by the necessity to make the same grueling decision the next year, and the year after that. As an example it is speculated that we could see the price of oil at $100 and $200 a barrel. Oil prices at this level would have dire economic consequences. The question is - What are these consequences and their magnitude? With all of the computer modelling capabilities we have available today, somebody should be attempting to put numbers to these facts to study the social and economic impacts.
I have been struggling for years, with albeit little success, to get my wife to view the future in an unemotional way in order to attempt to make reasoned decisions in charting a path. This experience has served to highlight to me how difficult it is to make the mental and emotional leap of facing the reality of a future without oil and to plan for it. If there is any hope of surviving during the transition, much more detailed information is needed to fill in the blanks of a societal meltdown. If we are all clear on the lifestyle toward which we are headed, it will help the transition. Instead of each day feeling robbed of the timbers that form the framework of our life with oil, we would be in a better position to more gracefully accept the disintegration of the old paradigm. Knowing in advance that things are changing in a predicted direction is at least more comforting than having no idea what is happening, why it is happening, or where our civilization is heading.
I would like to see the requisite computer processing capabilities coupled with the knowledge of the experts on peak oil, economics, anthropology and others to attempt the impossible and chart the course into the new century. We know from where we are starting. We know to where we are heading. We need only to connect the dots.On An interview with peak-oil provocateur Matthew Simmons posted 3 years, 10 months ago 2 Responses