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This discussion has been inactive for longer than 5 days, and doesn't want to be resurrected.
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mrghosty
Yeah, it feels that way sometimes. But the US had a huge attitude shift in the last year or so; evangelicals have started preaching about the saving the envrionment and helping the poor, states are passing laws tougher than federal standards, far less people are buying what neocons are selling, and some hot shit innovation is happening with alt energy.
Thanks for the response there Joe. You know I agree with that. I guess the problem is that I see more people concerned about picking either Blue Ray or HDDVD than worrying about the other issues... I guess I'm just getting more and more jaded. I just don't see any Social Will en masse these days at all.
I think I'd better shut up or I'll start singing 'I'm super, thanks for asking!" -
- CommentAuthorKosmopolit
- CommentTimeJan 30th 2008
That American evangelicals as a group have started thinking much more critically and become far more skeptic of the old guard evangelical leadership (like robertson) is one of the most hopeful developments of the last year or so. -
But the US had a huge attitude shift in the last year or so; evangelicals have started preaching about the saving the envrionment and helping the poor, states are passing laws tougher than federal standards, far less people are buying what neocons are selling, and some hot shit innovation is happening with alt energy.
That's good to hear. It's nice to hear of that shift in places. Mainly living in small town Ontario.. soon to be Manitoba all I end up seeing is a real lack of social will. But here's to momentum folks! -
- CommentAuthorMark Sweeney
- CommentTimeFeb 1st 2008
States are passing laws, and the Feds are overruling them...
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/12/21/tech/main3639921.shtml
One of the biggest problems with oil running out is not replacing the energy from oil with another source, but replacing all the unique things oil does, and everything it is used to manufacture.
The US comsumes 20 million barrels of oil per day.
By the time you add up growing the food (fertilizer and pesticides are petrochemical products); harvesting (fuel), transportation (fuel), refining/processing (energy), packaging (energy and petrochemical products), shipping, etc, etc, you end up using 400 gallons of oil and petrochemical products, per person, per year, of oil to feed one American.
400 gallons = 12.9 barrels of oil.
Population: 330,500,000.
Total oil required per year to feed Americans: 4,264,516,129 barrels
Total oil used every day in America: 20,000,000 barrels (and growing)
Oil used per day to feed Americans: 11,683,606 barrels
In other words, 58% of US oil supplies are used just to feed America. -
- CommentAuthorKosmopolit
- CommentTimeFeb 1st 2008
Organic farming advocates CLAIM (and I haven't checked those claims in detail) that their methods can produce either as much or only slightly less food per hectare than conventional methods - but at a higher cost because its more labor-intensive.
If those claims are correct,.you could probably reduce oil use in the farm sector substantially by going organic but at the cost of significantly higher prices for some items.
Organic farming, of course, doesn't use artificial pesticides or fertilisers but you'd still need energy for the processing and distribution side.
The other point to consider of course is that what the West can afford is likely to be ruinously expensive for people in the developing world. -
- CommentAuthorMark Sweeney
- CommentTimeFeb 4th 2008
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CommentAuthorScottBieser
- CommentTimeFeb 8th 2008
"Social Will?"
Perhaps I'm a bit jaded from having lived more than half a century, but when I hear the term "social will" this is the image I get:
Otherwise known as "The Madness of Crowds."
Social Will in the U.S. is what gave us Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, the Bushes and most likely now both the Clintons. It gave Britain Margaret Thatcher and Tony Blair, among other scoundrels. It's given Russia, Putin. It gave Australia, John Howard. It gave Argentina, the Perons and their ideological descendants.
Social Will is a lynch mob. Social Will is a race riot which destroys the lives and livelihoods of the powerless while leaving the actual power structure intact. Social Will is the so-called "Minutemen" patrolling the border zones looking for illegal humans. Social Will in schools lionizes football players and cheerleaders while shitting all over the academically excellent.
Give me individual will and enlightened self-interest as expressed through technological innovation and consumer choices, any day. -
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- CommentAuthorKosmopolit
- CommentTimeFeb 8th 2008
There was an interesting article in last week's New Scientist.
They describe several fuel-savign technologies which are already on the market in various forms.
These include:
replacing steel body parts with aluminium or carbon fibre;
lower rolling resistance tyres;
stop-start motor technology that turns engines off when a car is stopped at lights and restarts it rapidly when the driver steps on the gas;
turbo-steamer technology - basically a heat recovery system that recovers some of the energy from hot exhaust gases;
variable cylinder technology = engines that use only a couple of cylinders when traveling at low speed.
These aren't theoretical, they all exist in some cars already on the market.
Put them together in a single vehicle and you could probably cut fuel use by 30 or 40%.
The principal barriers to that are that they belong to different competing companies - and in any case companies have big sunk investment in existing technology. -
@Kosmopolit
replacing steel body parts with aluminium or carbon fibre;
But I don't have any steel body parts! Can I still get in on this?
Seriously, though. Haven't heard of a good bunch of these innovations. Thanks. It'll be interesting to see if these filter out into fossil fuel cars and compete with hybrids and electric. -
@ Scott Beiser.
While I agree with you that social will has it dark side, the whole idea of individual will and consumer democracy is the equivalent of social apathy in my opinion. Sure social will gave us all that stuff you mentioned, but it also led to the abolition of slavery, the suffrage movement, and the anti-war movement. I guess it depends on which way you look.
But it is social will that affects real change. For better or for worse. I for one hope that we filthymonkeys can get it together enough to create a social will that is a force for positive change. Jadedness aside, I guess I'm still an optimist. Although that may be end up leaving me with egg on my face.
This discussion has been inactive for longer than 5 days, and doesn't want to be resurrected.