Guest essay by Eric Worrall
Does Capitalism contribute to global warming? Australian Green Party Candidate Jim Casey wants to revive the debate – so lets start by agreeing with him, that increasing the efficiency of Capitalist systems increases anthropogenic CO2 emissions.
Thanks Daily Telegraph, I welcome a debate about the overthrow of capitalism
In an old tweet, I framed capitalism as an idea that could be overthrown. On reflection, it is something that is more likely to collapse under its own weight.
The Daily Telegraph published an old tweet of mine on Wednesday (as part of its front-page endorsement of my opponent, Labor’s Anthony Albanese, for the seat of Grayndler) that said: “Overthrow of capitalism – you don’t hear this often enough”
Who knew an old tweet could spark such a necessary debate but as a Greens candidate taking on Labor member Anthony Albanese at this election, I guess I can expect greater scrutiny. I appreciate the reminder and welcome the debate. Frankly, we don’t have this discussion often enough and what better time to have it than when political parties are selling their stories in the marketplace of ideas?
As a union leader used to speaking shorthand to comrades, I framed capitalism as an idea that could be overthrown. On reflection, it is something that is more likely to collapse under its own weight – we cannot adhere to a belief that is so obviously unable to make the transition into the future that awaits many of us and all of our children.
…
We must challenge the durability of capitalism in the face of three overriding realities: climate change, growing inequality and resource depletion.
…
Competition drives business to continually increase its profitability. How does it do that? By driving down costs of production. The main cost of production for most businesses is labour.
…
While the smart kids in Silicon Valley may claim that data, artificial intelligence and new technologies like block chain will turbo charge technology and solve that old problem of resource depletion – I argue it won’t. The robots won’t save us from water scarcity, the loss of arable land or indeed the loss of fish stocks as the oceans become more acidic.
Why do I think Capitalism increases CO2 emissions? After all, the vast Soviet industrial estates produced CO2 and toxic waste on a heroic scale. But I would argue that the Soviets were an exception. Most socialist economies, places like Cuba, Venezuela, Tanzania, Zimbabwe, don’t produce a lot of economic activity. Starving wretches picking at stubble for a few grains of wheat, don’t emit CO2 on anything like the same scale as a freeway commuter working in an air conditioned office.
So I guess it really comes down to choosing what kind of future we want – a value judgement.
If we embrace socialist economic stagnation, or more dramatically, a shift back to a primitive subsistence economy, there is no doubt we would substantially cut global anthropogenic CO2 emissions – especially when famine slashes world population. Chemical fertilisers and pesticides, utterly essential for modern levels of food production, are the products of a highly industrialised, CO2 intensive economy.
If we embrace a future of robots, artificial intelligence, endless exponential economic growth, we really might run out of a resource we can’t replace. I don’t think it likely, but the whole house of cards actually could come tumbling down. But is the possibility technological civilisation might fall down really a justification for giving it a hard shove? The bleak end result of such a collapse – survivors clinging to life through primitive subsistence farming – doesn’t sound all that different to the future greens seem to think we should all embrace as our first choice.
Personally I like my modern lifestyle – air conditioning, downloadable movies and TV, a fridge to keep the food fresh. So I’ll cling on to the “evil” conveniences of Capitalism, as long as the Earth can sustain my way of life. And when this planet can no longer produce everything needed to keep the economy running, I hope my descendants have the simple common sense to look beyond our planet for the resources they need, to keep those modern conveniences flowing. Because there is no doubt we already have the technology to affordably reach beyond our planet on an industrial scale, when the need arises to do so.
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That’s the money quote right there. Mind if I borrow it?
Go for it 🙂
“If we embrace a future of robots, artificial intelligence, endless exponential economic growth, we really might run out of a resource we can’t replace. I don’t think it likely, but the whole house of cards actually could come tumbling down”
===========================================
Eric, if you wish reinforcement of your skepticism about running out of energy, stuff, and food, I highly recommend these post from E.M. Smith…
https://chiefio.wordpress.com/2009/05/08/there-is-no-shortage-of-stuff/
https://chiefio.wordpress.com/2009/03/20/there-is-no-energy-shortage/
https://chiefio.wordpress.com/2013/01/11/grains-and-why-food-will-stay-plentiful/
I like the “Cars can run on salt water” in that girls poster.
Would help if she had some schooling maybe?
Roger
http://www.thedemiseofchristchurch.com
Hello! Communist China, heard of them! Produces almost 50% of the world’s coal and last time I checked they made just about every modern device I know of and actually use. The problem with our contemporary debates is that all our notions of reality are overdetermined tripe. Just about nothing ideological that passes for an argument today is remotely true. When did capitalism happen? The central planks of communism are up and working fine in all the developed economies of the world. The so-called capitalist countries are command economies. There is no such thing as a free market in the West and as for pollution, have you heard of Asia!
It’s not about socialism v capitalism neither exist without the other; it is about facism*.
* To be precise it is about ‘Global Facism’.
rogerthesurf May 15, 2016 at 3:20 am “Cars can run on salt water”
So?? I can walk on it.
Geoff
You are conflating political freedom with economic freedom.
Yes, those are classics. Stuff and energy are plentiful.
Scott, you really should think before posting.
China gave up on communism over 20 years ago.
The areas of the Chinese economy that are growing are those areas that have most enthusiastically embraced capitalism.
There is nowhere on the planet where communism has worked both past and present.
PS: Fascism is a form of socialism.
Also look at Herman Kahn’s books, The Next 200 Years, The Year 2000, and The Resourceful Earth.
Seems to me that ALL those people don’t like the Capitalist USA. Well…It’s a free world and no one is forcing you to live here. If you truly believe that Socialism is the way to go, move to Cuba or Venezuela or China and leave the USA to those nasty Capitalists.
The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings; the inherent virtue of socialism is the equal sharing of miseries. Winston Churchill
http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/w/winstonchu101776.html
The inherent vices of socialism include:
(1) the equal sharing of the ingenuity, hard work and sacrifice of the productive half of the populace;
(2) large centralized coercive government that creates many more problems and poverty than it solves;
(3) a that government takes all the reward away to the point where no one will try or want to succeed;
(4) propaganda, misinformation, and censorship to make an already captive citizenry even more confused and submissive.
Capitalism raises everyone up (yes typically those who work harder and smarter are raised up more than those who don’t–it’s called reward). Socialism lowers everyone to squalor except for the ruling elite.
https://jonathandaviswm.wordpress.com/2013/11/07/the-problem-with-socialism/
https://mises.org/library/todays-anti-capitalists-ignore-fundamental-problems-socialism
Come on y’all, let’s not forget the socialist structures that underpin our functioning societies. No one wants to return to the excesses of the Gilded age. We use both of these systems to balance the weaknesses of the other.
Pure socialism won’t work long term due to the vices of men (perverse incentives for laziness stall progress)
Pure capitalism won’t work long term due to the vices of men (hoarding and creation of robber barons lead to an underclass which will cause revolution).
Balance the two together, and you have a functioning system.
“Pure capitalism won’t work long term due to the vices of men (hoarding and creation of robber barons lead to an underclass which will cause revolution).”
Sorry, that’s just nonsense. Proper capitalism requires the reinvestment of profit, not hoarding. And provided you have non-monopolistic markets and the rule of law, competition puts those who hoard out of business rapidly. And that’s only if innovation doesn’t get them first.
What you see as “socialism” underpinning our societies is in reality simply statism and corporatism, which have created and perpetuated poverty and inequality on a far bigger scale than capitalism. Why for example does the state need to provide education rather than just pay for it through say vouchers?
Pbenofhouston
“Pure capitalism won’t work long term due to the vices of men (hoarding and creation of robber barons lead to an underclass which will cause revolution).
Balance the two together, and you have a functioning system”
Surely your arguments apply in general to the Conservative principals in Britain. Support capitalism to finance the nations infrastructure such as hospitals, schools, education etc. and look after those at the bottom of society with council housing, un-employment benefit, free health care, child allowance etc. Without capitalism social welfare could not exist, this is the simple truth that die hard socialists cannot understand.
.
that’s complete nonsense, ben.
and the problem is not necessarily you but your lack of vocabulary due to faulty education.
to help you clarify your thoughts:
capitalism is the positive sum game while socialism is the negative sum game.
and there is no logic to any claim that one must balance food with poison.
http://www.beyondintractability.org/essay/sum
then you may understand that capitalism results in an increase in wealth by production of wealth while socialism consumes until there’s nothing left.
Proper capitalism as in proper communism? By defining terms anew one can prove whatever.
I put democracy over free capitalism. Call me a socialist if you want. I’m strongly for parliamentarism and strong constitution.
I won’t answer that, but I can tell you won’t get very far by asking that question; rather you can go on and start thinking what you actually want. Do you want parents to choose the content of the education? For me it would be OK, but my pal got stupid parents. When you create more freedom, you usually create freedom to fail. While it sounds justified, it might not be good for the community. So, exactly, why or why not?
I just bought (at Sunday) a bottle of beer from the local shop. It’s now legal here and all. Freedom won, but some suckers will die drinking too much. You have to be aware of consequences of your decision. I’m fine with this one, but it means there will be more to do at the fetal alcoholic syndrome sector.
Boulder Skeptic
May 14, 2016 at 10:39 pm
My thanks.
Your four points relate rather too closely to the current UK debate on EU membership – or not.
“The inherent vices of socialism include:
(1) the equal sharing of the ingenuity, hard work and sacrifice of the productive half of the populace;
(2) large centralized coercive government that creates many more problems and poverty than it solves;
(3) a that government takes all the reward away to the point where no one will try or want to succeed;
(4) propaganda, misinformation, and censorship to make an already captive citizenry even more confused and submissive.”
I would say (2) and (4) without question – and in spades!
(3) is more problematic, but the EU tends to want to do more, so needs more money to do that ‘more’ – and this will mean higher taxes. Will it get t the point of ‘taking all reward away’?? I fear it is possible.
(1) will depend on how much the EU ‘invests’ in giant state-influenced corporations. Interestingly, it looks like the EU has produced relatively few ‘Tech Giants’ – and many of those are in the more capitalist economies – Skype from Estonia, and a few in the UK.
Still, Cameron – our Imperial Fearmonger General – has assured us that the EU has kept the peace since 1945.
Per Wikipedia [I know, I know, I can edit (some of) it] –
“The Maastricht Treaty established the European Union under its current name in 1993 and introduced European citizenship.” (Downloaded about 2008 Z – 15 May 2016].
What is 48 years between friends when – oh, the L word, and the U word and the V words, too, likely – and several other words . . . .
Auto
@ur momisugly ben of houston,
Robber barons (cronyism, syndicalist socialism, Green gov contracts for best friends) are the outcome of socialism.
ALL of those require a government of elites using the government gun to take care of best friends while destroying their competition.
They are NOT a vice of capitalism which is a willing and knowledgeable seller transacting with a willing and knowledgeable buyer…each interested in protecting their own interests.
“Syndicalist socialism” is the system in which policy is set by government, mainly for “social” objectives, and a select group of industries agree to carry out those orders in return for special considerations. Those considerations can include exclusive government contracts, relief from regulations, and the power of government being used to suppress or even destroy competitors outside of the favored group of “socially responsible” industrial cartels.
Crony capitalism (which is NOT capitalism) gets you railroad magnates being able to buy out upstarts for a penny on the dollar.
Syndicalist socialism gets you a car maker manufacturing cars nobody wants to buy on “ecological purity” grounds. It’s the difference between the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe, and the Chevy Volt.
Mussolini was a syndicalist socialist. So was Hitler. Rheinmetall, Krupp, Messerschmitt and Focke-Wulf didn’t tell Der Fuhrer what to buy for his military; he told them what he wanted, and they built it- or else.
This admin offered up special treatment and considerations including extensive funding, exclusive government contracts, regulatory relief, and gov power to suppress or destroy competitors outside of the favored group.
Same goes for WallStreet and Big 5 Banks. They must do as told or else suffer the consequences of audits, harassment, lack of funding that competitors have. Gibson guitars. JPMorgan ordered by Feds to take over BearSterns. Now the gov is suing them for the bad deals Bear did 5 years ago.
Obama tells Chrysler, GM, GE what he wants, CEOs say “Yes, SIR!”. Only Immelt has managed to make a profit at it..after moving to China. Same goes for Big Pharma, the ‘evil’ insurance companies, the mean water utilities, etc.
The so called excesses of the gilded age never existed in the first place.
The so called robber barons got rich because they made stuff that people wanted.
Nothing wrong with that.
They were called the “robber barons” by those who were jealous of their success.
Tim: The only way a monopoly can ever form is when it has the force of government behind it.
In pure capitalism, monopolies are quickly broken up by competitive forces.
Hugs, by supporting democracy over capitalism you are supporting the belief that the mob has the right to steal whatever it wants, just because they have the power to take it.
Benofhouston.
Hate to tell you this old chap, but our current dabbling in socialism is the main reason why the economies of Britain and the EU and the US and even my country have debt problems, unemployment and poverty.
Taxation and government spending are the main reasons for stifled economies and the poverty therein.
Our mindset nowadays is to pay the unemployed, (and I have been one of them in the past), rather than make sure jobs are available.
Its pointless to pay people who are unproductive will overall increase the problem so it is important to somehow to stimulate the economy so the jobs are there for everyone prepared to work.
So how do you stimulate an economy without the damage of inflation? Well most people quote Keynes and Samuelson who said “Government should spend more” but Keynes died before he saw the results of the Vietnam War US government spending which inflated the world’s economy. in other words he only talked half the problem.
The fact is you cannot increase government spending without commensurate taxation rise and this simply depresses the economy. The first causes inflation, the second causes recession and the typically unwise/unproductive government spending adds to the recession and unemployment rises.
Socialism is exactly high taxation and government spending, and when the taxation reaches 100% then its communism, and we should not forget the poor performances of past communist states. We should not forget for instance that possibly as many as 60 million people died of starvation in China during the 4-5 years from 1968.
We are some way near the center of the Capitalism-Communist continuum.
I suggest you read that wonderful economist Milton Friedman on how to handle an economy. And he is American as well!
Stimulate the economy? Well the hard truth of how to do that is minimize government spending and taxation. Try telling Obama that!
Cheers
Roger
http://www.thedemiseofchristchurch.com
ps Yes my degree, class of ’81, is a major in economics.
Actually, Keynes gets a bad rep. He said that governments should go into deficit during recession. Everybody knows that, but he also said that governments should control spending and pay down debt during expansions. This would better control inflationary pressures and lengthen the expansion. Unfortunately, this excellent idea was given to the democratically elected liars who run Western governments, who immediately seized the opportunity to start buying our votes with our own money. And we let them.
Keynes theories fail because he believed that there was a large pool of untapped resources that govt could seize and then inject into the economy.
This pool does not and never has existed.
MarkW Agreed. Even if there are some untapped resources and I’m sure there are, government would not be the one that is able to untap it. Bless their evil little souls, there sure do however, put on quite a show to make us think they can.
There is a certain level of nihilism in Marxism, that the current system is so bad it must be overthrown. The problem is what they replace it with when they succeed is worse. Of course, the advocates do not believe that they themselves will be the starving subsistence farmers, but their rulers.
“As a union leader used to speaking shorthand to comrades, I framed capitalism as an idea that could be overthrown.” Marx formulated this idea in Das Kapital. 150 years later we’re still waiting.
Kevin Lohse wrote: “Marx formulated this idea in Das Kapital. 150 years later we’re still waiting.”
The word “Captitalism” was created by communists as a perjorative; as a way of demonizing the concept of free enterprise.
We should be using the term “free enterprise” rather than capitalism, if for no other reason than to spite the communists.
Free enterprise is much more descriptive of the process conservatives and others advocate. Capitalism obscures the meaning, as it was meant to do.
Yes!!!
Thanks, TA! Great point!
At least one of them are not realities: resource depletion
There would not be resources to deplete without capitalism to find and develop those resources.
Fredrick Hayek, among others, would object to the “growing inequality” as a reality, too. The Road to Serfdom isn’t paved with universal equality.
As for “climate change” as an overriding reality? Sure. But is it for the better or worse? Locally, at least it is for the better — no one is forced to use heating or air conditioning, much less electricity and gasoline. People choose to use them.
Stephen Rasey wrote: “As for “climate change” as an overriding reality? Sure.”
No. There is NO evidence that humans are in any way involved in changing the Earth’s climate. The climate changes. That is a reality. But that is the only reality. Implying that humans are involved is simply wrong.
All three of them fail the reality test.
So it’s back to the feudal system for greens. How hilarious these are the same morons that wail about the 1% while their socialist system demands a 1% lording over 99% of the population. The stupidity staggers the imagination. But then just like out here on the left coast they have confused stupidity with sophistication.
Yes, and under the O the middle class is deteriorating, even before the ACA fully kicks in and lays its heavy hand on small business. Sadly the ever shinning allure of, “this time it will be different” statism leads to this…
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-05-13/scenes-venezuela-apocalypse-countless-wounded-after-5000-loot-supermarket-looking-fo
@ur momisugly David A, 10:54 am, And the attack on the California Framers is in full mode.http://www.breitbart.com/california/2016/05/15/water-policy-kills-farming-consumers-will-pay-price/
Logoswrench wrote: ” But then just like out here on the left coast they have confused stupidity with sophistication.”
What choice do they have? 🙂
The LIE from Bernie Sanders: “It’s funny, sometimes American journalists talk about how bad a country is, that people are lining up for food. That is a good thing! In other countries people don’t line up for food: the rich get the food and the poor starve to death.”
Sanders is clueless.
I have lived in a lot of different countries and survived even Carter. We had food lines. I never saw the 1% in a food line.
The 1% gov elites in socialism take very good care of themselves. When production is scarce,the demand for those products create food lines.
The dims travel to those places and proclaim total media control is great and there are not poor people int he streets. Nobody is in the streets because the gov removed them. That remarkable Cuba healthcare …is not for the people….its for medical tourists.
The idiocy and fallacy the slugs push is beyond compare.
It’s been estimated that if all of Bernies proposals were to be passed, federal spending would increase by 50%.
Anyone who believes that tax levels can be increased by 50% is loony tunes.
No way, man. You have to get off Stupity at Ventura to get to Sophistication. Pretty sure, dude!
Most of them don’t object to having 1% ruling the 99%. Their objection is that they are not part of the 1%.
These are the discussions of the ruling class.
The Soviet rulers were wealthy beyond the dreams of us and the normal people lived in abject poverty, cant wait, but suggest that ballot is run to see who are the shaggers and who are the shagees.
3 decades ago, I was a nuclear missile launch officer at RAF Greenham Common. CND “ladies” camped around the perimeter and the occasional mass GreenPeace rally would make getting on and off the base difficult. I knew it would be a really really horrific day if what I trained countless hours for, sitting alert in one of the hardened bunkers with16 ready to launch Tomahawks with their single W-84 payload, ever came to pass. Would I have carried it out? you betcha, and the same I’m sure was for my fellow launch officers and support crew. If we didn’t get our missiles to their targets, critical assetts at those targets would remain intact to exact death on Western Europe. Thankfully, none of that came to pass. I went on from that a flying career in USAF special ops and electronic combat. As I look back at those crazy times with Green Peace, and CND “ladies”, they had not a clue what had to be done to save Western Europe from Soviet domination as it did Eastern Europe and the misery of 40 years under Soviet rule.
Those cruise misiles went away not because of anything GreenPeace or CND did. They went away, along with the West Germ ay based Pershing II missiles, and the Soviet SS-20 missiles in Eastern Europe because one man had the strength of conviction to face down the Soviet Union bullies from a position of strength.
After the collapse of the Soviet Union and the effective end of Cold War I, GreenPeace had to find a new cause. This of course was during the early years of Hanson’s alarmism, IPCC FAR, and the on-going assessments of the effects of the Chernobyl reactor fire/core meltdown.
Today, GreenPeace, 350.org, NRDC, and all the other enviro-econutter groups that have signed onto the Climate Change religion are as nutty as CND and the original GreenPeacers were 30 years ago.
In an ironic twist nukes, US nukes, forced the Soviet hand to the bargaining table to get rid of an entire armada of nuclear weapons and then within 3 more years the collapse of the Soviet Union itself. Today, we need new nukes, in today’s this case LFTRs, that this an armada of thorium fueled power reactors to take mankind to salvation from the lunacy of climate change and the reality of dwindling carbon fuel sources.
The fact that Greenpeace and chums are opposed to spending money on advanced nuclear is, I think, a clear indication of their real agenda, which is to destabilize energy supplies.
Global spending on windturbines would pay for development of LFTR, or even fusion, many times over in just one year.
Their real goal can only be rationalized as bringing human population to well under 1 Billion. They means will be energy deprivation and soaring costs leading to a self-fullfilling prophecy of combinations of mass starvations, NK-like self genocides, forced sterilizations, infanticide, easy abortions on demand, elimination of a dominant middle class of educated voters, expansion of dependent class of peasant/prolitariat workers anesthtized with free stuff. Meanwhile the Obama clan, the Tom Steyer clan, the Al Gore clan, and many other political elites and their heirs have their private jets, megayachts to ferry them with fossil fuels to their Swiss chalets, Aspen retreats, and Carribean getaways.
So They can’t allow the unwashed masses to use up all the oil their grandchildren will need for their private jets and yachts.
I have no idea where you guys get your information on LFTRs. As far as I have been able to determine, no one has been able to design a commercially viable LFTR, so the concept remains in the science experiment stage. And from what I understand, the issue is about physical design constraints, which no amount of money or time can solve.
In the meantime, there are 400 plus commercially profitable nuclear reactors in the world, with 50 years technological development behind them, generating nearly 11% of the world’s electricity.
Well said, Pauly. LFTR is the 21st Century’s 100mpg carburetor.
Pauly wrote at May 15, 2016 at 5:35 am: “I have no idea where you guys get your information on LFTRs. As far as I have been able to determine, no one has been able to design a commercially viable LFTR, so the concept remains in the science experiment stage.”
Part of it is self induced by our government, self fulfilling prophecies. Not that I’m looking for government funding, I just want to allow the research and development to occur. Here is comedian Al Franken, turned politician, quizzing Peter Lyons before he was confirmed Assistant Secretary for Nuclear Energy. You can watch the whole thin, only about 5 mins long, but starting at the 3 minute mark, it rolls into a question about Thorium. To boil it down, his replay was {paraphrasing} ‘We already have one fuel cycle, we’re not interested in another.’
Well, how about letting private enterprise build one Thorium plant, in the desert, all at investor’s expense. Have the NRC inspect, but let free enterprise have a bite at the apple. But no, if they let that happen, their precious fuel cycle (read Westinghouse) would diminish.
There are tons of Thorium buried in the desert as waste by-product. Many rare earth minerals are also mixed with Thorium. With Thorium considered nuclear waste, it’s not profitable to mine these minerals.
Let free enterprise loose, with oversight. The world’s energy problem would be solved..
Pauly
May 15, 2016 at 5:35 am and a bunch of thers
Thorium reactors were built at Oak Ridge Lab in the 1950s. The US nuke agency, under pressure from the military canned the program BECAUSE it didn’t produce good bomb material!!
From Wiki no less:
“The reactor, built at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, operated critical for roughly 15000 hours from 1965 to 1969. In 1968, Nobel laureate and discoverer of Plutonium, Glenn Seaborg, publicly announced to the Atomic Energy Commission, of which he was chairman, that the thorium-based reactor had been successfully developed and tested:
In 1973, however, the U.S. government shut down all thorium-related nuclear research—which had by then been ongoing for approximately twenty years at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. The reasons were that uranium breeder reactors were more efficient, the research was proven, and byproducts could be used to make nuclear weapons. In Moir and Teller’s opinion, the decision to stop development of thorium reactors, at least as a backup option, “was an excusable mistake.
‘Thorium reactors were built at Oak Ridge Lab in the 1950s. The US nuke agency, under pressure from the military canned the program BECAUSE it didn’t produce good bomb material!!’
There was no thorium in the “thorium reactors” (sic) at Oak Ridge. Hence, the military canning it is ridiculous. “Moon landings were faked” level absurdity.
Thorium is not fissile. ANY reference to “thorium reactors” is marketing, depending on the ignorance of the audience.
‘There are tons of Thorium buried in the desert as waste by-product.’
More delightful marketing. What does this mean? You are supposed to believe from it that thorium is cheap. It is not cheaper than uranium; it is not competitive with uranium for nuclear reactors.
joelobryan’s original post is good, until he drifts into the thorium nuttery.
‘In 1973, however, the U.S. government shut down all thorium-related nuclear research—which had by then been ongoing for approximately twenty years at Oak Ridge National Laboratory.’
Where do you guys get this stuff?
U.S. experimental breeding of thorium was conducted at the Savannah River Plant, NOT Oak Ridge.
The Shippingport LWBR was operated from 1977-1982. 1977 is after your 1973 “shut down all thorium-related nuclear research.”
Interesting job, perspective, and post.
I recall driving past that base, and the protest camps, on the way to Newbury from Basingstoke once. I had to endure having solid objects thrown at my LandRover, my vehicle of choice at the time, some objects smelled somewhat like human waste.
Wow! They threw their actual brains at you!
GCHQ was only a few miles away, so was a target too. I also recall seeing the transport aircraft landing and unloading the weapons. The whole place was lit up like a football stadium in the distance as I recall while driving in to Newbury from the A34.
joelobryan wrote: “Those cruise misiles went away not because of anything GreenPeace or CND did. They went away, along with the West Germ ay based Pershing II missiles, and the Soviet SS-20 missiles in Eastern Europe because one man had the strength of conviction to face down the Soviet Union bullies from a position of strength.”
That’s right. Ronald Reagan showed strength and determination which is what bullies fear and respect.
Bullies push their envelope until someone pushes back. If you don’t push back, the bullies just keep on pushing. Why wouldn’t they?
But if you stand up to a bully, then you see their real character: Cowards posing as tough guys. The posers will back off. The crazies you will have to kill.
But you would have had to kill them anyway eventually, so do it when they are weakest and you are strongest. In other words, putting the reckoning off only gives the advantage to the crazy bullies.
That’s what Liberal appeasers always do: Put off the day of reckoning for as long as possible.
Meanwhile our enemies grow in strength and confidence. Not a good idea.
Liberal appeasers are not psychologically capable of standing up to bullies, they would much rather appease the bully, so you can’t count on them to defend the rest of us from the buliies. They won’t do it.
Witness Liberal pacifist Barack Obama and the chaos his inability to deal with bullies has created in the world. He has done unbelievable damage to world order and peace.
Liberals are fierce against their political opponents, even to the point of violence. But when it comes to foreign enemies, Liberals shake in their boots at the thought of dealing with them. If only Liberals were as fierce and meanspirited with our enemies as they are with Republicans and conservatives.
The problem with LFTR is the “F.” Liquid Fluorine is absolutely hideously corrosive, terribly toxic, cannot even be stored in a glass container as it dissolves glass, and has produced some of the most gruesome deaths imaginable. Sure, let’s fill a nuke plant full of this wonderful stuff, we’ll all be much more comfortable…
“LF” is not liquid fluorine, it is liquid fluoride, that is fluoride salts. They are solids at room temperature and liquid only at 459C, so they are no more hazardous than table salt.
I think the problem with your hypothesis is that the LFTR acronym stands for Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor. Fluorine as a gas or liquid is not involved.
Fluoride salts are stable and altogether much less reactive than fluorine:
https://inldigitallibrary.inl.gov/sti/4502650.pdf
Fluorine itself is only liquid below -188°C and it cannot be stored in glass because there is always some hydrogen fluoride in the gas and the HF, however small the amount, attacks the glass.
If the fluoride fuel salts are stored in solid form over many decades, radiation can cause the release of corrosive fluorine gas and uranium hexafluoride.[92
Michael Moon on May 15, 2016 at 8:27 am wrote:
“The problem with LFTR is the “F.” Liquid Fluorine is absolutely hideously corrosive, terribly toxic, cannot even be stored in a glass container as it dissolves glass …..”
Yes, Flourine is a nasty chemical. I have actual working experience with it in its liquid and gaseous states. The nasty thing is that it loves calcium, so it soaks thru the skin and attacks your bones. And yes, it dissolves glass, that’s why it comes in plastic containers.
Flourine is used in extensively in the semiconductor industry, liquid to etch certain layers, gaseous for the lasers used in the lithography sector. So this is not new or rare on the industrial scene.
With that said, with the state of technology for metallurgy today, compared what is required for current nuclear Uranium reactors, the Flourine issue is easily addressed. Especially since LFTR doesn’t require a large water cooling source on a river or at the ocean, where large populations tend to collect at. A LFTR can be in a desert, well away from population centers. If a leak would occur, the water resources would be protected since it wouldn’t be located at the water source. With double wall piping and sensor technology, any incident can be easily detected and contained. Plus the LFTR reactors can be easily and quickly shutdown and restarted, unlike current Uranium designs. (quick shutdown, long restart).
What I seem to get from your post is a scare tactic, not giving any references or information on Flourine. This reminds me of the early days of electricity. Thomas Edison tried to scare the general public on the ‘dangers’ for AC current, being promoted by rival Westinghouse with Tesla’s designs. Edison promoted DC current, and he tried to put fear in the public on AC being dangerous. Edison electrocuted a LIVE elephant using his version of AC (pulsed DC if I remember correctly) and he even invented the electric chair, but it all backfired on him.
What I would recommend is people actually do some research on their own for LFTR and Thorium. The internet can be a wonderful resource. From what I gather, one of the main reasons we didn’t follow the Thorium path instead of Uranium, it is very difficult to get nuclear weapons from Thorium. Uranium, it’s much easier. So the military aspect was a major factor deciding which fuel was promoted.
But don’t take my word for it, or Michael Moon’s, please check it out for yourself….
Go Thorium! (is my bias showing?)
There is a big mistake here. The “F” in LFTR is not FLUORINE….it is FLUORIDE as in the salt. This technology is using a molten salt, not molecular fluorine.
nonluddite wrot on May 15, 2016 at 9:02 am
““LF” is not liquid fluorine, it is liquid fluoride, that is fluoride salts.”
Thank you… I didn’t even catch that, I went into my Flourine mode, forgetting that it’s Flouride.. Knowing that, one of the early arguments against LFTR was how corrosive the salt would be on the metal plumbing. I believe that is a non-issue with today’s metallurgy.
Millions of people died as the USSR forcefully embarked on a plan to rid itself of capitalism. In the end, the “back market” nothing more than capitalism running illegally became more than half the USSR economy, and in fact the USSR economy was completely dysfunctional without it. It was the socialist economy that collapsed under its own weight. Lots more examples like that one. The converse I challenge the greens to produce and example of.
Capitalism is a moral philosophy based on free individuals negotiating freely between themselves to achieve mutually beneficial ends, without the use of force or coercion.
Capitalism is not anarchy. Under capitalism, citizens freely GIVE some specific enumerated powers to the State (as defined in a Constitution) to protect their individual rights to: life, liberty and property. In exchange for this government protection, citizens freely agree to pay SOME taxes (preferably consumption taxes not income taxes) to enable the government to fulfill their enumerated tasks. The costs of these enumerated tasks (military, creation of laws, courts, border security, prisons, police, infrastructure, fire stations, mail delivery, international treaties, etc.) should never need to exceed 10% of GDP, except in times of war.
Socialism is an immoral philosophy designed to achieve the arbitrary goals of the state through the use of force and coercion; namely the barrel of a gun…
Most countries now have an incompatible mixture of socialism and capitalism, which are Fascistic or crony capitalist in nature. SOME private property rights do exist, with the government deciding how much individual private property one is allowed to keep.
omg…
no, capitalism is not a philosophy. it is an economic system that happens to be consonant with objective morality. it is not that morality.
socialism is not a philosophy. it is an economic system that happens to contradict human nature and the way things work. it is not a morality but a symptom of a morality of death that considers those who produce values are milch cows and that feeding on other humans is a virtue
the chief virtue of capitalism is that it recognizes the concept of ‘property’ as a virtue by means of which values are achieved.
the definition of PROPERTY (in the applicable context) is ‘a material object that is owned by a person and subject to his exclusive control’
can you see how there can be no conflict of rights because ‘exclusive’? that bit matters.
rights are based on ownership. capitalism (or, free enterprise) recognizes ownership.
and that’s why it works – it does not contradict the nature of rights.
the winning argument is always down to rights. it’s not about the freakin science, ffs. that’s a distraction.
when you insist on and defend your rights – even if it’s with your last gasp – then you will understand.
until then, you are fiddlefookin around bandying words you don’t even know how to define.
it not only does not make you look wise but it identifies you as an easy victim for the rhetorician as you are obviously confused already and won’t be much work to manipulate.
Gnomish– Capitalism is an economic philosophy based on the moral imperative that individuals have the inalienable natural rights to life, liberty (freedom from government oppression), and property. Property isn’t a “virtue”, it’s a right based on individuals owning their own bodies, thoughts, ideas, efforts and labor, and the production thereof, is owned by the individual.
Capitalism is the only moral economic philosophy that respects the inalienable rights of the individual. Under capitalism, no entity has the right to initiate force or coercion against the will of others. All human actions are by mutual consent.
All other economic philosophies are entirely based on the use of coercion and the initiation of force, with individual’s rights subject to the immoral whims of the state without the consent of the individual.
The ONLY purpose of government is to protect individual’s inalienable rights.
samurai- we agree in great detail.
apparently we also love to quibble over the use of the particular cognitive tools (words) to parse reality.
philosophy is the study of principles relating cause and effect in some set of defined circumstances – so in a broad and general way it can be stretched to cover the study of economics or the study of baking cakes or the study of how to properly wipe after reading hotwhopper. i quibble over that because it’s obvious the better word to use is ‘study’ or even ‘science’. economics is branch of knowledge concerned with the production, consumption, and transfer of wealth. so the term ‘philosophy of economics’ is at best redundant and at least unnecessary. Yes, i recognize a ‘grammar nazi’ when i are one, but there is a good reason:
” economic philosophies are entirely based on the use of coercion” < this is an example of how abuse of language encourages confusion rather than clarity because 'an economy that functions by virtue of coercion' is not properly termed 'an economy', but 'a tyranny'
being as how nearly all manufactured items are made by virtue of tools, i said what i said.
a virtue is the means by which you gain or keep something of value. i should have better said: ownership is the virtue, rather than 'property' to make your quibble impossible.
words are also tools – the tools of cognition. one gets good results by virtue of good tools.
quibbling siblings we may be- but where it matters, we agree.
also- might as well say- no rights are inalienable, i.e.. unable to be taken away from or given away by the possessor. rights may be 'natural', i.e., consistent with the nature of the person who owns them, but they are taken away from and given away by those naturally endowed with them on a daily basis.
to gain or keep the value represented by 'rights' requires certain virtues which are self evidently lacking or it wouldn't happen. that, samurai, is a tautology and a compelling topic of study for me.
Gnomish– The world is at a philosophical crossroads with the widespread adoption and expansion of moral relativism and no longer believes in the concept of inalienable rights.
Without the concept of inalienable human rights, individuals inevitably become slaves to the state, where governments arbitrarily decide what people can: think, speak and do, the level of tyranny they must endure, and how much of their personal property they’re “ALLOWED” to keep….
That’s why mobocracies (aka democracies) will always eventually fail, because it’s simply the tyranny of the 50.01% majority enslaving the 49.99% minority with no respect to anyone’s inalienable rights…
The philosophy of Communism is based the total elimination of all inalienable individual human rights, and Socialism, Fascism and “mixed” economies are merely incremental stages to the inevitable elimination of inalienable human rights.
The ONLY moral and ethical philosophy that respects the existence of inalienable rights is free-market capitalism and Constitutional Republics. In free-market capitalism, no one is legally allowed to initiate force, use coercion against others or violate anyone’s inalienable rights without their consent.
In Constitutional Republics, individuals voluntarily agree to give local, state and federal government entities some specific and enumerated powers which they cannot exceed, even if 50.1% of a country’s citizens desire the state to violate others inalienable rights with powers not granted to the government by the Constitution.. Additional powers may be granted to the state though a Constitutional amendment process, but requires a 67% of Congressional approval or 67% of the individual states agreeing to the amended powers.
Because of deplorable and unconstitutional SCOTUS rulings, the US is no longer a Constitutional Republic and has become just another failed democratic state that no longer adheres to the constraints of its enumerated powers granted by its citizens. The Constitution can now pretty much replaced by one simple sentence, “The government can do whatever the hell it wants”…
That’s why the US federal, state and local governments now devour 60% of US GDP through reckless and unconstitutional spending and $2 trillion/yr in private sector rules, regulation and mandate compliance costs… Prior to 1901 (Teddy Roosevelt’s presidency), TOTAL federal, state and local government spending only accounted for 7% of GDP, when the US still (more or less) was a Constitutional Republic. To be fair, the beginning of America’s demise was the deplorable, capricious and unconstitutional 1890 Sherman Anti-Trust Act….
Because the US no longer believes in inalienable human rights nor follows the constraints of the Constitution, the US has a $20 trillion national debt, $100+ trillion in unfunded liabilities, $2 trillion/yr in private-sector compliance costs, the US$ has lost 90% of its value since unconstitutionally going off the gold/silver standard in 1972, no longer protects its national borders, and why its in a perpetual state of war around the world…
The failure of capitalism and Constitutional Republics is primarily due to the failure of these philosophies from being epistemologically explained and defended over the past 100+ years. Without a moral, ethical, epistemological and philosophical base upon which to build a society, all societies will eventually collapse, under the weight of moral and ethical relativism.
Well stated. It’s pretty simple math. Factor in how bureaucrats and corps work the system together and it is easy to see, who the real beneficiaries of the nation state are. Just like most wars are a racket. Go figure.
you’re preaching to the choir, samurai. i know the hymnal forwards and backwards.
but it certainly never hurts to rehearse. whatever you rehearse, you get good at.
still, i cringe at your careless use of language…
this, for instance:
” violate anyone’s inalienable rights without their consent.”
i don’t think you can actually ‘violate with consent’
and for sure, ‘inalienable’ does not mean what you seem to think it means…
and while the anti-trust act was obviously an excuse to rob, long before that came ‘the constitution’
i don’t think you have a clue what that constitution was about. primarily it was to establish the means to collect gold and silver from each state and the reaon for that was because it took less than 7 years for the first wannabe royalty to inflate the fiat currency to worthlessness. ‘not worth a continental’… article 1 section 10… it ain’t holy writ. it was about enumerating the ‘rights’ of states vs a new crew of overlords.
i’m sure you do understand, it is an absurd notion that rights pertain to anything but individuals.
so i’ll contend that the decline of the usa began with the acceptance of that absurdity. there are no ‘states rights’ or ‘federal rights’ – there is only individual rights. the debasement of the concept can be traced to that convention where the means to enforce it was established once and for all.
one last word, samurai- and i want you to pay close attention to this:
evil is never necessary.
Indeed. I, for one, welcome your decision to stop reciting catechisms.
Your gish galloping can go, too… lol
It doesn’t reconcile your self contradictory statements.
As you know- a self contradictory statement is false = a lie.
That tends to limit the value of anything else you might say, McGregor.
Have a magical day!
Gnomish– You hilariously wrote, “I don’t think you can actually ‘violate with consent.”
LOL! You really don’t get it, do you….
Far too many Americans GLEEFULLY consent to having their inalienable violated and happily consent to the government exercising unconstitutional powers… Jeez.. That’s PRECISELY why we’re on the brink of economic and societal collapse with: $20 trillion debt, $100+ trillion in unfunded liability, 60% of GDP being devoured by public sector, etc….
Like yourself, many citizens couldn’t care less about their inalienable rights, and, like you, don’t even believe the CONCEPT of inalienable rights even exists! Most people are more concerned about getting their unconstitutional “free stuff” (nothing is ever “free”) than they are about having their inalienable rights protected…. Jeez, you are naive….
The VAST majority of Americans happily consent to pay into the unconstitutional Medicaid/care, Social Security and Obamacare Ponzi schemes, and actively prevent the election of ANY candidate that has the audacity to expose these unconstitutional programs as bankrupt…
The VAST majority of Americans have NO problem with their freedoms of: speech, religion, press, assembly, petition, 2nd amendment, due process, warrantless search and seizure, etc., etc., etc., rights being violated…. “Hey, I’ve got nothing to hide.” OMG….
Look at the frigging military draft! You don’t think THAT’s unconstitutional and an utter violation of inalienable rights? Many Americans happily consent and support their sons being drafted into the military… I could go on and on but, yes, people often DO gleefully consent to their inalienable rights being violated…. You just haven’t given this much thought….
You also laughably wrote, “i don’t think you have a clue what that constitution was about. primarily it was to establish the means to collect gold and silver from each state and the reason for that was because it took less than 7 years for the first wannabe royalty to inflate the fiat currency to worthlessness. ‘not worth a continental’… article 1 section 10… it ain’t holy writ. it was about enumerating the ‘rights’ of states vs a new crew of overlords.”
Jeez, gnomish what a bunch of Leftist rubbish…. I understand perfectly well the intent and the moral, metaphysical, political and philosophical reasons behind the Constitution.
The Constitution written to “cage” government, which is at best, “a necessary evil.”
By severely limiting Federal powers to 18 simple tasks enumerated in Article 1, Section 8, and by building an intricate and frustrating process of checks and balances between and among the 3 branches of government, it was hoped that these measures would make it extremely difficult to pass laws, declare wars, spend money, implement government: rules, regulations and mandates, expand government size, etc., but, alas….
I agree with you that from DAY ONE government hacks and bureaucrats bit, gnawed, scatched, bent, stretched, twisted and kicked at the bars of the Constitutional “cage” until eventually the “cage” was torn asunder. I also agree with you that the Constitution no longer exists, except as a historical document held in a hermetically sealed case at the National Archives… That’s about the ONLY thing we agree on…
OF COURSE governments have the right to tax. Citizens agreed to GIVE the right of taxation to the government to fulfill their obligations of the 18 tasks that citizens freely GAVE the government to execute… Jeez…
Currency crises arise when governments spend more money than they have and simply print money if they’re unable or unwilling to borrow or generate the necessary tax revenue to finance their fiscal obligation… That’s NOT the fault of the Constitution it is IN SPITE of the Constitution. The Constitution was designed to prohibit unnecessary government spending and to prevent the government to spend beyond its means…
Granted, perhaps a balanced budget Amendment is necessary, along with a numerical constraint to limit total federal, state and local spending to a maximum of 10% of GDP/yr…
The Constitution and capitalism didn’t fail… Governments and citizens have simply refused, like yourself, to believe in the concept of inalienable rights and fail to live under the constraints and freedoms of Constitutional Republics and free-market capitalism…
well, now you are getting just a bit over the top.
your problem, however, is abuse of English language.
in order to make it a personal issue you must work very hard to confuse my very clear and proper use of English.
so now your problem is with me
so i’ll address your problem one time:
the concept of ‘inalienable rights’ exists. it exists in the same land as the concept of ‘unicorns’.
here, for your edification and review, is the definition of ‘inalienable’ and link to source:
“Unable to be taken away from or given away by the possessor”
http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/us/definition/american_english/inalienable
now, you say, ” yes, people often DO gleefully consent to their inalienable rights being violated”
any 3 yr old child of 2 understands that if it’s not possible to give something away, then it can’t be given away.
what part of ‘inalienable’ is too freakin difficult for you to grasp?
you b.s. about ‘limiting the powers of a federal government’ is truly absurd because until it was established, there was no federal government. the constitution established one for the first time. so you are terribly confused between the concept of ‘creation’ and ‘limitation’.
this is useful as grist for parody- for instance i can say i capitalism allowed wealth to be ‘limited’ when i really mean ‘created’.
but you don’t get it because you are concrete bound, your vocabulary is plagued with deficiencies and you are simple mindedly reactive rather than observant. you want to fight? or do you want to win? is that distinction also too much for you to grasp?
so that’s how it comes to pass that we are discussing each other instead of anything worth my time.
you’ll get there, though. you’ve come this far. even the slow boats get across the lake.
you’ll do it on your own, though. i won’t put up with your tantrums.
gnomish– The definition of Inalienable rights is PRECISELY how I use it:
“Unable to be taken away from or given away by the possessor.”
Just because some tyrannical government or individual refuses to accept the concept or the existence of inalienable rights, doesn’t negate their existence… Likewise, just because some tyrannical government makes it unlawful for people to exercise their inalienable rights does not negate their existence. “Any 2 year old understands that”…
As Thomas Jefferson so eloquently put it, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.”
BTW, “pursuit of Happiness” was substituted for the word “property” because of the abominable slave issue which existed at the time…. If you knew any history, which doesn’t seem likely, you’d understand that…
Anyway, try moving your lips when reading TJ’s words as it may help you understand them better….
Apparently you hilariously and childishly think that contract law is incompatible with the concept of inalienable rights because two entities mutually agree to exchange some form of property for another form of good or service… Jeez, gnomish, how silly.
A contract isn’t a violation of inalienable rights, it the execution of inalienable rights… Free men are perfectly free to utilize and/or spend their property or live their lives however they wish, providing their actions don’t violate the inalienable rights of others or incur an obligation on others without their consent..
A Constitution is simply a contract between a government (created BY the governed) for the BENEFIT OF the governed. The governed freely give SOME enumerated and specific powers to the government (that the governed posses) with the intent that these government powers will be used to protect their inalienable rights of the governed…. (again, read what I just wrote sloooowly and try moving your lips while doing so… It may help)..
Anyway, you seem unable to use reason and to think clearly… Perhaps this will improve with maturity. I doubt it…
I won’t waste anymore time to try explain the painfully obvious… You’re too stubborn, arrogant and condescending to carry on an adult discussion.
Have fun with that…
No system is perfect, but Capitalism sort-of works in most cases whilst Communism very rarely does. The only major power claiming to be Communist today is China, and it’s questionable whether it is Communist any more. Vietnam is about the only Communist state where people have a decent standard of living. -Paradoxically, the regime which the USA fought hardest to crush, but failed. Meanwhile the North Korean regime seems very much like a hell on earth, yet it was allowed to continue.
Ian Macdonald wrote: “Vietnam is about the only Communist state where people have a decent standard of living. -Paradoxically, the regime which the USA fought hardest to crush, but failed.”
No. The American military did crush the North Vietnamese to the point that the North Vietnamese gave up and signed a peace treaty.
Then, Liberals in the American congress threw South Vietnam to the communist wolves, even though they were legally and morally obliged to go to South Vietnam’s defense, after North Vietnam violated the peace treaty and attacked South Vietnam again, after all American combat troops had been withdrawn as part of the peace treaty in 1973.
The North Vietnamese violated the peace treaty (in 1975) and the Liberal appeasers in the United States said, “We don’t care. We are washing our hands of it”. Like Pontius Pilot.
No, the Liberal appeasers threw all the progess made in South Vietnam away without a second thought, just like Obama did in Iraq. Millions of innocent people died or will die as a result of this delusional view of the world held by Liberal appeasers.
BTW, the Vietnamese were the epitome of free enterprise before the war ended. No doubt that has carried over to today.
Also, Americans who return to Vietnam are treated *very* well by the Vietnamese, even the North Vietnamese. Ask yourself why.
Vietnam and the United States are destined to become very good friends in the future, because the creeping menace of communist China is on the horizon. The U.S. is going to have a lot of new friends in the area.
China should be careful about messing with Vietnam. I recall during the 1980’s that China tried to steal some of Vietnam’s land, and Vietnam gave China a bloody nose over it, and Vietnam still has possession of their land.
China hasn’t won a war in a long time, although they sure do talk tough. Just talking a good war isn’t enough though, unless you are talking to an American Liberal appeaser. Then it is VERY effective. That’s who they are talking to.
Me, I’m from the “Show Me” state, on the issue of China’s prowess on the battlefield. They are pretty tough against defenseless pacifist Tibetans, but other than that, they haven’t shown me anything, other than an exceptional abilty to steal and cheat others out of what they own.
The biggest problem China has when it comes to waging war is their one child policy.
There are 10’s of millions of children with 2 parents, 4 grand parents and no siblings.
Having an heir to carry on the family name is VERY important in Asian culture.
Having a war in which 10’s of thousands of these “little emperors” die will quite probably result in enough social unrest to bring down the current govt.
They can talk tough, but they can’t really afford to back it up.
PS: Let’s not forget that many of these “little emperors” have been pampered since birth. Trying to force them to go to war will not be easy in the first place.
Reminder: America lost the Vietnam War. Okay, America declared a win and walked away.
There can be no question that China is no longer a Communist state. It is a single party dictatorship wherein connected party apparatchiks have stolen state assets to create concentrations of capital (hence the name) and massive personal wealth. In the West, others found different ways to steal fortunes. Some even earned it. Regardless, modern economies need concentrations of capital. Socialists believe government can manage investment. I’m not making this up. That’s what they think.
Why should we “run out of a resource we can’t replace”?
Julian Simon worked on this topic for many years. He showed quite clearly that mankind has never done this, and never will. His ‘discovery’ was that ‘resources’ are NOT just raw materials – they are raw materials PLUS human ingenuity. If we become short of a raw material, we develop an alternative which is BETTER. Iron took over from stone and wood – steel took over from iron – composites are taking over from steel…
Those who think we will run out of raw materials are not considering how human ingenuity introduces game changes whenever necessary. Or perhaps they want us to stop thinking as well….?
Right on Dodgy,
People are sitting in carbon fibre composite aircraft thinking as if they are in a riveted steel plate steamship. The analysis is two generations behind reality.
…People are sitting in carbon fibre composite aircraft thinking as if they are in a riveted steel plate steamship….
The early riveted ship plates were IRON – an even earlier material…
I am always amazed that Julian Simon, who did all the early study and thinking on this topic, is rarely mentioned. Instead, people seem to re-invent his findings as if they were new. But he was the first to point out how humans progress really happens, and to provide all the historical data to justify what he was saying.
His classic book on this subject, of course, is “The Ultimate Resource” – quite hard to get at a cheap price nowadays. I got my copy from a second-hand sale at Exeter University. It was from the economics section and, as far as I could tell, had never been read…!
“His classic book on this subject, of course, is “The Ultimate Resource” – quite hard to get at a cheap price nowadays.”
helloooo. this is the internets calling:
http://www.juliansimon.org/writings/Ultimate_Resource/
Dodgy geezer wrote: “Those who think we will run out of raw materials are not considering how human ingenuity introduces game changes whenever necessary. Or perhaps they want us to stop thinking as well….?”
There are unlimited raw materials available just beyond the escape velocity of Earth orbit.
Which goes to Julian Simon’s point that human ingenuity has the means to increase the available resources.
“If we become short of a raw material, we develop an alternative which is BETTER. Iron took over from stone and wood – steel took over from iron – composites are taking over from steel…”
Classic examples of capitalism at work to the benefit of us all.
As a resource starts to get scarce it also starts to get expensive.
In the real world resources come from a wide variety of sources, some sources are easy to extract, some resources are expensive to extract.
Basic business logic says you exploit the easy sources first, and the difficult ones later.
As a result of the rising price three things happen.
1) Sources that were previously too difficult become economical and are exploited, increasing the amount of the resource available.
2) People find ways to use less of the resource. That is efficiency steps that weren’t economical before, start to become economical. Plus new ones are invented as the incentive to do so increases.
3) People start looking for alternatives to the resource.
Between these three things, the transition from one resource to the next has always occurred with minimal fuss and disruption.
Right on Dodgy Geezer…Our pending leap into space to extract resources is exactly a case in point, ingenuity is the driver of economic and social advance. I’d wager that there are a greater percentage of people in the world who can read, write, and perform basic math than at anytime in the history of the world and that is a powerful transformative tool.
Every ism produces pollution, thus health hazards. Capitalism provides a meansof concentration of wealth in few peoples banks and other extreme ism make people live with the begging bowls. We need an ism that better utilizes weather and make the people live happily. Forget about CO2 and pseudo global warming hysteria.
Dr. S. Jeevananda Reddy
Nuclearism. That is a thorium-fueled nuclear-ism.
Peak oil, peak natural gas, peak coal will happen. Because by definition, those are non-renewable resources. Thorium nuclear power will last for thousands, if not 10’s of thousands of years. The greens don’t like it because it means man is left in its dominant position of expoliting the Earth’s other resources in the oceans and in mineral deposits.
Dr. S., Please tell me- where and when was capitalism “invented” and “imposed” on anyone? Where is the founding document?
Total garbage, but thanks for playing.
Capitalism creates wealth and makes everyone wealthier. There’s a reason why poor people in the US live better than do middle class people in most of the rest of the world.
There is nothing wrong with capitalism, it’s that governments interfere in it and banks and financial institutions imbalance it. It is governments that wont allow failed institutions die, which capitalism demands.
AIG should be gone, as should some car makers, banks ect.
This is the problem, preventing capitalism running its course.
100+
“But I would argue that the Soviets were an exception.”
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I would argue the Soviets haven’t even begun.
Give them 40 years and the extraction of their natural resources.
The Soviets have been gone for 20 years.
Perhaps you are thinking of the Russians.
“As a union leader used to speaking shorthand to comrades,”
=================
Careful with your threats……
For me this outburst by Jim Casey :-
“As a union leader used to speaking shorthand to comrades, I framed capitalism as an idea that could be overthrown.”
…does rather say it all – The targeting of CO2 was a ploy to simply overthrow capitalism. The descriptive term for those that tried this on is the very apt “WaterMelon”
I have on many occasions frustrated some of these people to the point of their getting all angry and shouty by demonstrating the ecological carnage of the old Soviet Union and indeed its CO2 emissions because it ignored any sort of emission management of its factories.
And the classic variation in individual wellbeing from the old Left run Countries compared to that of the Capitalist West was usually the point where they would storm off in a huff shouting over their shoulders that I did not know what I was talking about.
Excellent to see these same points so ably set out by Eric Worrell
Soviets weren’t any “exception”. They were simply a communist country that was advanced enough to have lots of heavy industry – something that was built already by Lenin – and communism unavoidably makes all these things inefficient. If you have some countries like Cuba that haven’t really been industrialized yet, you can’t use it as an argument relevant for the part of the world that already knows how to deal with lots of industry.
The point is made even more clearly than with the USSR by my homeland, Czechia (and Slovakia), the most industrialized communist country the world has seen. When capitalism started, the CO2 emissions dropped by 1/3 or so – despite the GDP quickly jumping on a fast increasing trend (after 20+ or 40+ years of near stagnation).
Communists loved to beat their record in the coal and steel production etc. – lots of things that weren’t really needed. Communism intrinsically wastes all the resources and human work etc., it’s just a big part of the definition of this system. For example, in 1968, top Czechoslovak economist Ota Šik found a coal mine near Ostrava and a nearby power plant. The power plant consumed all the coal produced by the mine and the mine consumed all the electricity from the power plant. 😉
You know, this is exactly the type of wasteful loops that no one easily notices in communism – all of them ay be said to fulfill some “plan”. In reality, the loops may be much more complicated. Without clear prices and for-profit motivation of the business entity, and their right to buy cheaper material or components from others, one simply can’t avoid this kind of wasting.
At the end, the wastefulness of socialism and efficiency of capitalism was seen even after Kyoto. The EU was full of words and plans. The U.S. didn’t ratify Kyoto but it actually saw a lower increase of CO2 than the whole famous European Union. To reduce CO2 emissions “dramatically” relatively to what is “natural” is extremely expensive and no wise businessman or politician is doing such things. So we end up with the question which trend of CO2 emissions is natural and the trend in free enough capitalist economy is more efficient – so at least, the amount of CO2 emissions per produced dollar is surely increasing less quickly, or decreasing more quickly, in a proper free-market economy than in a planned or semi-planned one.
“… in 1968, top Czechoslovak economist Ota Šik found a coal mine near Ostrava and a nearby power plant. The power plant consumed all the coal produced by the mine and the mine consumed all the electricity from the power plant …”.
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Beautiful, now that’s what the left would call sustainability.
bravo- you did the quotable phrase that pays!
Still, it was one side that felt the burn – or “The Bern”, as USA college voters would have it.
Germany’s Energiewende is to be abandoned by 2019. The Germans have realized how wasteful and uncompetitive it is. The solar and wind subsidies in the US will wind down (pun). The result will be bankruptcy for Solar City and the wind power companies in 10 years, companies that today own and maintain the turbines and solar farms littered across the US. Who will remove these derelict, decaying eyesores? It will become a booming cottage industry to the entrepreneur that still may exist then to get the valuble copper in those wind turbines and solar panel connections.
Kyoto was about political solutions to achieve politic ends. The same with Paris COP21, which of course by any objective assessment was an abject practical failure and a joke.
Obama and Kerry tut-tutted across stages, making meaningless speeches to their sycophant audiences; audiences who told them their invisible clothes were obviously made of the finest fabrics.
ParisCOP21 allowed China, Russia, and India keep doing whatever they wanted while theWest made INDCs to self-strangle, a further joke. The lackey left media barely was critical of how big a fialure Paris was for the Church of Climate Change congregants. The mainstream media reporters and editors of 2016 are basically incompetent morons and uneducated rubes compared to their father’s critical questioning in the 1950’s and 60’s.
“Soviets weren’t any “exception”. They were simply a communist country that was advanced enough to have lots of heavy industry – something that was built already by Lenin – and communism unavoidably makes all these things inefficient. ”
No. Lenin ran the Soviet civil war, after which the factories were destroyed. He tried to prevent mass starvation by allowing limited capitalism under his NEP New Economic Policy. Then he died.
USSR was at that point about as developed as Libya is now, i.e. total shambles after civil war.
Stalin then had the first 5 year plan in 1923 (I think) drawn up by Albert Kahn, Henry Ford’s industry architect. Kahn designed 623 factories for the 5 year plan. German and US companies built them. Stalin payed with resources (so he needed the Gulag prisoners to extract them).
Lubos Motl
May 14, 2016 at 11:48 pm
I hope your country is going to opt out of the EU – it looks like there is talk of it. In the EU the “marxbrothers” don’t use military power but rather slowly eat you alive like a disease to achieve what you just got rid of a couple of decades ago. The tactic is to tie you up and make you dependent so that you have no choice. You do have a choice, though because they won’t use military force. They are already using threats of a fine for not accepting massive immigration. I like the speech by the Hungarian President on the subject. It is the best I have ever heard from a politician:
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=President+of+Hungary+speech+on+EU+and+immigration+youtube&t=ffnt
Back in the 1970-ties a Polish colleague told me that their TVs (then) were so heavy to carry because they contained much more steel than actually needed to insure integrity. In this way TV production helped the steel plants to make their quota as laid down in the 5-year plan.
Capitalism is a good system if one is willing to work. If one is not willing to work capitalism sucks big time. Socialism and communism are not good systems especially if one is willing to work, and just as sucky as capitalism if one is not willing to work. What seems to work well is crony capitalism and passing the cost on to unborn generations. This way we get the toys we want now and that is all that matters. To hell with future generations. This isn’t rocket strategery. /snark
No, socialism sucks whether you want to work or not. In Venezuela, with the power on for just 2 days a week as the economy collapses, you cannot work. You cannot stand in line 14 hours a day for bread and do work.
US officials concerned about possible coup in Venezuela
http://www.foxnews.com/world/2016/05/15/us-officials-concerned-about-possible-coup-in-venezuela.html?intcmp=hplnws
“The main cost of production for most businesses is labour.”
Not in poor countries run by socialist elites.
Capitalism and communism are both aspects of materialism and both will collapse under the weight of their false promises that everyone will be happy if they just have enough things. Capitalism promises that if you work hard you can earn all those things, while ensuring that most never do. Communism promises that there is already a big pile of enough things, we just need to redistribute them equitably and there will be enough to go round, eventually, after the completion of the next couple of 5-year plans, or not.
Classical textbook capitalism and communism, if they ever existed, certainly don’t any more. What we have now is bankism and cronyism elitism – with quasi-capitalists and crypto-communists each grasping for the control of the levers of…the banking sector! Who needs public power when you hold the purse strings.
We are surrounded by a combination of “too big to fail” and “too dumb to succeed”. The Left-Right agro on WUWT is boring and empty. End the political partocracy – ban the parties outright. There is no ‘us v.s. them’. There is only ‘Us’. There is no problem we cannot overcome if it is preceded by unity of purpose.
/rant
The country has always been run by oligarchs. For example, get the names of the families who own the Reserve Banks. Right, you cannot. The Congress cannot. Those names are protected. So about a dozen families decide the economic agenda and direction. For example, you cannot run for President without the backing of an oligarch. Hillary is backed by Soros. Cruz lasted as long as he did not because anyone was listening to him, but he was backed by an oligarch who brought in two others. When the oligarch pulled out, bang, Cruz withdrew from the race in 24 hours. It was over. Trump is his own oligarch, but still needs support of super-oligarchs, those much richer than himself. So really, we don’t have capitalism, we have a hybrid.
I think you seriously misinterpret capitalism. Capitalism was never imposed by anyone. Capitalism is what people do when they are free- free to own property and exchange goods and services by mutual agreement.
” Capitalism promises that if you work hard you can earn all those things, while ensuring that most never do.”
more fatuous nonsense
capitalism promises nothing – absolutely no promises are made by anybody to anyone.
capitalism simply recognizes ownership – that you own your body, your mind and the fruits of your labors – and that you have exclusive control over the use of your property. that makes it possible to keep what you make and trade what you want to with anybody else who wants to trade.
capitalism is an economic system, not a freakin religion.
if left/right framing is boring and imbecilic, it’s no worse than illiterate rants.
Nobody ever promised that working hard would be enough to get ahead.
You also have to work smart.
You can be a ditch digger and work as hard as you want, but no company will ever pay you more than it would take to rent a machine to do the same job.
Companies exist to create products to sell, and that is the only reason why the exist.
They do not, and never have, exist to create jobs.
Jobs are the side effect of a successful company. The minute you forget that is the minute the company starts heading for bankruptcy.
You go Crispin. Problem is we’re just over evolved apes. Our appetites overrule our rational thought. Good luck putting an end to consumerism. Maybe via virtual reality?
+ superlative (The equivalent of a big number 😉
“I framed capitalism as an idea that could be overthrown. On reflection, it is something that is more likely to collapse under its own weight – we cannot adhere to a belief that is so obviously unable to make the transition into the future that awaits many of us and all of our children.”
Relax as the Greenies have their transition covered in case you’ve forgotten-
http://www.break.com/video/you-ve-always-wanted-to-see-exploding-school-children-1932565
Whatever turns you interventionist Greenies on with your kids dude but don’t even think for a nanosecond about going there with mine or the climate will change very dramatically.
A decent famine restricts the human footprint both by stunting growth and killing off a large proportion of the population. But the Chinese had the ultimate footprint reduction method by bandaging the feet of girl babies. QED
Does he have kids I wonder
He does not have kids. He is a Bioethicist!
What frightens me is that United Nations seems to be a mingling place for unelected megalomaniacal bureaucrats having ideas about global revolution. These are the kind of changes United Nations want to bring about:
“This is the first time in the history of mankind that we are setting ourselves the task of intentionally, within a defined period of time, to change the economic development model that has been reigning for the, at least, 150 years, since the industrial revolution,”
—
“The tools that you design, the financial structures that you develop, the blends that you are able to put together, all of that, in the next five years, will decide the quality of certainly the energy and certainly the quality of the global economy for the next thirty-five years, and hence the quality of life for everyone else for hundreds of years.” The New Yorker – The Climate Summit of Money
– Christiana Figueres, who heads up the United Nations’s Framework Convention on Climate Change
I can think of a few others who intentionally brought about radical changes to societies or developed creative financial structures. It didn´t always turn out well. Often it turns out really really bad. By the way – Christina Figueres will be replaced by a new revolutionary leader this year. Nobody will be given the right to vote for alternative candidates.
What the proponents for green revolution does not seem to get, is that the precautionary principle is two sided:
“The precautionary principle (or precautionary approach) to risk management states that if an action or policy has a suspected risk of causing harm to the public, or to the environment, in the absence of scientific consensus (that the action or policy is not harmful), the burden of proof that it is not harmful falls on those taking an action that may or may not be a risk.” – Wikipedia
It may also be suspected that the policy propounded by United Nations may cause harm to the public, by increased energy costs and by malallocation of resources. This is already happening.
United Nations seems to be far out of line with its charter.
Two centuries ago my South Wales ancestors were agricultural workers. They lived in verminous timber and wattle cottages with leaky straw roofs and stamped earth floors. They defecated in a privy over a pit at the bottom of the garden, which was moved every few years as the pit filled up. Water was untreated output of the village pump down the road. Cooking was done with firewood gleaned from the local woodlands. Half the children died in infancy and many women died young, exhausted from continual childbearing.
After a century the evil capitalistic Coal and Steel magnates had forced the younger generations to leave this idyllic existence and herded them into stone built houses with slate roofs. There were flagstone floors, sash windows with clear glass and cheap coal for heating and cooking. There was a tap with clean piped water and flush toilets connected to a sewer system, both just outside the back door. Only half the children died in infancy and birth control was starting to become accepted.
After another century the plumbing is indoors, insulated houses have gas and electricity, small families are normal and infant death a rare tragedy. However the evil capitalists in Silicon Valley have forced us to fill our houses with electronic gadgets and we have to spend our long leisure hours communicating with the rest of the world!
Never mind, only temporary. The greens have plans to send us all back to a new 17th century utopia.
Rant over.
If you presuppose that we are in a Depression, then all of the anxiety, economic stagnation, high unemployment, constantly doctored government numbers all over the place that we are okay (such as zero inflation) fits. Clearly, people want to try something else, after all, an economic crash in 2008 where we gave 40% of our wealth to save our banks, and since then, there has been no economic recovery, is not pleasant. With doctored inflation so the government no longer pays Social Security increases (inflation is now said to be zero, while others say it is 15% because irrelevant things to the government like food, fuel, and rent, do matter to the population), doctored unemployment officially at 5%, while others estimating it is 20%, massive price spiral in college costs backed by government-for-life indentured servitude to pay those costs back, cannot be addressed if the data is fake. If we step back and think about it, it very well may be that we have a parallel narrative constructed by the government for their own goals, backed by faulty data, for absolutely everything, not just climate. We don’t have a climate conspiracy, we live in a house of lies.
That’s what you get when you allow people who have no skin in the game to vote.
Tom,
Plenty of them do have skin in the game. They’re the ones on the dole — the takers, versus the makers. They vote in their own best interest.
The problem is the government giving them far too much. Now they’re hooked. They are being paid to not work. You get what you pay for, no?
50% of the working age population is on the dole (more, if you include everyone).
How long can this go on?
Perhaps I should have been more blunt. Only those who are business owners (including stock holders) and those that own real property are allowed to vote. Keeps all the freeloaders from voting themselves OPM.
Yeah Tom, that poor 19 year old grunt that enlisted into the Navy can’t vote because he doesn’t own a business, doesn’t have stock or real property. But he sure can give his life defending our country, so you can sit on your fat butt watching cable TV all day long.
Well Betty, I spent 9 years in the USMC and am a 10% disabled vet. I am self employed and own my home. I pay income and property taxes. So if anyone has a beef with freeloaders it would be the tens of thousands of people like me. Serving in the military is part of the life learning experiences that moves you towards earning the right to vote. So next time you shoot your ignorant mouth off try to think of whom you just may be addressing.
The 19 year old grunt who doesn’t have any real property nor stocks, and you will deny him the vote? Is that how you treat your fellow servicemen?
Betty P,
I’ll agree with you — if you wouldn’t mind if I can vote your money into my pocket. I think that’s the basic issue that Tom is raising.
Tom said: ” Only those who are business owners (including stock holders) and those that own real property are allowed to vote.” He didn’t say anything about paying taxes. People that don’t own real estate, nor own a business pay income taxes and payroll taxes. They also pay sales taxes, and sin taxes if they smoke or drink.
He left out a large class of average working class people that work hard and don’t get a free ride.
Betty Pfeiffer
May 15, 2016 at 1:58 pm
“He left out a large class of average working class people that work hard and don’t get a free ride.”
The problem, as stated by Donald Kasper above, is that we have a government full of liars and thieves. But who’s fault is that? It is our own. Why? Because we have allowed people to vote for anyone who promises them benefits off of other peoples effort. When you have a financial stake in something that these liars and thieves regulate to your detriment, you tend to see things differently. So may I suggest to you that you go out and buy $2000 worth of stock in a company. It isn’t hard to do. Save for it, borrow it, whatever it takes but just do it. Then you will start to see what I am talking about.
Betty, anyone can buy stock. Many shares can be acquired for 10 to 20 dollars.
All you have to do is forgo optional consumption for a few months, and put the money into a mutual fund.
Tom, I would prefer to limit the vote to those who are net taxpayers.
We are all concerned that from time to time certain of the planet’s resources will be inadequate or depleted. But the most important resource of all is essentially unlimited. Human ingenuity.