Coping with Awareness

Stellarwind72 proposed we write an essay on how to remain in good mental health while being aware of our overshoot predicament.

I have assembled here ideas from thirteen un-Denial participants plus my own.

If any reader would like to add their own list of tips, please send me a message and I will update the essay with your contribution.

14-Jun-2024 Friend Jack Alpert, who has developed the only viable plan to minimize suffering and retain some of our species’ best accomplishments, has contributed to this compilation.

ABC

The insights of yours truly, on how to engage with the predicament. 

“We are survival machines – robot vehicles blindly programmed to preserve the selfish molecules known as genes.”
– Richard Dawkins

“Right, as the world goes, is only in question between equals in power, while the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must.”
– Thucydides

Both statements are correct, philosophically one might describe them followingly. 

Natural selection:

  • “Dao; The Way” 

Maximum Power Principle:

  • “Nietzsche; The Will To Power”

How to perceive the predicament?

  • Strive for power, as an act of self-preservation.

Death is indifferent.

  • What is there to lose?

Charles

We are waiting for the barbarians while getting a free ride and think we are in charge. 

It’s time for a doomer’s jubilee.

Yes, I am happy with what’s happening in the world. Whatever the outcome. Whatever the way it unravels. (Which doesn’t mean I don’t have problems which come and go and need to be solved, up and downs, fears and obsessions probably like many.)

I so wanted to share with you the ticket out of thinker’s hell, out of humanist’s hell. It turns out to be hard. It all seems so simple now, that I don’t even remember what exactly triggered a change of state.

I could try to recount my encounter with non-duality. I could list some of the leads I followed: Ramana Maharshi, UG Krishnamurti, Swami Prajnanpad, Ramesh Balsekar, Paul Hedderman. And, how one day, the whole mental edifice crumbled. The whole indoctrination of science, layers upon layers painstakingly acquired during years of learning, repetition and practice, nothing but rumbles. Not to be replaced.

Would it be understood (comparing science to a belief system is anathema to many: sometimes the only way to notice we are wearing a pair of glasses is to try wearing another one)? Would it be of any use? Isn’t one of the points that no generalization is possible, that every one’s experience is fiercely unique.

Maybe it’s the realisation that there is a limit to our ability to predict the future, or that the worst already happened (more than once) in the past (the Shoah, Native American genocide, …), or witnessing so many experts defending tooth and nail their own version of truth, or noticing that imagination of a dreaded outcome has nothing to do with the actual experience, or going through some hardships and realising that things just go on, or that the world is 1 without 2 (it is as it is and not some imaginary else), or seeing how tough life is on most people yet they somehow manage, or that it’s always all an experience, good or bad, it’s entertaining (like I am the station in front of which trains come and go and I have no agency on which type of trains or the schedule. So I might just as well enjoy the show), or realising the shallowness of the myths that have been stacked one upon each other (by religion, by science, by the self, by the mind, …) and for which we deploy so much fervour and energy.

Maybe it’s simply the recurring small encounters with beauty, with life. Gardening does that for me, fearlessly exchanging with people to reach the depths and truth of an aspect of their mental shape too (as we are doing now), or just greedily inhaling every small details reaching my small field of consciousness.

Or, it may just be getting bored of negativity.

As much as I had wished to share this state, it seems not to be really communicable. It will dawn on you, I am sure. And some day, you will be suddenly laughing out loud in the middle of the fields. If anybody sees you then, they will think all that worrying ended up getting the best of you. 🙂

Anyway, thank you for finding and periodically bringing to our attention smart people doing original thinking on this topic of collapse. I am grateful for your clear eyesight, your ability to separate the chaff from the wheat. Especially, it has been a great support during covid.

To conclude, here are the most important ideas I want to share:

Redemption, betterment, moksha, liberation, self-realization, illumination, enlightedment, progress, self-improvement, planet rescue… As if the world could be any different than it is. As if it could be improved upon. As if we had control. As if the dynamic of life were a math problem with an optimum solution. If you meet the Buddha, kill him. I say burn them all, Fahrenheit 451 style: Buddha, Jesus, Darwin, Einstein, Malthus, the Meadows. They clutter our souls. Time for renewal. Snap out of any form of idealism, absolutely any kind of indoctrination. Now the earth was formless and empty. Go back there and start anew.

To me, it’s thinking which shapes our experience by arbitrarily slicing, labelling everything, arbitrarily picking a perimeter to focus on (identification), a start and an end, creating concepts: birth, death, progress, evolution, species, collapse, NPK (chemistry), MPP, MORT, you name it… That’s all delusional. There is no way anything can be understood. It is not meant to. And that’s fine. There is nothing to be either fearful, angry, saddened or cheerful about. It is just as it is. And that’s awe-striking.

As far as I understand, this is UG Krishnamurti, this is non-duality (not 2, which does not imply 1 either).

And then, there is all that matters, that which can’t be put in words…

el mar

el mar´s approach:

Take care!

  • Be friendly and balanced, don’t believe every bullshit.
  • Be peaceful, self-critical but don’t put up with everything.
  • “Come down”, think “small”, for species-appropriate human husbandry.
  • Buy regionally, support local producers, manufacturers and craftspeople. Eat healthy, fresh, unprocessed food
  • Start a kitchen garden. Start small.
  • Learn something crafty and practical.
  • Cooperate and share with like-minded people.
  • Listen to your inner voice – not to ideologues and pied pipers from the right and left.
  • Avoid mass consumption and mass media.
  • Inspire other people to join this movement.

Saludos

Florian

It’s pretty funny to me, I’m a “young person” (< 40 years) and I’m not following a single of Robs points.

I live in a big city (I was born here) and work in tech (which I enjoy within reason) and I can afford to only work 30h. In a slow collapse scenario I will have to trade my database knowledge for food lol but, personally, this is not the future I envision.

My own version of the future is a lot more bleak so I live my life of pleasure, sitting comfortably in my office hardly working knowing that it could end next month, year or decade. Which also has it upsides because I don’t need to worry about my retirement.

Gaia

Do you remember my post on suffering that you decided should be a guest essay (and that quite floored me to see my words the next day front and centre!)? My core outpouring then, and even more now, is the question, was it all worth it? That so few have benefited so much at the expense of so many? Even to the point of the destruction of our biosphere, endangering life systems at the macro and molecular level through our hubris in thinking we can grasp power and control far beyond our reach. In my darkest hours I feel that deepest, helpless, purging sorrow is the only true emotion we can justifiably claim; all other feelings and reactions to our existence are derivative of our denial that allows us to continue living so. It’s denial that keeps me as positive and equanimous as I seem to all around, if anything I feel an imposter as I should be more depressed and grieving for the world and humanity as a whole.
I consider this recent post a continuation of that lament on suffering and even more a personal outcry of remorse and regret that I was not as conscious of my role and responsibility in the greater good and suffering as I could have been, or if I was aware, I certainly was not courageous as I know is rightful in failing to use my one life boldly to declare justice as others have done.

As children, we naturally understand and feel injustice aggrievedly, possibly because we are otherwise helpless and dependent upon the goodness of others, but also in our naivete and innocence we trust that others know and care how we feel, and would treat us as we and they wish to be. Through a thousand thousand cuts of disappointment and breaches of trust, cog-turning assimilation into the culture and society into which we were born, it comes to pass that we throw off that banner of righteousness and justice in exchange for a yoke of resignation and complacency. We carry our burden with hardly a murmur, willingly or not, wittingly or not, so we can stake our claim of existence in this society upon which we are wholly dependent. To conform with the dominant tribe is our survival strategy, and the more complex our society becomes, it is clear that for the masses there is little choice but to continue the status quo or be cast out. We come to realize our relative individual unimportance to the system, so it is not much of a step to endorse anothers’ insignificance, especially those outside of our tribe. Then it is no matter at all to deny their right to existence, and all manner of injustices become justified. For all my complicitness of inaction, I shall bear my own guilt. It is through recognition of myself in the majority that will lead to my release of judgment for them, and if by grace I can come to some measure of forgiveness, I hope to absolve myself a little, too.

Truth to tell, at some level we know we are here because someone else is not, we have because someone else does not. My ancestors survived at the cost of another, and now I have my material life at the expense of another. There is no way else to balance this equation, however we try to reconcile it. It is all justified because we are who we are, and they are who they are–as in the developed world, complete and worthy, still deciding if the “developing” ones have a right to exist. The colour of our skin, the language we speak, the land we find ourselves, and most expediently, the exchange rate we decided upon, keeps everyone in their own respective domain and hierarchy of who shall have and not have. We call it fair trade to keep us in the West living in our high standard whilst those whose labour and resources we have stolen through our inflated dollars can only keep living in their degraded standards. Any child can see through this unfairness which we have called our globalised world. Genocide still may be abhorrent, but slavery, as long as it is at arm’s length, has its merits. I am a beneficiary of this and cannot and will not erase that stain upon my conscience. We need not wait for AI to overcome our humanity; we have already given away a greater part of that when as a species we chose to continue following the algorithms of power as a method for survival instead of allowing our still small voice of conscience to heed the golden rule. Until we embrace the earth as our village and kinship with all life, we are quite alone on this blue-green planet, spinning alone in this corner of the universe.

I contend that we all have the possibility of a Hitler as well as Mother Theresa–the only difference is quantity of intention and scope of action, but the quality is already in us. It must be so if we are a species together, the family trait of both runs deep and will out given the right circumstances. Our continued survival as a species has depended on at times dominance and exploitation, and at other times, cooperation and altruism. Daily we balance between the spectrum in all our decisions, whether consciously or not. As a species, we perhaps could never have evolved differently, but gifted with the birthright of consciousness and conscience, individually we could have chosen differently. We know it can be done because it has been done, we all have done it–have risen to the occasion of defending the defenseless, be it a rescued bird or standing for a friend against a bully. Courage in those moments is a direct line to our hearts, bypassing our brains working out what is in it for us. I daresay those are the times we felt most alive and sure of our purpose, the moments when we consider anothers’ well-being before our own. This quality of beneficence is every bit a part of our species as well, all we lack is consistency, which is the mark of mastery. Whilst some rare few may achieve instant enlightenment, the other path, however long and arduous, will also reach the goal through awareness and effort. We must be able to practice our kindness and goodness; it matters not how small the task before us as we have the quality already, it is merely the quantity we can choose to increase or withhold. We can choose kindness and rightfulness again and again, until it is no longer a choice but defines us.

Despite these physically, mentally, and emotionally draining times, I am going along as well as I can be, seizing the joy and wonder in every day as I know how precious life, and the passing time that unravels life, are. I now understand clearly why Cicero (considered a Skeptic, not a Stoic) stated that gratitude is the greatest of and the parent of all virtues. I find comfort in managing the daily tasks that so many wish they could do with as much freedom and ease as I have enjoyed all my life, and in helping others by being more generous with my time through practical action or listening ear. Giving back is the choice I am hanging onto for having the privilege of receiving so much. Knowing now as I do that our life of continued ease will be greatly foreshortened due to our own making, crystalises for me the certainty that my remaining days and choices are fast becoming last chances to consolidate what I have learned as a human being on this planet. And even more importantly, to prove to myself that my life has been an examined one and the highest version of what I can be. Whilst I cannot save humanity, I can still save the part of me that can be more grateful, kind, compassionate, accepting and forgiving. It is the only and true thing remaining for me to do, and for which my entire life was preparation.

Rob here, I’ve added to Gaia’s contribution a powerful paragraph she wrote as a comment a month ago:

The on-going genocide of the Palestinians really nailed it for me. Now we know that given the opportunity, we would act just the same way the majority of Germans did, in turning a blind eye to what we know is morally unjust and thinking we can continue with our own lives. We will watch the slaughter and deplore it, but why don’t we have the courage to upend our lives by doing something radical in effort to stop it? It’s the same for the response to Covid. It seems the most radical thing a Westerner can do (and more power to the pro-Palestine youngsters at universities who still have heart and guts) is publicly protest but why are we not all walking out of our jobs or going on hunger strikes and the like? What does it take to really take a stand, to deliberately override every instinct of survival by choosing suffering and even death (like Aaron Bushnell, who conflagrated himself) for an ideal? The drive to protect ourselves and just keep living the lives we are accustomed, especially us in the West is overwhelming–we have too much to lose and we know we cannot survive outside our system. We are workers in the hive, and we are programmed for only the hive. Knowing this, we finally come to understand that we are not free beings and never have been, but that does not mean we do not still have choice and our internal world can be closer to what we want to make it. That’s why the Stoic philosophy is particularly attractive to me; I have succumbed to relinquishing any hope of changing the outer world but I can still find meaning, purpose and joy in life by improving my inner self.

Hamish McGregor

There are no specific actions I take, to help with coping – unless being constantly negative, whining, passive aggressive and excess criticism (of everything) counts.

Hideaway

In working out where we are headed, I cope via a variety of mechanisms. We are a close family, my wife and our children, and we come from close families, so there is always the following of everyone’s progress through life as a positive to look forward to. We are financially well off, as I’ve invested well by predicting the way the world would try to head, given what I know of resources, which has allowed our children to have a much easier path. They are well aware of my findings and none of our children, in their 30’s, have chosen to have kids, so no grandchildren to worry about. They say they will just return to the farm when civilization collapses.

I have native areas of bush (forest for non Aussies) on our property that are regenerating from before we bought, 40 years ago. Taking a long walk through these areas gives a regenerative feel for the world overall. Life will go on after us, until it can’t, but will spring up somewhere else in the universe. Life is for living and I enjoy spreading the word of what’s happening in reality, so it doesn’t get me down at all. We have plenty of food, heat when necessary and great shelter that we built with our own hands. I cut wood from our bush for heating the house, mostly from storm damage, or dead/dying trees as the bush goes through it’s natural succession, so providing our own heat source in winter is also cathartic.

I get a type of internal peace knowing that there is no purpose to life, it just exists, so making the most of it with as many different experiences as possible in great company is what counts. being part of a like minded community of thinkers at un-Denial also helps with sanity as it clearly shows I’m not ‘out of my mind’ with my findings on the direction of the world, so thanks to all contributors at un-Denial and especially to Rob for hosting the site..

Jack Alpert @ https://skil.org/

I am not going to prep for the down slope for four reasons:

  1. There is no protection from the roving hoards. Both, preppers and non-preppers, will end up with nothing to eat but each other very quickly — probably in the next 50 years and most certainly in a hundred years.
  2. Running, hiding, and being the last man eating the last can of corn in the last cupboard is not what I want to work toward.
  3. I cannot drink a good glass of wine and watch the sunset without guilt.
  4. That I am old and I might make it out of here before tragedy strikes brings me no joy.

I will feel bad every day if I do not try to fix things I can see are broken.

Some fixes I do not care to work on. I am done being distracted by efforts to fix the miss perceptions and dysfunctional behaviors resulting from our limbic brain which evolved too slowly to keep up with our cognitive capacities to create civilization’s momentum.

My work focus each day:

  1. Define a viable Human Earth system in terms of behavior that controls  mass and energy flows that can exist continuously without degradation of the earth’s productive capacity.
  2. Define the collective behavior required to transition to this Human Earth system.
  3. Implement the required behavior:
  • i) Extracting bad behavior takers from the population:
    • a) Old age deaths
    • b) Starvation deaths
    • c) Deaths from violence
  • ii) Coerce the required behavior from the remaining population:
    • a) Physical enslavement
    • b) Social contract enslavement
  • iii) Create universal upgrade in cognitive processes in every living person.

Some milestones on this journey:

The existing 8 billion people living today will not be living in 2100. They will have died from:

  1. Old age
  2. Starvation
  3. Violence

The human population that exists in 2100 will be the sum of births after today. If the system that is viable under the above definitions is only 50 million that means births will have to be limited to about 500,000 a year.

If we have only natural births, not test tube babies, that will initially be only 1 birth for every 140 woman, but will increase until it reaches 2.00 in 50 years.

Implementing this will be a challenge.

At one extreme it will require immediate sterilization of 8 billion people with some mechanism for refertilization to get 500,000 annual births.

This path creates great injury and can only be selected when compared to the worse alternative of an estimated 13.4 billion people dying of starvation and conflict during the next 80 years on the present path.

The rest of the transition is equally painful and difficult to implement.

I expect that existing cultural machinery will struggle and probably fail in making a transition to the defined viable civilization. It is more likely to descend into a dark age — probably with little chance of recovery to present science and technology.

Some other more powerful transition mechanisms may be applied by groups or individuals to our predicament. Individuals may soon become powerful enough to sterilize the 8 billion. Others may become capable of culling any portion of the 8 billion.

These options may be implemented (not abiding current ethics) with much lower total lives or environments injured.

These alternative paths forward for the human experiment on earth may be selected and implemented  independent of existing organizations.

I have worked my entire adult life understanding the creation of cognitive processes that if they were universal among the 8 billion, the collected behavior to implement a viable earth system would be possible. Each individual behavior would result with the same reliability as that individual selecting to not step off the curb in front of a rushing bus.

I have made much progress but lacking a quick and universal way of inserting these cognitive abilities into a whole global population over night I imagine the individual-produced interventions of sterilization and culling to be implemented to avoid the unrecoverable dark age on our horizon.

marromai

As far as I can see, it always comes down to the same thing: oneself is powerless when it comes to the big picture, you can only make sure that you and your loved ones are doing well. That’s also what I try to do as best as I can (like the closing words from my first guest post – carpe diem).

My coping methods are:

  • I am present at work because I need the money, but I only do the minimum required. I know that our economic system is doomed, but I cannot survive without it because I am inevitably a part of it.
  • I avoid the mass media and scrutinize any news.
  • The state is not my friend. I avoid contact wherever possible. State rules and laws are interpreted as flexibly as possible to my advantage (of course only where they don’t harm other people).
  • Most people don’t know what I know or dismiss it as nonsense. I keep my knowledge to myself and don’t try to “convert” anyone.
  • Current “Science” is just another religion – I know that I know nothing. However, (old) science offers us models and techniques that explain many things well or have made them possible in the first place. I use these where it makes sense to me.
  • I am not afraid of death, because I will return to the big picture – only dying could be unpleasant…
  • We will never understand the big picture, because as long as we are alive we are a split-off part of it, and can therefore never observe it in its entirety.
  • “I hope that when the world comes to an end, I can breathe a sigh of relief because there will be so much to look forward to.” (Donnie Darko)

But nonetheless:

  • Try not to worry too much – as long as I can survive this day, the next one will also be possible. It’s like an incremental approach on living 🙂

To conclude with a quote from “A Book for No One“:

We should stop sinking into depressive moods we have created and start enjoying life in the here and now. The doomsday fantasies are due to the phase of prosperity, in which the human brain looks for new problems because our fundamental needs have already been satisfied. Even in ancient Rome, doomsday prophecies and the proclamation of new ages were booming – and yet the Romans lived relatively well for centuries without apocalyptic upheavals.

nikoB

nikoB’s farm

1993 was when I first became aware that progress (as we in the west generally think of it) was not really leading us to this consequence-free wonderful utopia in the not too distant future. The first was witnessing first hand, the clearfell logging occurring in forests across Australia. The second event that got doubts flowing in my head was my uncle casually remarking – what are we going to do when oil runs out?

Over the next decade I was a rampant greenie, studying ecology and horticulture but not really putting much of the bigger picture together. Climate change was a problem but still so far away – so fixable. That was all to change when a friend invited me to a lecture by Richard Heinberg and David Holmgren. Peak oil came and put a stop to all my illusions. The door was opened and I stepped through.

It was 2006 and I was in my mid-thirties with a young family just starting out. It wasn’t long before I was aware of the Oil Drum, Nate Hagens, Jim Kunstler, Dmitry Orlov, The Druid JM Greer, the Chris Martenson crash course and many, many other places of ideas and discussion. To say this altered my thinking on everything is a massive understatement. Priorities changed overnight and I launched myself into a personal crusade to bring the truth of the peril that awaited us to anyone who would listen.

So fast forward to today, to cut through what is really a fairly dull story with maybe a few juicy details, I basically learnt that no one gives a “solidly digested meal” about resource depletion and overshoot. No matter how many ways you approach the subject. For it became a passion to try and work out the magical key that will unlock humanity’s thinking. All it did was result in the loss of close friends and family. I was mostly just a downer to people when I used to be one of the funniest people in the room (thanks to class clown training).

So where does this leave me now nearly 20 years later of being a peak oiler and recent anti-vaxxer. Reevaluating everything I do because what I have been doing hasn’t yielded results in changing minds.

I am lucky to be blessed with a partner who shares much of the same view of overshoot and its consequences. We spend quite a substantial amount of time discussing all the issues it brings bubbling to the surface. I am also blessed in that she shares the same passion for self sufficiency living that I do and together we work our little farm in the hinterlands of the northern rivers area of New South Wales Australia.

What I am slowly coming to the realisation of, is that we must not lose our passions, humanity and connections. For too long they were side lined and sacrificed for the greater virtue of telling everyone just how it is. The loss I felt was immense but that was balanced by the anger that I felt that nobody could see that what I think is so bloody obvious and that no one cares to do anything about it.

So in order to repair broken relationships (because I miss them) I have had to change my priorities and my thinking as well I suppose, so that I don’t just naturally clash with most people. This is difficult, especially not judging people for their ignorance and self destructive behaviours. But as it turns out I have all my own ignorant self destructive behaviours.

Maybe time is short before collapse makes living a nightmare, Hideaway makes many compelling arguments that this complex system is exceedingly brittle and can only withstand so many spanners thrown into the gears. Or perhaps the druid is right and that the collapse is catabolic, step by step, some big, some small but pretty much all down hill. Either way my thinking has changed on how to deal with it, though I must say the covid saga produced a huge detour and removed many friends from my circle and I would venture to say that most are not destined to return. But now I am getting back on track to living while compartmentalising the potential horror of a potential future.

I have decided to let go of the major criticisms I have of the human condition which are beautifully spelt out here in Rob’s blog over and over again. I don’t know if any of it really matters as we are all dead in the end. It is the journey as they say that matters not the destination. If we really think about it we know that is true as the destination is a hole in the ground.

So now I look to seeking the connections I can find with people that are easy to build on and see where it leads. Time to encourage rather than discourage. Soak up the interpersonal transactions and notice when something deeper occurs. But at the same time I won’t gladly immerse myself in exchanges full of bovine discharges.

As a focus for my own passions, I am back to making music, finding the humour in most things without resorting to be overly sarcastic or caustic. Observing and appreciating absurdity is great for that. Giving love as much as I can and forgetting the anger and the hate. I won’t pretend that it is easy but it does seem to be the most beneficial path and I must remember to forgive myself if I stray from it at times.

Paqnation (aka Chris)

Surprisingly, our story was more depressing to me when I was in full Daniel Quinn sustainable/wisdom mode. The whole “where did we go wrong” thing haunts you when you know humans “can” get it right. Now that un-Denial has set me straight on some of these core issues, our story is less depressing in that respect. I do think denial is at the heart of the matter, but I bounce around on how much emphasis to put on MORT, eToM, and MPP. And I am now slowly shifting to a new state of mind where it’s all about energy constraints and you can pretty much throw everything else out the window.

Society can be full of Quinn type worldviews or full of overshoot, MORT aware citizens. It doesn’t matter. Once those sacred constraints are broken, there is no way out of the madness. And there is no way to resist using this new energy technology because if you don’t, someone else will, and you will be conquered and/or killed. By the time your civilization has enough EROEI to start understanding concepts like overshoot and sustainable vs unsustainable… it’s too late. You are now way too addicted to the comforts of this energy surplus to voluntarily decrease usage. And you’re already in massive overshoot because of all the self-induced damage to your environment (mining and domestication of plants/animals). Ditto for your worldviews too. Separation of nature along with a superior way of looking at your own species are unavoidable default worldviews that come along with busting through energy constraints. The most depressing thing for me nowadays is the realization that this kind of modern intelligence (cleverness) has no purpose in the entire universe.

I have two techniques for my sanity. One thing is trying to accept the inevitability of it all. Understanding that the best-case scenario for Mother Earth is NTHE, helps me to go with more of a “I might as well partake in the Peak before it’s all gone” mentality. But the most important technique is hanging out on this website. When I first came onto the scene of un-Denial, I was shot out of a cannon. The two years prior that I was learning about overshoot, etc., I never had a reliable outlet to ask any questions. That all changed when I got here. I cannot talk to anyone in my personal life about collapse, but now I have an online support group. The following is more of a love letter to you guys for how much you’ve given me and my appreciation for being part of this Tribal Connection.

Here are some quotes I collected from un-Denial comments that caused me think and increased my awareness:

Monk: Something that helps me a lot is when I see dumped rubbish, which happens a lot in “magical NZ”. And I just think to myself how excited I am for collapse, because spoilt brat humans don’t deserve everything that we’ve got when we can’t even do something so basic for nature as pointing rubbish in the bin.

Rob: For the last 10,000 years we broke through normal resource constraints with agriculture (bigger share of solar energy) and fossil energy (ancient solar energy) and became a destructive unsustainable species, that is smart enough to know better, but denies what it is doing.

Mike: In a climax ecosystem, the system appears to be in balance with all species living in harmony. But it’s an illusion and no species intended it that way. Quinn probably got it wrong, in that respect. (Chris here, Mike calling out Quinn like that was the beginning of my internal temper tantrum)

Gaia: So over time, the ascendancy of lighter skinned humans in the cooler climates prevailed and these were the climates where agriculture and feudal living flourished, cementing the dominance of this culture type rather than the nomadic style of earlier hunter/gatherer societies which matched well with the grassland/savannah fauna of equatorial Africa.

Rob: The probability of getting 100% of things wrong by mistake is 0%.

Monk: They dug up a lot of roman prepping gold in villas in the UK. Funny to think of them prepping all that gold and never getting to use it.

Hamish: Too many people treat dogs like fashion accessories and discard them immediately when they have health issues.

NikoB: I always think of it in terms of give and take. What did you take from this world in order to live and what did you give back?

AJ: …reinforcing my opinion that the grandchildren of the victims of genocide are now the perpetrators of genocide.

Charles: I love watching the activity in a compost bin, on the surface of a decomposing carcass, the eerie colours of mushrooms feeding off dead logs… Death doesn’t really feel like an end: there is so much activity going on, and (in good temperature and moisture conditions) recycling happens so fast one can almost witness the migration of energy.

Rob: I envy people who obtain comfort from believing there is some form of spirituality in the universe that cares about us. Unfortunately I see a flow of electrons looking for a home.

Gaia: That’s just it, Rob! I identify best with being a bunch of electrons looking for a home! …Then the electrons I borrowed can go do something else for the rest of eternity.

Stellarwind72: What if intelligence over a certain level is inherently maladaptive on long timescales, because it allows you to destroy the very ecology you depend upon.

Hamish: If I ever have to turn away people seeking help, I will offer them my thoughts and prayers – that seems to be the solution to all calamities from the shit stains in Washington DC and state capitals.

ABC: “Progress” equals to mental regress in many if not most aspects, nothing short of “wickedness”.

Florian: If you are happy with what you have or even downsize then you are, from an evolutionary perspective, a defective individual and the chance is very very high that you will be thrown on the genetic trash heap. There is this saying, To understand all is to forgive all and while it can be hard to not show emotion in this absolute cluster-fuck there is absolutely no point to attach yourself to an outcome.

Charles: Life, to me is a constant invitation (sometimes quite painful) to open up to possibilities.

Rob: I’m still fascinated by denial. I see it every day in every single person I interact with. No one speaks reality, except the few that hang out here.

AJ: The lack of humility and stating that one could make a mistake, always makes me suspicious of a person’s conclusions.

Monk: Without fossil fuels the planet would have become a frozen wasteland. It looked like earth was heading for permanent ice age because too much carbon got lock up.

Rob: I believe one of the reasons we had so much coal is that large plants were enabled by the evolutionary invention of lignin and it took quite a while for fungi to figure out how to digest lignin. Today coal would not accumulate in the same quantities.

Notabilia: Remember, none of us fossil fuel colossi have to stick around when our inherited profligate way of existence hits the ground below the cliff. That will become the one remaining “civil right”. (Chris here, this one got me focused on writing my exit strategy article)

ABC: Wisdom has no inherent value in a world of energy, and never stood a chance against unhinged violence.

NikoB: Perhaps having a good spice rack will put those cannibalism fears to rest.

Stellarwind72: Our leaders seem to think that if Putin is allowed to win in Ukraine, he will invade several other countries, similar to what Hitler did after the Munich agreement.

Gaia: Maybe we can even say that MORT (denial) has been our species’ only true religion, for through it we almost became like the gods, or more poetically, it was the way in which the gods could become human.

Charles: I believe Quinn/Murphy’s story will propagate because it shows a possible way ahead for survival. It is becoming useful in this world of limits, of civilisation/technology collapse.

Hideaway: Crocodiles have existed in pretty much the same form for 200 million years, that’s long term sustainability.

Monk: Anthropologists do think pre-historic people had a lot more sex than their civilized counterparts.

Charles: I find the terms reincarnation and “life after death” misleading. They are too loaded. One should perhaps use “informational remnant through structural reorganization”.

Hamish: I’ve given up on the idea of saving people, society, knowledge, culture, wisdom. If I can help nature that will be enough.

Rob: The problem is our citizens, not our leaders.

Hideaway: Increasingly I’m thinking most major solar and wind installations are nothing more than a scam paid for by subsidies from the government, then quickly sold to whatever pension fund that wants ‘green’ credentials in their portfolio.

Stellarwind72: If MORT is true, the story of humanity will turn out to be a tragedy. The species intelligent enough to realize it is in overshoot doesn’t do much about it due to denial.

Rob: Life is not some spiritual mystery, but rather a predictable outcome of the fact that the universe abhors an energy gradient, and life is its best mechanism for degrading energy. (and) “If life is nothing but an electron looking for a place to rest, death is nothing but that electron come to rest.” (Rob here, I think that’s a paraphrased quote from Dr. Nick Lane)

Chris here. These next two get me emotional and make me think about what could’ve been (Closest to me ever having my own family was in 2003, but we both agreed on abortion. One of my biggest regrets).

ABC: I’d like to have a family, rear children and experience being a father. I know it is extremely selfish if not cruel by all definitions knowing our predicament, however I cannot shake this primal biological urge of self-interest and naïveté of having a “sense of meaning”.

CampbellS: We saw the southern lights, aurora astralis, here in the Far North of NZ. First time for me in my 53 years. Pretty spectacular and awe inspiring. Was nice to share it with my teenage kids.

And this is a nice little moment between the young, cocky Skywalker and the much wiser Obi-Wan Kenobi. They could both see the magic early on:

Paqnation: I actually think he/she is Art Berman, Simon Michaux or someone like that. I have a hard time with energy (which is why I love Sid Smith), but Hideaway is like an energy oracle.

Rob: Hideaway is better than both Berman and Michaux. Berman is deeper on oil but shallower on other energies and overshoot. Michaux has some worrying woo-woo.

One final note. While going through all my comments, I came across what is by far the most MORT thing on this entire website = My anti-pornography article. 😊

scarr0w

My journey to tranquility ( 🙂 ) is as follows:

I’ve known for as long as I have memory that I was “different”. Not exactly on the spectrum, not genius, not sociopath, but maybe a dash of each. I was in parochial school my first four years, and it was not a good fit for me. To get along, one should just fill in the answer blanks in your Baltimore Catechism workbook, not ask the nun to explain grace. Questioning the pablum we are spoon fed is not a way to be one of the gang.

Anyway, from childhood experiences, I over time built a mental outlook that more or less has evolved to be expressed best by the Niebuhr/Wygal serenity prayer. I generally kept my own council, especially when I fully realized the overshoot predicament we are in while working for a company that builds stuff for the fossil industry. I guess you could say I was “in the closet”.

Serenity, or at least equanimity is not an easy thing to maintain all the time, but I’ve gotten better over time. Raising kids, staying on the treadmill even after realizing that’s what it is, etc… can test your resolve. While I follow collapse progress and analysis at sites like Rob’s and several others, it is more to keep current, not to perseverate on (and let’s face it, being witness to this huge event in the human story is fascinating). Mostly I am grateful that I was lucky enough to be born in a location and time that will never be again.

Currently, some mental energy is on local political issues (I’m on the county board, trying to see opportunities to shift policy into more future ready states), but primarily I try to slowly make a few acres of land more in tune with what the local biome wants to be. That will be enough.

I liked a lot of what others said, especially Gaia, but since my emotion circuits were partly burnt out as a kid, I just don’t get wound up over the path out culture has chosen, or my role in it. I know others suffer and indirectly I benefit, those of us aware just have to live with a foot in both worlds, slowly reducing our complicity as best we can. Not much help for others, but that’s where I am.

Stellarwind72

Being overshoot aware constantly weighs on me. Given my young age (I was born right before the turn of the millennium), I know that the sh*t will hit the fan in my lifetime. From time to time, I feel existential dread. I know that there is a substantial risk of me dying early due to the effects of overshoot and collapse.

Sometimes just being able to talk about this issue with other people helps me with anxiety, knowing that there are other people who are aware of what is going on.

I sometimes like listening to classical music and taking hot baths to calm my nerves, but given how those are both dependent on large amounts of surplus energy (I mostly listen to classical music on YouTube), I don’t know how long I will be able to keep doing that.

Rob Mielcarski

In no particular order of importance, here are some things that have helped me remain partially sane with overshoot awareness.

Collapse Early and Avoid the Rush

There is no way to predict which of the many paths we will take (inflation, deflation, war, confiscation, theft, etc.), however we know with certainty that the destination of fossil energy depletion will be less material wealth, less food abundance, a lower energy lifestyle, and much less help from governments.

I think it is a wise strategy to voluntarily downsize your lifestyle and learn to live happily with less so that when everyone else is shocked and losing their minds due to loss of wealth and entitlements, you are already happily living the new normal.

Some things that have worked for me include:

  • Pretend you can’t buy gasoline and see how little driving you can get by with.
  • Stop flying. Find ways to vacation locally like camping.
  • Monitor your electricity consumption in real time and practice using less.
  • Practice food storage and preparation without refrigeration.
  • Practice low energy cooking like one-pot meals and pressure cooking.
  • Practice living at lower temperatures in the winter.
  • Shower when dirty, not every day.
  • Change clothes when they are dirty, not every day.
  • Stop eating out. Cook all your food from scratch.
  • Cut your own hair.
  • Maintain your vehicles yourself.
  • Practice fixing things that break.

Local Food

I think we face 5 main threat vectors and it is unclear which will strike first:

  • nuclear war (due to resource scarcity)
  • accelerating warming (due to aerosol reduction)
  • asset bubble crash (due to extreme debt and degrowth)
  • energy scarcity (due to depletion of low-cost non-renewable reserves)
  • deadly covid variant a la Bossche (due to our idiot unethical leaders)

The most important common denominator is likely to be food scarcity.

I once had a dream to buy a farm and build a doomstead. I took a small scale farming course and after about 5 years of employment as a farm laborer I learned that I lacked the money and the passion and the time to pull it off successfully. So I switched to plan B. I now assist a local farm with construction and maintenance in return for a source of local food. I still buy the majority of my calories at the grocery store but I know we can ramp up calorie production when SHTF.

Prepping

I work hard at being a wise frugal prepper which means I stock things that:

  • I like to eat and have a good shelf life so they won’t be wasted
  • are likely to become scarce first like protein, fat, and caffeine
  • are essential for good health
  • are purchased when on sale to save money

I maintain a detailed spreadsheet of consumables with quantity, cost, date of purchase, best-by date, storage location, date opened, date finished, and predicted duration the item will last. This allows me to:

  • track my consumption of each item so I can accurately predict how long each will last, and to adjust inventory levels based on my assessment of world events
  • track price inflation and to stock more of what is expected to inflate fastest
  • rotate inventory so I always eat the oldest first
  • conduct shelf life tests and record results so I know when a best-by date can extended or ignored
  • calm down – reviewing my spreadsheet reduces my stress

I have methodically gone through every durable item and service I use and asked what will I do if that item breaks and cannot be fixed or replaced, or can’t be fueled. For those items that I consider essential I have purchased a spare, or I have plan for accomplishing the same thing a different way, or I know I can do without. Here are a few examples:

  • my town water supply is not gravity fed and depends on electric pumps so I installed a hand operated pitcher pump on an old shallow well on my property
  • I can light my living area with 4 different types of energy
  • I can cook with 7 different types of energy
  • I can heat my living area with 3 different types of energy and I have practiced living with the thermostat at 15C
  • I have 4 different modes of transportation and I have some spare parts
  • I can keep my refrigerator operating, which is the main thing I care about in a power outage, for a couple weeks
  • I have spare parts to keep my computer, which is my main indoor hobby, going until I’m dead
  • I have spare hiking boots, which is my main outdoor hobby, to last until I’m too old to hike

Doing something to prepare provides a sense of agency over things out of my control which improves my mental well-being.

Prepping is of course not a fix to permanent scarcity or a catastrophe, but it might sustain life during a temporary shortage, and it might make life more enjoyable when non-essential but highly valued items like coffee become unavailable.

Prepping can be a good use of limited savings given that inflation is a likely outcome of energy scarcity. I smile every time I see price increases on things I have in inventory.

Health

When things get tough, good health will be one of our most important assets.

Most available employment will require manual labor, and if you’re out of shape and overweight you may be unemployable.

I expect pensions and safety nets to vaporize so many will be forced to work until they die.

I expect the availability and affordability of health care services to decline as governments become impoverished.

Covid taught me that I do not want to use our unethical and incompetent healthcare system if I can avoid it.

So I try to maintain good health by:

  • eating healthy unprocessed, low sugar foods
  • fasting 16 hours every day
  • getting some exercise
  • sleeping 8 hours
  • taking a few critical supplements like vitamin D and C
  • no alcohol or tobacco

Gratitude

Someone wise said something like “the foundation of happiness is gratitude”.

I believe it.

The lifestyle of the poorest Canadian is better than a pharaoh. It is easy to forget how lucky we are in the rich western countries at this point in history.

The majority of my good fortune came from being born in Canada, not from my skill or hard work.

So I try to be grateful.

A few things that work for me include:

  • cook deliberately: I plan my meals, and I think about the path the food took to get to my kitchen, and I try to show respect to the food by cooking it nicely, and wasting nothing
  • eat deliberately: I try to slow down and appreciate what I am eating
  • drive deliberately: when I press the accelerator I think about the miracle of fossil energy
  • shower deliberately: I think about the path the water took to get to my house, and the energy it took to heat the water, and what a luxury a hot shower is

Learn to Enjoy Your Own Company

I spend quite a bit of time alone for several reasons:

  • I find it easier to “collapse early and avoid the rush” when I am not surrounded by people competing for status
  • nobody likes being around a doomer, I’m invited less these days
  • I struggle to chit chat about things that do not matter
  • I have become less tolerant of people who believe nonsense and are incapable of changing beliefs regardless of evidence – yes I know MORT is often the cause, but I still don’t enjoy the company of people in denial

So I have learned to enjoy my own company.

I have conversations with myself, and I listen to interesting (and sometimes aware) people via podcasts and audiobooks, and I interact with a few nice and aware people at un-Denial.

MORT

When you become overshoot aware you realize there is near zero awareness and zero discussion in society about anything that matters, and not only are we doing nothing that a wise species should do, we are doing everything possible to make our predicament worse. This can be crazy making.

Understanding Dr. Ajit Varki’s Mind Over Reality Transition (MORT) theory has been a big help to maintaining my mental health because it provides a scientific explanation for why almost everyone in the world, including our brightest intellectuals and all of our leaders, are oblivious to everything that matters.

If I Was a Young Person

If I was a young person, knowing what I know now, and wondering what to do, I would:

  • not live in a big city
  • avoid occupations that depend on discretionary spending (except maybe brewing beer and distilling alcohol)
  • learn a useful skill that poor people will need and value
  • learn a skill that can be performed with today’s complex power equipment, and yesterday’s simpler manual equipment
  • I’d personally lean towards a trade like carpentry, plumbing, masonry, electrician, roofer, mechanic, etc. but I’m sure there are many other viable occupations
  • farming would be good but land is too expensive for most people to buy today; a good compromise is a skill that generates income and a home garden or rented community garden plot that you tend after work; or if you are passionate about farming, join a good farm as a laborer and work up to a position with responsibility

569 thoughts on “Coping with Awareness”

  1. Well, been rather busy lately, so just now trying to pitch in, but collapse waits for no man……….

    My journey to tranquility ( 🙂 ) is as follows:

    I’ve known for as long as I have memory that I was “different”. Not exactly on the spectrum, not genius, not sociopath, but maybe a dash of each. I was in parochial school my first four years, and it was not a good fit for me. To get along, one should just fill in the answer blanks in your Baltimore Catechism workbook, not ask the nun to explain grace. Questioning the pablum we are spoon fed is not a way to be one of the gang.

    Anyway, from childhood experiences, I over time built a mental outlook that more or less has evolved to be expressed best by the Niebuhr/Wygal serenity prayer. I generally kept my own council, especially when I fully realized the overshoot predicament we are in while working for a company that builds stuff for the fossil industry. I guess you could say I was “in the closet”.

    Serenity, or at least equanimity is not an easy thing to maintain all the time, but I’ve gotten better over time. Raising kids, staying on the treadmill even after realizing that’s what it is, etc… can test your resolve. While I follow collapse progress and analysis at sites like Rob’s and several others, it is more to keep current, not to perseverate on (and let’s face it, being witness to this huge event in the human story is fascinating). Mostly I am grateful that I was lucky enough to be born in a location and time that will never be again.

    Currently, some mental energy is on local political issues (I’m on the county board, trying to see opportunities to shift policy into more future ready states), but primarily I try to slowly make a few acres of land more in tune with what the local biome wants to be. That will be enough.

    I liked a lot of what others said, especially Gaia, but since my emotion circuits were partly burnt out as a kid, I just don’t get wound up over the path out culture has chosen or my role in it. I know others suffer and indirectly I benefit, those of us aware just have to live with a foot in both worlds, slowly reducing our complicity as best we can. Not much help for others, but that’s where I am.

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

  2. Hideaway slaps Dennis, again. You’d think it would sting, but it doesn’t seem to. MORT again?

    https://peakoilbarrel.com/opec-update-june-2024/#comment-777406

    Dennis, do you read the papers you link to? The assumptions in the one above are ridiculous, and of course if you use such non sensical assumptions you can attain any solution desired…

    Using one aspect you continually repeat, about overbuilding solar and wind capacity 3-5 times. Why would anyone do it? Why would anyone build extra solar when there is no market for a new plant?

    If solar were capable of providing 100% of energy requirements in the year 2027 in grid XXX, then why would anyone build an extra plant?

    Economics 101 means no-one would, because there is no payment for when the sun shines as existing solar would be providing all the power needed. However when the sun is not shining no-one has power, but building another plant by itself makes no economic sense, because there would be zero returns..

    Any new build after 100% of grid capacity and use was reached, would require batteries or pumped hydro to store all the excess energy. This would greatly increase the cost of any new plant. A 100MW new solar array would need 800MWh of batteries attached, greatly affecting the cost of the operation, as all energy would need to be stored until night time, even in summer with longer sun hours.

    They would not be selling this, much more expensive power, at zero dollars, at any time.
    No-one with half a brain is going to build an expensive industrial plant, based on a theoretical zero electricity price. They would want/need contracts to purchase the required electricity. No-one is going to sign a contract that guarantees they get zero dollars for the electricity they are selling..

    Other ridiculous assumptions, that the cost of all the equipment needed to build these industrial scale operations, based on lots of specialised equipment like electrolysers and methanation plants, requiring mountains of specialist metals and experts, will get cheaper in the future, when the ore grades mined get lower, requiring more fossil fuel energy to mine, as the newer mines are more remote on average..

    Plus the biggest weakness of the entire paper, not a cent allowed for payment of any labor or expertise in the building and operating of the plant, zero, nada… Plus there is no cost in obtaining the CO2 either, yet they claim to be buying in the CO2, not taking any out of the atmosphere, so someone else has to be burning fossil fuels, then paying for the capture of the CO2, then delivering it to site..

    The fact that you cite such nonsense as these types of papers, means you just don’t understand. As I keep asking you. How about you do the numbers yourself, from real existing examples, where we can find actual real world costs. It’s the only way to prove to yourself that it’s all viable, or not, on a worldwide scale..

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    1. https://peakoilbarrel.com/opec-update-june-2024/#comment-777356

      Dennis … “And not as ridiculous as suggesting the price of coal should be considered to be zero, now that was ridiculous.”

      The price of coal to humanity as a whole is zero, just like solar, wind, oil and gas. We build machines to turn any of them into useful energy.

      We agree to pay others for access to these resources, but energetically they are there for the cost of building the machines to take advantage of them.

      This is an area that economics is totally wrong, in not understanding the world economy runs on energy, not money.

      When it comes to working out what’s the cheapest form of new energy, all sorts of rules and assumptions are placed, for example the Lazard LCOE type calculations. If you apply enough assumptions, you can make anything look good..

      An immediate example is the assumption that 100% of the energy from solar and wind get used while coal, gas, nuclear are all limited in their capacity, when in reality the latter can operate 90% of the time.

      In this country where solar and wind are often 40%+ of the power in the grid, the utility plants have to be turned off a lot of the time in summer months, because the wholesale price of power has gone negative, so are not operating anywhere near their capacity. Likewise coal and gas plants are having a similar reduction in capacity.

      We’ve ended up with a very inefficient system with lots of capacity sitting idle, but still suffering from entropy, so their is a long term cost to this idleness.

      Now in the middle of winter, we have had a dearth of wind over the last couple of months, and often cloudy days, so the coal and gas plants have had to be running at pretty much maximum power, with diesel generators often added to the mix for peak times..

      So tell me, in economic terms, who is going to build extra solar capacity, when we already have utility solar plants often turning off when the sun shines and prices are negative??
      Adding solar does nothing for the system in times of low sunshine, while existing solar is already above what the system can cope with when the sun shines most of the year!!
      Already the only new large solar plants planned for the country are those with direct contracts with an industry to supply power when the sun shines, but ‘the grid’ is expected to make up the power supply the rest of the time…

      Why are solar, wind and batteries having subsidies around the world if they are cheaper?? The answer is they are NOT cheaper in the real world!!

      AS I keep stating, no-one anywhere is building an off grid Aluminium smelter based on solar, wind and batteries, because it’s too expensive to do!! It’s uneconomic, would lose money compared to cheap coal fired power running Aluminium smelters around the world.
      This is precisely why the new Aluminium smelters in Indonesia will be running on coal fired power!!
      It’s not good or bad, it’s just reality, and lying to ourselves over and over and over that solar, wind and batteries are cheaper, doesn’t change reality at all!!

      Again my question to you is how does anywhere get to 3-5 times too much solar, in an economic environment, where already there are negative prices for solar, when the sun shines most of the year???

      Economics 101 is that no new utility scale solar should be built in Australia and that’s exactly what’s happening, we built too much, so negative prices prevail during most of the year when the sun shines, but we need enormous ‘other’ power for the rest of the time.

      Dennis …”Just skimmed the paper, to properly analyze it would require a reading of the papers referenced as well, I have not done that.”

      Exactly, which is why all these types of proposals look sound until you go into details, where they clearly are extend, pretend and distract.

      The Haru Oni plant was thought to be proving synthetic fuel was ‘viable’, instead it’s clear evidence it’s not viable at all from intermittent power, despite their 70% capacity factor in the best location in the world for wind.

      It was really all about having the European commission drop rules banning new ICE vehicles by 2030 or 2035 date, paid for mostly by Porshe, Exxon etc..

      The entire concept of synthetic fuel, gas or just hydrogen is totally flawed by using enormous quantities of built materials (built from fossil fuels!!), in an extremely inefficient way to make some energy available when the wind isn’t blowing and the sun not shining. It’s all extend, pretend and distract…

      The longer you just skim some papers that show nice answers, while not doing the full calculations on all of this yourself, the longer you will stay in the dark about the reality of our situation.

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  5. Pre-covid I was certain anti-vaxxers were dangerous whack jobs.

    Now I don’t believe anything health “experts” say, and I think RFK Jr., who I used to assume was a nut job, is the best presidential candidate ever offered to the American people.

    Today’s essay by Endurance is a really good detailed history on vaccines with references that argues nothing we are told about vaccination is true.

    https://endurancea71.substack.com/p/deja-vu-all-over-again

    Fifty years ago, prior to the campaign of hyper-vaccinating children, the autism rate in the US was around 1 in 10,000. Now it’s 1 in 36. Back then a kid received 5 shots. Now they receive 180.(101) I’ve even seen a case where triplets all developed autism on the same day, within hours of their pneumococcal vaccine.(102)

    “Contrary to popular belief, there is actually a great deal of compelling evidence linking vaccines to autism. For example, regressive autism always develops shortly after vaccination—but never before, something that cannot happen unless one causes the other.”(103)

    Evidence suggests that most SIDS (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome) cases (probably 75% or more) are also due to childhood vaccination, usually within 48 hours of a ‘routine’ jab. Pediatric clinics which avoid vaccines have zero (or near zero) rates of both autism and SIDS.(104) Vaccine injuries in general are far more common that the establishment is prepared to acknowledge and not simply limited to SIDS and autism; one in five children have neuro-developmental disabilities, one in ten have ADD or ADHD, one in eleven has asthma and one in twenty under the age of suffers with seizures.(105) There are numerous mechanisms of harm, well-documented. Only a fully paid-up member of the hard of thinking club could fail to make the connection.

    And while adjuvants such as aluminium are undoubtedly a large part of the problem, the entire concept of vaccination is built on lies. The answer isn’t to clean up the jabs, remove harmful ingredients, rationalize the schedule. The answer is to go back to basics, to understand that there never has been any evidence that any vaccine is necessary. That’s after 225 years of trying; you’d have thought there’d be some by now. What we find instead is that either vaccines are introduced when diseases are already on the verge of being eradicated or that the ‘disease’ isn’t a disease at all and the vaccine does nothing but harm, often producing the very same symptoms that the ‘disease’ itself presents.

    “For 60 years, the CDC has propagated vaccines as the holy grail of medicine, like a magic pill that keeps everyone from dying of scary infectious diseases that nothing else on earth can save anyone from. Yet, billions of people survive without having any vaccines at all their whole lives, and on average, these folks are much healthier than the “fully vaccinated” droids and zombies who seem to be fighting mysterious disorders most of their lives.”(106)

    We might also learn some lessons about the nature of our opponents, the credentialed class which populate Big Pharma and government. From the beginning of the vaccine era, they have lied to us. In the dim and distant, they also mandated inoculation, a practice that is enjoying a revival. They simply cannot be trusted to be honest and altruistic on any matter. The conniving and dishonesty is pathological. Any group that can inject the healthy with AZT, use orphans as pin cushions or preside over our latter-day CVS is comprised of monsters, but we should have known that already given their enthusiastic support for the clot shot. And they’re not done yet.

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    1. Sorry Rob, I don’t know how to take off my “Like” for the above article (I hit the wrong key instead of hitting reply.

      This “article” is the quintessential example IMHO of what makes many things on the internet suspect. I for one believe that vaccines are efficacious (at least the ones I had as a kid were) and would not want to not have a tetanus shot up to date (or smallpox for that matter). Maybe all the vaccines that kids get now days are overdone and should be investigated for adjuvants that are causing unintended consequences (i.e. there is room for serious research).

      However, if you look at the article it appears light on the science of immunology/virology and heavy on “statistics” (which can be made to show anything). I don’t have the time to read the dross such idiots produce (a true conspiracy theory) but I did appreciate his/her numerous citations. When you are citing to Zero Hedge, Mises institute, Expose News, Brownstone, Off Guardian, Viroliegy.com, and other web sites rather than the fundamental scientific literature, everything you (the author) say is suspect. I realize that much of “science” has been subverted by Pharma/Medicine and current Scientific Journals, but true rational falsifiable science still exists and their are some practitioners.

      If someone like Dr. John Campbell came out and said this I might listen a little more closely, but not to someone hiding behind “Endurance”.

      AJ

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      1. I’ve also accidentally clicked like (in the past) and found that clicking it again did the opposite. Of course, things are always changing, so that might just be a thing of the past.

        Like

        Reply

      2. I can’t unclick your like but I believe you can as Hamish explained.

        Fair criticism. I’ve read a bit by Endurance over the last few years and my recollection is positive but maybe my memory or judgement is failing.

        Did you read any of the essay? I don’t think he discussed Tetanus which skeptics like Dr. Bret Weinstein would agree with you are effective and valuable.

        He focused on other vaccines with dubious stories like polio.

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        2. I have such problems on your website with WordPress, hence the only time I read un-denial is when I’m on Chrome, otherwise I use the Epic browser (behind their free VPN) and I leave no trail. (I hate the Chrome browser but WordPress will let me post something without logging in ). WordPress hates me everywhere and won’t let me log into the multiple accounts, I have made with them over the years.

          I read some of what Endurance wrote, and I didn’t buy much of it from what I knew having taken immunology years ago. He cites statistics and studies without discussing basic immunology, in my opinion. Hence, I go to his long list of citations at the end of the article to see if he is really quoting science. He is not!! IF 90% of your sources are dubious, as I put in my response above, then you are dubious as a writer and I don’t see any sense in trying to parse the little bit of wheat from the vast chaff.

          I would never read anything from Endurance, or even skim it. What time I have left is too valuable.

          AJ

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          1. I have used Edge and now Brave with no WordPress problems. Maybe another reader here might be able to provide tips since I’m an administrator and may not have the same browser experience as you.

            The damage our trusted institutions like health departments, regulatory agencies, family doctors, and universities have done to themselves by lying, hiding data, and not publicly correcting themselves when they made mistakes is a disaster.

            Even the best journals like Nature and the Lancet were caught being corrupt during covid and so we can’t even trust peer reviewed papers any more.

            Who can we trust now?

            It’s tragic what they’ve done to public trust.

            Liked by 1 person

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  6. Maybe Dr. Tom Murphy has been lurking here. His latest on population has a little more reality .

    https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/2024/06/stubborn-expectations/

    We have no modern precedent for declining global human population, so cannot confidently predict what happens in such a scenario.  In the short term, I can imagine more positive feedback mechanisms that accelerate the plunge than corrective negative feedback mechanisms—as it won’t feel “safe” or ethical to bring children into a period of great uncertainty.

    Firstly, the economic house of cards—essentially a Ponzi scheme predicated on unsustainable growth—will likely collapse.  Since we foolishly based most of modern life on this inherently shaky economic foundation, its implosion will be felt far and wide, potentially setting off violent conflict and famine as nations struggle to maintain their expected but unsustainable material and energy flows.  Even without this unfortunate development, how many of the factors itemized above would be reversed?  Many are only exacerbated, which could lead to a faster population decline.

    My best guess is that whether the process is quick (famine, war) or moderate (demographic factors alone, let’s hope), the process will remain in a positive feedback condition until most of the unsupportable complexity has melted away.  At this point, the period of positive feedback might self-terminate as groups of people find themselves enjoying locally self-sufficient lifestyles that are ecologically stable and disconnected from the complexity that once bound modernity together in the same trap.

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    1. Cancer is the other big lie that medicine and pharma are intent on keeping going because it makes money.

      They don’t want it known that it is a metabolic dysfunction of the mitochrondria and the genetic mutations are a secondary side effect. Thus treating it as a genetic disease is not a good strategy even though it does yield results.

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  8. The Nuremburg Code prevents doctors from claiming they were only following orders.

    Any that survive need to go to prison.

    54 year old Dr. Philip Boll, nephrologist at Trillium Health died suddenly Mar.24, 2024.

    He is at least the 5th Canadian doctor to have died suddenly at same hospital.

    COVID-19 mRNA vaccinated doctors not doing well.

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    1. In New Zealand you would literally get fired if you didn’t follow orders. So the Nuremburg Code creates a paradox – any doctor that doesn’t follow orders gets de-registered and then can’t be a doctor.

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  9. This is one reason inflation is the more probable path to poverty than deflation.

    https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/kenya-protesters-storm-parliament-police-fire-live-rounds-after-lawmakers-unleash-eco

    The Kenyan capital of Nairobi has descended into violence and mayhem as large street protests by Kenyans outraged at new tax policies and a harsh ‘Eco-Austerity’ program imposed by the government have resulted in the parliament building being set on fire.

    The new taxes were tucked away in Kenya’s Finance Bill 2024, and directly impacts imports, prices, and sales of diapers, batteries/dry cells, smartphones, earphones, clocks, radios, TV sets, cameras… staplers, printers, calculators, photocopying machines, keyboards, mice, projectors and LCD monitors.

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  10. Col. Larry Wilkerson’s becoming a full on doomer without being overshoot aware. 🙂

    Really good wide ranging discussion.

    Among other things, the MIC killed Kennedy, Ukraine is screwed because Russia has a better military, the US is going to implode due to it’s debt, Israel is evil, the world sees that the US is backing terrorists.

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    1. Excellent discussion by Wilkerson. The U.S. is so screwed, militarily and economically. How we’ve survived this long I don’t know.

      AJ

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    1. The semiconductor industry has placed most of its eggs in one basket, because only 3 companies can to afford the manufacture the most advanced chips: TSMC, Intel and Samsung. The costs of building new fabs (and therefore chips) is rising quickly. https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/firm-predicts-it-will-cost-dollar28-billion-to-build-a-2nm-fab-and-dollar30000-per-wafer-a-50-percent-increase-in-chipmaking-costs-as-complexity-rises

      This is evidence of semiconductor scaling running into the law of diminishing returns.

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  12. Sarah Connor went the guest essay route this week. Prior to un-Denial, I would have loved and been inspired by it. But now all I see is another Daniel Quinn fan who is blinded by the hopium of humans “getting it right”. The tag line of the article is: Humanity is acting like a disease. But humanity isn’t a disease; humanity has a disease.

    Same thing as me crying about how humans aren’t a failed experiment, it’s our culture that is the failure. LOL. Funny how much (and how quickly) I have changed on this issue. The Quinn view is dangerous because it implies that humans can get it right even if sacred energy constraints have been broken. Also implies that there is some good or purpose for complex intelligence. Both implications are dead wrong of course. 

    The author’s main point in the article is “I would like to propose that the disease is a certain idea that humanity began to embrace 6,000 years ago. It’s the idea that humanity is separate from and superior to nature and other forms of life.”

    We were already thousands of years embraced with breaking the solar energy constraints. Those separation & superior worldviews that come attached to the hip of “busting through” were already brewing hardcore by then. The better you get at performing evil (agriculture, mining & domestication) the more entrenched those worldviews become which means you get a guaranteed exponential increase of evil over time.

    The only reason we got to agriculture was because we conquered fire. So not even fire is an acceptable energy constraint to break. (which is hard to imagine, but certainly correct when compared to how many other species have used it and how much of an advantage it gives you). 

    The author’s last line annoys the hell out of me because of how much I used to buy into it. “The good news is that there’s a cure. If the disease is separateness, then the cure is to end the separateness.” 

    Humans are the disease. Including hunter gatherers. The only human not diseased is pre-fire homo. The pro-Quinners need to do a better job of explaining what they mean when they say, “the cure is to end the separateness”.

    To truly end the separateness, you’d have to go back to pre-fire times and live with a max EROEI around 1.5 (quinn fans always leave this part of the equation out of their story).

    Guest Post: What’s Our Disease? (collapse2050.com)

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    1. I understand love and light solutions from people who have never had to get their sustenance from the land directly can be annoying. But do you need to be so harsh on humans?

      The first life on earth, Cyanobacteria (bluegreen algae), grew in such abundance when it evolved a new oxygen-releasing ability. They feasted and turned the earth into a frozen ice ball. Scientists suppose that a thin line around the equator stayed warm enough to allow some cyanobacteria to survive. From those survivors, all life on earth evolved.

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      1. LOL. Sorry for being such a scrooge but yes I do need to be so harsh.

        I can’t stand the fairy tale that I was sold. It reminds me of Nazis sitting around talking about the few decent qualities they possess and equating that to being an overall good person.

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      1. I think too clever for your own good is another feature that’s baked into the cake of busting through an energy constraint. We know the worldviews that automatically come with the energy breakthrough, so there is an added bonus that the extra time you free up with the higher EROEI will be dominated by separation and superiority thinking. 

        And this just guarantees that you will be a walking tsunami of bad information. To the point where when you finally get to anything like modern human EROEI levels everything you do and how you do it is wrong (evil).

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    1. It’s always the plebs fault isn’t it! Never the capital class that has to give up something or do something different

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  15. I’ve always liked the argument that Hideaway uses here that if it were possible it would already exist.

    https://peakoilbarrel.com/opec-update-june-2024/#comment-777532

    Hickory, …. “Its all going to cost a hell of lot of money”…

    This is the criteria that economists use, thinking that there is no limit on money, yet in reality, energy, materials and expertise is what’s needed. We use money to represent all of these things and economists have convinced most of the world to think this way (as in it’s all unlimited).

    It has worked in a world of continuing growth of all the resources necessary, especially energy that makes both materials and expertise available. The energy has been in the form of fossil fuels over the last 200 years, with everyone alive, their parents and grandparents all existing in a world of ‘more’ on average for everyone..

    In the future, once past peak oil, for real, no matter what the spend, then the price to build everything goes through the roof. None of the electric world survives without constant input of plastics and polymers, every new electrical wire, solar panel and wind turbine totally relies upon plastics and polymers, every mine relies upon chemical ingredients from fossil fuels as well as the fossil energy to run it…

    Fossil fuels are not just energy, though that’s how everyone counts it in terms of XYZ TWh… It’s useful energy AND products all wrapped up together that we ‘ refine’ (one word for a huge variety of processes), to separate all the products gasoline, plastics, diesel, fertilizers, bunker fuel, polymers, kerosine, tar, explosives, coke etc.

    We need to mine 100% of it to get all the fractions for the necessary purposes we’ve put them to, in the world we’ve built. We haven’t built a different world and if we tried to now, it would take a lot of new materials to do it..

    We can’t just mine plastics and polymers, fertilizers, explosives, chemicals for mines, farms, industry etc. We need high grade coke to make Aluminium and steel, both coking coal and pet coke, likewise for thousands of products.

    Trying to swap, one energy form for another that doesn’t produce the products we need for modernity, doesn’t work and can’t work. Sure in the short term while we continue to use MORE fossil fuels to make all the ‘alternatives’ it all looks possible, but take the fossil fuels out of any part of system of renewables production and deployment and the concept instantly becomes unviable.

    Every single paper written about the ‘renewable’ future looks at bits in isolation, never ever the entire system, because it only looks doable if we treat everything as separate, like the rest of the system acts normally as we multiply solar by magnitudes or batteries by magnitudes etc, then look at current prices of all the components, extended into the future as cheaper… ( A simple example of the absurdity of the ‘research’ ; if we used 600% of world silver production for the silver paste in magnitudes more solar production, then solar and silver will get cheaper because of economies of scale). Ask any ‘hydrogen future’ expert, about Molybdenum and the reply will probably be “what’s that got to do with it”….

    We can’t do the mining, the processing, the transport, the refining of materials, nor the manufacturing of any of them without using fossil fuels at every step. What’s worse, is that despite all the talk of transition for several decades now, no-one anywhere is trying to build any of it without fossil fuels. Why not??

    If a future of modernity was possible without fossil fuels, then why aren’t we building any of it without them?? Why aren’t new mines and factories built to operate on only renewable energy using only materials gathered by, using, and made from electricity?

    Why isn’t there at least one demonstration plant somewhere in the world showing it’s possible??

    If it was at all possible, and having solar panels for over 5 decades and wind turbines longer, then we’d be doing it. We’d be building the future with electricity and multiplying up everything from the huge excess energy from this electricity.

    The plan is not working, and cannot work, so we need a better plan. So far all we are getting is extend, pretend and distract.

    If we can’t work out a better plan then the best thing to do is power down, reduce population and degrow as fast as possible before we turn the planet into having an unlivable climate, with huge starving populations destroying the remainder of the natural world.

    Go and read the paper Dennis provided above, the one he didn’t read in detail. It makes all sort of assumptions about how improvements in technology will make doing A, B and C much cheaper in today’s dollars (2017 dollars to be precise), and somehow assumes all the materials to build it also become cheaper and less energy intensive, all because of the magic of technology…

    The current system of fossil fuel use can’t last, because of pollution, climate change and depletion, it has never been an answer, as it was always a temporary short term way to produce modernity. As we haven’t worked out how to maintain modernity without them, let alone ‘grow’, the extend, pretend and distract model just guarantees we continue on the same path we’ve been on, until it all collapses.

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    1. https://peakoilbarrel.com/opec-update-june-2024/#comment-777539

      Dennis, as per usual it’s one hand wave after another….
      “That is where stored hydrogen would be used,”

      OK, so do the calculations on that, how much hydrogen would be needed to be stored, plus all the extra equipment that needs to be mined to build it all, plus all the extra workers in both construction and O&M.

      None of it is a hand wave, it’s extremely expensive, and if ‘everyone’ around the world needs to do it we run into shortages of all sorts, like molybdenum that we mine in the ppm range but is needed in the 2.5-3% range in all the stainless steel pipes needed in all the stages of hydrogen production and piping to storage.

      The other ‘alternative’ is lots of long distance HVDC transmission lines in the many GW range and lots of batteries elsewhere in the country to send the solar from outback Queensland South for maybe only 5%-10% of the time…

      All the hand wave solutions you offer are extremely inefficient when it comes to material use, with all these materials (mostly metals) having an extremely high energy cost to produce, which is mostly from fossil fuels…

      YOU are advocating the burning of a lot more fossil fuels as your solution to burning too many fossil fuels, because you refuse to look at the details of your suggestions, preferring the hand wave as it sounds easy…..

      Another example of the hand wave…
      Dennis …”Industrial operations do not have to be continuous.”

      Anything using high, which is most heavy industry, would be wildly inefficient if they had to wait for everything to heat up again before commencing, only for the power to go out again soon after resumption, plus there is a lot of equipment that must be heated slowly and cooled slowly so the machinery is not damaged. It’s often not something that can just be stopped because the power is suddenly low..

      It’s interesting that both Carnot and myself totally destroyed the argument about using stored hydrogen from ‘excess power’ a month or 2 ago, but you didn’t learn anything, and just repeat the same rubbish.

      The water used for electrolysis is heated to a nominal temperature, needs to be very pure and often is a weak alkaline solution, with no energy allowance for the huge quantity of water used (the pure water magics itself to the electrolysis plant for free). Like most things it’s most efficient when in a continuous operation, so having these giant electrolysis factories sitting idle most of the time waiting for excess electricity from the grid, is a non starter economically and another waste of resources in building it.

      So when do the workers turn up at these giant electrolysis plants waiting for electricity to become available?? Do they sit there twiddling their thumbs getting paid to do nothing when there is no power??

      The world can only be this nice bright green future providing you don’t look at any details of it, hand wave every aspect into existence, then year after year wonder why it’s not really happening, and we are only tinkering at the edges. It’s because reality gets in the way of ill thought through dreams.

      BTW after 2 years of back to back 25-30% power price increases, while the percentage of renewables in the grid has gone up, we now find we need a whole lot more transmission lines that will add another 22%-30% in real terms to prices over the next few years, for this power that is meant to be cheaper…

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      1. https://peakoilbarrel.com/opec-update-june-2024/#comment-777563

        Dennis, you don’t get it at all…

        “Let’s look at electricity generation as we won’t have to get into the fact that 60% of fossil fuel used to produce electric power is just wast heat so counting that waste heat as TWh as if they are useful is silly, the exergy is what is important unless the fuel is being used as a heat source only.”

        Dennis that ‘waste heat’ is not part of the EROEI calculations at all, which is the important aspect to run a modern civilization. It never comes into it..

        The EROEI calculations look at the energy used in the construction and O&M of the operation.

        We built the system of modern civilization by placing the power stations next to the coal pits, those closest to cities to start with, then transmission lines to those cities. The amount of coal burnt was irrelevant, only the power output was counted.

        The cost of building the power plants and transmission lines was relatively cheap, and through time we had efficiency gains at these plants by using bigger machines to mine the coal fed into the plants via conveyor belts etc, using less labor in the processes..

        This cheap power allowed us to build all sorts of machines cheaply. We thought it could go on forever, so as we grew, we built the power plants further away, using less desirable coal, then even further away buying coal from elsewhere if the close by coal ran out.

        It became less efficient in some ways while overall efficiency in other ways improved, by using more efficient generators, more automation, larger machines at all the coal pits, larger machines transporting it all etc. All the extra materials and machines being provided by other fuel mostly cheap oil and gas and operated by them..

        The system of civilization we set up, relies upon power at night, so while coal and gas have waste heat, they provide electricity when needed and used by the civilization we have.

        Can you for once work out the actual material and energy cost of providing batteries and hydrogen or whatever backup for the times when the sun isn’t shining in winter and the wind isn’t blowing, instead of the wave of the hand you usually do..

        It’s only going into this detail, that you see the ‘hand wave’ of solutions don’t work, unless most people are slaves and very few get to enjoy modernity.

        I keep telling you it’s an entire system we have, not lots of separate bits that can only grow massively if the rest of the system operates normally. When you want to massively increase A and B it comes at a cost to C, D, and E.

        We do not have the unlimited resources to build it all, and by trying are in the process of making the planet unlivable, destroying most of the ecosystem in the process, while we only have a 2-3% penetration of renewables.

        Dennis …. “If wind(12.6%) and solar(21.2%) annual growth rates of the past 4 years continue in the future,”

        OK do the calculations on this, how many more Adaro type of Aluminium smelters running on coal are needed to produce the Aluminium for the frames of all these new solar panels? Plus of course the EV panels, plus of course all the new transmission lines, plus more, plus more, more, more….

        How many new factories are needed to be built to keep up this growth rate? Do these new factories need power ,water, roads, gas, coking coal? Or do they just magic into existence? Do they use concrete in these new factories buildings? Do all the new workers, mostly in developing countries use the new higher wages to power their homes, buy appliances. Do you think we need more of these? Or is all from slave labor?

        You never think through the entire argument of building MORE, of growing anything.. It’s all just more of the same that we’ve had for over 200 years, more growth leading to more environment destruction, and getting closer to the point of collapse where oil production declines at an accelerating rate…

        The only choice we ever had was to go down the path of industrialization, guaranteeing collapse when the major energy went into depletion, or not building an Industrial civilization in the first place.

        Your method of making statements of we can do this, that, and all sorts of other things, while never doing the exact calculations on the energy and materials to build it, is just a belief system to help you sleep at night. It’s not a part of our reality…

        The simple reality is we have added fossil fuel use by 10 times more energy in the last 20 years as we have added from renewables. Plus renewables are not replacing anything, they are being added to all existing energy use, all to the detriment of the ecosphere.

        Advocating for more just means more fossil fuel use to build it, because we can’t build it with just electricity from renewables, as it’s uneconomic to do so. The EROEI is too low (and probably negative when ALL energy building them is taken into consideration)!!

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        1. The question isn’t “how do we replace fossil fuels?”, but “how do we soften the landing as fossil fuels deplete?”

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        2. Thanks Rob, for always plucking the good stuff from POB.

          I just spent over an hour lurking around on that site. People are asking Dennis questions like he has credibility. Aren’t they reading Hideaways gold? Funny if Hide is a pain in the ass over there and most dislike him because he’s too dark for their MORTness. Or maybe it’s just dumb blind loyalty to their leader Dennis. But if they’re pretty well versed with overshoot & collapse, MORT would have to be what it’s all about. They just can’t let go of that final (but huge) piece of the journey called hopium. 

          Maybe you’re right about our denial genes being defective and your audience being mostly made up of the few freaks on earth (maybe universe) who can actually handle the top of the collapse mountain with the crazy info about how horrific, hopeless, and inevitable it’s gonna be.

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          1. I get why an uninformed or uneducated person might believe the energy transition story.

            But I don’t get Dennis unless it’s MORT. Facts and evidence do not penetrate his skull. It’s fascinating to watch.

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  16. I’m still hung up on Campbell’s coming out party. I watch that 12min video of his family every day. Never fails to put me in a good mood.

    Last night I watched a movie called Sliding Doors (starring Gwyneth Paltrow). The film alternates between two storylines, showing two paths the main character’s life could take depending on whether she catches a train. I kept thinking about Campbell during the movie. He is my Sliding Doors. 

    I was reflecting on a few decisions I made in my younger days that completely changed my life. The main one revolves around me turning away a person who would have had a tremendous positive impact on me. Instead, I embraced a relationship with someone who had a horribly negative impact on me. I mean you could not choose the more incorrect path if you tried.

    Not that I think I would have had Campbell’s life if a few decisions went the other way. Like living in New Zealand driving around in little miss sunshine 😊.  No, I just think I would have had a family, and been more of a nature loving outdoorsman. She was very family orientated and a total hippie tree hugger. My vainness and shallow appetite chose the girl with supermodel looks and not a caring bone in her body (and when I say “supermodel” I dont mean it in a complimentary way. More in a fake Barbie doll way. Gross!!!). By the time I woke up, it was too late, tree hugger was happily married with kids.

    Supermodel never really loved me. Tree hugger loved me more than I will ever experience again in my lifetime. Incredibly, that is one of the main reasons things turned out as they did. I always had a problem with the balance of love. If you like me too much, I’ll end up liking you less. If you dont love me (and if you are a little cruel to me), I will end up falling head over heels for you. What a fucked-up way of doing things!

    So crazy how those little decisions in our life have such a lasting effect. It reminds me of humans and technology. In Mesopotamia there is no way I would have said no to the plow when it was invented. Five thousand years later and it’s easy to see what a crucial mistake it was.

    p.s. Sorry if this post is weird but it’s 110F outside and 89F inside because our A/C is having issues. I think I might be losing my mind due to wet-bulb syndrome. Gonna get a motel room tonight if the A/C is not fixed soon.

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    1. I am truly sorry for your loss of what could have been. How I wish everyone was taught to work through their childhood wounds before making important life decisions in love and marriage. So much of being attracted to the wrong thing/person stems from something in our childhood, particularly in how our parents loved or didn’t love us.

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      1. Thanks monk. Your words are so true. When I got into Robert Sapolsky and Gabor Mate, they made me see how important every little thing from your childhood is (including the stress level of your mom while she’s pregnant with you). And how you can’t just go blaming your parents for your baggage because they probably had their share of trauma when they were children. And so on and so on. Such a delicate balance to “get it right”. 

        If I had kids, my main goal would be to have a strong support system within the family. Over here in USA, it’s very common for siblings to be rivals and hate one another. My brother and I had that growing up, and all of my friends did as well. I only knew of one brother and sister who were actually tight (and they were twins so that doesn’t really count 😊). Would like to think I could buck that trend with my kids.

        Also, I would encourage emotions and feelings. After I ask my kids how their day at school was, I would not allow a one-word answer (like I used to give to my mom). Actually, I would want to be home-schooling them. And cell phones… forget it, not allowed. Oh man, I would be a monster in their eyes. LOL. Good parenting has probably never been more difficult than it is right now in our current digital age. 

        p.s. It got up to 92F in the house (and thats with 4 ceiling fans and 5 standing fans on high with ice cold water towels from freezer). A/C is pumping like brand new now (knock on wood). All is right in my world (except the fact that its 104 outside right now at 930pm).

        Our thermostat is set at 77 all the time. At 85 it was getting very very uncomfortable. What a soft sapien I’ve turned into. Can’t handle an 8 degree bump. I can definitely handle a bigger bump in the opposite direction. In winter we keep it at 68F. But if it was up to me, I’d have it set around 50.

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        1. Cool and raining here today. Spent the day studying how to program my new handheld ham radio that arrived from China in 6 days with free shipping! It’s an amazing piece of gear for $22 Canadian.

          I think I’ve figured out what frequencies I can use for communication without (really) breaking the law since every I do will be dodgy without a license. Also figured out the important channels to scan all the time.

          The rumor I heard seems to be true because 1 week later the price jumped $10 and almost no one ships to Canada now.

          I’m thinking the time to prep is now. If it’s too good to be true it probably won’t continue.

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        2. If I have kids, I will be a pretty strict parent as well. I know Gaia said it has been cold in Australia, but we have been having a very warm winter. Next year is the solar maximum, plus it has been El Nino. But I feel so concerned about if we are reaching a new baseline that’s hotter, with climate change. It’s scary noticing a difference in real life

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    2. Habits, here cultural ones, can be stronger than feelings (not in the sense of emotions, but just what is felt). Our pleasure/pain dashboard is here for a reason.

      About the temperature: time to lose weight, dig underground shelter, harvest water, plant trees… Forget the air conditioning.

      You don’t do it now, it’s your choice. Ultimately, it means choosing death or migration. That’s OK too. Just know what you are choosing, in full conscience.

      🙂

      I forgot where you live exactly in the US, but trees can grow in more places than we think: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Desert_greening, https://www.editionsfavre.com/livres/regreening-the-sahara/, https://reverdirlesahara.org/, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WCli0gyNwL0.

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      1. Good advice Charles. And yes I am fully conscience for the only real choice that matters: Nitrogen or Helium?

        I’m so far away from digging an underground shelter in order to survive that I’m almost offended you suggested it 😊. My plan for nuclear war, migration, water issues, grid failure, etc is one month of survival. (only 2-3 days max if electric grid goes down during summer). The perfect amount of time to appreciate the moment and prepare for the end. 

        I’m at true acceptance with this plan. I know I can carry it out. And I know I won’t crack under pressure. I think that’s why my tone lately is even darker than usual. Like an actor getting too deep into character (Heath Ledger’s Joker), I’ve been too focused on the plan because I think it’s coming soon. I need to balance that out with appreciating the “Peak” while it’s still here.

        I’m at a point now where I see humanity the same as I see colonialism, nazism, or any other ism. Yes, if you look hard enough you will find plenty of good, but it’s all saturated in immense evil. (Hamish’s breakdown of the smart phone below is a good example of this). For the sake of Mother Earth, I am rooting for the extinction of humans. Even though it seems that after civilization crumbles, it will be impossible for sapiens to do any major damage to the environment. Just give it time, we will find a way, we always do.

        My Nate Hagens magic wand would involve everybody doing the right thing, right now and opting out of life. But it’s the same concept as willful energy reduction, we’ll have to be forced into it. So when SHTF, I know I’ll be ready.

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        1. Great 🙂

          And I forgot to mention passive cooling https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passive_cooling, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sKbEOMCsqaI…

          It is not my intent to offend you: my suggestions only reflects who I am 🙂 I have given up on this culture, but not on the continuation of life on this planet, and even not on humans. The dichotomy human vs. nature doesn’t make much sense to me. So I don’t really have remorse either. In simple times, it’s easy to deny the murky, messy nature of reality which is mirrored in our souls. We are not in simple times anymore.

          Thank you. I enjoy this conversation.

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          1. Hey Charles. I know you do not intend to offend. I love when you speak up. And your good at making me think. 

            I’m glad you’re ok with us not being on the same page here. I am going full dark on humans because it’s easy for me to get lured back into the trap of “we’ll break the cycle”. The new kick I’m on about energy constraints is helping to yes simplify things, but also just clicking. 

            No way to keep it light (like permaculture only) when you finally break through with agriculture. The universal rule seems to be a never-ending desire to increase EROEI. And no way to stop the built in worldviews of separatism and superiority from constantly getting stronger over time as you get more efficient. And no way for this to play out and not have tremendous negative effects on all life forms and Mother Earth.

            Fossil fuels are just the final solution for anyone who gets this far with agr. No way to be using the ancient sunlight shortly after breaking through with the current sunlight. Few thousand years minimum.

            The first contraint of fire is what gets it all started. One or two million years seems like we took longer than the average fire to agr moment. But I could also believe that the road to the “Peak” for any other lucky planets out there is in the ballpark with our trajectory. 1,000,000 / 12,000 / 200

            “It cant go any other way” which I hated about MPP, makes sense now. And yes, live for the now and the good in the world, but no. Not when the evil far outweighs the good. That person needs to go. There’s a perfect equilibrium for the diversity of life thriving on a planet and it does not involve breaking sacred energy constraints. Sooner we go, sooner life finds that perfect balance.    

            If my ramblings sound like a depressed person who needs help, or a tough guy projecting his fear. I assure you I am neither. 😊 Just a new focus and like I said, it’s clicking for me.

            And thank you, I enjoy this conversation too. 

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            1. Yes, I understand.

              I have come to accept:

              • different people can hold even radically distinct world views,
              • some of which I can understand (like yours), some I can’t, yet it doesn’t make them any less valid,
              • some of which I can experimentally validate, some I can’t, yet it doesn’t make them any less valid,
              • it is not given to me to understand many things of this world,
              • my world view is not necessarily correct.

              Ultimately, the description of reality (Truth) one ascribes to does not matter much: as long as it clicks for oneself, as long as the shoe fits, “you will know them by their fruits”. In a way, we are all movie makers of our lives: we can not choose the scene, but have ultimate freedom on framing.

              In the future, I might again overlook who you chose to be, how things came to be framed for you, bear with me 🙂

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    3. I understand the sliding doors analogy. I was the sports jock whose true self chose the hippy tree hugging artist who didn’t know the rules of rugby. We’ve traversed the road somewhat less travelled. It has been a roller coaster because the sports jock part of me who wants to fit in and look good to his peers has tried to undermine that choice at times. It’s only in the last few years I have finally been able to leave him behind completely. Nikki is indeed a saint for putting up with me and helping keep us on course towards this awesome life we have today.

      In making the choice I’ve let go of quite a few friendships and a lot of potential income but I don’t regret it for a second. I totally agree with Monks comment. I was lucky enough to find a space to deal with some childhood stuff and be at peace with my parents just prior to meeting Nikki. If I hadn’t then…. the door would probably slid open to another path.

      I’m glad our video gives you good vibes. I really enjoy and appreciate your presence here Chris. Have a great day.

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      1. Thanks Campbell. I should have known you used to be a dumb sports jock. 😊. Me too. Baseball was my thing. I was really good in high school, but not good enough for college, not even community college. 

        But you were playing the toughest of the tough. Of all the different team sports, rugby is by far the most violent. I used to enjoy watching it, but I am too squeamish nowadays.

        Glad you were able to leave the sports jock part of you behind. Same with me. I used to be so concerned about winning/losing. Even if we went bowling for fun, I would ruin it for everyone because of my competitiveness. Such an exhausting way to live life!

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  17. Videos like these are always fascinating to watch if you want to turbo charge your denial circuits and feel optimistic. I can’t believe there was a time when I used to revere this guy and believe his predictions. He is a big shot in the tech community who is highly respected.

    So according to him we are few years away from AGI and then its on to the stars from there on. A bunch of doomers on some remote corner of the internet believe civilization is going to crash hard within the next few decades. I wonder who to take seriously.

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    1. He’s a good example of why I became so interested in Varki’s MORT theory. Kurzwell is a bright well educated guy and yet he believes things that are obviously impossible due to energy and material constraints.

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      1. Ray Kurzweil : Holds up a “smart” phone and claims “that makes us more intelligent”.

        All of the evidence contradicts him. The phone is obviously much more than just a phone. More properly, it is an immensely powerful, battery-operated, computer – that enables high quality digital photography, portable media player, flashlight, phone, texting, secure messaging, navigation, calendar and more. It also fits in your pocket and runs for days. Practically the stuff that was science fiction two decades ago.

        If anything it has made people dumb, with no need to be able to read a map, remember things, or attempt to actually develop an understanding of life’s issues. It has largely destroyed normal social interaction and the innate social intelligence required. For some people, losing their phone is akin to losing a limb.

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        1. Yes. To me, the whole industrial civilisation enterprise is the production of crutches for masses of people who don’t need them. Debilitating.

          To me, the worse aspect of the phone is the mental addiction: the immediate feedback loop it creates between mental obsession and pleasure center.

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      2. I used to think that MORT is probably wrong and all that is needed is exposure to right information and a lack of investment in the survival of civilization which will allow that information in. My reason for thinking so was simple- If it was so easy for an average individual like me then it should be easy for anyone provided the latter two conditions are met.

        Now I think denial may be like a mountain with awakening on the other side and varying gradients depending on each individual. Information is your horse and investments are obstacles. You may lose your way and tumble back down but if you persist you can reach the other side and see the truth.

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        1. Well said.

          All of the famous overshoot aware people like Rees, Meadows, Hagens, Martenson, Murphy, Alpert, etc. think more information and education is required for a better path.

          A few, like Meadows, gave up.

          Not a one embraced MORT awareness as the first step. Despite overwhelming evidence that information and education does not work.

          They don’t even engage in a discussion on why MORT is wrong. They simply ignore or deny MORT.

          The only big name that engaged with me was Jay Hanson who attacked MORT and me for a year before I eventually caught him being unethical by hiding the fact that the whole time he had a fundamentally incorrect understanding of the theory. If I was religious I’d be comforted to know he’s in hell.

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    2. Thanks for the memories.

      I read Kurzweil’s book on the Singularity some 20+ years ago and was a firm believer for a couple of years. When nothing happened (as far as nanotechnology) I started to have doubts. Soon thereafter I came across Guy McPherson and figured we were going to overshoot planetary carrying capacity and became a doomer.

      AJ

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  19. Good short video about why music sucks nowadays. It got me thinking. Was gonna write something about how society (not just music) falls into this category. But then I saw this comment that sums it up perfect.

    “This is a fantastic bit of social commentary. Speaks to something beyond just music. Our whole culture is increasingly 1) Easily produced, 2) Easily consumed, 3) Easily forgotten”

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      1. From “das gelbe Forum” “Ashitaka” – translated: https://www.dasgelbeforum.net/index.php?id=656872

        What very few people realize is that today’s 25-year-olds have been completely psychologically reprogrammed in the last 15 years. And this also applies to all migrant daughters and sons. For today’s 15-year-olds, it is even more dramatic: almost none of them are capable of making social contacts with the opposite sex, of having sexual experiences in the coming years and then of fulfilling their desire to have a child in a relationship. The ever-increasing development of social media will make it impossible to escape into the desert of reality. They have lost any potential to gain a foothold in a society that makes relationships and children possible in the first place. This development will rob us of our ideals and hopes at such a tremendous speed that today’s society will be unrecognizable in a few years. There will then be no need for primary schools. What comes next, here as in all other EU states (especially the eastern ones), will no longer be able to deal with this curriculum content.

        Very few people are aware of the extent of the population destruction and the inevitable destruction of today’s welfare state. The population figures, and even the birth rates of the last few years, do not reflect the exponential dimension of the collapse. This is why corrections on the markets are always so sudden and unexpectedly severe. Because we do not want to be aware of the shortest exponential equivalents of the waves preparing for the big change.

        Saludos

        el mar

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      2. Yes I tried to explain the difference to my 16 year old daughter about experiencing music from the longing to buying and then listening while absorbing the visuals of the record.

        She is quite keen on vinyl but really has no money to buy it. At least she gets the idea of listening to an album though doesn’t do it regularly. She does note though that spotify is mostly feeding her crap and is now looking for new places to get recommendations.

        I quite liked Pandora. It introduced me to some great music such as A fine Frenzy and her album The pines.

        Look it up on You tube. For some reason it won’t let me link it.

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      3. Spending hard earned cash no doubt. For a couple of summers in the mid 80’s, me and my two best friends would go door to door begging to wash your car for $2. Three or four cars would give us enough to buy a new album (cassette tape) at the record store. 

        Or how about recording music from the radio onto a tape. First form of piracy for me. Top 8 at 8pm on local radio channel you were just waiting for your song with a finger hovering above the record button. Ya, it all had tons of value and stuck with me too. Different times for sure. 

        Well, guess I’ll go back to youtube and sift through tons of free music until I find something that entertains me.

        Are You Not Entertained? #Gladiator – YouTube

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        1. Cassettes for video and audio was where my pirate days began. To the video store and local library then back to the linked vhs’s at home and the double cassette deck.

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          1. Me too. I had a high end cassette deck for recording and could make really good copies of cds. I also was an early adopter of dvd-r writers for ripping dvds, and DivX for ripping movies onto a single cd-r. Back then I still paid money for the original cd or to rent the dvd. Today everything is available for free.

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          2. The double cassette boombox was a big deal. Everyone on my block seemed to get one at the same Christmas. Suddenly the streets were filled with kids walking around with a big ghetto blaster on their shoulder. 😊 

            Another thing I just remembered was how some tapes/cd’s would come with the lyrics for every song. I was always bummed when the lyrics were not provided. 

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        2. That brings back good memories. I bought my first car in 1976, a lime green Mazda 808 2 door sports coop with white racing stripes. 🙂 I put Michelin radial tires on it which had just come on the market. I removed the two high beams and replaced them with high power aircraft landing lights which could blind anyone that forgot to dim their lights when approaching me. But the best customization was a stereo cassette player with an external power amp and really good speakers. Me and my buddies would meet at the lake to drink beer and I’d open my trunk to let the sound out and blast Nazareth’s Razamanaz for all to enjoy.

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          1. LOL. Just like the way people used to have more uniqueness, the cars did too. I bet everyone in your neighborhood knew it was you when they saw the lime green machine rolling down the street. 😊

            My first car was in ’93. 1980 Chevy Monte Carlo with white wall tires. The prize customization for me was the Kenwood pullout cd deck. We used to actually think we were cool lugging around a stereo deck at school all day.

            But ya, the biggest game changer had to be when you could finally play your music in your car and did not have to rely on the stupid radio. I remember my dad talking about how cool this was and how you were a nobody until you had an 8 track or cassette player in your car.

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          2. Still in a nostalgic mood. This is my favorite video on the internet when it comes to yearning for my childhood. If you were alive during the 80’s, you’ll probably like it.

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              1. Hell yeah! Those were great. The editing and syncing up with the music is so impressive. And the time it must take. 

                Liked the old movies one the best. But the first video has a couple of hilarious parts. At the 1:47 mark it looks like Leslie Nielsen doing Travolta’s Pulp Fiction dance. Never seen that before. I’m betting it’s from Naked Gun part 3. And then the 3:01 mark is even funnier. I don’t know that movie either.

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  20. Sarah Connor says what I’m feeling.

    https://www.collapse2050.com/the-future-we-deserve/

    That was not the presidential debate I hoped for.

    Here we are, civilization entering the abyss, and this is the best America has to offer? Bickering over golf and growth?!?

    I really don’t know what the fuck to think anymore. It’s like the officers of the Titanic arguing about the dinner menu as the ship sinks in the Atlantic. I shouldn’t really expect much else, I suppose. But something definitely broke tonight.

    We’re on the precipice of world war 3. People are actively planning to turn America into an authoritarian state. The biosphere is collapsing. This could be the last free election. Yet these are the presidential choices on the menu?

    It’s clear that voters don’t care, candidates don’t care and moderators don’t care. We’re fighting for our lives yet these existential risks are essentially a non-issue to those given a podium to speak.

    What do the 20-something year-olds think about all this? They must think the old folks are losing it. It’s embarrassing, assuming they’re paying attention at all. I hope they are because they have yet to experience life.

    I guess we’re about to get the future we deserve.

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    1. There is only one party in the United States, the Property Party … and it has two right wings: Republican and Democrat. – Gore Vidal

      I watched the RFK one. Yes, he was much better than those two idiots, but he wasn’t as good as I thought he’d be. Doesn’t matter though as he has no chance anyway.

      The stupidest moment of the entire night did not involve any of the debaters. It came from the RFK moderator. Towards the end that dipshit said something like:

      “Well Mr Kennedy, if you believe what those candidates are saying you’d think America is in real trouble. But I don’t see people lining up to leave the country. I see people trying to get in the country. And yes the middle class is disappearing in America, but that’s because they are all getting upgraded to the upper class.” 

      And that was the moderator from the independent (non-corporate sponsored) debate. What an absolute blind and obedient jackass.

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    2. “Unfortunately, most people vote like they never left grade school. They pick the loud jock with great one-liners that promises to remove bean sprouts from the cafeteria.”

      That’s about the size of it…

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      1. Biden Implodes: And Here’s Who Is Really To Blame

        The Debate on 06/27 is a damning indictment of the American political system in its entirety.

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  21. The west’s disconnect from reality is breathtaking.

    https://consciousnessofsheep.co.uk/2024/06/28/the-real-threat-to-our-security/

    The UK is a basket case in this respect, importing half of the food consumed (and around 60 percent of the calories) together with 20 percent of its electricity.  And things get far worse when it comes to agricultural and energy supplies.  A major reason for the high UK food inflation in 2022 and 2023, was that our elites in their infinite wisdom decided we did not need Russian gas or Russian fertiliser – the former being used extensively in greenhouses both for heating and for additional carbon dioxide, the latter being essential to maintaining UK crop yields.  Less obviously, the Cameron-Osborne 2010-2015 UK government closed the UK’s last diesel refinery because Russia could provide diesel cheaper – so that the cost of operating agricultural machinery is now also prohibitively high… it is no accident that farmers’ protests are mushrooming across Europe as costs rise even as affordability plummets.

    If we manage to avoid nuclear Armageddon – which, given the USA’s neocon leadership, is far from certain – it will be the BRICS who come out controlling the food, the energy, and the money.  But hardly anyone in the western political class is prepared even to mitigate the ensuing shock.  Indeed, in the UK, we are allowing fundamental steel, transport, agricultural land, and energy to close despite having no idea from where we will replace it… just the vain hope that our increasingly discredited currency will continue to buy it from elsewhere… making the political elite the real threat to our security.

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    1. I listened to this while working at the farm today. I didn’t enjoy it. Nothing new and he’s still avoiding discussing population and the Hideaway fast collapse scenario.

      One thing of note. He said he’s been quiet of late because he’s working behind the scenes to prevent a WWIII nuclear war.

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        1. I can’t remember if Korowicz believes collapse will be quick. I know he believes it is inevitable because of the complex, globally interconnected, just-in-time nature of our modern economy.

          I was referring to Hideaway’s argument here that things will unravel quickly once oil supply starts falling year on year because of the many self-reinforcing feedback loops that will be triggered, and because everything in our economies depends on a fragile global supply chain.

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        2. My fast collapse theory and I have to call it theory until it happens, is based on a couple of aspects.

          Firstly we have been in decline since the early-mid ’70’s when the rise in oil production stopped being exponential and started to go up in a linear fashion. This allowed us to hold modern civilization together, while dragging future use of oil, coal and gas into the present, using debt as the roundabout mechanism. All while world population has grown to massive overshoot plus using up all the easy to get high grade ores of everything.

          All the technology and efficiency gains have led us to a much more complex and fragile industrial civilization, where there is total dependence on the entire global supply chain operating in harmony with an ever increasing quantity of energy and minerals needed to feed this super organism of modern civilization.

          Once we are past peak oil and the plateau of oil production, there will inevitably be a period of accelerating decline in oil production, which will precipitate much higher prices and lead to crashing markets and debt implosion. At this point printing money, which worked in the past can no longer work as oil production continues to fall. All that’s likely to happen is massive inflation during the continued fall in oil production.

          With oil production declining, and deep recession/depression around the world, chaotic feedback loops will prevent the global supply system from working properly, if at all. Mine production, will fall, factory output has to fall with less supplies, again in a chaotic manner effecting a vast array of businesses across the world, reducing the ability to make complex machinery and repair a lot of existing machinery, affecting more businesses and power grids. The supply chain disruptions will see a faster reduction in oil, gas and coal production, also affecting their supply chains, because it’s too complex for anyone to fully understand.

          It becomes a self sustaining reaction to the downside, because every system is so complex, and trying to go ‘local’, as in start up new industries to make important parts, equipment whatever, just wont work as these new local industries need a lot of energy and materials to start up, the exact things that have increased demand everywhere, just as the shortages grow.

          At the same time 8 plus billion people need to be fed, with a world of rapidly falling food staples due to shortages of fuel for tractors, fertilizers, pesticides and transport fuel to cities. Food prices obviously also go through the roof..

          It rapidly turns into uncontrollable by governments, with the rapidly increasing unemployment, lack of investment funds and food shortages, leading to populations everywhere becoming increasingly desperate.

          Even if governments brought in harsh emergency measures before it gets to food shortages, rationing fuel to ‘important’ uses, the following year there is less fuel anyway, likewise the year after that etc. Very rapidly, no matter how ‘tough’ the government, there will not be enough fuel for mines, farmers and heavy transport, guaranteeing starvation in cities..

          Of course the above is just normal collapse and assumes war, as in WW3, and/or serious climate change doesn’t collapse civilization first, or hastening the process

          The intense complexity we have requires billions of people to provide the markets for every little widget manufactured, plus an organised system of 8 billion people needs the complexity to stay stable. As the complexity unwinds due to global supply chain disruption and oil production falling, it can no longer support 8 billion people and the crash in population can no longer support complexity, so again a spiral downward in a world of falling energy availability.

          It seems to be a law of the universe that small simple systems unravel slowly while large complex systems collapse quickly. A small red dwarf star will shine for billions perhaps trillions of years before slowly running out of fuel, while the largest stars life, has many complex reactions within and collapse very quickly by going supernova after a relatively short 10 million years or so.

          Our civilization is the largest to ever exist by orders of magnitudes over previous civilizations and incomprehensively complex, so the final implosion should be spectacular. Prior civilization collapses are not viable models for ours, as the complexity is so vast compared to anything prior..

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          1. Very good. I think your fast collapse theory is the most likely outcome.

            I can imagine some reasonable aware people might disagree and think a slow collapse is more probable. Key arguments might include:
            1) Rich countries consume a lot more than they need to have reasonable lives.
            2) There is redundancy in the global economy.
            3) When forced to do so, humans will innovate workarounds.
            4) An economy in depression will free up oil for critical uses.

            Contrasting the arguments for fast versus slow would make a interesting guest essay.

            Does any here want to defend the slow collapse theory?

            Or has anyone seen a really good essay elsewhere making the case for slow collapse?

            (I know JMG believes in a stair-step slow collapse but I’d prefer we found someone else that doesn’t require me to delete 9 out of 10 words to get to the point).

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                1. I actually think that collapse may be slow for some regions and faster for others depending on factors such as ecology, demographics and geopolitics. It isn’t as if oil and mineral resources will vanish overnight. I also agree with points 1 and 4.

                  One factor in the debate on fast or slow collapse: How well can we fall back on older (i.e. simpler) technologies to cushion the descent. I do agree that in the not so distant future, a wide array of discretionary products will become permanently unavailable.

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          2. Thank you Hideaway for this latest summary of the fast-collapse theory (it’s probably the third explanation of yours I read about it, but every time, I understand a little bit better).

            Personnally, I am fond of a theory of two economies: fast collapse of everything exploitative/globalized/centralized/high-tech/industrial/service coupled with the slow rise of inefficient/small-scale/local/decentralized economies oriented towards co-survival with the rest of the living.

            Even though I believe my “plan” could technically be feasible, I also think your scenario will turn out to be closer to how it will unfold: it’s easier for human to die en masse rather than implement something preemptively or which requires collective focus for a long time. Although we (this culture at least) may not want to admit it, death can often be the path of least resistance and the most efficient way to quickly get from one state to another.

            However, I also believe, this could unfold quite differently according to the locations in the world: places which can sustain their population with local production and which are bearable all year long temperature wise, may fare better. Also, some places have a great probability of turning into hell quite quickly (densely packed cities short on water and dependent on A/C). Current food inflation and lowering fertility rates are a blessing in (not so) disguise.

            As a side-note, framing the question this way is extremely anthropocentric: the so-called collapse is probably going to be the flourishing of something else. I find the case of wildlife in Chernobyl fascinating.

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            1. The unexpected explosion of life in Chernobyl fascinates me too. And Hideaways brilliant fast-collapse theory is why I am hopeful for that Chernobyl effect to happen worldwide after humans die off. 440 Chernobyl’s sounds like way too much for Mother Earth to handle, but life has proven itself time and time again at being unbelievably resilient.  

              Below is a recent interaction I had when trying to explain why all humans must go extinct. Have had a couple of these already. This one is from Indi’s site. No need to include my comment because you guys have already seen those words. I’ll just copy the two replies. (but I’ll leave the link below just in case)

              MORT will guarantee that most overshoot aware people agree more with Alan Sutton. My goal is to work on tightening up my story in order to convert the people “on the fence” into mine and Pintada’s view. If I can ever get you Charles to come over to this line of thinking, then I will retire and know my job is done. 😊 

              Alan Sutton: Dear me. That is a sad thing to end up thinking. There is plenty of good. Rooting for the extinction of humans is easy to say but hard to swallow. Believe me, I am pessimistic but not all the humans are guilty. Certainly none of those poor bloody kids in Gaza.

              Pintada: Is humanity better than the 300-400 species that go extinct every day? Since it is us that is causing those extinctions apparently the choice has been made. Someone, or something decided to kill all of those animals so that humanity could have airplanes (or whatever). The only way to fix the problem is to have humanity go extinct and like paqnation I can’t wait.

              Opposites Day — indi.ca

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              1. Hello paqnation. Sorry to disappoint you (again). I don’t think this is going to happen during this lifetime for me to root for the extinction of humans.

                Difficult to make this short…

                I don’t carry the collective guilt of extinction. I don’t really understand abstractions such as “human species”. And responsibility, guilt of a species are not notions which make much sense to me. I believe the notion of species belongs to a particular scientific field and can not be used in this way.

                If I beat a child, or if I plow a field, I feel pain in my heart and that’s how I know this is “bad”. This is a small action, at my scale, with relatively direct feedback which I can witness. Even though I had to unlearn my endoctrinations to be able to hear my feelings and this world which talks in so many various ways. For instance, I choose to garden without gloves, because if a bush is too thorny, I want to leave him finish his cycle. His thorns are his way to communicate this is an area under construction. I have come to understand that many of the unpleasant situations I can find myself in just stem from my inability to listen and my obsession to go on with my idea. Similarly, if something is too difficult, (like getting a root out of the ground by hand) I just don’t do it and wait for another force to erode it.

                With climate change, extinction, this is different. This is the field of “grand” abstract ideas I can’t really relate to. There is not much meaning in that. I believe this is simply not for me to decide or worry or feel guilt. Worse, I believe, collective guilt (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_collective_guilt) is maybe part of the psychopathic propaganda this society subjects us to. For most, it serves no real purpose, except to live in a constant mild level of fear and do nothing about it except consume and comply.

                At a philosophical level, who/what really is in control? This led to that led to this and here we are, in bondage of our genes, of our nature, of our personal history, of our context, of our environment. If you cut out an individual out of reality, is he responsible for his behaviour or is everything else except himself making him who he is? The dichotomy humans/nature is only one way to give meaning to what we are witnessing. We could equally say it is simply nature against nature. Is there truly any thing, entities against entities, or is this reality, just a field of unicity? Of course, there are many ways to frame things, not necessarily exclusive. Thinking in terms of species, is just picking a particular model.

                Lastly, (maybe not for you, but I suspect for some), to think we, (exceptional) humans, are the root of all evil and the source of this extinction (the destroyer of worlds as some like to repeat, even though, I am unsure of which worlds Krishna was refering to in the bhagavad gita) is the opposite side of the same coin: humanism, anthropocentrism, exceptionalism or human supremacism, as Tom Murphy and Derrick Jensen like to call it. It feels to me as a yet again hidden form of egocentrism.

                Anyway, I love life. It’s going to continue, die and renew, shape-shift…

                🙂

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                1. Monks request the other day asking if I could tone it down on my harshness for humans and now this great conversation with you has me wanting to try and explain myself a bit. I dive in too hard and fast with this stuff. I can be very aggressive and unstable. And because I am such a typical Empire Baby, I like to make it all about me. I do appreciate everyone’s patience and pleasantness.

                  As I’ve said before, un-Denial is the first time I’ve been vocal online ever. So when I got here, I was very green. If Rob still remembers, he’ll vouch for me. For my first comment (my long introduction) I emailed it to Rob via his contact page. And I was asking him if it could be a guest essay because I thought that was how you post comments to this site. 😊. I’m telling you; I was green.

                  Once I figured it out, I started to let loose. And I went through what most people probably go through when they come out from the shadows for the first time online. Confidence going up and down. Not really for the shorter posts, but for the longer ones “likes” and replies would get my dopamine juices flowing, and no activity would get me bummed out. There were many times where I questioned if I should be posting on a site where the audience is so knowledgeable. I was also worried because I have the disease that Rob hates so much. Taking 10 words to say one. With the experience I have gained, nowadays it’s easier to barrel through all those worries, to hell with ego. 😊

                  But I hope I have credibility here for honesty. I was a lying salesman for twenty years. Stopped in 2017. This site is the first time I’ve challenged myself to go full honest ever in my life. Easier than I thought it would be. Should have faced that fear a long time ago, but I think it’s only because of my journey and this site.

                  The only thing you ever have to worry with me lying about nowadays is an occasional exaggeration. Like my intro post where I’m trying to sound like I became overshoot aware in 2020. Nope. Jan 2022. My ego still has trouble admitting that. Saying you’ve been overshoot ever since covid, sounds way cooler. 😊   

                  My high point on this site was my guest essay in Feb. It’s also my curse because it came so early, and I’ll never top it. I’m a one hit wonder. It could use a rewrite to change a few things and tighten it up, but that essay is damn good. And I know I’ve had a few other good ones too. But I am known here because I throw a lot of shit on the wall to see what sticks. So yes, I have more bad ones than good. 😊. But that damn essay! I can’t get back to that zone.

                  And a tip for the audience members who are in favor of more content. No one will admit this, but if the like button activity around here doubled or tripled, I guarantee the posts would increase with about the same ratio of hits & misses from the authors. And no replies required. It doesn’t take much to motivate the simple monkey brain. 😊  

                  My low point here was my MORT for Dummies. I was so sure that thing would be the talk of the town when I was thinking it up on vacation. And then devasted when it got no love here. I still read it once in a while. It’s pure trash, but it does actually help me a little bit.

                  Sorry, that was a lot rambling to finally get to the point. My new flavor of the month with energy constraints and cheering for human extinction is too dark, I know. And it screams of being mad and blaming something. A very delicate topic to balance. Easy to get wrapped up in the “humans deserve this” aspect. But totally unproductive and coming from a negative place in the heart.  

                  When it’s pure with no garbage interference, it’s coming from a simple, honest and scientific approach to the puzzle (I miss Dowd so much. He was good with this subject). My goal is to write a high-quality essay about it. 

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                  1. Hello paqnation

                    🙂

                    Did you notice I never gave likes? Just so you know: simply because it’s a hassle to login… I am kind of proud that I do not to contribute to your dopamine shots 🙂

                    I don’t have much to reply. Don’t worry being dark. It does not feel too dark for me yet. Nor do I find you mad. We just have different ways to make sense of it all. And that’s fine.

                    These days, I try to focus on the concrete, the feasible at my scale and in my context: I consider full picture ideas only insofar as they help me stay the course. I guess, that’s all I was expressing in the previous comment. Also, instead of constricting my heart to follow the head, I am trying it upside down: starting from listening the heart.

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                    1. Thanks Charles. I’m so with you about trying it upside down. My babbling comment above proves it. Sometimes letting the heart take the lead over the mind will produce much ado about nothing. 😊

                      And damn you for depriving me of my dopamine! LOL. You get a pass because you post comments. I was mainly talking to the lurkers.

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            2. Hi Charles, …” coupled with the slow rise of inefficient/small-scale/local/decentralized economies oriented towards co-survival with the rest of the living.”

              I certainly agree with slow rise of small scale local economies over time, but I have a hard time believing in last bit of “oriented towards co-survival with the rest of the living.”

              I’d like to think that is how the remainder of humanity exists in the future, but past collapses of civilizations have led people to regroup, reorganise and build another unsustainable civilization.

              I think it’s the nature of civilization itself. We get specialization of tasks and people doing these specialised tasks can see that life gets better for themselves if their share or position grows, plus leaders always are in favor of growth to be bigger than the other tribes/groups/settlements near by, as worried about being overrun by others as much as anything.

              Only without civilization, in a hunter gatherer mode do groups of humans seem to be able to get along, as long as each group stays in their territory, unless invited by other groups..

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              1. Well, it depends if humanity really has a choice at this point.

                You may be right, this is just an intuition which goes like this:

                I believe we have reached the point where cooperation with the rest of the living is now the optimal path. In other words, not only is this probably a matter of survival (on a depleted polluted Earth), but also, humans will get more by contributing to replenish life rather than plundering it.

                To risk a financial analogy, my simple idea goes like this: we can’t eat the capital anymore, we are limited to the interests which are very low because the capital has been so degraded. The only option to increase our gains is to contribute to the accumulation of capital (I am talking about natural capital here).

                Ernst Gotsch says something like this about agriculture: that the ecosystems of the world are maintained in the accumulation phase (an early phase in the successionary model). If we were to operate on the abundance phase of the system, the gains would be much more and benefit the rest of life too. Grow 4, give back 3, but in a state of the ecosystem which is able to generate 4 rather than the 1 we are currently totally accaparating.

                Same with war: at some point, peace is the optimal strategy, because the gains are so little as to not justify going to war anymore.

                This is only an intuition and accept I may be wrong. Still, I base all my actions on this intuition. (mostly to try something else, because culturally this goes counter-current)

                We could call this phase of human evolution: reintegration, or the end of separation. This may take quite a long time to establish itself. But, I still think that is a possible outcome.

                (Then, once natural capital is replenished enough, a new civilization will come and plunder 😉

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    1. Why don’t US leaders respect their own constitution that they swore to protect?

      Why did almost all doctors ignore their oath to do no harm?

      Why do news journalists ignore the biggest environmental crime of all time, Nordstream?

      Why don’t health authorities tell citizens to supplement vitamin D and to eat less sugar?

      Why is the Green Party in Europe pro war?

      There are hundreds of questions like this.

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    2. Hi Stellar. That question stands out for me because I have asked it more than any other along my 20-year journey of waking up. Gonna try to give a simplified answer. I did not watch the video, hopefully I’m not repeating anything.

      The phrase “the west” is cloaked in bullshit. Let’s first make sure I know what it really means. USA, and that’s it. I formed that opinion years ago from seeing all UN, World Council vote tallies for some important issue look like this:

      188 votes Yes / 1 vote No 

      Or even the more absurd where usa abstains, so its 188-0. Whatever the important issue is, with some luck, it gets some media coverage for a while, but goes away eventually. Most are killed right there on the spot by one country’s vote. And they don’t even have to waste the energy of showing up to cast that vote. That is the “West”. The head MF’er in charge. And it surprised me that these UN votes (that tell such an obvious story) would get out to the public. And then surprised again to realize “they” don’t have to hide anything.

      So how and why does the rest of the world put up with this shit? What, no formed alliances by now to take out the big bad wolf? C’mon man! This should have been handled long ago. But it goes back to whoever wins the race for the Old World to create the first big empire in the New World was pretty much guaranteed to be driving the bus during the sacred ancient sunlight breakage era. Tons of untapped resources. Perfect location (big island too far away for enemies to be successful at killing you or destroying your precious “property”).  

      Skip to the end of WWII, it was a cash bonanza. Most of the world is destroyed except yours. And everyone is afraid of you because you actually went through with dropping two a-bombs on people. You’ve got a monopoly on everything (for a while). And of course, they’re all broke so you get the power that comes with the vampire like combo of high interest lending to buy your shit. The exponential growth, power, and influence from that monopoly bonanza is almost a “game over” by itself.

      A different country inventing the nuclear bomb first is about the only thing that could have changed international law from ever applying to USA. But its coming to an end, thank god. Climate, energy depletion, virus/vax, BRICS, nukes, inflation, take your pick.

      p.s. this energy constraint focus I’m on is making it easy to see that my white skin blaming was a waste of time. But don’t celebrate too much. It’s not a great tradeoff. No reason to focus on skin color anymore, but much reason to focus on why humans need to go extinct asap. 😊

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  25. There’s no bottom to this cesspit. More evidence our leaders are still screwing with the data.

    Plus a fresh theory on why covid may have been released to prevent a bigger problem.

    https://www.rintrah.nl/the-problem-nobody-wants-to-think-about/

    If you look at Euromomo, there’s no excess mortality in the Netherlands anymore, because the Dutch government pulled a clever trick. Excess mortality in 2020 and 2021 became part of the baseline mortality projected from now on. But if you use the old method they were using, excess mortality looks like this:

    Since 2021, we have been living in a “new normal”. And we know this is a lingering problem, because they base the retirement age on the projected life expectancy. The retirement age was supposed to keep climbing because people would live longer, but a few months ago they suddenly announced the retirement age would not have to go up after all. Why the change all of a sudden? Because of these continuing excess deaths that they no longer show in the excess mortality statistics, that bring down the projected life expectancy.

    And as the whole country starts to cough again in the middle of summer, while blaming their “hay fever”, I figured this was worth pointing out. Anyone who has tried to predict when the grand finale is going to happen has been wrong so far. Some treat van den Bossche as their prophet and mock me because I post about psychedelics, but I would rather just let the evidence speak for itself.

    The general pattern that I tried to warn people about is just clearly visible in the statistics: A bad vaccine is forever.

    Is there anyone who wants to pretend that this is normal, to just have the hospitals now fill up again in summer, with people coughing their lungs out, in june 2024?

    You get that pattern, when you have a virus busy evolving to dodge whatever recent antibody iteration the population came up with.

    None of the other respiratory viruses show this pattern. In climates like ours the other respiratory viruses peak once a year, in winter when people’s immune systems are weak, following each other because of interference between the different viruses. We know what the pattern is supposed to look like in temperate climates:

    You’re not supposed to have a sudden corona wave emerge in late June. It did not happen in 2020, but it has happened in every year since 2021, when people were vaccinated.

    This is happening because the immune system of most people is stuck deploying an antibody response that doesn’t work.

    And it’s not a sustainable situation. The Dutch newspapers now announce that Dutch youth are “still suffering under the consequences of the lockdowns”. What are they suffering from? An elevated rate of suicidality. Why can’t these newspapers just be honest to people? Why can’t they just admit that people are getting infected twice a year or more, by a virus that infects the brain?

    I would just be able to move on from this topic, if people could be honest to me: We tried to give everyone a bad vaccine, so now we have a growing number of deaths.

    A conspiracy theory

    The saving grace in all of this, is that a population that has a trained innate immune response against SARS-COV-2, has a reasonably competent protection against the polybasic cleavage site variants of H5N1. NK cells effectively recognize this virus and most unvaccinated people will have developed an effective cross-reactive innate immune response against H5N1 in their brains.

    This leads me to mention an idea, you may call it a conspiracy theory, I have been struggling with in my head for quite some time. There isn’t really any doubt left that SARS-COV-2 is a product of human intervention in nature. The question to ponder is: Why? Why was a virus released into the population that gradually becomes more virulent over time?

    Well, the thing we have to comprehend, is that H5N1 was always the big one. H5N1 was always the grey swan: Something that every competent virologist knew would eventually start causing trouble. We have known since the late 90’s that this is a virus that evolved in our own chicken broilers. We have known for a long time that it is essentially unstoppable. We have known that it is practically impossible to develop an effective vaccine against it, that it enters the brain through the eyes and starts to wreak havoc and that it mutates so fast that any vaccine rapidly becomes ineffective.

    So what do you do? You’re dealing with a virus that kills half the people it infects, a virus that you can’t properly vaccinate people against, a virus that is spreading through wild birds, increasingly showing up in mammals and can not really be eradicated anymore. A virus that can bring down civilization, a virus that you and your virologist colleagues lie awake about at night.

    And even if you luck out, if you get a variant in humans that kills just 1% of people, it’s going to damage the brains of the survivors and they’re just going to get constantly reinfected.

    What do you do? How do you prevent the apocalypse that you and your virologist colleagues see coming? How do you try to stop the worst damage?

    You look for some other pathogen. Something that ruins the party. You look for some other pathogen, something that very gradually grows more virulent, something that gradually trains the innate immune system, which can only really be properly trained by allowing the body to suffer some damage, so that it stands a chance once the bigger bad guy makes that final jump that you can not stop.

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  26. I enjoyed this discussion between an outlaw left wing journalist, Matt Taibbi, and an outlaw right wing journalist, Tucker Carlson.

    I like it when smart people articulate the insanity I see because it makes me feel like I’m not going crazy.

    I also find it fascinating that people with a lot more knowledge of world affairs and human nature than I have are just as confused as I am about why we are descending into darkness.

    One idea I’m beginning to believe is that the fault it not with our leaders. It’s the beliefs of citizens that drive the bus. For example, if US citizens really cared about the 1st amendment so too would the politicians. Or if citizens really wanted accurate complete data on mRNA health outcomes, our health authorities would provide it. Or if US and European citizens really wanted peace in Gaza and Ukraine, the wars would stop.

    I wonder if overshoot and imminent collapse have triggered some ancient evolved survival behaviors?

    Maybe this is why overshoot blind people like Taibbi and Carlson are unable to explain troubling trends?

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    1. Yes, and at the same time, it’s complex because there is a feedback loop: who/what shapes the beliefs of the mass of “citizens”?

      I never quite understood Hobbes Leviathan arguments which makes us believe the state of nature is that of a constant war of all against all. To me, that is a very ancient mystification which serves the purpose of legitimizing the state. And it seems to me, most people I know believe, that, without the state, it would soon be chaos as every one would turn against every one. I don’t see how this can be right: people are not totally stupid and can quickly understand the value of cooperation. Cooperation is possible without vertical/central authority. Of course, denial helps in this rationalization, because part of the reason most people believe this is because they know they are weak/powerless in front of the state, but would rather not admit this truth to themselves. Few are the Nietzschean men.

      Closer to us, we have mass media, and further from us, the church. Etc…

      There is so much convenient bullshit everywhere… In other words, the masses are fed lies, but the lies are comfortable and most would go at great length before examining them.

      Just my 2 cents.

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  27. Delusional deep dive into the technology challenges and planned fixes of wind turbines.

    1. The 15 ton gearboxes are designed to last 20 years but actually last only 7 years. Imagine our economy’s ability to replace these gearboxes in 20 years!
    2. Maintenance costs can be 20% of the total cost of producing electricity.
    3. You can eliminate the gearbox if you substitute more rare metals for more magnets.
    4. Wind turbines are non-synchronous meaning as wind energy is increased you need to increase other sources of electricity to maintain 60 Hz.
    5. Hydrogen will be produced with surplus wind electricity to solve all of the problems and make the system sustainable.

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    1. most people would watch that and think well the problem is well in hand. Let us not mention all the mining etc that needs to happen, etc etc……..

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    1. Is Joe Biden’s Brain Vaccine Injured?

      https://www.midwesterndoctor.com/p/is-joe-bidens-brain-vaccine-injured

      Story at a Glance:

      •One of the most common side effects of the COVID-19 vaccination we’ve observed is cognitive impairment. This can range from brain fog to dementia, and frequently we see a rapid acceleration of pre-existing cognitive decline into Alzheimer’s disease.

      •Recently large data sets have emerged which support our observations and indicate millions of people are being affected by the adverse neurological effects of the vaccines. Those datasets are summarized here.

      •After Joe Biden became president, he had a rapid decline in cognitive function, leading many to say he is not the same man who assumed the presidency four years ago. Since that decline paralleled his vaccination uptake, the pertinent medical information about his case is provided here so you can assess if the two were indeed linked.

      •Many other prominent Democrats have had significant vaccination injuries, including 8% of the Democratic Senators. Each of their brain injuries (3 strokes and encephalitis) and their link to vaccination are discussed here. This article particularly focus on Dianne Feinstein’s case, because like Biden, she had pre-existing cognitive impairment which rapidly progressed after the COVID vaccines (which she forced on America) hit the market and rather than admit it, she did everything she could to cover it up until she died.

      I believe Biden’s poor performance was due to him both having had his cognitive impairment continue to progress and the fact that the nighttime schedule of the debate made it impossible for his team to chose a period of high lucidity for Biden to speak to the public.

      During the debate, the following jumped out at me (and many others).

      1. Biden repeated overt falsehoods with certainty.

      For example, early in the debate he asserted that Trump had told people to inject bleach into themselves, when Trump had in fact discussed ultraviolet light—and the most of media has now acknowledged Trump never said this. In my eyes, the most important thing about this was that Biden appeared to sincerely believe most of what he said.

      2. Biden repeatedly showed his disgust for both Trump and his supporters (e.g., those present on January 6th). I found this concerning because history is rife with cognitively impaired tyrants who treated their subjects unfairly due to their own (often petty) delusions.

      3. Biden rarely blinked.

      4. Biden’s face appeared to be mostly frozen. This is a classic symptom of Parkinson’s and also something which can resulted from a vaccine injury where a series of microstrokes can damage the facial nerve (which was corroborated by his face being asymmetrical and his smile being extremely asymmetrical).

      5. Biden often seemed to stare into space for long periods of time, and in numerous cases struggled to come up with a coherent answer when it was his turn to speak (e.g., you could see on his face his was making an effort to think, or halfway through something he said he would close his eyes and pause for a while).

      6. Biden missed many important points he needed to raise for his base (e.g., when talking about abortion, rather than hit the important points, he talked about the epidemic of sister on sister rape).

      7. He had very limited mobility in his hands (e.g., he slowly raised them to make a point and then rarely moved them while he was doing so).

      8. When the debate ended, he needed to have his wife help him walk off stage.

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      1. Seymour Hersh’s take.

        https://seymourhersh.substack.com/p/who-is-running-the-country

        WHO IS RUNNING THE COUNTRY?

        Whatever happens, we have a president—now fully unveiled—who just may not be responsible for what he does in the coming campaign, not to mention his actions in the Middle East and Ukraine.

        Whatever happened to the 25th Amendment that authorizes the vice president and a majority of the Cabinet to declare the president incompetent? What is going on in the Biden White House?

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    2. Funny video. Shows the idiocracy in full motion. But its misleading because it makes me think everything was ok in 2012.

      Evil Empire was obviously not ok back then. They were better at packaging & selling the illusion with smoke and mirrors. That’s it. Just like they had been for all of history prior. 

      This debate is more about how social media and technology have evolved. The efficiency with hijacking our brains and dumbing us down has been turned up full blast (humans have never had a 12 year stretch where it was this powerful and intense). The political arena & ruling elites are not immune to this. Technology has the same effect on them as it has on us.

      Back then I could read books no problem. I could sit down and watch a three-hour movie without ever pausing it to jump on the computer for a hit of dopamine. I only spent a fraction of time on the computer compared to now. I still had a social life where I enjoyed going out and mingling with other sapiens that were not in my inner circle tribe. And we were not nearly as divided.

      I don’t think we’ll be around, but by some miracle if we are still in BAU mode in 2036, those debates will make the 2024 debate feel like the 2012 debate. AI guarantees it.

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  29. This is one of the best covid vaccine interviews I’ve heard.

    It’s with a vaccine developer that speaks honestly and openly without assuming evil intent or conspiracies. Some key points:

    1. mRNA approvals were careless.
    2. There was no science to justify mRNA mandates.
    3. There was no science to claim mRNA is safe and effective.
    4. mRNA safety monitoring was weak.
    5. There’s evidence that weak diseases should be protected with weak vaccines. mRNA is a the strongest type of vaccine which may explain the problems we are seeing.
    6. Bossche might be right but he’s painting an unlikely worst case scenario.
    7. No discussion of clots, cancer, etc.

    In this eye-opening interview with Prof Nikolai Petrosky, a prominent vaccine developer, he completely dismantles the COVID narrative, shedding light on key aspects that challenge the mainstream understanding of the pandemic.

    Join us as we delve into the details that could change everything we thought we knew about COVID. Don’t miss out on this jaw-dropping conversation that could revolutionize the way we view the current global situation.

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  30. HHH @ POB with another data point supporting fast collapse.

    https://peakoilbarrel.com/open-thread-non-petroleum-june-27-2024/#comment-777833

    Back during the Great Recession 2008-2009 the amount of unrealized losses sitting on the balance sheets of the banks just here in the US was about $75 billion.

    Currently in 2024 the amount of unrealized losses on the balance sheets of the banks just here in the US is $675 billion.

    At the end of the day liquidity is all about risk. Not central bank hand waving. If the commercial banks decide it’s too risky to lend then liquidity dries up.

    All the QE and interest rate cuts in the world won’t matter if banks decide it’s too risky to make loans.

    China is finding out that it doesn’t matter what rescue programs they try to put in place. They don’t matter if the banks and the general public believe their real estate market is too risky.

    Asset prices can continue going up as long as banks and the public believe the risk involved is minimal. But as soon as it’s deemed too risky. Liquidity dries up and assets prices fall.

    As assets are the collateral backing the loans . When asset prices go down these banks are going to eat the losses.

    A lot of loan modifications going right now. They are trying their best to keep from having to mark assets to market.

    When you are a bank and you are hemorrhaging you tend not to make new loans. Which puts further downward pressure on prices.

    The capital needed to expand energy use is going to dry up.

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  31. Great movie recommendation. The Man from Earth (2007). It’s a dialogue driven film that takes place entirely in a living room. If you can handle these types of movies, I bet you’ll enjoy it. 

    It’s a fictional story about how we came to believe what we believe. And it doesn’t matter how spiritual or atheist you are, this movie will make you think. I don’t recommend doing any research, just start watching it for free on yt right here:

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  32. A little good news for all the New Zealander’s that hang out here. Also some chuckles in the comments.

    It sounds much like Canada, a lovely place except for its woke transfecting dictator.

    I visited NZ once in 1989 and I remember:

    • the few remaining old growth forests had amazing trees
    • nice sheep farms (stayed in one B&B)
    • funky fast food take-aways with smashed flat sandwiches
    • fishing in the ocean and catching a beautiful looking fish that when barbecued was the worst awful tasting oily boney fish I’ve eaten in my life
    • tree plantations for pulp fiber planted in perfect rows that grow 5-10x times faster than here in British Columbia thus helping to bankrupt our once large pulp & paper industry

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    1. After civilization collapses, if the New New World ever produces another empire, seems like it will be New Zealand. Lots of survivors will come from there. And many will already have the important essential skills for agriculture. 

      My nightmare consists of climate intensification to the point where there is some insane mega earthquake which opens up 500 years’ worth of easily accessible fossil fuels. Would take some time to play out, but you NZ’ers might end up being responsible for getting humanity back to some form of industrialized BAU. 😊

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  33. Wendy Williamson is another person troubled by what she sees in our citizens and leaders.

    https://www.wendywilliamson.com/the-oedipus-complex-in-society/

    I didn’t watch the presidential debate, as I was prepping for my son’s graduation party. I heard about it, though, and that was enough. The overwhelming feeling I’ve had about our political system is that it’s unnatural. It’s unnatural that a free country allows only two “assigned” candidates to have a platform in the mainstream media. It’s unnatural that these two men competing for our nation’s top leadership position are not very intelligent, creative, exciting, imaginative, inspiring, interesting, or impressive on the world stage. All they know how to do is print money out of nothing to accomplish anything. I can think of a myriad of people in my life who would make better presidents than these two.

    From an entertainment perspective, it’s like watching the same show over and over again. America is mesmerized by being disgusted about this show, even though there are other new shows like Robert F. Kennedy Jr. airing at the same time. RFK answered all the same questions as the two stars, but since he wasn’t given the spotlight of the mainstream media, the vast majority of people chose to ignore him and watch the other two reruns, as usual. I have never liked watching a show more than once…I don’t like knowing what happens next. Certainly there is the question of why the same people and same families continue to run America, which is supposed to be a free country. If our country were really free, shouldn’t anyone who qualifies have equal opportunity to compete for the role?

    In professional sports, or the Olympics, we wouldn’t see a subpar athlete rise to the top for any reason. You have to be tall to play basketball in the big leagues and you must be good at the game! The best! Where is the LeBron James of politics? I know that politics is not basketball, but there should be some sense of rising competition in the field, especially on the way to the nation’s top post. We wouldn’t see someone with dementia on a debate or chess team, and we wouldn’t hire a loud-mouthed bully for a job that requires strong skills in diplomacy, so why are these two men being given platforms on the world stage? Is it not important to the American people, or to the world, to have a leader who knows how to think, debate, and communicate?

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  34. Hideaway on fusion.

    https://peakoilbarrel.com/open-thread-non-petroleum-june-27-2024/#comment-777842

    On your next post about fusion, have a look at the energy inputs already without any success so far. Let’s assume ITER is wildly successful, can easily return the 500MW with the 50MW power input and does it by 2035.

    ‘They’, EU Automic Energy Commission or whoever, then decide to build the demo power plant of 750MW. Is this going to take another 30+ years to build? Will it also suffer cost blowouts? Way too late to be of use, plus the materials needed to build it have a massive energy cost of which most is provided by fossil fuels. Plus most of the processes and materials totally rely upon fossil fuel products, not just the energy.

    Speaking of large long term projects and cost blowouts, ITER was originally scheduled to cost 5B Euro to build, so far they have spent ….

    “By extrapolation, the total ITER cost during that period would be €41 billion if the entire project were to be undertaken in the EU. The US Department of Energy in 2018 estimated ITER’s cost would be $65 billion if all the work were to be done in the US.”

    From..
    https://pubs.aip.org/physicstoday/article/76/8/18/2903082/ITER-appears-unstoppable-despite-recent

    In other words fusion still looks to be 30 years away just like it’s been for many decades and is part of the fairy tales about the continuation of modern civilization once fossil fuels production declines massively.

    People just don’t seem to understand that modern civilization was only ever possible because of long term geologic processes that concentrated many minerals, metals and organic compounds in the Earth’s crust, which humanity has used to create our civilizations.

    We are effectively dispersing all these natural materials right across the surface of the planet over time, in much lower concentrations. We do it by using the organic concentrated materials, refine them, then dissipate the energy collecting the minerals and metals, which are converted into ‘products’, which all end up as waste dispersed back into the environment, no matter how much ‘recycling’ we try to do (also reliant upon fossil fuels and FF products).

    As the energy cost of producing the energy we need keeps rising, because we use lower grade fossil fuels and ores, it effects every aspect of modernity mostly hidden. all sorts of ‘other costs’ can be traced back to energy and fossil fuel products.

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  35. Hideaway on falling EROEI and (implicitly) MORT…

    https://peakoilbarrel.com/open-thread-non-petroleum-june-27-2024/#comment-777847

    Your highway cost index has risen from a reference point of 1 to 1.8 in 20 years…

    T Hill …. “Yes, the cost of infrastructure is certainly linked to energy.”

    It’s the cost of everything that’s linked to energy and falling EROEI makes the relative cost of energy intensive projects much higher than first assumed, which is clearly shown on large multi year projects, especially the ones that take the longest. Background energy cost is always going up as we deplete the easy to access energy.

    T Hill … ” Giving up is not an option for some of us.” Who ever said anything about ‘giving up’?

    Reality hits whether you are ready for it or not. a persons belief in something doesn’t change the reality of the situation. We’ve had a massive build out of renewables always gaining in size for a couple of decades. It’s all on top of all the other industrial production, that still happens, all mined, transported, processed using fossil fuels with declining grades.

    The physics tells you it’s not possible to continue for the long term if you are prepared to do the calculations, which most people are not prepared to do. Instead they like to find comfort in some research papers, that have artificial boundaries, so never consider all relevant details, to put their own minds at ease.

    Knowing the truth of the situation has nothing to do with giving up. The world and our future just is. Any individual can choose to believe in whatever they want, but it wont change the overall situation at all.
    An individual can make decisions to put themselves and loved ones in a slightly better position by researching the future and knowing what’s coming, and preparing the best they can, or just ignore it and let the future happen to themselves.

    Individual companies that are involved in heavy industry are a clear sign of the future, as in the direction they are heading or not heading.

    The mere fact none are choosing to go off grid and produce their own power with solar, wind and batteries, while forgoing all the extra grid connection fees, is a very clear message to anyone listening. It’s obviously not competitive to do so, which destroys the myth that solar, wind and batteries are ‘cheaper’, everywhere…

    The fact that only 15-20% at most of humanity enjoys the level of modernity we do in the west, and we are already running into planetary environmental limits, also clearly shows it’s not possible for all. If it’s only possible for a small percentage of population now, then what happens with falling fossil fuel availability and declining ore grades??

    I’m just a messenger that’s done the research over decades, trying to get people to do their own research and calculations, and not rely upon ‘nice’ stories that are written to calm you, but have no basis in reality.

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  39. For those who think the covid panic by our leaders was genuine, but for a difference reason than claimed. I don’t have an opinion yet on this theory, but I’m watching it unfold.

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  40. Liked by 1 person

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  41. I listened to this interview of Jean-Marc Jancovici by Nate Hagens for the 4th or 5th time today while repairing my shed.

    I’ve posted it here before but because it’s one of the best ever discussions on our overshoot predicament I’m posting it again for any of the new people that may not have seen it.

    I would rate it a must listen.

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    1. Remember the survey Nate asked listeners to do about a month ago, where everyone from here put population as the major aspect to look at… Silence since on that survey, because I think a lot of overshoot aware people also population the same as the same important aspect of overshoot.

      Population is something Nate seems desperate to avoid, despite it being the elephant in the room.

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        1. Gonna watch this video tonight because of the recommendation. I am slowly losing interest in TGS. I probably only watch one out of three videos. I still like Nate a lot, but most interviews are identical. And the lack of overpopulation talk is getting ridiculous at this point.

          Regarding that survey, I have only heard him mention 2 popular subjects from it. Vanessa Andreotti (I liked her interview a lot, but its still the same old formula for TGS). And the second was David Graeber’s writing partner, David Wengrow (who’s personality will put you to sleep, but he has lots of interesting tidbits, so I’m looking forward to it). 

          He should have went full disclosure and broke down the results of that survey so the fans could get a sense of what the other fans are thinking. I bet population was high on the list, but we’ll never know because Nate is not allowed or just doesn’t want to touch it.

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              1. Yes, Jancovici has quite a “large” base of followers in France, expecially amoung engineers. He created The Shift Project (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Shift_Project) and there is a somewhat related nonprofit called The Shifters (https://www.theshifters.org/)

                He seems to be a very positive, honest and rational mind. However, personaly, Jancovici is not my cup of tea. He is a doer and has an engineering mindset. I feel we need to grow beyond technocracy, to move away from the mindset of control. Life is not something which can be framed as a mathematical problem from some “Grande école” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grande_%C3%A9cole).

                Btw, I read this comics 🙂 Jancovici puts nuclear energy forward as a parachute to be used during the degrowth phase. I am not sure this is feasible. And what happens, when the installation will need to be decomissioned? Also, I got the impression he has a very civilisation centric view of existence. (There are some pictures depicting middle age as a dark backward period). But maybe, that’s only me: you’ll tell me.

                In summary, my harsh verdict is: lack of imagination, lack of poetry, lack of rawness 🙂 But probably the limit of what is acceptable to battery farmed humans.

                But, change will turn out to be so radical that it is not imaginable from the couch of this civilisation.

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                1. I have a bias towards the importance of engineers because nothing in our modern world would exist without them, but I understand your perspective and it’s true the future would be better if we had avoided modernity.

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            2. Thanks for recommending this. Jean-Marc is really good at explaining our predicament. Subtitles helped me a lot.

              In other news, Erik Michaels linked our guest essay in his newest article. Out of respect for you, I will not provide link. But I thought it was kind of cool. Except I wish he would have been more flattering. That excellent essay deserves more than just: 

              “On coping with the knowledge we have and what to do about it, this article is quite comprehensive.”

              And just to leave something for the heck of it. This is a beautiful song I found recently. Cant stop listening. 

              Ocie Elliott – Like A River – YouTube

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              1. Thanks. I think Erik Michaels is pretty much the only overshoot blogger that ever mentions this site.

                Never heard of Ocie Elliott but they are a duo from Victoria at the south end of the island I live on.

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                1. Goddamn! All the good people of this world live in Canada or NZ/AU. Share the wealth you guys. 😊

                  I like most of their songs. Here is a live recording that highlights their wonderful chemistry.

                  Ocie Elliott – Tracks (Live) – YouTube

                  And yes, Erik’s is the only place where I have ever seen un-Denial links. Would have thought Sarah Connor would have some by now, since I bug her all the time trying to recruit her. Dont worry Rob, when I get my site up and running, I’ll be plugging the hell out of this site.

                  Actually have thought about trying my own. But I can already see the future. Maybe a couple people here would support me with some comments, but then we’ll all rush back to un-Denial because this is where we freaks belong. No point in trying to create a middleman.

                  Plus, with my focus on dark topics, if I did get an audience, it will be filled with people who you would never want to invite into your home. 😊

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                  1. It would be interesting to know why this site is so unpopular. I expect it’s because of one of the following:

                    1) Most people dislike the idea that genetic denial explains i) our uniquely powerful intelligence and ii) our inability to use our intelligence to act wisely about overshoot, and iii) why we’re the only species that believes in god.

                    2) Most people don’t like to be told the only good path forward is population reduction.

                    3) This site does not do enough original research.

                    4) I have an unpleasant personality.

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                    1. I disagree with your #4, you do not have an unpleasant personality IMHO.

                      You are forthright, clear, logical and rational those are admirable characteristics.

                      AJ

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                    2. I agree with AJ.

                      Also, I’m curious about “original research”, what could that be, given our very limited numbers and resources?

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                    3. People like Gail Tverberg and Tom Murphy spend a lot of time analyzing data to find new ways of describing our overshoot predicament.

                      I instead monitor all the best overshoot minds I am aware of and curate their best work with praise and criticism when warranted, and I try to connect dots back to MORT, but I do not often do original analysis.

                      Hideaway has kindly recently deepened the analysis component of this site but that’s his work, not mine.

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                    5. #4 made me laugh. You crochety old man you. 😊. But that is not a valid reason. 

                      #3 maybe some blame here, but only a tiny bit.

                      #2 is the winner. 

                      #1 should actually be the main reason this site is popular. I was so relieved when I found un-Denial. Instantly, a big piece of the puzzle finally made sense (by understanding how important denial is). There is a prize waiting for most overshoot aware people that wander onto this site.

                      Understanding why Carl Sagan, Noam Chomsky, and pretty much the rest of the world have no clue about this stuff allowed me to first, let go of it. No more doubting myself about why a polymath does not understand what my low IQ brain understands easily. And it also helps me to connect dots in other areas. 

                      So you get the huge relief and confidence of knowing that you are not the crazy one. After some time on this site with new or more in-depth concepts you will understand why rapid population reduction is the only good option at this point. And you’ll probably get into even darker subjects. 

                      So in a nutshell, MORT is dark and people aint signing up for dark. But it’s the only road to the top of Collapse Mountain. (and the big bonus is: the relief of understanding how important denial is far outweighs the scary, dark stuff) 

                      p.s. Just saw your good comment on Tom Murphys blog.  Love Tom but hate how he started his answer: “I don’t deny that denial is an important factor…. but…”

                      With that kind of reply, I dont have to read anymore, I already know he is underestimating denial severely.

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                    6. Thanks. Music to my ears that MORT was helpful to someone else trying make sense of the insanity, especially in our science grounded intellectual leaders.

                      I’m not going to read Murphy’s response. It’s too depressing that a brilliant overshoot aware person with a really good heart is going to try the same thing that has 100% failed every time it’s been tried in the past.

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                    7. The aspect about denial is that most people think every problem has a solution, they have probably watched too many TV shows and movies where the hero/heroine always solves the problem in the end.

                      Put the ‘problem’ of a rogue black hole suddenly appearing and will wipe out our solar system in 6 months to anyone that has denial and ask them what’s the solution. They will most likely deny it’s possible or come up with weird useless ways to combat the problem. Or the ‘other’ standard, “God will save us”…

                      Such people are never going to understand they have denial of bad outcomes, and it’s pointless discussing the future with them, unless you are just countering their hopium for ‘others’ benefit.

                      BTW this from an Astronomy web page… “Their results, which appeared in The Astrophysical Journal, raise the possibility of finding more of the estimated 100 million such rogue stellar-mass black holes drifting through our galaxy unseen.”

                      What are the odds of a rogue black hole passing within 1-2 light years of our solar system and greatly disrupting gravity throughout our solar system, and hence causing massive short term changes that are unpredictable?

                      Given that our Galaxy is around 105,000 light years in diameter, the odds of a black hole passing within 1-2 light years (as in less than half the distance to the nearest star) are extremely high, and likely happens fairly regularly on geologic time scales. It probably also helps to account to so many mass extinctions and rapid changes in the geological records of sudden massive tectonic activity. Our period of stability, being the Holocene is most likely the anomaly… Sorry off on a tangent..

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                    8. Another threat I was not aware of. Rogue black holes sound plausible. 😦

                      I’ve only got another 20 years left. Think I’ll stay focused on peak oil and nuclear war.

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  42. I relistened to this today with the up-to-date context of NATO being on the edge of a humiliating defeat in Ukraine, a mutual defense agreement between Russia and North Korea, and certainty that the US president is non compos mentis.

    There’s a ton of detail here on the absolute and sole power the president has to wage nuclear war, how little time he has to make a decision, and the kinds of things that will be expected of him in war, such as jumping out of Air Force One with a parachute if it is certain of being destroyed by an EMP.

    Also detail on the risks associated with fighting North Korea. For example, to nuke North Korea the US has to overfly Russia.

    The risks our zombie citizens are sleep walking through right now are unbelievable.

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  43. If you are looking for some left-leaning hopium, here it is.

    The biggest problem with the Solarpunk city is that it is energy and materials blind. A city powered by solar energy would necessarily be a lot smaller than the today’s megacities. Even though the channel owner is highly aware of the symptoms of overshoot, he still denies overpopulation. But there are a few things he does get right, like the need to drastically reduce the use of private automobiles, and the need for de-growth in general.

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  44. That’s interesting. Apparently traditional inactivated covid vaccines screw up the immune system, just like mRNA.

    Which means mRNA is not so bad because it only causes clots, dementia, myocarditis, and cancer.

    https://www.rintrah.nl/not-just-mrna-chinese-vaccines-also-result-in-a-dysfunctional-antibody-response/

    This is the sort of problem where it can take many many years, before we know how big the problem really is. And it’s not fair, for the people who had no idea and no way of comprehending what they were signing up for. The people who pushed these vaccines, have a responsibility to apologize to the victims, which includes millions of underage people worldwide. And they have a responsibility, to come up with a solution.

    Stéphane Bancel became a billionaire, thanks to a vaccine that makes people’s adaptive immune systems treat the spike protein of a dangerous SARS virus that has killed tens of millions of people so far, as if it were a peanut protein or some pollen from trees. With all those billions, with that vast fortune, he could fund a solution to the damage that was done to people’s immune systems, or he could at least offer some financial compensation to the people affected by this error.

    And this is not something you’re supposed to read about on this blog. This is something you’re supposed to read about in every newspaper. Your newspaper is supposed to be asking why the life expectancy projections have suddenly stopped going up, why the methods of calculating excess mortality have changed, why people are coughing their lungs out in the middle of summer, why the retirement age suddenly doesn’t have to be raised in my country after all. But it seems that once again, only the jester is allowed to tell the king the truth.

    A reader in the comments said: “It was a total disaster rolling this out without 20 years of study.”, to which Radagast replied:

    Yup. We always knew it was very hard to make a proper vaccine against it. They tried out a vaccine against a corona virus in a bunch of animals, it generally resulted in antibody dependent enhancement of disease. They tried a vaccine against RSV before, it killed and hospitalized a bunch of kids.

    But now they went ahead and tried it anyway, on a global scale, against a virus that was inevitably going to mutate in response to it. And they didn’t just try it. No, they promised us lifelong social ostracism if we didn’t go along with the experiment.

    It took until June 2021, until the Scottish hospitals were full of sick elderly again, after they vaccinated 90% of them. Half a year, it didn’t even take half a year, for the whole experiment to utterly fail, visible to anyone who bothers to follow the numbers.

    But nobody pulled the emergency break, nobody thought “you know what, let’s not risk this with the kids”. No, they came up with QR codes that prohibit you from sitting in a restaurant. Just the pettiest bullying possible, treating a small share of the population like this is 19th century India and we’re the dalits.

    Mind-boggling.

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  45. B’s not worried about nuclear war but does expect a fast collapse.

    https://thehonestsorcerer.substack.com/p/2019-peak-western-civilization

    So what does the actual data tell us about our state of affairs? Upon first sight nothing terribly interesting is going on — no collapse for now — unless one is willing to understand the context, or the background of the data. Based on the diesel and fuel oil consumption numbers alone, we are on an extremely flat plateau: around 35 million barrels of fuel consumed on a daily average around the world for the past ten years (except for 2020 for known reasons).

    What is not shown on the chart above is a 10% population increase during the same period, creating more demand of food, and all sorts of goods (at least in theory). Oh, and what about GDP growth? How could the world economy process more raw materials, build more roads, houses and stuff without using more fuel? Is it because of efficiency gains, perhaps? Surely you jest. Diesel engines are in use for more than a century now. There are not a lot of practical efficiency gains left to be made here: the last great advancements in fuel economy were achieved in the 70’s and 80’s, and that was half a century ago already. No wonder that not an iota of improvement was made in actual (on the road) fuel consumption of heavy duty trucks since the turn of the last century.

    If my understanding of the role of energy in energy production — and ultimately in economic output — is correct, then it’s no mystery why the West is facing so many hardships all at the same time. Inflation and rising food prices. A cost of living “crisis” not willing to recede. Homelessness, rising inequality, falling living standards, failing institutions. Geopolitical tensions, and an increasingly ineffective (profit, not purpose driven) weapons industry unable to manufacture enough ammo, missiles, tanks, you name it. Well, no energy, no economy, no hegemony… 

    The collective West’s heydays are definitely over, but its rivals face a difficult to navigate future as well. The long decline has begun, and although it looks like a slow and steady process, it can accelerate rather abruptly. As all the buffers, safety stocks and barriers are removed to preserve a semblance of normalcy, the system will eventually lose all its resiliency and become fragile. Western economies are skating on ever thinner ice, without taking notice of the cracks and pops all around them.

    Will this end in a massive world war for the last remaining resources then? Well, I’d rather put my bets on a massive flop, and the collapse of the current world order happening much sooner than later. This could quite possibly result in a chaotic dissolution of both the US and the EU in the not so distant future, and eventually forcing all of humanity to go through an involuntary simplification, as the once prodigious energy returns from fossil fuels slowly fade into memory, and “problems” suddenly turn out to be too numerous to handle.

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    1. Those not worried about Nuclear War are uninformed in denial idiots. It is probably the biospheres greatest threat. Sure, climate change will screw with the biosphere but some mammals will probably survive. A nuclear war has the potential to take the planet back to insects and plants (sorry New Zealand, Australia I think you are ultimately screwed by fall out and nuke plant meltdowns long term). With Biden being brain dead and his ignorant corrupt self serving family in charge of the U.S. I don’t see how we avoid WW3 and nuclear Armageddon. Bad Monday blues.

      AJ

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      1. From my small view of the world I saw some supply chains break during covid but they seem to have healed and in some cases are even better now, for example shipping times from China for inexpensive items.

        Maybe Hideaway is correct and everything will more or less continue to work until energy supply begins to fall for real, year after year.

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        1. These days I even consider the Limits to Growth models wrong. They missed an important factor about energy and non renewable resources.

          All non renewable resources are totally dependent on ‘energy’ for their extraction and use. In fact the only important non renewable resources are fossil fuels. There are no shortages of anything else. We as in humanity can extract any metal or mineral from basalts, granites, seawater, desert sands in literally unlimited quantities for thousands of years, if we had enough energy to do it.

          Energy is the limiting factor, not the other minerals and metals. Unlimited too cheap to meter ‘energy’, means unlimited everything else.

          Limited energy, which is what we have, means the LTG steady state was never possible, because they didn’t account for increasing energy to harvest lower grades of every non renewable resource that civilization needs to survive.

          Therefore any civilization that uses metals and minerals as products will eventually get to the stage of having to use too much energy to replace these products when they inevitably suffer from entropy and dissipation back into the environment.

          Civilization always needs to replace all the ‘tools’ of civilization over time. Even with 99.99% recycling, which is pretty much impossible, given enough cycles, the metals and minerals need to be replaced by new metals and minerals, which requires more energy on average as we use all the highest grade, easiest to get and closest metals and minerals first.

          Our civilization is like a wooden sailing ship in the middle of the ocean that we have set fire to, too keep warm and comfortable, while we breed up our numbers onboard. We now have the most number of people and biggest fire, but without this large fire people will freeze, because they are spread all over the boat. We are running out of fuel and starting to use the deck chairs, sails and fishing gear as fuel, while the sea is getting rougher around us.

          The only possible long term civilizations are those based upon completely renewable resources, rock, soil, wood, plants, animals solar and wind.

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          1. This is an important new idea you have cemented in my brain. None of us peak oilers paid enough attention to minerals.

            I suppose this is a different way of explaining why civilization needs economic growth. Even if the population and consumption of civilization remains steady, its energy consumption must increase due to mineral depletion, and therefore economic activity must grow.

            I added your excellent sailing ship quote to the sidebar.

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            1. What is the energy required to get minerals from other planets? Is getting minerals from other planets really the wisest use of of our remaining fossil fuel budget?

              And why is Elon Musk constantly screeching about “population collapse” when the population is growing by roughly 80 million per year?

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              1. My guess is that Musk knows a lot of what Hideaway knows, namely that if growth stops we have a hard collapse, and he’s not willing to give up despite the near zero probability of success that we can colonize another planet.

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                1. I don’t think that modernity will immediately implode when growth stops. We will likely get something like the great depression on steroids due to the overhang of debt and other financial claims, but not a collapse back to the stone age.

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                    1. Rob the problem is how do we get to medieval without collapsing back to near stone age first?

                      Unfortunately it has to be hard collapse when feedback loops kick in and we have 8B plus people to start with, all trying to survive. It will be an event that no human has ever experienced throughout history.

                      Even in past civilization collapses, some of the people were able to disappear into the jungle/forest or wilderness area and start from scratch as hunter gatherers with a bit of prior knowledge of some agriculture. Most people will have nowhere to go, except to the ‘relatives’ places in the country, if they can get there.

                      Once a collapse happens, fuel supplies will dry up very quickly. Modern farms will not be able to supply much food at all, and certainly not transport it anywhere. There will be virtually no horses to use, to carry food stuffs to nearest towns let alone cities.

                      Every prepper I’ve ever met or seen on a you tube documentary, is totally unprepared for what’s coming. We all rely so totally on fossil fuels we just don’t realise it…

                      I was in the mode of, we have to colonise space and keep growing just a few years ago, after working out civilization has to have growth to survive because of the metals issue, but it is too easy to poke holes in as viable.

                      The other aspect about it being possible to grow into space and interstellar regions, is that if it were possible, then Aliens would have done it and been everywhere, including using resources on Earth…

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                    2. I agree it’s going to be a gong show.

                      I did say medieval in the “lucky regions”. It might be easier to survive with a medieval lifestyle than stone age because we’ve wiped out all the wild game. I’m thinking a couple hogs, potatoes, beans, veg, and fruit.

                      I don’t buy your alien theory. I don’t think there ever will be a technology that makes inter-galaxy travel possible due the distances and energy requirements. So if Mars doesn’t work out then that’s that, and we’ll never meet an alien, but we can be confident they exist and probably deny unpleasant realities.

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                    3. Hello Rob and friends,

                      Thank you all for the stimulating daily reads, I only wish I had more time at the moment to follow through. I trust everyone is well and successfully trying to constantly recalibrate themselves in these off-centring times. Just a comment here because I couldn’t resist and it’s something I’ve been thinking about for a long time.

                      I don’t know how we are even going to be able to get back to medieval days as we’ve lost the foundational infrastructure and knowledge to do so, at least scaled up in a way that will lead to continuity of structured society. I recall reading that in Australia there are 200 some people who identify blacksmithing to be their career, but I am not sure many of these use pre-industrial methods to fabricate their wares, which are probably mainly wrought iron gates and chandeliers, not plows and horseshoes. In medieval times, every lane would have boasted a blacksmithery, and most could do simple forging.

                      Another example, we have 4 scythe kits (but no way of making more) but I don’t know of any neighbour that has one, but they all have ride-on lawn mowers. Nevertheless, due to physical energy and time constraints, we still use brushcutters and the scythes are back-up relics for the “one day”. Today we felled trees using chainsaws, once again we do have some axes, but our skill in using them is farcical compared to what every pioneer knew only 150 years ago. As for making and repairing axes and saws from scratch, I haven’t the faintest clue and I reckon this skill can’t exactly be learned competently from YouTube or even a book.

                      In medieval days, we had stables on every estate and legions of servants to care for the livestock. How many horses and oxen do we have at the ready now for working at plowing fields and cartage, not to mention the gear they need in order to do so? Who knows how to make saddles, harnesses, wheels and wagons? And in the quantity necessary to sustain even a village population? Just because we may live in a community with a few horses and cattle and some rusted out farm implements in the local county museum does not make us equipped for pre-industrial living. We have completely lost the collective knowledge, resources, and thus supply chain for those times and there’s no path to get that back in a concerted, coordinated way from where we are now. All it takes are simple thought experiments to prove that idea of when the lights go out, we will just go back to a more simple and wholesome era, is an impossibility. It seems that we can’t go forward into more technology but neither can we go back to what was once the latest technology, perhaps there’s some lesson in here about only being able to live in the present.

                      We can only hope to use the tools and knowledge we have, to the best of our ability and experience, for as long as we can. We hope to share what we can of material and knowledge with others who may reach our circle of influence but there is much uncertainty in how this may unfold. There is a world of difference between sharing and taking; one may take goods but skills and experience have to be earned and that takes time and energy we have already long squandered on other pursuits. And once skills and knowledge die out, then we really will be in the dark, and very likely adopting whatever survival strategy that still maximises power and potential.

                      I have written before that it may be poetic justice that our species will probably end as scavengers after our brief domination as apex predators. I am definitely in the camp that the final throes of collapse for the majority, will be nasty, brutish and swift, and that last might be our and the biosphere’s saving grace.

                      The wonder and awe of being alive now is in no way diminished, neither is our ability to choose how to make of our remaining days. I hope you and your families are going well and steadily. Namaste, friends.

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                    4. Hi Hideaway,

                      Haha, it looks like we have the same train of thought on this and I didn’t see your post until I uploaded mine so I am definitely seconding yours! I imagine you are keeping warm with your supply of wood and your Russian stove through the cold snap you’re having. Have you gotten some rain yet? Here in Far North QLD it’s been relatively warm for the season. Another perk of this highland tropical climate is we hairless apes don’t need to expend quite so much energy to stay warm during the winter and the summers aren’t as brutal in this elevation. either. But, every year is different now and it’s always good to be prepared for even drastic changes. The wood cutting today was for firewood as well as getting logs ready for inoculating with mushroom spawn, any one have much experience with this? If done properly, one log is supposed to provide a steady (seasonal) crop of mushrooms (oyster and shiitake varieties) for 5-7 years!

                      All the best and thank you for all your contributions on Rob’s page and those he reprints here. This is a beacon of sanity in the turbulent seas we are floundering in, and even though what we may be doing here is no more than re-arranging the deck chairs on the Titanic, I cannot wish for better companions to the bitter end.

                      Namaste.

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                    5. I don’t think, there will be a “medieval” life after collapse.
                      This was also metioned in the second half of my guest article Post Peak Everything

                      Let me quote the relevant part:

                      Q: Why should our highly complex society not “only” be thrown back to the development level of the 16th century?

                      A: This is just not possible. Where are the tools of the 16th century?Where are the robust but low-yielding seeds of the 16th century? Where are the cows of the 16th century? Small-framed, robust, calving unassisted because the offspring are not uterus-bursting high-yielding cattle?

                      All that is no longer there. Instead, we have corn rootworm, fire blight, Colorado potato beetle and other pests that were unknown in the 16th century.

                      Where are the 30 people per square kilometer of the 16th century?
                      How many do we have today? Around 250.

                      No one is going to push aside some humus and use a pickaxe to mine coal or ores anymore. These resources are gone, no longer extractable without large-scale industrial material and energy input.

                      Economic reconstruction, by the way, goes the same way as energy consumption: No energy, no recovery.

                      Nobody will found a city at the sea anymore and reach a population density of 100 persons per square kilometer, thanks to fishing like in the antiquity.

                      The shoals of fish for this are also gone and will be for our lifetime.

                      Even if we still hurriedly forge everything possible to plows: Where are the oxen?

                      Even if we plow the fields with human power: Where is the non-F1 hybrid seed for next year’s harvest?

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                    6. Thanks Gaia, you put it so much more eloquently than I ever could.. This should be framed on everyone’s mantlepiece…..

                      ” We have completely lost the collective knowledge, resources, and thus supply chain for those times and there’s no path to get that back in a concerted, coordinated way from where we are now.

                      All it takes are simple thought experiments to prove that idea of when the lights go out, we will just go back to a more simple and wholesome era, is an impossibility.

                      It seems that we can’t go forward into more technology but neither can we go back to what was once the latest technology, perhaps there’s some lesson in here about only being able to live in the present.”

                      …with extra paragraphs added LOL…

                      It hasn’t rained more than a few mm here and we are in a time of year where it’s either drizzle or rain every day normally. Today not a cloud in the sky, but temperatures below freezing in the morning and barely getting above 10c in the sunniest time of day.

                      We don’t have a Russian heater, but do have a big wood heater, that can close down, and last all night. This is the driest I’ve ever seen it for this time of year ever, and by a long, long way. We have truly trashed the climate..

                      Rob, another aspect of not being able to go back to medieval type conditions is that we’ve possibly stuffed climate so much that any permanent agriculture is impossible.

                      Also my argument about Aliens, was that it’s impossible everywhere, hence no Aliens nor signals as there civilizations all collapsed just like ours will, and so will others throughout the universe, all by exactly the same means of overshooting their environment, and their civilizations only lasting a short limited time when they start to use fossil fuels…

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                    7. Occasionally a species overshoots the carrying capacity so badly that when they crash, they simply go extinct. The reindeer on St. Matthew’s Island are a good example.

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                  2. Thanks for the re-read Marromai, I read that last year and can remember nodding in agreement when I first read it..

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          3. Maybe time to mention this source for post industrial technology.

            Not sure if anyone here keeps tabs this guy. I’ve been following him for years. Maybe time to start emulating? Talk about prepping for the future! Yet another Aussie with a clue.

            https://primitivetechnology.wordpress.com

            He also has a youtube channel with all the more recent projects.

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          1. Hello Rob,not really. Since most models there are quite limited on some specific systems or aspects, I had the idea of building my own model of my understandings so far.

            But I didn’t know where to start, so I’ve discarded the idea due to lack of motivation…

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          2. Thats my kind of collapse. 😊
            Something satisfying about the video too. Waiting for what you know is coming and yet just looking at it from the front you’d never know there was a problem.

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  48. Dr. Tom Murphy has launched a new video series called Metastatic Modernity.

    Murphy is deeply and correctly concerned about the future of humanity, wants to influence citizens to change to a better path, and believes like almost everyone else that is overshoot aware and has not given up, that more effective education is the key to success.

    I think Murphy is wasting his time by not focusing on our genetic tendency to deny unpleasant realities as explained by Dr. Ajit Varki’s Mind Over Reality Transition (MORT) theory.

    Many great minds, like for example, Dr. Dennis Meadows, Dr. William Catton, Jr,. Dr. Bill Rees, and Dr. Nate Hagens and have devoted their lives to educating about overshoot with zero success. Others like Dr. James Hansen have devoted their lives to warning about symptoms of overshoot, also with zero success.

    Success is not possible because the brains of normal humans aggressively deny the obvious reality of overshoot.

    The focus must shift to understanding and finding a way to override our denial mechanism before any progress can be made.

    https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/2024/07/metastatic-modernity-launch/

    I am excited to announce a new effort that will attempt to provide a crucial set of perspectives on modernity. It is to be a series of video shorts (5–10 minutes is my target) called Metastatic Modernity. The name conjures a grave cancer diagnosis—terminal, in fact. This intentional association captures my sense that modernity is fated to self-terminate, like any cancer, on account of its complete reliability on non-renewable materials, accumulating ecological damage, and failure to exist as a part of an ecological whole in reciprocity with nature.  It has no long-term place on this planet.

    But, because modernity is just one of many possible ways for humans to arrange their lives, a failure of modernity does not translate to a failure of humanity.

    I have recognized for some time that a blog format—and one with “math” in its name, no less—has limited appeal. Over the last year, only four posts broke 10,000 views (about fusion, my confessions, modernity’s fate, and population projections). Yet the video I created about population projections reached 10,000 views within two weeks. So, it’s a channel that might reach more people. By chopping up the big message into small chunks that provide exposure in a more natural communication style, perhaps a greater fraction of humans can begin to see the world we inhabit differently, in a beneficial way.  I have not studied how the YouTube (algorithmic) gods work, but I presume you can help promote the video series’ YouTube recommendations by thumbs-upping the videos and subscribing to my channel.  Apologies for coming off as a self-promoting influencer wannabe!

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  49. Bill Gates just started construction of a 345MW liquid sodium nuclear power plant scheduled to be complete in 2030. One of its big ideas is that thermal energy is stored in the liquid sodium which makes it possible for this reactor to compensate more quickly to varying wind and solar supply than conventional nuclear reactors.

    Hideaway, have you looked at this?

    https://www.forbes.com/sites/antoniopequenoiv/2024/03/19/terrapower-what-we-know-about-bill-gatess-nuclear-power-plant-in-wyoming/

    https://www.terrapower.com/

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    1. I had a quick look, but consider the ‘planned’ $3B spend on 345MW way too high. Just dividing the capital cost by the lifetime output over 60 years gives a cost of $16.50/MWh, before any operating and maintenance costs, which for nuclear in the USA are around $30-32/MWh. It’s likely to be higher for a smaller unit.

      We are building energy devices with current energy costs of around $40/MWh (the approximate average of wholesale energy price over the last decade). We are building these energy devices to replace $2.50-$5/MWh energy which we built and operate the current system with.

      What it means is we need energy prices to be 10 to 12 times higher, relative to everything else, which is impossible to run a modern civilization upon.

      Simple math provides the obvious conclusion current wholesale price of energy $40/MWh, so anything costing over $40/MWh to build and operate over the lifetime of operation adds nothing to civilization, except using more energy in the present to build it.

      Plus of course, there are no products from nuclear that civilization constantly needs, that are produced by fossil fuels.

      Everyone knows that the final cost will be a lot higher than planned and likewise the date of completion. They already know it’s not cost competitive, hence the $2B from govt to build it, added to debt pile no doubt. All debt has been energy related, dragging future use of energy into the present, hence debt has grown to unsustainable levels and just adds to the collapse when it comes.

      A small gas plant that’s been built and added to the West Australian gas system had a capital cost of $40M, but is adding 3,041,581MWh of energy to the system per year. The lifetime operating cost of this new energy is $2.50/MWh.

      The 345MW new reactor costing an expected $3B to build produces 3,022,000MWh of energy each year over it’s life at a cost of no less than $46/MWh and likely much higher.

      The elite/very rich think they can survive just fine on much more expensive energy while the equality gets worse for everyone else. They don’t understand that every system grows slowly until it can’t, then some degrowth happens slowly at first then all at once, as in systems always unravel in collapse.

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      1. Thanks Hideaway. I know for sure that Gates is energy aware. Odd he would make a really bad investment. I’m guessing the $2B from the government makes it good for him.

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  50. Chris Martenson these days mostly bugs me because he’s trying too hard to find a message that generates income, but every once in while he still does good work.

    I know most of you are sick of covid and have moved on but I’m still white hot mad and am looking for a pound of flesh so I enjoyed this covid rant by Martenson.

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