By BenjaminTheDonkey: Limericks of Doom

A small sample of an impressive portfolio…

http://benjaminthedonkey-limericksofdoom.blogspot.ca/2015/02/limericks-update.html

BAU

I’m O.K. with more BAU—

It’s better than being all through;

The truth is, my friend,

I don’t want it to end,

And neither, I’m betting, do you.

 

We’d be smart to shut our damn yaps

And keep this doom stuff under wraps:

If we kept it hush-hush,

We might put off the rush

To inevitable collapse.

 

But it doesn’t take a savant

To excuse being nonchalant:

Once we admit

That we can’t change jack shit,

It doesn’t matter what we want.

 

Rational Animals: An Oxymoron

What logical reasoning gave

To us since we came from the cave

Sure got lots of ink

And changed how we think

But not the way we behave.

Socialism 2.0

History proves that to maintain a civil society it is wise to keep the wealth gap between rich and poor to a reasonable level. Every culture has a different optimum wealth gap. For example, Japan’s optimum wealth gap is lower than Europe’s.

The wealth gap has been increasing around the world and is at dangerous levels due to the financialization of our economies and the low interest rate policies we are using to try to maintain business as usual. The wealth gap has been increasing not due to the skill of the rich or fault of the poor, but rather is a predictable outcome of our monetary policies.

Traditional socialist policies maintain the wealth gap by redistributing wealth from the rich to the poor, but in today’s world this policy will make things worse.

Much of the wealth of the rich sits idle. If this wealth is redistributed it will be immediately spent which will increase inflation, resource depletion rates, and CO2 emissions.

We need a Socialism 2.0 that understands limits to growth and the relationship between energy and wealth.

To maintain the wealth gap in our growth constrained world the correct policy is to tax excess wealth from the rich and pay down public debt while not permitting governments to re-borrow the funds, or to convert the excess wealth into cash and bury it.

Are We Experiencing the Peak of What is Possible In the Universe?

Like the collapse of Rome, but with Wi-Fi

 

I think yes. Here’s why.

The laws of physics are the same everywhere in the universe. There are no forms of energy useful on a human scale that we do not already know about.

The laws of biological evolution are likely the same everywhere in the universe. Life’s form and chemistry may differ, but its foundation of evolution by natural selection of replicators is probably universal.

Any life with advanced technology requires two things. First, a powerful brain with an extended theory of mind capable of collaborating on the invention of advanced technology, and second, sufficient energy to allow the specialization of skills, extraction and production of materials, and construction of infrastructure necessary to develop the technology.

Varki explains that a brain with an extended theory of mind initially requires denial of reality behavior.

The only form of energy with the utility, density, portability, and extractability necessary to boot strap the creation of advanced technology is liquid hydrocarbons (oil). The biological and geological processes that create oil remove carbon from the atmosphere, bury it under ground, and release oxygen into the atmosphere. The creation of oil therefore changes the environment, and the burning of oil, which reverses the process, also changes the environment.

If a planet has life with advanced technology then it likely began by denying reality and burning oil. The energy from oil will increase food production which in turn will cause the population and pollution it produces to increase unchecked due to universal reproduction behaviors coupled with denial of reality.

Depletion of the non-renewable oil, disruption to the climate from burning the oil, and other associated negative impacts on habitat make it probable that the life will overshoot its environment and collapse before it has time to evolve the awareness of reality necessary to reduce its population and develop a high density non-carbon form of energy such a fusion, if indeed fusion on a human scale is even possible given the temperatures and pressures involved.

This may explain why we have not detected life in the universe despite trillions of planets.

We should be grateful for being alive to witness the peak of what may be possible in the universe.

Our Place in the Universe

The goal of the universe is to degrade energy. Life is one of the universe’s best inventions for degrading energy because it replicates until it has used all available resources. Humans use their unique brain power, which emerged after a rare mutation for denial of reality, to out compete other life. But the losers would do the same thing if they could. A dead planet seems to be consistent with what the universe wants.