X-Message-Number: 30740
Date: Sun, 18 May 2008 19:36:02 -0700
From: hkhenson <>
Subject: Re: More Web Site Recommendations
References: <>

At 02:00 AM 5/18/2008, Will Knot wrote:

>In #30735 yesterday, Keith Henson seems to fall prey to the peak oil
>doomsday promoters, by providing us a link to what appears on the surface
>to be a very scholarly document from one of them.
>
>The author is a doctor of psychology.  Perhaps he was doing clinical
>treatment to his essay, as shrinks are wont to do to their patients,
>bending reality to shape the desired end result.

I am amused that you think so little of your arguments that you 
resort to an invalid ad hominem attack in the first two paragraphs of 
your reply.

For the interested, go to http://www.drmillslmu.com/  Dr. Mills is 
not a "shrink" in clinical psychoanalytic practice.  He is a research 
professor at LMU whose main interest is in evolutionary psychology.

I find nothing out of line with his work and am qualified to judge. 
My papers on evolutionary psychology are considered good enough to be 
published even though my academic background is electrical engineering.

In any case, what academic discipline is proper to consider the 
future?  Given the importance of human motivations, EP would seem as 
good as any of them.

>Regardless, the article is highly biased in favor of peak oil
>apocalypticism.  The good doc relegates material which should have been
>given equal weight in his tome, to side references and footnotes.  Here
>are some of the important ones he did that to, and which any reader of
>his piece of alarmist rhetoric, should pay careful attention to:
>
>Sweden plans to be world's first oil-free economy
>http://www.guardian.co.uk/frontpage/story/0,,1704937,00.html

Worth reading the story and trying to apply other places.  (It's 
going to be nearly impossible there.)

>Apocalypse, Not. A Critical Look at Peak Oil Catastrophism, by Toby
>Hemenway
>http://www.energybulletin.net/14695.html

The two year old comments 
here:  http://www.theoildrum.com/story/2006/4/7/125541/6883 are very 
much worth reading.

>WSJ:  The World Has Plenty of Oil, By Nansen G. Saleri
>http://tinyurl.com/5gdty8

The article comments were thoughtful and uniformly negative.

>Peak Oil Debunked
>http://peakoildebunked.blogspot.com/

Not a comforting web site but worth reading.

snip

>Just look at recent charts of the
>share prices of oil companies - if there is a "peak oil" crisis, why are
>oil investors getting filthy rich?  Example:
>
>http://news.ino.com/headlines/?newsid=20080516010651

You might note that ExxonMobil can't figure out anything useful to do 
with the profits beyond buying back their own stock.

>The answer lies in the political control of production, to drive prices
>higher - not due to any lack of oil in the ground.

I don't see any evidence that oil production is being withheld.

snip

>From: Francois <>

snip

>Reality, of course, is always somewhere in between. With peak oil, for
>instance, there will obviously not be a 6.5 billion die off, nor will or
>civilization be able to continue with business as usual for very long. A
>reasonable expectation would be conditions like what existed in Great
>Britain during WW2, with severe rationing of food, water, energy and travel
>for some time,

That's essentially my expectation.  And how will cryonics fare with 
"severe rationing of . . . energy and travel"?

>until practical alternative energy sources are finally
>deployed.

That is what I have been talking about.  Given the long engineering 
time lines even with crash programs it would be a darn good idea to start now.

Keith

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