End of the World Part I

[Grunt]

We haven't had a good end of the world thread for awhile, so here goes.

<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tbody><tr><td valign="top"> </td> <td class="b" valign="top" width="100%">In my opinion, we are approaching the end of the world as we know it (and I feel fine).
Global Warming
It appears that global warming is happening significantly faster than previously thought.
The Age (http://www.theage.com.au/news/world/climate-report-heat-on-australia/2006/10/31/1162056953893.html)
Coping With Climate Dread (http://thetyee.ca/News/2006/10/20/ClimateDread/)
Population Overshoot
We are currently at 6.5billion people. More than doubled in my life time. If the population continues to grow at current rates, we'll be at 9 billion in 30-40 years.
For 6 of the last 7 years the world has consummed more grain that it has produced.
Grain Production (http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0c021878-5a16-11db-8f16-0000779e2340.html)
Peak Oil
The world has hit peak oil production. From now on we will be able to extract less and less oil for the earth at an ever increasing cost. There are no viable alternatives.
Peak Oil (http://www.lifeaftertheoilcrash.net/Index.html)
Resource Depetion
Every year we consume what it takes mother nature 400 years to produce. Plainly, in a finite world this can't continue.In an attempt to maintain the lifestyle we live now the world will attemp to mitigate the effects of peak oil by:
Converting Coal To Oil, try and extract more oil from the Tar sands of Canada and grow vast quantities of biofuels.

The first 2 are going to increase carbon emission in a serious way. This will further contribute to Global Warming. Global Warming will effect food production. For instance the drought in Australia means we will probably have to import wheat to meet domestic demand.

Also, vast tracts of land that are currently used for food production will start being used for biofuels production.
Everything we do, all the food we eat, all the things we buy are oil derivataves. It takes oil to grow, make, dig up, transport, package etc. everything in our lives.

Humans being humans, we will fight over the last of the food, oil and other resourses.

Basically, the behavour of mankind over the last 150 years has left us in a position that unless we radically change our ways now we will be in for some very nasty times in the very near future.


We've got a very small window available to us to make changes to the way we behave. Let your pollie know that it's worth votes.

</td></tr></tbody></table>

[DavidG]

I won't live long enough to be greatly effected.
I feel sorry for my kids and grandkids for the mess my generation has left.:(

[silentC]

Grunt, what makes you think the pollies know what to do about it? They're probably in as bad a position as the rest of us, at least the ones who give a damn about it anyway. Imagine trying to get the whole world to agree on a way forward, with all the self interest and mistrust that exists. You might as well kiss your butt goodbye now mate.

[echnidna]

And keep yer bat tub full so yer got water when the river dries up...

[Grunt]

You might as well kiss your butt goodbye now mate.

Can I kiss your's goodbye too. :D

Sadly, I think you're right. Self interest and greed will win the day.

I keep thinking that leaders like Johnny will do anything for a vote. The sudden interest in building wind/solar farms by the Federal Government is because their polling suggests that there is a vote in it.

[silentC]

It will only ever be a token gesture though. They'll make appearances of doing something while everyone is looking. Then as soon as our attention is turned elsewhere, they'll sweep it under the carpet and hope no-one asks about it. People who do will be put down as loonie lefties.

How many election promises that were never kept can you remember? Even from the last election. We are fickle-brained mush heads for the most part. As long as we are spoon fed our daily serve of contentment, nobody bats an eyelid. Most people I talk to about this stuff either don't believe it, or just assume that we will be OK somehow.

[bitingmidge]

I believe Mr Costello.

He says that Australia produces less than 1% of the world's greenhouse gasses. Whether this is more than our share is not in question. In Australia we produce less greenhouse gas in TOTAL than the annual INCREASE in China.

I don't agree that there is no viable alternative to fossil fuels. There is.
It's called not going anywhere, reducing consumption and producing part of the staple food in each household (just like much of Asia currently lives). My grandparents used to live like that, and my grandchildren will also.

While we have politicians who seriously believe that daylight saving will contribute to skin cancer, there is little point in even discussing a future.:mad:

Water hasn't dried up. The claim that it's the longest dry period on record is just a cop-out for "we didnt' get our infrastructure planning right".

While ever people waste electricity by communicating unnecessarily via electronic devices instead of solving the world's problems in some pub, there will always be a problem.

P
:cool:

[Christopha]

As the waters rise and all the cities and suburbs drown the only survivors will be those who have PD Racers in which to escape to Port Kosciousko...

[martrix]

I tend to agree with the stingy Midge.

.....two words, 'Mad Max'

I'm going out tomorrow to get myself an XA Coupe and a blower....'last of the big V8's, thucks nitro!'

[ozwinner]

We haven't had a good end of the world thread for awhile, so here goes.

<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 border=0><TBODY><TR><TD vAlign=top></TD><TD class=b vAlign=top width="100%">In my opinion, we are approaching the end of the world as we know it (and I feel fine).

Global Warming
It appears that global warming is happening significantly faster than previously thought.
The Age (http://www.theage.com.au/news/world/climate-report-heat-on-australia/2006/10/31/1162056953893.html)
Coping With Climate Dread (http://thetyee.ca/News/2006/10/20/ClimateDread/)
Population Overshoot
We are currently at 6.5billion people. More than doubled in my life time. If the population continues to grow at current rates, we'll be at 9 billion in 30-40 years.
For 6 of the last 7 years the world has consummed more grain that it has produced.
Grain Production (http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0c021878-5a16-11db-8f16-0000779e2340.html)
Peak Oil
The world has hit peak oil production. From now on we will be able to extract less and less oil for the earth at an ever increasing cost. There are no viable alternatives.
Peak Oil (http://www.lifeaftertheoilcrash.net/Index.html)
Resource Depetion
Every year we consume what it takes mother nature 400 years to produce. Plainly, in a finite world this can't continue.In an attempt to maintain the lifestyle we live now the world will attemp to mitigate the effects of peak oil by:
Converting Coal To Oil, try and extract more oil from the Tar sands of Canada and grow vast quantities of biofuels.

The first 2 are going to increase carbon emission in a serious way. This will further contribute to Global Warming. Global Warming will effect food production. For instance the drought in Australia means we will probably have to import wheat to meet domestic demand.

Also, vast tracts of land that are currently used for food production will start being used for biofuels production.
Everything we do, all the food we eat, all the things we buy are oil derivataves. It takes oil to grow, make, dig up, transport, package etc. everything in our lives.

Humans being humans, we will fight over the last of the food, oil and other resourses.

Basically, the behavour of mankind over the last 150 years has left us in a position that unless we radically change our ways now we will be in for some very nasty times in the very near future.


We've got a very small window available to us to make changes to the way we behave. Let your pollie know that it's worth votes.


</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>

Huh.:confused:

Al

[echnidna]

Huh.:confused:

Al

It means ya shood go buy a home brew kit Al afore the pubs all close down.:D :D :D

[Gumby]

Self interest and greed will win the day. .

Yay !!! And so they should too. ;)

More power to the greedy. :)

[bitingmidge]

More power to the greedy. :)

I've got it sussed!

You know that saying: the rich get richer and the poor get poorer?

Well I don't intend to get poorer!
:D :D :D

P

[Wongo]

You know where I stand on this. I am convinced that I will see it in my life time.:(

I feel so bad for my children.:(

I hope that I am wrong.:(

[Rocker]

I look at the predictions of doom from a geologist's viewpoint. The Earth has undergone enormous climate changes in the past. Much of North America, and northern Europe was covered in ice sheets within the past million years; and the coal deposits in Antarctica indicate that once there were tropical swamps there. Plant fossils from Cretaceous times indicate that Australia once had very widespread rainforests. Back in the 1950's the scientific consensus was that the world was destined to cool down disastrously. Now the pendulum has swung the other way.

In my view, if global warming happens as predicted currently, there will be major detriments, but there will also be compensating gains. Areas that previously were too cold for agriculture will then be able to grow food.

Often, natural disasters can bring increased prosperity and a new lease of life. Look at Darwin's progress since Cyclone Tracy.

I am an optimist.

Rocker

[Daddles]

No need to worry abouit global warning. Wee Johnnie goes to the polls next year. He'll get kicked out and then we'll have Kimbo to look after us.

Richard
now, where are my pills;)

[woodsprite]

Gotta add my 2 bob's worth. I agree that lack of planning, from maybe 30 years ago has a huge part to play in the current dry period. This is about when I recall the first mumblings about climate change and global warming. And when I recall the power people saying balderdash. Seems to me that the power people - the population - could have been acting then to insulate us against the situation we now have.

I also feel bad about the prospects for my kids and their kids, for the physical world of their futures. It is not that simple that where the climate changes dramatically there will be more land for agriculture, etc. I believe there are far reaching ramifications of climate change that go beyond making some places better off and others worse off - problem is we don't rreally know what the ramifications will be. I am hopeful that there are positive impacts. Weather man was saying the other day that central australia - like up around the Tanami desert, has started to see increased rainfall - might be the place to be in 20 years time (snap up a few hundred kilometres of prime farming desert while you can :) ).

Have always held the view that in the order of things, we humans are pretty insignificant (except for the damage we have done to our home). The earth is about 14 billion years old - it has been arid, frozen, super-heated, etc. Land masses have come and gone, mountains and seas have risen and fallen and risen again. The whole planet is continually changing - mankind is just contributing a bit of the change - and will always do so regardless of we humans.

We panic a bit about the big dry and about our immediate situations, whatever they may be. But at the end of the day mother earth keeps plodding along, changing. She will be here in another several billion years, we will have come and gone as a species, and none of this stuff will have mattered one bit.

But that doesn't help things now I guess. So I think we all need to do our bit to help out with the current problems - conserve water, reduce energy use where we can, stay positive, etc. And I accept that this dry spell may merely be a bit of a glitch in the weather pattern and all will return to normal in a while - wet winters, warm summers, etc. However I suspect it is a tad more than a glitch.....

Sorry about the ramblings...been up a while, still waking up, still not coherent, waiting for coffee number 2 to hit the mark:o

[namtrak]

I worked out yesterday, that if 32,000 houses planted out the average nature strip with Australian Natives it would amount to something like:

384,000 litres of fuel saved per year
326,400,000 litres of water saved per year
1,920,000 new plants
At a cost of around $400 per house.

Dont ask me why - I had too much time on my hands :D

[echnidna]

So have you planted your nature strip yet?

[bennylaird]

Might be that human domination of the world may be but a spike on the timeline. Even dinosaurs managed to survive here longer. Then again they didn't do anywhere near as much damage.

[Andy Mac]

I'm prepared to accept that there are natural and cyclical climate changes, often severe enough to cause major changes in the Earth's biota. In some ways this worry about man actually causing it, making a severe impact, is really over-inflating our own importance: as stated above the Earth will continue quite well without us.
However, there is something special about humans... and that is our ability to adapt.
As a species we will adapt to meet the physical changes, but socially we will change too.
One thing for sure, as farming land dries up, and people in poorer countries (like some of Africa) are displaced, there will be impacts on other nations...like Europe. Social changes, government changes and political instability. Maybe the US will tire of policing the world, they certainly seem stretched at present, but that could leave a vacuum.
There have been some interesting forecasts that combine physical stuff like climate, with poverty, changes in male-female balance (due to hormonal changes or infanticide I'm not sure, but more unemployed males mean trouble!)), Internet access (which links political and racial affiliations across borders) and large scale immigration as seen in Germany, France, UK, and dare I say it, Australia.
Interesting times ahead, and my kids will be in the mix, for better or worse.

Regards,

[namtrak]

So have you planted your nature strip yet?

Years ago - I hate lawn mowers!!!

More food for thought, I reckon there are at least 3,000,000 nature strips in Australia (7,000,000 households)

I've mentioned this before but a good read about the end of the world is the Bill Bryson book A Short History of Nearly Everything - this is a great read - and its not just about the end of the world. Mind you, and this is a bit sobering he comes up with I think 9 different ways for the world to end. One is we get hit by a rock. And he reckons that movies like "Deep Impact" and "Armeggedon" don't quite have it right, and the most likely scenario is that the planet will know it's going to get hit about 20 secs before it happens. Just about enough time to fill one's dacks!!!

[woodsprite]

Geez the things we hope for... I want to do in my sleep, if we are gonna get hit with a big rock make it a whopper! (don't want a slow death resulting from the resulting ice age) that takes the whole planet out and make it quick! Would hate to have a month's warning that we were in the way of something big and fast and couldn't duck it!

Doesn't pay to ponder too long on the possibilities of the future - well, the negative ones anyway. As mentioned mankind is pretty adaptable and will quite possibly make the adjustments necessary for whatever it is that may be coming, be it ice age, meltdown, big rock, Waterworld or whatever - better join the boaties forum:rolleyes:

And now, having eaten, back to the REALLY important things in this world - gotta hang the last cupboard door, my least favorite job!

[Auld Bassoon]

No need to worry abouit global warning. Wee Johnnie goes to the polls next year. He'll get kicked out and then we'll have Kimbo to look after us.

Richard
now, where are my pills;)

Wee Johnny may be pretty awful, but Kimbola? Aw strewth! What a bunch of waste-of-skins!