Growthed Out (was Re: A Disturbing Morning)

From: joecosby@mindspring.com (Joe Cosby)
Newsgroups: alt.slack
Date: Tue, Mar 5, 2002

Her Ladyship Lilith von Fraumench <lilith@ZubJenius.com> hunched over
a computer, typing feverishly;
thunder crashed, Her Ladyship Lilith von Fraumench
<lilith@ZubJenius.com> laughed madly, then wrote:

>In article <L_eh8.7168$aP6.8156@rwcrnsc54>, Arbane the Terrible
><arbane@attbi.com> wrote:
>
>> St. Marc the Perpetually Amused wrote:
>>
>> > And we don't even have to get that far, because
>> > without an expanding petroleum supply, growth stops, and without growth,
>> > the Western economic model (all flavors) breaks down.
>>
>> This is one of those things I just don't understand. How can an 'economy'
>> keep 'expanding' FOREVER? There's only so much planet--Thud, there's only
>> so much UNIVERSE.
>>
>> Is all economics just a REALLY BIG, slow Ponzi Scheme?
>
>It wasn't until someone came up with that Invisible Hand crap. Would
>*you* accept a reacharound from an invisible hand? I wouldn't.

If it bought me dinner first.

--
Joe Cosby
http://joecosby.home.mindspring.com

I don't need to test my programs. I have an error-correcting modem.
- Om I. Baud

Sig by Kookie Jar 5.98d http://go.to/generalfrenetics/
----------------------------------------------------------------------
From: sanfordandson40@hotmail.com (Kat Suit Model)

Arbane the Terrible <arbane@attbi.com> wrote in message news:<L_eh8.7168$aP6.8156@rwcrnsc54>...
> Is all economics just a REALLY BIG, slow Ponzi Scheme?

Looks like you've hit on something here.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
From: "St. Marc the Perpetually Amused" <disciple@templeoferis.org>

"Arbane the Terrible" <arbane@attbi.com> wrote in message
news:L_eh8.7168$aP6.8156@rwcrnsc54...
> St. Marc the Perpetually Amused wrote:
>
> > And we don't even have to get that far, because
> > without an expanding petroleum supply, growth stops, and without growth,
> > the Western economic model (all flavors) breaks down.
>
> This is one of those things I just don't understand. How can an 'economy'
> keep 'expanding' FOREVER? There's only so much planet--Thud, there's only
> so much UNIVERSE.

Very true. The answer is, it can't. But if we had, say, efficient space
travel, we could create enough local nodes that it would take millions of
years to run into the problem again. Without it, or some other miracle cure
like cheap fusion power (although we use petrochemicals for lots of other
things besides energy... I think matter converters are also required,) we're
about to run into it really hard. Keep in mind I don't expect this to be
visible for five to ten more years as a worst-case scenario absent some
other accelerating mechanism like a hyperinflated war economy.

Whoops. Let's hope I'm wrong on that one too. Never mind.

> Is all economics just a REALLY BIG, slow Ponzi Scheme?

Yes. The problems are twofold: interest, and population increase. If the
economy doesn't grow, either one is sufficient to eventually destroy the
system. It's very Malthusian, really.

St. Marc
----------------------------------------------------------------------
From: "St. Marc the Perpetually Amused" <disciple@templeoferis.org>

"Bryan J. Maloney" <bjm10@cornell.edu> wrote in message
news:bjm10-774F2F.11522206032002@newsstand.cit.cornell.edu...

> In article <4prh8.39990$ZC3.3165253@newsread2.prod.itd.earthlink.net>,
> "St. Marc the Perpetually Amused" <disciple@templeoferis.org> wrote:
> > system. It's very Malthusian, really.
>
> Malthus--didn't he say everybody would starve to death by 1900?

I can't remember his theoretical dates, but he based them on the
then-current population increase rates and food production levels. The Green
Revolution bought us some time - for a while there, the rate of food
production increased exponentially faster than the population increase rate.
But production rate increases are once again flat or nearly so, and
population increase has caught up. If we were to *lose* any of the gains of
the Green Revolution, the result would be millions dead of starvation within
months, billions within a few years. And that is what the math is saying is
going to happen. The whole world a North Korea.

You can change the data input, but not the rule. The rule is that a
population will increase to the maximum sustainable by its environment, then
past it, then it will experience a dieoff. The farther it exceeds the limit,
the more dramatic the dieoff. Unless and until *all* of us, every human and
humanoid on this planet, make the decision to lower our population and
become more efficient in our use of limited resources, we are animals just
like any other animal for purposes of this rule, and our cleverness will
merely postpone the inevitable. I'm beginning to wonder if this isn't what
Keynes had in the back of his mind when he issued his famous "In the long
run, we are all dead" remark.

St. Marc
----------------------------------------------------------------------
From: "Bryan J. Maloney" <bjm10@cornell.edu>

In article <0hsh8.40210$ZC3.3173779@newsread2.prod.itd.earthlink.net>,
"St. Marc the Perpetually Amused" <disciple@templeoferis.org> wrote:

> You can change the data input, but not the rule. The rule is that a
> population will increase to the maximum sustainable by its environment,

"Life at K really sucks."

--Brent Smith, professor of Ecology, Earlham College.

--
America is a wonderful country. Where else could a young Black man like
Michael Jackson grow up to be a middle-aged White woman?

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Original file name: Growthed Out (was Re- A Disturb - converted on Friday, 20 September 2002, 16:06