Overshoot

[Libertarian666]

But I got a very "Austrian Economics" vibe from the whole book. It's so neat and tidy, with every historical event being explainable using the author's perspective, using such moralistic critiques of any who disagree. It's telling you The One True Theory That Explains Everything If Only Everybody Would See It That way.
...

All you really need do is unleash the power of capitalism on the problem and then people's short-term interests become aligned with what would be best for the long-term--which is exactly what we're seeing today.

"to unleash the power of capitalism" is about as concise a summary of Austrian economics as I could imagine. So I'm having trouble seeing how these two statements aren't contradictory.

[MediumTex]

But I'm not sure we can "Star Trek" our way out of the problem completely, and it would be good to remember that we're part of nature and depend on it, rather than being separate from it.

Maybe if you just "Star Treked the shit out of it".

[Pointedstick]

"nleash[ing] the power of capitalism" is about as concise a summary of Austrian economics as I could imagine. So I'm having trouble seeing how these two statements aren't contradictory.

Well I don't think Austrian economics is all wrong! In fact I think most of it is right on the money. Most of it. But I don't think the entire thing falls apart if it isn't 100% correct about everything. The vibe I'm talking about is the "we're completely right about everything and anyone who disagrees just doesn't understand it or is an idiot" undertone that you can get when reading Austrian economics books. Overshoot had a very similar tone.

[MediumTex]

I think that what's going on here is people are wearing different generational lenses.  For anyone who lived through the 1970s, they will immediately recognize Catton's somber tone and serious concern for the future.  Lots of people felt that way back then, and Catton's work is like a concentrated and bottled version of the general sentiment, or "malaise", of the time.

It's easy to sit here in 2016 and point out that Catton need not have been concerned about the 30 year period following the date Overshoot was published because everything has worked out pretty good on the energy front. 

My understanding of Catton's analysis, though, has always been that it isn't so much a set of predictions as a challenge to look more deeply into many of our strongly held beliefs about our species and ourselves. 

What's the first thing you think when you look at the chart below?  Does "sustainable" come to mind?



On to the important question, which is whether Pointedstick is a Cargoist.

Okay, I've read the whole book. It was fun, albeit extremely repetitive. The chapter on ecology and life systems in particular was really neat, and the idea that societies also experience succession just like ecosystems is a thought-provoking one. But I got a very "Austrian Economics" vibe from the whole book. It's so neat and tidy, with every historical event being explainable using the author's perspective, using such moralistic critiques of any who disagree. It's telling you The One True Theory That Explains Everything If Only Everybody Would See It That way.

Time and again I found myself reading a bold claim, casually thrown out there, that sounded right until I really started to think about it. Like the supposed relationship between violence and the crowding of the planet… except that global rates of violence--both crime and war--have been continuously falling since records have been kept.

The fossil fuel powered wars of the 20th century were by far the most deadly in history.  Do you disagree?

Or the assertion that within the lifetimes of people living in 1973, the world would run out of easily accessible oil, as evidenced by rising EROEI, and yet here we are 43 years later with oil under $30 a barrel, so cheap and plentiful that the president has called for a tax to make it more expensive!

The price of oil is a market concept, while EROEI is a scientific concept.  Catton was mostly right about declining EROEI of existing oil fields.  Here is what the U.S. profile looks like:

Or the casual dismissal of renewable energy generation methods as "Cargoist." Well, news flash to Catton: the transition is in the middle of happening right now! Solar PV and wind have achieved grid parity and then some: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grid_parity
It is now cheaper to add solar PV and especially wind generation capacity in many parts of the USA than it is to construct a coal-fired power plant. In fact, 68% of the new electric capacity added last year was solar PV or wind: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/ ... -u-s-power.

I hear what you are saying, but here is what it sounds like from a distance:

As much pessimism as Catton expresses for the capacity to technologically innovate our way out of the problem, in the 40 years since he wrote the book, we've been doing just that, and the trajectory is definitely positive.  I think Catton would have been totally floored by the notion of solar PV and wind economically outcompeting coal.

A person in 2008 would have been floored by that concept.  I don't blame Catton for being suspicious of it in the late 1970s.

A few pages later, his true argument surfaces:

It was enough of a misstep to have committed ourselves to drawing down non-living resources; it would be a double folly if we were to become any more committed to consuming renewable resources faster than their rate of renewal.

How exactly do you consume solar energy faster than the sun produces it? It seems like Catton hasn't actually given this technology any thought at all, because this argument is nonsensical. You could say this about biomass energy from burning wood, but not solar PV. When the sun doesn't shine, it doesn't make any electricity--full stop. The concept simply doesn't make any sense; there is no way to unsustainably consume solar irradiance.

Renewable resources can be strained just like non-renewable resources can be strained.  The point he makes about the theoretical effect of covering the earth with solar panels is not nonsensical.  If you intercepted a significant portion of the solar radiation that is now reaching the earth's surface for energy production, it would affect the stability of the earth's current ecosystem.

I think that the point Catton was trying to make was simply that there is no free lunch when it comes to energy harvesting and storage, even if it seems otherwise.

I could go on with more individual critiques since there are ton of these kinds of things throughout the book, but I think I've made my point. Catton wants to look at everything through an ecological lens and it very much seems like he ignores the technological and economic ones.

I think that Catton might say that for an organic life form, the ecological lens is the only lens that matters.

And it's a shame, because these lenses show options that can very much be both good for the planet and good for the bottom line. Oregon, Washington, and Maine get more than 66% of their electricity from hydroelectric tidal generation that produces zero carbon-based pollution and consumes no fossil fuels. The grid is being solarized and wind-ified the world over.

I feel like you are doing the Cargoist equivalent of speaking in tongues. 

Here is a macro view of renewable electricity production in recent years:



There's been some nice growth there overall.  It's gone from 9.4% to 13.1% of our total production over the 13 year period in the chart, which is impressive, but it's still a niche segment of an overwhelmingly fossil-fuel oriented production system.

Catton's doom and gloom just doesn't seem realistic in the face of all the changes that have happened since he wrote the book. To put it in Cattonian, ecological terms, my general argument is that humanity appears to be now in the midst of raising the Earth's carrying capacity to match the overshoot. In time, it won't be an overshoot anymore. I guess I'm a "Cargoist," but it seems like the world empirically supports it pretty well.

Does it?



Remember that "carrying capacity" is a measure of what an ecosystem can support based upon renewable resources more or less in perpetuity (for our purposes, let's say for 10,000+ years).

Does the chart above suggest that we have increased carrying capacity, or does it suggest that we have developed better technology for exploiting non-renewable sources of energy?

***

Let me lay something heavy on you:

Modern humans are a fossil fuel byproduct.

Without fossil fuels, modern humans wouldn't exist.

Fossil fuels are the hardware and industrial capitalism is the software.  Humans consume what the system produces.



(Or maybe that's just the 1970s in me coming out.  )

...or maybe not:

[Libertarian666]

"to unleash the power of capitalism" is about as concise a summary of Austrian economics as I could imagine. So I'm having trouble seeing how these two statements aren't contradictory.

Well I don't think Austrian economics is all wrong! In fact I think most of it is right on the money. Most of it. But I don't think the entire thing falls apart if it isn't 100% correct about everything. The vibe I'm talking about is the "we're completely right about everything and anyone who disagrees just doesn't understand it or is an idiot" undertone that you can get when reading Austrian economics books. Overshoot had a very similar tone.

Ok, so what part of Austrian economics do you (and what part don't you) agree with?

[Mountaineer]

What's the first thing you think when you look at the chart below?  Does "sustainable" come to mind?

My first thought is "How in the heck do they absolutely know what the population was that far in the past?"  I just FEEL there was a large continent in the unseparated waters between sky and abyss heavily populated (25+ billion) by long-gone silicon based Martians who ate coral and burned sand for fuel.  After that continent ascended to the heavens and took it's place in our solar system as the planet Mars, there was no earthly proof it ever existed, but I just FEEL it did.  It all happened long before MT's ancestors crawled out of the slime and establshed a Permanent Portfolio.  Who needs proof?  Good gosh man, faith in science for things that cannot now be proven, that is the only way to eat your Wheaties, not to mention boat floating! 

... M

[Jack Jones]

What's the first thing you think when you look at the chart below?  Does "sustainable" come to mind?

A technological advancement over time chart would follow a similar course. It's our technological prowess that is making such growth sustainable.

[MediumTex]

What's the first thing you think when you look at the chart below?  Does "sustainable" come to mind?

A technological advancement over time chart would follow a similar course. It's our technological prowess that is making such growth sustainable.

You don't think that the sudden appearance of an incredibly elegant form of dense, cheap and portable energy had anything to do with the rate of technological change?

An explosion in technological development fueled by a one time allotment of fossil fuels leads to growth that is anything but sustainable.

[Cortopassi]

Hopefully in those 7B+ brains that we now have will be the intelligence to unlock fusion, travel to other planets, etc, etc.  We have the potential, and hopefully we can make something of it before we blow ourselves up or get wiped out by some epidemic or global catastrophe.

If anyone has not run into this website, I suggest reading the posts I have linked below.  Along with that exponential rise in population comes an exponential rise in our intelligence, and at some point artificial intelligence may either get us to the next level or the robots will kill us...

http://waitbutwhy.com/2015/01/artificia ... ion-1.html

http://waitbutwhy.com/2015/01/artificia ... ion-2.html

[Pointedstick]

If I could paraphrase, MT, it seems as if you buy into Catton's general thesis, even if maybe some of his individual arguments aren't perfect, while I reject it, as evidenced by those individual arguments not holding water to me.

All of the visual aids you introduced are pretty interesting, and they tell us a variety of stories, for sure. It's undeniable that fossil fuels are limited and that their exploitation has propelled human population and technology forward very quickly. But here's my general belief: as sources of those resources become scarce, their rising price and falling availability will automatically force a switch to solar and wind, principally, and others where appropriate (hydro, geothermal, biomass, etc). To me, this is self-evident: in every market, once prices rise, alternatives become more attractive and themselves develop to be better and cheaper as more people commit to them.

Can you explain to me why you don't think this will happen with energy, if I've understood you correctly? I don't understand why energy would be an exception to this general pattern.

[Mountaineer]

[img width=500]http://energyskeptic.com/wp-content/upl ... tion-2.png[/img]

Here are some other correlations that provide unquestionable truth. 

http://twentytwowords.com/funny-graphs- ... -pictures/

I particularly liked "Tech Expenses and Suicide", correlation over 0.99.

Point is, statistics can "prove" most anything.  MT, I'm not really poo-pooing what you presented, just having a bit of fun.

... M

[Pointedstick]

Time and again I found myself reading a bold claim, casually thrown out there, that sounded right until I really started to think about it. Like the supposed relationship between violence and the crowding of the planet… except that global rates of violence--both crime and war--have been continuously falling since records have been kept.

The fossil fuel powered wars of the 20th century were by far the most deadly in history.  Do you disagree?

I do disagree. They were the deadliest in terms of absolute human death toll, but in terms of relative death toll--casualties as a percentage of the human population--they're not even close. The winners there would be the Mongol conquest of Asia and the Taiping Rebellion, both of which killed between 14 and 17% of the total human population at the time. No fossil fuels required, just steel and flesh. The An Lushan Rebellion ranks up there too, although whether it's worse proportionally than all others or simply in the top 5 is still up for debate. Other contenders worse proportionally than World War II would be the Middle East slave trade, the fall of the Ming Dynasty, the fall of Rome, the Native American genocide, and the Atlantic slave trade.

Sources:
https://www.quora.com/What-was-the-most ... on?share=1
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_w ... death_toll

[Libertarian666]

If I could paraphrase, MT, it seems as if you buy into Catton's general thesis, even if maybe some of his individual arguments aren't perfect, while I reject it, as evidenced by those individual arguments not holding water to me.

All of the visual aids you introduced are pretty interesting, and they tell us a variety of stories, for sure. It's undeniable that fossil fuels are limited and that their exploitation have propelled human population and technology forward very quickly. But here's my general belief: as sources of those resources become scarce, their rising price and falling availability will automatically force a switch to solar and wind, principally, and others where appropriate (hydro, geothermal, biomass, etc). To me, this is self-evident: in every market, once prices rise, alternatives become more attractive and themselves develop to be better and cheaper as more people commit to them.

Can you explain to me why you don't think this will happen with energy, if I've understood you correctly? I don't understand why energy would be an exception to this general pattern.

I'm not MT, but I also have grave doubts about renewables filling in.

The problem is EROEI, which is far higher with fossil fuels than with renewables. In cases where that ratio is less than 1, it doesn't matter how high energy prices go, because you will never get out more energy than you put in.

[Xan]

It seems to me that nuclear is the only option going forward.  Hopefully safely!

[Mountaineer]

It seems to me that nuclear is the only option going forward.  Hopefully safely!

+1

... M

[Cortopassi]

Nuclear in some form.  I believe we'll figure out fusion in our lifetimes.

[Pointedstick]

Nuclear is another option Catton totally dismisses, citing safety concerns. Those concerns are real, but if the alternative is industrial civilization falling apart due to lack of fossil fuels, doesn't he or any other sane person think that those concerns might be worth accepting?

[MediumTex]

Nuclear is another option Catton totally dismisses, citing safety concerns. Those concerns are real, but if the alternative is industrial civilization falling apart due to lack of fossil fuels, doesn't he or any other sane person think that those concerns might be worth accepting?

I think that what Catton was saying was that if your only real option to maintain the status quo is nuclear energy, then you've already lost and you just don't realize it.

Through the nuclear power era to date, it seems like there has been a serious incident of some kind every 10-20 years.  When you extrapolate that going forward in a world with many more nuclear power facilities than we have today, you see a world with large areas that cannot be inhabited for hundreds of years or longer because of the periodic nuclear power-related accidents that are virtually certain to occur.

Then you have the problem of disposing of the nuclear waste.

And the problem of maintaining decommissioned power plants.

Nuclear is one solution, but it's a messy one.  Nuclear is the solution that Hubbert probably put the most faith in.

[Cortopassi]

Coincidentally, today:

http://www.sciencealert.com/china-s-nuc ... sma-record

and last week:

http://www.sciencealert.com/germany-s-m ... gen-plasma

Just like self driving cars, I think we'll see a lot of this tech sooner than we think.

[MediumTex]

If I could paraphrase, MT, it seems as if you buy into Catton's general thesis, even if maybe some of his individual arguments aren't perfect, while I reject it, as evidenced by those individual arguments not holding water to me.

All of the visual aids you introduced are pretty interesting, and they tell us a variety of stories, for sure. It's undeniable that fossil fuels are limited and that their exploitation has propelled human population and technology forward very quickly. But here's my general belief: as sources of those resources become scarce, their rising price and falling availability will automatically force a switch to solar and wind, principally, and others where appropriate (hydro, geothermal, biomass, etc). To me, this is self-evident: in every market, once prices rise, alternatives become more attractive and themselves develop to be better and cheaper as more people commit to them.

Can you explain to me why you don't think this will happen with energy, if I've understood you correctly? I don't understand why energy would be an exception to this general pattern.

Throughout human history, there has been this tension between the way God or the gods are projected out of the human mind as a kind of idealized and immortal version of ourselves, and the wink and nod most people feel deep down about the nature of God or the gods and how they can't really be that much better than us because we invented them after all.

Whether God or the gods are real or just projections of our own idealized version of ourselves, however, Mother Nature is real, and she does things that are truly beyond our comprehension and humble us in ways that God probably wouldn't think to do.

For example, Mother Nature has given us our organic form.  God may have helped, but that's speculative.  We know, however, that Mother Nature had a hand in it because we are part of an ecosystem and we can easily see where we originally fit into the food chain and how our organic form compares to other animals and the rest of our ecosystem.

Mother Nature gave us a special gift in the form of fossil fuel deposits.  Our raw intelligence, combined with such a versatile form of energy, allowed us to easily think of ourselves as more godlike than ever.  Look at all that we did with the cheap energy we discovered!!!  We went to the freakin' moon...several times.  We drove a car on the moon!!!  If that's not godlike I don't know what is.

Against that backdrop, someone starts saying that maybe the fossil fuels won't last forever, and maybe some alternative plan should be developed.  Most people just scoff at the person who doesn't understand how awesome humans have become, but finally the scientists say "Okay, fine, you want us to show that we could have done all of this without fossil fuels?  Fine.  We'll show you.  We're going to make a shitload of windmills, solar panels, hydroelectric dams, nuclear power plants, magic batteries, and ultracapacitors, but once we do you've got to sit down and STFU, okay?"

So the scientists got to work on their renewable energy/non-fossil fuel energy plans, and in some cases they did some really neat work.  What everyone came to notice over time, though, was that all of the scientists' energy creations had the vague appearance of a prosthetic device used to replace a missing human appendage.  None of the scientists' creations came remotely close to matching the elegance and versatility of the original appendage supplied by Mother Nature.  People came to think of fossil fuels as the hands of industrial humanity, and each attempt by the scientists to create a replacement hand seemed more macabre than the effort before it.  In time, of course, it became painfully obvious that the mind of humanity could not create a source of energy remotely resembling fossil fuels, but their pride kept them from admitting defeat and revising their cultural, religious, economic and financial beliefs, and that was probably what made it the worst for them.

Imagine Icarus receiving a call from the tower informing him that the wax on his wings was melting when he had plenty of time to turn back and think of a better plan.  Rather than turning back, though, his last transmission to the tower was: "Icarus to tower.  Got your message.  Melting wax no problem.  Will come up with solution en route before it endangers the mission."  That's hubris, and it's hubris even if Icarus didn't think of it as hubris.

I think that between our modern religious beliefs which include a God who is concerned about the behavior and fate of every single person, and our modern secular beliefs in technology as a potential savior for any predicament humanity may find itself in, we have turned into a species with a remarkably high and unrealistic opinion of itself and its place in the universe.  It's exactly the state of mind one tends to see right before a major "humility event."

There is something akin to a cultural membrane that covers us all.  It's very tough, and its translucence only allows ideas to enter that are more or less coherent within a certain predefined conception of who we are and what our place is in the world.  Most of the time, this covering is protective, and it's almost never outright destructive because, after all, it evolved as a survival aid.  Sometimes, though, it blinds us to long term risks to our own survival that the existence of the membrane allowed to develop in the first place. 

I think that Catton's analysis is just an attempt to see through that cultural membrane and clearly see what is on the other side of it.  What I think there is to be seen isn't so much death and destruction and an end to a way of life, but more the basic lesson that we are not God or gods, nor are we even on par with Mother Nature.  We are weekend guests in a hotel that has been there for centuries, and we somehow got the idea that we owned the place and could improve upon it any time we wanted to.  The real cognitive dissonance comes in trying to shake off that delusion and accept that, yes, we are a special life form.  We are very very smart, and we like to tinker, but we are relatively new on the scene in geological time, and one of the very first things we did with our allotment of fossil fuel fairy dust was to build weapons stockpiles for the purpose of killing each other that, if used, would also make much of the world uninhabitable for any life for potentially hundreds or thousands of years.

However special the species that does those things may be, it also sounds like a species with an inflated opinion of its own long term survival prospects.  Simply internalizing this concept and developing a healthy skepticism to accompany our optimism about technology would go a long way toward improving our species.

One of the most interesting manifestations of the hubris I am describing above is the belief that artificial intelligence is a serious threat to human survival.  I'm sure that most people don't think of this as a religious belief, but if you swap out "The Big Supercomputer" for "God", you will find that the concerns over artificial intelligence basically track the ancient tendency of humanity to worry about whether it meets the approval of a higher power (even if deep down it knows that it created the higher power at some point in its past), and whether falling short of that approval might lead to our destruction.  It's a really fascinating thing to see people be seriously concerned about, even as most of the same people scoff at the primitiveness of traditional religious beliefs.  That's Cargoism--the belief that technology will always deliver a solution, but also worrying that technology might become prescient and somehow find us lacking...and stop delivering that precious technological cargo. 

[Pointedstick]

So the scientists got to work on their renewable energy/non-fossil fuel energy plans, and in some cases they did some really neat work.  What everyone came to notice over time, though, was that all of the scientists' energy creations had the vague appearance of a prosthetic device used to replace a missing human appendage.  None of the scientists' creations came remotely close to matching the elegance and versatility of the original appendage supplied by Mother Nature.  People came to think of fossil fuels as the hands of industrial humanity, and each attempt by the scientists to create a replacement hand seemed more macabre than the effort before it.  In time, of course, it became painfully obvious that the mind of humanity could not create a source of energy remotely resembling fossil fuels, but their pride kept them from admitting defeat and revising their cultural, religious, economic and financial beliefs, and that was probably what made it the worst for them.

What?

Fossil fuels are not "the original appendage supplied by Mother Nature." That would be the human arms and legs! Fossil fuels are not especially elegant or impressive. They are simply combustible hydrocarbons you can burn to produce heat or rotational velocity, and with them, all kinds of other cool effects. Their only major feature is a high energy density which allows vehicles to have a high power-to-weight ratio. But that only really matters for vehicles that can't be connected to the grid while in motion (like trains can). For electricity generation, it's largely irrelevant, and once you neutralize the advantage of an especially high energy density, you don't really need fossil fuels as long as the economics of alternatives are sound.

Non-fossil-fuel alternatives are just fine. If you have a heat pump, you already have a non-fossil-fuel version of a furnace. Electric cars are awesome to drive and have far superior performance and handling in most respects, range being their only drawback. All gas-powered home appliances have electric versions that can be just as "elegant and versatile"--in fact more so since they don't have complicated venting and make-up air requirements and can't poison you in your own home. And so on.

Whether or not electrically-powered machines supplies with electric power generated from renewable sources are as elegant as fossil fuel burners does not strike me as especially relevant or even true. If they work, what's the problem? Replacing my gas burning water heater with an electric or solar heater does not strike me as "admitting defeat." I'll admit your position here doesn't make much sense to me. It's very spiritual and not very practical, but the matter at hand is entirely a practical one.

[jafs]

What I get from MT is that he thinks we have a mind-set problem as well as a practical one, and that they're connected.

And I completely agree with that.

[MediumTex]

What?

Fossil fuels are not "the original appendage supplied by Mother Nature."

But for modern humans with their expectations concerning progress and consumption, they are.

As I recall, Catton used the term homo colossus to describe the modern techno-centric human who is fascinated with ever-higher levels of production.

That would be the human arms and legs! Fossil fuels are not especially elegant or impressive. They are simply combustible hydrocarbons you can burn to produce heat or rotational velocity, and with them, all kinds of other cool effects. Their only major feature is a high energy density which allows vehicles to have a high power-to-weight ratio. But that only really matters for vehicles that can't be connected to the grid while in motion (like trains can). For electricity generation, it's largely irrelevant, and once you neutralize the advantage of an especially high energy density, you don't really need fossil fuels as long as the economics of alternatives are sound.

Fossil fuels provide about 65% of our electricity.  That's not irrelevant.

Non-fossil-fuel alternatives are just fine. If you have a heat pump, you already have a non-fossil-fuel version of a furnace. Electric cars are awesome to drive and have far superior performance and handling in most respects, range being their only drawback. All gas-powered home appliances have electric versions that can be just as "elegant and versatile"--in fact more so since they don't have complicated venting and make-up air requirements and can't poison you in your own home. And so on.

What your saying is the premise that we will be testing in coming decades.  I'm not as sure as you are.

Whether or not electrically-powered machines supplies with electric power generated from renewable sources are as elegant as fossil fuel burners does not strike me as especially relevant or even true. If they work, what's the problem? Replacing my gas burning water heater with an electric or solar heater does not strike me as "admitting defeat."

The problem is that renewables generate vastly less surplus energy once you factor in their cost of construction and maintenance.  Surplus energy, like surplus food, is what we use to create our culture and belief systems.  With less surplus energy, reality and cultural beliefs begin to rub against each other.

I'll admit your position here doesn't make much sense to me. It's very spiritual and not very practical, but the matter at hand is entirely a practical one.

If it made sense to you, you wouldn't be you.  Cargoism isn't a joke.  It's a very real worldview and it informs people's decisions in many ways.  Challenging it often creates the same sort of arguments and irreconcilable positions that religious discussions create.

I'm not saying you're wrong.  The cargoist paradigm is a common belief system that can grip entire societies as a response to natural resource constraints.  The problem is that it rarely represents a complete solution to the problem of a society that has simply outgrown its habitat, or its habitat has shifted in a way that the population didn't anticipate or plan for.

I'm taking what you call a spiritual approach to the problem because I am trying to demonstrate the blind spots embedded in a cargoist belief structure.  I've had this discussion many times, and when you don't include the human psychology and human sociology elements, it turns into a technology expo as a counterpoint to cargoist critiques, as if to say: "Oh yeah, if cargoism is so shorsighted, would we have all of this awesome cargo?"  The problem is not today's cargo.  Today's cargo is awesome.  I enjoy technology as much as anyone.  The problem is the future beliefs that are shaped by today's cargo, especially when much of the last century of cargo came from fossil fuels and the tremendous energy surpluses they provided us with.

[MediumTex]

What I get from MT is that he thinks we have a mind-set problem as well as a practical one, and that they're connected.

And I completely agree with that.

Yes. 

IMHO, the self-image of modern human societies is like a lottery winner who imagines that his riches come from his innate number picking ability, as opposed to just being lucky enough to be living through a truly remarkable period in human history.

The former self-image is hubris.  The latter self-image is humility.  I believe that the humility approach equips us much better for the future.  It can also lead to far more interesting insights about who we are and what we're about.  The ability to see ourselves as another intelligent life form (like whales or maybe aliens) might see us is an exercise that is well worth the effort.

Remember, too, that humans also have a strong tendency toward self-loathing, so we are talking about a life form that can be delusional in both its optimism and its pessimism about itself.  When it comes to cargoism and humanity, I imagine a group of nerds in a porn theater watching a techno snuff film featuring a robot committing auto-erotic asphyxiation using a wiring harness.  They might seem to be repulsed, but the theater would still be full for every show.  They would like it because it represented all of their hopes and fears about the future, while also giving them a good titillating scare in the now.

For those who might want to avoid the hardcore stuff, there would also be films with titles like Simple Mac, which would feature a dim-witted farm boy who thought he was a laptop computer containing secret code representing the missing link needed for the Singularity to arrive. 

[MediumTex]

When trying to put together a useful mental model for how energy sources affect human culture and society, cheap fossil fuels stand in contrast to all other forms of energy, including expensive fossil fuels.

Once fossil fuels begin to get expensive compared to earlier price levels due to increasing scarcity, they begin to soil the nest of industrial capitalism in the same way that renewables do.

Cheap fossil fuels are what we need for business as usual.  Natural gas will be filling that role for the next 10-20 years, but I don't know what comes after that.  There is also a lot of cheap coal still to be dug up, but coal isn't a transportation fuel.