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So I read the Jesse Ausubel essay that apparently inspired this, and while I'm tempted to dismiss it all as utter unsupported horseshit, that would be unsupport

So I read the Jesse Ausubel essay that apparently inspired this, and while I'm tempted to dismiss it all as utter unsupported horseshit, that would be unsupported as well. The most I can say that is defensible is that I'm suspicious of it, and here are some random thoughts about reasons why, in no particular order: It could be clearer throughout, whether he's talking per capita or overall. Data is selective and ignores resource utilization shifts. Example: In the 1940s crop acreage decoupled from crop yield, he says. Great! Instead it coupled to petroleum and energy, he doesn't say. American farms today are in the business of converting fossil fuels to food. For example, the 1940s are when when cheap internal-combustion tractors started being mass-produced, thanks to all that spare manufacturing capacity left over after the war. There's also a graph where he looks at "every input" into growing corn, even down to the phosphates, while scrupulously avoiding any talk of fuel or energy. A resource shift of a different kind: efficiency gains in chicken production are due mostly to inhumane factory farm conditions. (Ones to which pork & beef are less amenable, hence chicken outdoes them.) Wood is no longer used for railroad ties, because we use concrete. Which has its own problems! The point in most of this kind of example is that we stop using A because B comes along to fill the void. Nobody uses paper anymore, but they sure use a lot more lithium than they used to. And so on. Finally, and speaking of stepping in to fill the void: ctrl-F - "China" - 1 match. The single mention is to refer to it as a developing country, not to acknowledge it as the present-day location of much of the USA's manufacturing.

thedudeabides5 7y ago
Re concrete, I’ve been hearing a lot that we are running out of sand (the kind we make glass out of and the kind we make concrete out of). Is that true? Anyone have numbers/research on sand that’s good?
- mdorazio 7y ago
  Depends who you mean by "we". Seems there are regional shortages [1], but the US only hits supply constraints occasionally. [1] https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/world-facing-global-sand-crisis-180964815/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/world-facing-g...
  - rapnie 7y ago
    Also discussed on HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15739917 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15739917
- imtringued 7y ago
  There is an abundance of sand away from the construction sites but transportation is too expensive so regional suppliers are preferred.
  - logfromblammo 7y ago
    Though it seems like it might be easier to ship sand for pre-stressed concrete crossties, given that all the materials must necessarily be connected to the rail network. Also, I wonder why concrete crossties don't use neoprene bearing pads under the rails to reduce the abrasion problem.
    - simonrobb 7y ago
      Are concrete crossties pre-stressed? It makes sense now I think about it, but I'm just surprised more effort than "pour concrete into a mold" goes into such an unassuming structural member.
      - logfromblammo 7y ago
        I'd guess that poured concrete is not cost-competitive with timber crossties, and pre-stressing is the only way to make them cheaply enough to compete.
daxfohl 7y ago
It might have some teeth though. Maybe there's a point of maximum consumption, beyond which the average person would get overburdened by too much stuff. And maybe we're hitting that, and per capita people aren't wanting more stuff so much as they're wanting roughly the same amount of stuff but cheaper. So maybe we're approaching "peak stuff". This would fuel greater investments into making things more efficiently rather than making more things, which would allow the economy to continue growing until we actually hit "peak stuff", while raw material consumption would be reducing.
- NeedMoreTea 7y ago
  Nice idea, doesn't match reality though. We do indeed have too much stuff, but too much stuff being produced. With no sign it's stopping. In fact it's accelerating. Instead of getting what we need, we're getting what we need, in excess packaging, and having to replace it every year or two as structural components, hinges, gears and bearings are made of plastic. If that's not enough we build far larger and heavier cars, we buy far more food than we eat, fridges and freezers get ever bigger. Clothes that lasted years are now made to wear out after a few months or if lucky, a year and the rubbish bin is now a wheelie bin with 2-3x the volume, and a recycling bin or 3. Today we struggle to get all the crap in the huge bin as it's full. So is the recycling. In 1980 the old school trashcan was rarely filled, except maybe the week after Xmas. Meanwhile industry is convincing us that some other standard bit of being human is a source of failure and sells a cream, perfume or product to mask it, or a pill or service to avoid it. Or selling us a subscription to some simple thing made complex - e.g. fruit juice, bottled water, coffee pods. Even those of us who still try to be old-school and not buy into every fad, or replace a kitchen because they fancy a new colour, end up buying far more than we did in the 80s or 90s as the world is now built to make it unavoidable. I'd love to see the merest hint that people are even thinking about not wanting more stuff...
  - daxfohl 7y ago
    Yeah and it's not only that. I didn't think it through. We're not at peak stuff ownership either. If we were, then we'd see wealthy people living in average-size houses. As is, however, wealthy still live in bigger houses, presumably buy more stuff to fill them, than those without the money to do so. This all implies if/when average income rises, stuff ownership will continue to rise with it.
rorykoehler 7y ago
Jeremy Rifkin discusses how economic growth is tied to energy efficiency and that it changes depending on fuel source. His theory is we have already hit peak efficiency for fossil fuels which is why developed economies can't grow any quicker. You can find out more by watching his talk on Vice's YouTube [0]. Well worth a watch if you haven't already. [0] https://youtu.be/QX3M8Ka9vUA https://youtu.be/QX3M8Ka9vUA
pizzazzaro 7y ago
The inciting article fails to mention the financialization of our ecomony - lets make more money for having money! What do you mean these serfs cant pay $2,000/ month for a studio apartment while earning minimum wage? Note that historically, this sort of behavior on behalf of markets has preceeded revolutions - from Irish Independence to Mao's Communist Revolution. We can stop it, if we work NOW to make the economy actually distribute goods and services.
samirillian 7y ago
Yeah, it feelsl like one more thinkpiece on how we can definitely have our cake and eat it too.

thedudeabides5 7y ago

Re concrete, I’ve been hearing a lot that we are running out of sand (the kind we make glass out of and the kind we make concrete out of). Is that true? Anyone have numbers/research on sand that’s good?

mdorazio 7y ago
Depends who you mean by "we". Seems there are regional shortages [1], but the US only hits supply constraints occasionally. [1] https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/world-facing-global-sand-crisis-180964815/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/world-facing-g...
- rapnie 7y ago
  Also discussed on HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15739917 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15739917
imtringued 7y ago
There is an abundance of sand away from the construction sites but transportation is too expensive so regional suppliers are preferred.
- logfromblammo 7y ago
  Though it seems like it might be easier to ship sand for pre-stressed concrete crossties, given that all the materials must necessarily be connected to the rail network. Also, I wonder why concrete crossties don't use neoprene bearing pads under the rails to reduce the abrasion problem.
  - simonrobb 7y ago
    Are concrete crossties pre-stressed? It makes sense now I think about it, but I'm just surprised more effort than "pour concrete into a mold" goes into such an unassuming structural member.
    - logfromblammo 7y ago
      I'd guess that poured concrete is not cost-competitive with timber crossties, and pre-stressing is the only way to make them cheaply enough to compete.

daxfohl 7y ago

It might have some teeth though. Maybe there's a point of maximum consumption, beyond which the average person would get overburdened by too much stuff. And maybe we're hitting that, and per capita people aren't wanting more stuff so much as they're wanting roughly the same amount of stuff but cheaper. So maybe we're approaching "peak stuff". This would fuel greater investments into making things more efficiently rather than making more things, which would allow the economy to continue growing until we actually hit "peak stuff", while raw material consumption would be reducing.

NeedMoreTea 7y ago
Nice idea, doesn't match reality though. We do indeed have too much stuff, but too much stuff being produced. With no sign it's stopping. In fact it's accelerating. Instead of getting what we need, we're getting what we need, in excess packaging, and having to replace it every year or two as structural components, hinges, gears and bearings are made of plastic. If that's not enough we build far larger and heavier cars, we buy far more food than we eat, fridges and freezers get ever bigger. Clothes that lasted years are now made to wear out after a few months or if lucky, a year and the rubbish bin is now a wheelie bin with 2-3x the volume, and a recycling bin or 3. Today we struggle to get all the crap in the huge bin as it's full. So is the recycling. In 1980 the old school trashcan was rarely filled, except maybe the week after Xmas. Meanwhile industry is convincing us that some other standard bit of being human is a source of failure and sells a cream, perfume or product to mask it, or a pill or service to avoid it. Or selling us a subscription to some simple thing made complex - e.g. fruit juice, bottled water, coffee pods. Even those of us who still try to be old-school and not buy into every fad, or replace a kitchen because they fancy a new colour, end up buying far more than we did in the 80s or 90s as the world is now built to make it unavoidable. I'd love to see the merest hint that people are even thinking about not wanting more stuff...
- daxfohl 7y ago
  Yeah and it's not only that. I didn't think it through. We're not at peak stuff ownership either. If we were, then we'd see wealthy people living in average-size houses. As is, however, wealthy still live in bigger houses, presumably buy more stuff to fill them, than those without the money to do so. This all implies if/when average income rises, stuff ownership will continue to rise with it.

rorykoehler 7y ago

Jeremy Rifkin discusses how economic growth is tied to energy efficiency and that it changes depending on fuel source. His theory is we have already hit peak efficiency for fossil fuels which is why developed economies can't grow any quicker. You can find out more by watching his talk on Vice's YouTube [0]. Well worth a watch if you haven't already. [0] https://youtu.be/QX3M8Ka9vUA https://youtu.be/QX3M8Ka9vUA

pizzazzaro 7y ago

The inciting article fails to mention the financialization of our ecomony - lets make more money for having money! What do you mean these serfs cant pay $2,000/ month for a studio apartment while earning minimum wage? Note that historically, this sort of behavior on behalf of markets has preceeded revolutions - from Irish Independence to Mao's Communist Revolution. We can stop it, if we work NOW to make the economy actually distribute goods and services.

samirillian 7y ago

Yeah, it feelsl like one more thinkpiece on how we can definitely have our cake and eat it too.