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Well, a lot of this comes down to shades of grey. The modern world is built on an impressive rube goldberg machine of supply chain dependencies and cheap oil.
by AtlasBarfed 3y ago
Well, a lot of this comes down to shades of grey.
The modern world is built on an impressive rube goldberg machine of supply chain dependencies and cheap oil. Yes green energy appears to be able to beat natural gas turbine, but we're careening towards 9 billion people.
In particular, we don't warehouse anything anymore. Everything is just-in-time production, and a minor disruption like COVID (which on the scale of 20th century historical events like world war I+II, or earlier pandemics like the black death, is chump change) caused major supply chain disruptions.
I wouldn't dismiss the problems outlined in the blog, just the certainty of the presentation and the binary thinking.
There are two real dangers: first is the combination of species extinctions and rapid climate change collapsing the entire biosphere. The second is an old and forgotten one: nuclear armageddon.
- jonnycomputer 3y agoI'm under no (or few) polyannish illusions about the challenges we face. but the blog post is ridiculous, and worse, positively harmful death-cultism.
- maxerickson 3y agoSo how do you compare the impact COVID would have had on a less capable society?
- scoofy 3y agoThere are lots of non-extinction level events that could cause high-level collapse via knock on effects. E.g., long term water issues in the American west, or if the Glen Canyon Dam were ever attacked, you would likely see the largest east ever mass migration in America away from the American Southwest in a week or two, followed by a catastrophic famine.