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Like with chickens, the Jayhawk should just learn to fuse hydrogen down to lithium. I think the analogy doesn’t quite work. Humans produce chickens because we

Like with chickens, the Jayhawk should just learn to fuse hydrogen down to lithium. I think the analogy doesn’t quite work. Humans produce chickens because we can do that. We find more lithium because we need it. Jayhawks can also evolve to get better at finding more chickens. And by their very nature, have been doing exactly that.

wolverine876 3y ago
Evolution is a bit slow. How many millenia will it take the Jayhawks to figure it out? Humans can increase chicken production this year or maybe next.
- Waterluvian 3y ago
  For sure. That’s what makes us exceptional. What I’m mainly pointing to is that we can’t currently just mass produce lithium. We just go around looking for it more.
  - setgree 3y ago
    https://www.cato.org/economic-development-bulletin/julian-simon-was-right-half-century-population-growth-increasing#simon-s-wisdom-in-historical-perspective https://www.cato.org/economic-development-bulletin/julian-si... > when a particular resource becomes scarcer, its price increases, and that change incentivizes people to discover more of the resource, ration it, recycle it, or develop a substitute for it. As such, population growth and resource use do not automatically lead to higher commodity prices in the long run. So no, we can't mass produce lithium, but a high enough price might drive someone to discover a substitute.
    - Gravityloss 3y ago
      Sodium batteries are being researched as alternative to lithium. Same with other materials like cobalt, nickel, and graphite - there are battery versions that avoid those.
  - jacobr1 3y ago
    It is more than that. We also invent new technologies. Searching for resources, refining them, do the same stuff more cost-effectively, extraction from different kinds of compositions and ores with processing methodologies, recycling, changing other elements of a system to require different amounts or mixtures in a final product are all different ways to "increase yield." On the scale of decades, collectively, this is very responsive to demand and why arguments about "only so much of resource X exists" are usually highly misleading.

wolverine876 3y ago

Evolution is a bit slow. How many millenia will it take the Jayhawks to figure it out? Humans can increase chicken production this year or maybe next.

Waterluvian 3y ago
For sure. That’s what makes us exceptional. What I’m mainly pointing to is that we can’t currently just mass produce lithium. We just go around looking for it more.
- setgree 3y ago
  https://www.cato.org/economic-development-bulletin/julian-simon-was-right-half-century-population-growth-increasing#simon-s-wisdom-in-historical-perspective https://www.cato.org/economic-development-bulletin/julian-si... > when a particular resource becomes scarcer, its price increases, and that change incentivizes people to discover more of the resource, ration it, recycle it, or develop a substitute for it. As such, population growth and resource use do not automatically lead to higher commodity prices in the long run. So no, we can't mass produce lithium, but a high enough price might drive someone to discover a substitute.
  - Gravityloss 3y ago
    Sodium batteries are being researched as alternative to lithium. Same with other materials like cobalt, nickel, and graphite - there are battery versions that avoid those.
- jacobr1 3y ago
  It is more than that. We also invent new technologies. Searching for resources, refining them, do the same stuff more cost-effectively, extraction from different kinds of compositions and ores with processing methodologies, recycling, changing other elements of a system to require different amounts or mixtures in a final product are all different ways to "increase yield." On the scale of decades, collectively, this is very responsive to demand and why arguments about "only so much of resource X exists" are usually highly misleading.