5 ms·

Ok, let's say US Agricultural production drops in half - I don't mean prices double, I mean for every two tons of produce we produce today, we produce one ton i

Ok, let's say US Agricultural production drops in half - I don't mean prices double, I mean for every two tons of produce we produce today, we produce one ton in this scenario. What do you think that looks like for our country? How do you think we adjust to that? Do you think it looks like the same place that it does today? Note too that this is not an uncorrelated change - there's no "somewhere else" to get food here. Let's say that India faces the same problem - that's a nuclear armed state. How does that play out? Remember the power outage in Texas? By and large, that was because Texas didn't have its grid hooked up to the rest of the country - but how many different areas do you think need to be facing the same conditions before we knock out the power across a region we can't laugh at for a substantial amount of time? What happens if we have to deal with that on a regular basis? People think "civilizational collapse" is "we're now hunter-gatherers" - typically, it means "the existing state apparatus falls apart, the wealth and health of the people diminishes significantly, and what was a previously recognizable culture and lifestyle is no more. Think "Roman Empire circa 450CE" - that's what we're facing. Yes, there will be humans in 100 years - pending that India question, of course - but that's not the victory condition here.

roenxi 1y ago
> I mean for every two tons of produce we produce today, we produce one ton in this scenario. What do you think that looks like for our country? Well, the ~33% of food that gets wasted in the US would probably need to be handled a lot more carefully. Probably the obese people would need to eat less. And the strategy of growing the population every year through migration might need to be rethought if more farmland can't be found. Plus maybe there'd need to be more fertiliser produced. That involves fossil fuels. The US has an explicit strategy of growing the population every year. That is a strategy that eventually leads to famine. Pointing out that global warning might lead to famine is less scary than pointing out that business as usual certainly leads to one - the poulation of the US doubled since 1950 and that is equivalent to halving the food production per person. In fact, letting natural population decline take hold would solve both problems and let the smaller population enjoy higher living standards. > Let's say that India faces the same problem - that's a nuclear armed state. How does that play out? They're switching over to industrial farming as far as I'm aware, they're probably going to be fine. Eg, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agriculture_in_India https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agriculture_in_India looks like a 50% reduction in farmland would knock them back to 90s levels of production efficiency, and they were mostly ok in the 90s. That is value not calories though, doing a precise estimate is probably more than I can manage for a comment. > Remember the power outage in Texas? Civilisation in Texas didn't get anywhere near to a collapse. I'm no expert on 450CE Rome, but from what I do know it looked nothing like modern Texas. I wish I could trade for problems like that and enjoy Texan electricity prices. I don't mind having to be ready for an emergency, that is already something that I need to do. Texas got a good deal on that one. --- I want to stress here that I'm on board with the idea that these are all catastrophic risks that could end badly. But that is business as usual for humanity, we ignore a lot of catastrophic risks on an average day. These are all things we've faced before and faced anyway without the climate changing at all. Cheap energy is the best bet to manage those risks and turning away from it is madness.
jrowen 1y ago
I mean, I was asking you to supply the "what happens then" part. That's my point, most doom prophecies seem to take the form of: 1. Scary event 2. ??? 3. Collapse I think it does just kind of come down to an innate optimism vs. pessimism. Nobody really knows how any given scenario plays out, it's too complex to predict and could hinge on some tiny little detail or singular event. I look at the Texas thing, or Covid, as evidence of, no big deal, we kept on truckin, pretty much business as usual. What was the cause of the agricultural issues? How do we know there isn't a solution? We do rationing, we curb new births, we find alternate ways to produce, we optimize the system that was lazy when there was excess, we mobilize everything we have to solve the problem. Yeah it becomes kind of a wartime effort, things aren't exactly 100% as they were, but cultural expectations normalize and adapt and go in new directions. Sometimes it just feels like a fear of change, of the unknown, if you ask anyone today yeah they would not choose to give this and that up but when necessity calls for it you adapt pretty quickly. I still don't see how we get from "food is more scarce right now" to "state apparatus falls apart." And just to be clear, I am all for efforts to prevent these outcomes. I'm not saying fuck it who cares. I'm just saying fear is the mind-killer.
- M95D 1y ago
  There is no 2. There is: 1. Scary events (plural) 2. Collapse > What was the cause of the agricultural issues? Weather. Possibly weather + water. > How do we know there isn't a solution? There is, we can't afford it: Hurricane-proof greenhouses for all crops everywhere. > We do rationing, we curb new births, How? Like managing COVID, only for food and sex this time? OMG! You'll have civil war in every city, town and village, which will cripple production even further => faster collapse. > we find alternate ways to produce Yeah, it's called subsistence agriculture [1] after 99% of the population dies of famine and crime (killed for their food). > we optimize the system [...] What system? There is no system anymore. > we mobilize everything we have to solve the problem Guns, we mobilize lots of guns. Those damned farmers won't work hard enough! We'll make them work! Let me paint a more clear picture: Adverse weather events => lots of crops destroyed => news inflated scary, as they usually are => huge price increase even before harvest time (of what remains) => hoarding => less food to buy, even higher prices => more news => desperate hoarding => even less food to buy => crime for food from warehouses/stores => even less food to buy => crime for hoarded food => people killed => more scary news (for real this time) => cities run out of food => mass migration from cities to farm country => pillaging of remaining crops, harvest by non-farmers in destructive/wasteful ways => even less food => even more desperate crime for food => mass death Somewhere in that chain, the army intervenes, which hoard food for themselves first, are unable to manage efficient distribution of food to everyone, kill and get killed by hungry mobs => more death and news. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subsistence_agriculture https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subsistence_agriculture

roenxi 1y ago

> I mean for every two tons of produce we produce today, we produce one ton in this scenario. What do you think that looks like for our country? Well, the ~33% of food that gets wasted in the US would probably need to be handled a lot more carefully. Probably the obese people would need to eat less. And the strategy of growing the population every year through migration might need to be rethought if more farmland can't be found. Plus maybe there'd need to be more fertiliser produced. That involves fossil fuels. The US has an explicit strategy of growing the population every year. That is a strategy that eventually leads to famine. Pointing out that global warning might lead to famine is less scary than pointing out that business as usual certainly leads to one - the poulation of the US doubled since 1950 and that is equivalent to halving the food production per person. In fact, letting natural population decline take hold would solve both problems and let the smaller population enjoy higher living standards. > Let's say that India faces the same problem - that's a nuclear armed state. How does that play out? They're switching over to industrial farming as far as I'm aware, they're probably going to be fine. Eg, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agriculture_in_India https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agriculture_in_India looks like a 50% reduction in farmland would knock them back to 90s levels of production efficiency, and they were mostly ok in the 90s. That is value not calories though, doing a precise estimate is probably more than I can manage for a comment. > Remember the power outage in Texas? Civilisation in Texas didn't get anywhere near to a collapse. I'm no expert on 450CE Rome, but from what I do know it looked nothing like modern Texas. I wish I could trade for problems like that and enjoy Texan electricity prices. I don't mind having to be ready for an emergency, that is already something that I need to do. Texas got a good deal on that one. --- I want to stress here that I'm on board with the idea that these are all catastrophic risks that could end badly. But that is business as usual for humanity, we ignore a lot of catastrophic risks on an average day. These are all things we've faced before and faced anyway without the climate changing at all. Cheap energy is the best bet to manage those risks and turning away from it is madness.

jrowen 1y ago

I mean, I was asking you to supply the "what happens then" part. That's my point, most doom prophecies seem to take the form of: 1. Scary event 2. ??? 3. Collapse I think it does just kind of come down to an innate optimism vs. pessimism. Nobody really knows how any given scenario plays out, it's too complex to predict and could hinge on some tiny little detail or singular event. I look at the Texas thing, or Covid, as evidence of, no big deal, we kept on truckin, pretty much business as usual. What was the cause of the agricultural issues? How do we know there isn't a solution? We do rationing, we curb new births, we find alternate ways to produce, we optimize the system that was lazy when there was excess, we mobilize everything we have to solve the problem. Yeah it becomes kind of a wartime effort, things aren't exactly 100% as they were, but cultural expectations normalize and adapt and go in new directions. Sometimes it just feels like a fear of change, of the unknown, if you ask anyone today yeah they would not choose to give this and that up but when necessity calls for it you adapt pretty quickly. I still don't see how we get from "food is more scarce right now" to "state apparatus falls apart." And just to be clear, I am all for efforts to prevent these outcomes. I'm not saying fuck it who cares. I'm just saying fear is the mind-killer.

M95D 1y ago
There is no 2. There is: 1. Scary events (plural) 2. Collapse > What was the cause of the agricultural issues? Weather. Possibly weather + water. > How do we know there isn't a solution? There is, we can't afford it: Hurricane-proof greenhouses for all crops everywhere. > We do rationing, we curb new births, How? Like managing COVID, only for food and sex this time? OMG! You'll have civil war in every city, town and village, which will cripple production even further => faster collapse. > we find alternate ways to produce Yeah, it's called subsistence agriculture [1] after 99% of the population dies of famine and crime (killed for their food). > we optimize the system [...] What system? There is no system anymore. > we mobilize everything we have to solve the problem Guns, we mobilize lots of guns. Those damned farmers won't work hard enough! We'll make them work! Let me paint a more clear picture: Adverse weather events => lots of crops destroyed => news inflated scary, as they usually are => huge price increase even before harvest time (of what remains) => hoarding => less food to buy, even higher prices => more news => desperate hoarding => even less food to buy => crime for food from warehouses/stores => even less food to buy => crime for hoarded food => people killed => more scary news (for real this time) => cities run out of food => mass migration from cities to farm country => pillaging of remaining crops, harvest by non-farmers in destructive/wasteful ways => even less food => even more desperate crime for food => mass death Somewhere in that chain, the army intervenes, which hoard food for themselves first, are unable to manage efficient distribution of food to everyone, kill and get killed by hungry mobs => more death and news. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subsistence_agriculture https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subsistence_agriculture