This will be true until it isn't. Since supply is absolutely finite and EROEI declines over time (easy reserves are used first), fossil fuel extraction as a ge

This will be true until it isn't. Since supply is absolutely finite and EROEI declines over time (easy reserves are used first), fossil fuel extraction as a general economic phenomenon is basically a bubble. Bubbles have a way of going higher and further than anyone expects. As they do so, everyone gets their turn to look like a fool. Initially the bubble skeptics look like idiots and the believers are repeatedly proven right as the bubble builds and builds. Then the bubble pops and the situation inverts. When bubbles do pop they often do so rapidly and destructively. To the extent that our civilization is dependent upon fossil fuels, complex technological civilization is therefore also a bubble. I'm really surprised this doesn't scare the crap out of more people. It's really simple math and physics, and most of the people here have lived through two economic mega-bubbles so you all know what a bubble looks like. You've all seen how "it's different this time" until it isn't, and then crash. If we're still 80+% dependent upon fossil fuels and a real crash comes, this could be an extinction level event. It would likely trigger a global thermonuclear or biological war, since game theoretically the rational course of action would be to attempt to exterminate the rest of humanity as quickly as possible so you have some chance of survival in the face of a rapidly collapsing resource base. A likely scenario would be a brutal Darwinian war of all against all played out in a matter of years, and given our capacity for destruction it's possible that nobody would win. Slower but equally catastrophic scenarios are possible too. An oil crash could lead to immense expansion of the use of coal and coal-to-liquids technology, which would cause exponential increases in CO2 emissions per unit energy generated. As EROEI crashes, we just dig up exponentially increasing quantities of carbon since the net energy profit per unit is declining. If we think we have a carbon problem now, imagine the emission curve going hockey stick. This ends with planetary desertification, an anoxic event, or some kind of chaotic flip to a new ice age. This IMHO is the existential threat faced by humanity in the 21st century. Given the likelihood that similar deposits of easy energy are found elsewhere in the universe, I personally think this is a good candidate for one of the "great filters." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Filter https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Filter (I've speculated that the first great filter is warfare, the second is ecology, and the third is a non-expansionary planetary utopia -- leading to gradual disengagement, birth rate collapse, and fade to black. A pleasant extinction event if you will.)