So last week I finished The Post-American World and I have to say it was one of the best books I have ever read. Although relatively short at 259 pages, it is amazing the breadth of information he has managed to pack into it. I can’t remember another book where I found myself nodding in agreement to almost everything he said. I do have a problem with the title, though. It absolutely makes sense in the context of the book but I think it’s a little too inflammatory for those that aren’t familiar with his work and it will probably cause a fair amount of people to dismiss it as “just another anti-American book.” Really, it is anything but that. While he certainly doesn’t pull any punches in criticizing American blunders, he is also careful to point out the myriad of successes and instances where we’ve gotten an undeserved bad rep. Overall he presents a vision of a world where, yes, America will inevitably be stepping down from its role as the sole super-power but where we also have a very important new role to play and we will be instrumental in determining whether or not the age of globalization surges ahead smoothly or lurches forward unsteadily. In the analogy of the world as a corporation, we will be the Chairman of the Board. We wield the most power at the table, but we will no longer be able to unilaterally act without the cooperation of the rest of the Board of Directors.
Rather than expound on the subjects he talks about, I thought it would be better to give it to you in his own words, with some commentary from me after each quote.
On Terrorism
“Some Western leaders speak of a single Islamist movement – absurdly lumping together Chechen separatists in Russia, Pakistani-backed militants in India, Shiite warlords in Lebanon, and Sunni jihadists in Egypt. In fact, a shrewd strategist would emphasize that all these groups are distinct, with differing agendas, enemies, and friends. That would rob them of their claim to represent Islam. It would also describe them as they often are: small local gangs of misfits hoping to attract attention through nihilism and barbarism.”
This is such a great point. Even in anecdotal discussions with pretty well-informed people I have often heard (and been guilty of saying myself) things like “well, the Sunnis want this, and the Shiites want this” when the reality is far more complex. In the U.S. if someone were to make a statement that the KKK, the IRA, and pro-lifers that bomb abortion clinics were all the same because they are all radical Christian-based organizations, people would rightfully look at them like they were crazy. But far too often we are eager to group things together and gloss over all the extremely important complexities of the situation. We do so at our own peril.
“Here is the bottom line. In the six years since 9/11, Al-Qaeda Central – the group led by Osama Bin Laden and Ayman Zawahiri – has been unable to launch a major attack anywhere. It was a terrorist organization; it has become a communications company, producing the occasional videotape rather than actual terror. Jihad continues, but the jihadists have had to scatter, make do with smaller targets, and operate on a local level – usually through groups with almost no connection to Al Qaeda Central. And this improvised strategy has a crippling weakness: it kills locals, thus alienating ordinary Muslims. . . The minority that wants jihad is real, but it operates within societies where such activities are increasingly unpopular and irrelevant”
Now I’m sure a lot of people will see this as goading the terrorists but I think this is a far cry from Bush’s “Bring it on” from 2004. The most important thing, and the thing we need to improve the most upon in this country, is to keep the threat of terrorism in perspective. If you don’t like the above quote, consider this one: “Get on the damn elevator! Fly on the damn plane! Calculate the odds of being harmed by a terrorist! It’s still about as likely as being swept out to sea by a tidal wave.” That’s from John McCain’s book (Why Courage Matters, 2004). Fighting terrorism, like fighting crime, is an important part of any country’s safety. It should not, however, be dominating the political agenda.
The Effects of Terrorism on the Economy
“In the West, the effects of terrorism have diminished with each additional attack. After 9/11, global financial markets collapsed and did not return to 9/10 levels for 2 months. After the Madrid bombings in 2004, the Spanish market took a month to recover. After the London bombings in July 2005, British stocks were back to pre-bombing levels in 24 hours.”
As an economics geek, I find this kind of thing really interesting, and it is one of the things I have believed for a while. Since terrorism cannot kill the genocidal type numbers of a huge war, the only way it really succeeds is if it manages to create instability and fear within a population. That is why I was actually upset when, on the evening of 9/11, there was nothing to be found on the TV but WTC coverage. Certainly I don’t think that it wasn’t newsworthy, I just thought that the best response to the attack would have been a collective shrug where we get on with our lives. It bothered me that we kept saying “the terrorists failed” while all the while further solidifying that 9/11/01 will be a pivotal date etched into the history books. That’s what they wanted to do, and they succeeded. 9/11 should not be our date or our rallying cry. 9/11 is about a group of misguided extremists who decided to bring tragedy and destruction into the lives of innocent people. That’s their date. You know what our date is? 7/4. Always has been, and always should be. To quote The World is Flat, “we need to restore 9/11 to its rightful place on the calendar. The day after 9/10 and the day before 9/12.”
Climate Change
“Between 2006 and 2012, China and India will build 800 new coal-fired power plants – with combined CO2 emissions five times the total savings of the Kyoto accords.”
Again, this is all about perspective (though this time in the reverse). It’s all well and good for us Americans to switch to fluorescent lights and even drive our hybrid cars, but unless we are able to get China and India on board in the fight against climate change, it’s probably all moot. That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try, though.
American Hypocrisy
[This is Fareed quoting a Chinese government employee]“When you tell us that we support a dictatorship in Sudan to have access to its oil, what I want to say is ‘And how is that different from your support of a medieval monarchy in Saudi Arabia?’ We see the hypocrisy, we just don’t say anything, yet.”
Fareed expounds on this a lot in the book. Bush is fond of saying how much he loves democracy and condemns countries that support non-democratic regimes. Yet the rest of the world sees our relationships with countries like Saudi Arabia and Pakistan and our words seem very hollow. We consider those countries to be “exceptions”. But we either need to stop having our own exceptions or realize that other countries are entitled to their exceptions too and drop the empty rhetoric.
“On terrorism, both parties continue to speak in a language entirely designed for a domestic audience with no concern for the poisonous effect it has everywhere else.”
When our politicians fall all over themselves decrying this and that country and leader, it’s always with the mindset of how American voters will see the issue. But the rest of the world watches too, and it does not set the stage for very effective diplomatic relationships.
The Global Economy
“For all its abuses of power, the U.S. has been the creator and sustainer of the current order of open trade and democratic government – an order that has been benign and beneficial for the vast majority of humankind.”
“That is why it seems perfectly natural that the largest casino in the world has been built in Macao, China – and it is an imitation of St. Mark’s Square in Venice, which is itself strongly influenced by Moorish (Islamic) design. Is it Chinese, Western, Moorish, or modern? Probably all of the above.”
From the Pew Global Attitudes Survey – “Of the 47 countries polled, however, the one that came in dead last in terms of support for free trade was the US . . .We want the world to accept American companies with open arms, but when they come here – that’s a different matter.”
“Over the last 15 years the U.S. has placed sanctions on half the world’s population. We are the only country in the world to issue annual report cards on every other country’s behavior.”
“Generations from now, when historians write about these times, they might note that, in the early decades of the 21st century, the United States succeeded in its great and historic mission – it globalized the world. But along the way, they might write, it forgot to globalize itself.”
I don’t have a lot of comments on these individually, as I think they generally speak for themselves. I think together they paint a pretty good picture of the role the U.S. has had in shaping the current world and global economy we operate in, and also the challenges that we face in now needing to reshape the way we interact with this new world order.
Tuesday, May 27, 2008
Friday, May 23, 2008
One More Down, One Still Pending!
Well, my last post has confirmed what I’ve always thought: you get the most interest when you talk about sex or death (though, preferably not at the same time). In any case, I’m working on a couple more serious posts but hey, it’s Friday so let’s turn to some more fun stuff!
The big news from today is that at long last I finally found out one of my CPA scores (the Financial Reporting section) and I did indeed pass! Contrary to my other two exams, where I far exceeded the minimum passing score of 75 (87 on BEC and 91 on REG), this time I got through by the skin of my teeth with a 77. I like the way my co-worker put it when I told him this morning: “That just means you studied exactly the right amount.” Still waiting on the final section (Audit) but I am ecstatic that I will never need to study this Financial Reporting junk again. That was by far my weakest area and the one I was dreading the most going into this process. Even though it will suck if I have to retake Audit, I will appreciate the inherent irony that I have been an Auditor for 7 years and that might be the one section I don’t pass. More than anything, though, I just hope I find out sooner rather than later. With the holiday weekend upon us, I have the distinct feeling that if it isn’t posted today by 5 I won’t find out till Tuesday at the earliest.
Last night Christy and I got out to see the new Indiana Jones movie on opening night. Since I’m assuming most of you haven’t seen it yet but are planning to, I won’t give away any specifics and will just let you know my reaction to it. Overall, I was actually really impressed. My first thought as the credits rolled was “that was a far better job of preserving the legacy of a historic series than the new Star Wars films.” Everything about the film still *feels* like an Indiana Jones movie. The way it’s shot, written, acted, the action scenes, the sound effects, and even down to the Indy one-liners are all done pitch-perfect. They don’t shy away from the fact that he is a lot older than he was in the last one, and I’m glad for it. It does add a tinge of sadness to the whole proceedings, because where the other stories felt like we were seeing just one adventure in a long series that began long before and would continue long after, this one really feels like it is his last adventure and thus almost plays out like a long epilogue. But, hey, by all accounts it really IS the last adventure for him, so that feel is appropriate too. There are subtle and not-so-subtle nods to the previous films, but rather than seem contrived or superfluous they feel logical within the context of the story. It manages to exceed in walking a very tight line of invoking nostalgia while at the same time being an exciting new adventure in its own right. This is definitely a film I can see myself watching over and over again. The only complaint that, to me, really keeps it from being masterful is the ending. Again, I won’t give specifics, but I’ll just say that while I won’t go so far as to call it bad, I think underwhelming is a good descriptor. I think that’s partially a function of the fact that all 3 previous films managed to have unbelievably awesome endings. Seriously, the opening of the ark in Raiders, the mine cart race and rope bridge fight in Temple, and the trials and choosing the right grail in Crusade would all probably be in the top-50 most memorable scenes of all time. The end of this film will most definitely not be included there, but that’s ok. For me, it knocks it down from a 10 to a 9/10, but that’s still pretty impressive and a lot better than I was expecting. I was also trying to think of where this film ranks out of the four films and you know what? I can’t do it; because I actually can’t rank the other three either. Depending on the day, I can make an argument that any of the other three are my favorite. The only things I can say definitively is that on no day is Raiders my least favorite, and on no day will the Crystal Skull be my favorite. Everything else is up for grabs though.
This is Captain Tollway, the new mascot for the Illinois er . . . tollway I guess. For the moment I am going to bypass the inherent ridiculousness of having a mascot for tolls (what’s next? Taxy the IRS mascot who looks like a cab?) and just concentrate on the absolute absurdity of the appearance of this particular one. First of all, why are only his lower teeth showing and why exactly is his lower jaw three times the size of the top of his head? Second, I question the decision to give him the Cameron Diaz There’s Something About Mary hair. I also don’t understand why his knees curve inward instead of out, and I am moderately disturbed by the sharp, triangular (possibly cancerous) growths protruding from both biceps. All that being said, I can’t wait to pick up my free Captain Tollway coloring book and crayons! Yes, that’s our tax dollars at work.
Finally today, I’ve come up with an idea for some group participation (no, not that; get your minds out of the gutter people). Since there seems to be a fair amount of opinionated people that read this, I thought it might be neat to do a sort of “round table” discussion. I’ve seen this done on some other sites (mainly sports blogs) and I thought it was pretty cool. Basically, I’ll come up with a list of topical questions (maybe 5 or 6) and me and 3 other people will provide short (~100-200 word) answers to them. It’s basically meant to simulate if we were all on one of those Sunday morning talk shows (or discussing over a few beers at a bar). Anyway, let me know if you are interested in participating. Not sure how many people will be, but to keep it fair if I get a lot of volunteers I’ll just take the first 3 I get. I haven’t even started to put together questions yet, but I’m thinking I’ll do that in the next week, send them out, and then give another week to get everyone’s response. I vow to reprint your responses exactly as I receive them (typos and all); no censorship of any kind. Anyway, let me know if you want to participate.
OK, I think that’s all for today. Monday or Tuesday I will post my comprehensive review of Fareed Zakaria’s The Post-American World, complete with a ton of quotes from the book that I think are awesome (hopefully I don’t get sued).
Have a good holiday weekend everyone!
The big news from today is that at long last I finally found out one of my CPA scores (the Financial Reporting section) and I did indeed pass! Contrary to my other two exams, where I far exceeded the minimum passing score of 75 (87 on BEC and 91 on REG), this time I got through by the skin of my teeth with a 77. I like the way my co-worker put it when I told him this morning: “That just means you studied exactly the right amount.” Still waiting on the final section (Audit) but I am ecstatic that I will never need to study this Financial Reporting junk again. That was by far my weakest area and the one I was dreading the most going into this process. Even though it will suck if I have to retake Audit, I will appreciate the inherent irony that I have been an Auditor for 7 years and that might be the one section I don’t pass. More than anything, though, I just hope I find out sooner rather than later. With the holiday weekend upon us, I have the distinct feeling that if it isn’t posted today by 5 I won’t find out till Tuesday at the earliest.
Last night Christy and I got out to see the new Indiana Jones movie on opening night. Since I’m assuming most of you haven’t seen it yet but are planning to, I won’t give away any specifics and will just let you know my reaction to it. Overall, I was actually really impressed. My first thought as the credits rolled was “that was a far better job of preserving the legacy of a historic series than the new Star Wars films.” Everything about the film still *feels* like an Indiana Jones movie. The way it’s shot, written, acted, the action scenes, the sound effects, and even down to the Indy one-liners are all done pitch-perfect. They don’t shy away from the fact that he is a lot older than he was in the last one, and I’m glad for it. It does add a tinge of sadness to the whole proceedings, because where the other stories felt like we were seeing just one adventure in a long series that began long before and would continue long after, this one really feels like it is his last adventure and thus almost plays out like a long epilogue. But, hey, by all accounts it really IS the last adventure for him, so that feel is appropriate too. There are subtle and not-so-subtle nods to the previous films, but rather than seem contrived or superfluous they feel logical within the context of the story. It manages to exceed in walking a very tight line of invoking nostalgia while at the same time being an exciting new adventure in its own right. This is definitely a film I can see myself watching over and over again. The only complaint that, to me, really keeps it from being masterful is the ending. Again, I won’t give specifics, but I’ll just say that while I won’t go so far as to call it bad, I think underwhelming is a good descriptor. I think that’s partially a function of the fact that all 3 previous films managed to have unbelievably awesome endings. Seriously, the opening of the ark in Raiders, the mine cart race and rope bridge fight in Temple, and the trials and choosing the right grail in Crusade would all probably be in the top-50 most memorable scenes of all time. The end of this film will most definitely not be included there, but that’s ok. For me, it knocks it down from a 10 to a 9/10, but that’s still pretty impressive and a lot better than I was expecting. I was also trying to think of where this film ranks out of the four films and you know what? I can’t do it; because I actually can’t rank the other three either. Depending on the day, I can make an argument that any of the other three are my favorite. The only things I can say definitively is that on no day is Raiders my least favorite, and on no day will the Crystal Skull be my favorite. Everything else is up for grabs though.
This is Captain Tollway, the new mascot for the Illinois er . . . tollway I guess. For the moment I am going to bypass the inherent ridiculousness of having a mascot for tolls (what’s next? Taxy the IRS mascot who looks like a cab?) and just concentrate on the absolute absurdity of the appearance of this particular one. First of all, why are only his lower teeth showing and why exactly is his lower jaw three times the size of the top of his head? Second, I question the decision to give him the Cameron Diaz There’s Something About Mary hair. I also don’t understand why his knees curve inward instead of out, and I am moderately disturbed by the sharp, triangular (possibly cancerous) growths protruding from both biceps. All that being said, I can’t wait to pick up my free Captain Tollway coloring book and crayons! Yes, that’s our tax dollars at work.
Finally today, I’ve come up with an idea for some group participation (no, not that; get your minds out of the gutter people). Since there seems to be a fair amount of opinionated people that read this, I thought it might be neat to do a sort of “round table” discussion. I’ve seen this done on some other sites (mainly sports blogs) and I thought it was pretty cool. Basically, I’ll come up with a list of topical questions (maybe 5 or 6) and me and 3 other people will provide short (~100-200 word) answers to them. It’s basically meant to simulate if we were all on one of those Sunday morning talk shows (or discussing over a few beers at a bar). Anyway, let me know if you are interested in participating. Not sure how many people will be, but to keep it fair if I get a lot of volunteers I’ll just take the first 3 I get. I haven’t even started to put together questions yet, but I’m thinking I’ll do that in the next week, send them out, and then give another week to get everyone’s response. I vow to reprint your responses exactly as I receive them (typos and all); no censorship of any kind. Anyway, let me know if you want to participate.
OK, I think that’s all for today. Monday or Tuesday I will post my comprehensive review of Fareed Zakaria’s The Post-American World, complete with a ton of quotes from the book that I think are awesome (hopefully I don’t get sued).
Have a good holiday weekend everyone!
Wednesday, May 21, 2008
An Argument Against Capital Punishment
OK, so usually even in my political posts I try to inject a little bit of humor there. After rereading this one, I realize that it is an exception. So, sorry, but this is one that will be all serious.
This is a topic I’ve had a lot of thoughts about over the last year and since I just read an article related to it I thought it would be a good time to bring it up. CNN is currently running a series of articles on DNA exonerations in the Dallas, TX area. To date, 17 people in the Dallas area (and, according to The Innocence Project, 216 nationwide) have been freed due to DNA evidence which has come to light since their incarceration. The latest is a man (James Woodward) who spent 27 years in prison for a murder he didn’t commit. While he will never get those 27 years of his life back, one of my favorite expressions applies here; things can always be worse. He could have been executed.
I suppose one of the reasons this issue has been on my mind is that it’s only been in the last year that I’ve changed my mind about it. Prior to that, I was firmly in the pro death-penalty camp. Largely my rationale was consistent with a conservative, Ayn Rand line of thinking where I was not in favor of using taxpayer money to support the lowest dregs of society. In many ways, I still believe that. However, I heard an argument on Penn and Teller’s Bullshit! that, try as I might I cannot refute.
Essentially, it boils down to an issue called the “paradox of the death penalty.” It means that if you believe that people responsible for murder deserve to be put to death then you are forced to believe that no innocent person has ever been falsely convicted and put to death. Otherwise you, as a member of a society that kills people, are responsible for the death of an innocent and therefore you yourself deserve to be put to death. While that may seem like academic rhetoric, I think it’s a very powerful point. How can you possibly support a policy where it is known that it will result in the death of the innocent?
Well, I guess I always knew that theoretically some people were imprisoned wrongfully. But seeing ironclad proof of it, as has been the situation with these DNA cases, is something else entirely. One of the scariest things about the James Woodard case is that he happened to be “lucky” enough to be convicted in a county that has evidence preservation laws. Had he not been, all the DNA evidence would have been destroyed long ago and he would still be in jail today. How many hundreds of other people does that apply to sitting in prison today? How many does it apply to that have been executed? We’ll never know the answer to either of these, and that’s what is so disturbing. The other thing that is just as frightening in his case is that it appears that during his original trial the police didn’t follow-up on several key leads and the prosecution apparently didn’t share information they were legally obligated to. The fact that this did not appear to even come up or factor in any of his appeals cases is further evidence of the fallibility of our legal system and further strengthens my case.
One of the counter arguments is that these anomalies represent “collateral damage.” The injustice done to a few individuals is minor when compared to the increase in safety to the public from ridding the world of dangerous and deranged criminals. After all, whenever the military engages in struggles there will inevitably be civilian casualties. Doesn’t following my logic indicate that I must believe all military action is immoral as well?
I would counter that military action, when properly used, is supposed to be a last resort. The wielding of death and destruction is meant to be used when there is no other option available. And that is the key: the lack of other options. With the death penalty, there is another option. And that option is locking criminals up and keeping them segregated from the general populace for the rest of their lives. True, it does not eliminate the injustice of imprisoning an innocent, and it is also true that it means that public money must be used to support them. All I can say is that sometimes you do have to choose the least worst option, and I believe that this is it.
I suppose it comes down to a fundamental question: are you willing to financially support 99% of people convicted of the most heinous crimes imaginable in order to avoid killing the 1% that were falsely convicted?
This is a topic I’ve had a lot of thoughts about over the last year and since I just read an article related to it I thought it would be a good time to bring it up. CNN is currently running a series of articles on DNA exonerations in the Dallas, TX area. To date, 17 people in the Dallas area (and, according to The Innocence Project, 216 nationwide) have been freed due to DNA evidence which has come to light since their incarceration. The latest is a man (James Woodward) who spent 27 years in prison for a murder he didn’t commit. While he will never get those 27 years of his life back, one of my favorite expressions applies here; things can always be worse. He could have been executed.
I suppose one of the reasons this issue has been on my mind is that it’s only been in the last year that I’ve changed my mind about it. Prior to that, I was firmly in the pro death-penalty camp. Largely my rationale was consistent with a conservative, Ayn Rand line of thinking where I was not in favor of using taxpayer money to support the lowest dregs of society. In many ways, I still believe that. However, I heard an argument on Penn and Teller’s Bullshit! that, try as I might I cannot refute.
Essentially, it boils down to an issue called the “paradox of the death penalty.” It means that if you believe that people responsible for murder deserve to be put to death then you are forced to believe that no innocent person has ever been falsely convicted and put to death. Otherwise you, as a member of a society that kills people, are responsible for the death of an innocent and therefore you yourself deserve to be put to death. While that may seem like academic rhetoric, I think it’s a very powerful point. How can you possibly support a policy where it is known that it will result in the death of the innocent?
Well, I guess I always knew that theoretically some people were imprisoned wrongfully. But seeing ironclad proof of it, as has been the situation with these DNA cases, is something else entirely. One of the scariest things about the James Woodard case is that he happened to be “lucky” enough to be convicted in a county that has evidence preservation laws. Had he not been, all the DNA evidence would have been destroyed long ago and he would still be in jail today. How many hundreds of other people does that apply to sitting in prison today? How many does it apply to that have been executed? We’ll never know the answer to either of these, and that’s what is so disturbing. The other thing that is just as frightening in his case is that it appears that during his original trial the police didn’t follow-up on several key leads and the prosecution apparently didn’t share information they were legally obligated to. The fact that this did not appear to even come up or factor in any of his appeals cases is further evidence of the fallibility of our legal system and further strengthens my case.
One of the counter arguments is that these anomalies represent “collateral damage.” The injustice done to a few individuals is minor when compared to the increase in safety to the public from ridding the world of dangerous and deranged criminals. After all, whenever the military engages in struggles there will inevitably be civilian casualties. Doesn’t following my logic indicate that I must believe all military action is immoral as well?
I would counter that military action, when properly used, is supposed to be a last resort. The wielding of death and destruction is meant to be used when there is no other option available. And that is the key: the lack of other options. With the death penalty, there is another option. And that option is locking criminals up and keeping them segregated from the general populace for the rest of their lives. True, it does not eliminate the injustice of imprisoning an innocent, and it is also true that it means that public money must be used to support them. All I can say is that sometimes you do have to choose the least worst option, and I believe that this is it.
I suppose it comes down to a fundamental question: are you willing to financially support 99% of people convicted of the most heinous crimes imaginable in order to avoid killing the 1% that were falsely convicted?
Friday, May 16, 2008
Is it the end, the beginning of the end, or just the end of the beginning?
One of the classes I never thought I'd take but was really glad I did in undergrad was Nuclear Engineering 100. I knew it was going to be a good class right away when the professor said on day 1: "I can't promise anything, but I try to blow up at least one thing during every class period." The thing I learned that was most interesting to me at the time was how to make a still (sadly, I have never put this knowledge into practice). I also got to do a presentation on how rockets work, a topic I picked for the sole reason that I wanted to use the headline "This IS Rocket Science". However, the most interesting thing I learned that has stuck with me was an analysis of the different forms of energy production and some speculation on what the near and long term future might look like. Among the things I learned: nuclear power plants aren't nearly as dangerous as they are perceived (not surprising coming from a class called Nuclear Engineering), solar power is good on a micro level but is unlikely to ever make up more than a minor portion of our power needs, coal is just about the worst possible way to generate power, and finally that the end of the oil age was coming a lot sooner than most people expected.
I remember very clearly the day we discussed oil, because I was completely taken aback by the figure presented to me. According to the latest estimates, at present consumption levels it was projected that there was approximately 60 years left of oil in the world. This included ~40 years from sources that we knew about, and a best guess of another 20 that were either undiscovered or to this point impossible to drill for (i.e. underneath the ocean floor). This was in the spring of 2000 that I was told this, and I just remember thinking "wow; we're talking about 2060 here. If I just slightly beat the national average lifespan we're talking about my lifetime here." But that was 8 years ago; a veritable eternity in terms of scientific progress. In addition, that was based on 2000 consumption levels, and with China and India on the rise that has increased markedly since then. So, I figured that this would be a good time to revisit this. Just how much oil is left in the world?
Well, to the surprise of probably no one, the answer is that no one really knows. I have tried to track down some hard numbers but all you really ever get from anyone is a range. So, I will go ahead and do what I was trying to avoid: use wikipedia for some quick, back-of-the-envelope type calcs. For the record, though, the other sources I consulted (which included American Theocracy by Kevin Phillips, Collapse by Jared Diamond, and The Weather Makers by Tim Flannery) also pretty much support the numbers in wikipedia.
Essentially, there are 2 problems that make calculating a hard number difficult and they have to do with the concept of "peak" oil and the rate of discovery. A good definition of the "peak" concept comes from American Theocracy: "Geologists define it as the point at which at least half of the field's reachable oil has been extracted. After this stage, getting each barrel out requires more pressure, more expense, or both. After a while . . . more energy is required to find and extract a barrel of oil than the barrel itself contains. By then, production becomes uneconomic - at least until the price of oil rises or the cost of extraction drops." This explanation is used to describe one particular oil field but can be expanded to discuss all oil in aggregate. Over the years, there have been numerous attempts to try and calculate the point when the world will hit "peak" oil production, and of course all of them have been wrong so far. A big part of the problem is that many of the world's largest oil fields are government-owned, and by and large these governments do not have an open-book philosophy on the data from these fields. As a consequence, we're left to largely speculate. Pessimistic projections say that oil may have already peaked or will in the next couple years, and very optimistic projections say it won't peak until 2050. The year 2030 is probably cited the most often and I imagine it is not just coincidental that it is around the mid-point of the divergent opinions. Obviously, the difference between oil peaking next year versus oil peaking over 40 years from now has tremendous implications on how urgent the situation is.
The other issue that is very speculative and causes significant variance in the overall oil supply number is the discovery rate. As the name implies, this is the measure for how often either previously unknown sites are discovered or where previously unextractable oil becomes feasible. Here again, depending on what you project the discovery rate to be has huge implications on the ultimate oil supply number.
So, with all this uncertainty, what's the bottom line? Basically, we get a huge range: between 2 and 3 trillion barrels of oil. The 2 trillion number represents the average finding of major oil surveys done since 1960. The 3 trillion estimate comes from a 2000 USGS survey. I would classify the 2 trillion estimate as generally realistic with a tinge of pessimism while the 3 trillion estimate is more on the side of wild optimism. This is because the worldwide discovery rate has been steadily falling since 1960 and the 3 trillion estimate counts on the discovery rate to suddenly and dramatically reverse itself. That seems unlikely, but of course that doesn't mean it won't happen. It should be noted, however, that the trend of falling discovery rates has continued in the 8 years since the USGS released their report.
So, if we agree that the actual amount of oil in the world lies between those two numbers, what does that mean in terms of years of oil left? Here again, we will have to make some assumptions about projected future use, but at least we have solid data on the current usage. Right now, world oil consumption from 2007 was just over 85 million barrels of oil per day. That translates into just over 31 billion barrels per year (these figures come from the US Energy Information Administration: http://www.eia.doe.gov/steo). If we apply just the current consumption to our range of estimates that works out to about 65 years (for 2 trillion barrels) and 97 years (for 3 trillion barrels). However, that figure is not very realistic since oil consumption has risen markedly from a little over 27 billion barrels per year in 2000 to the current 31 billion. That's almost a 15% increase in just 8 years. The EIA further projects global oil usage to rise by 1.2 million barrels per day in both 2008 and 2009, leading to annual global oil usage of over 32 billion by the end of 2009. Obviously the farther we get out from here, the fuzzier the numbers get. Just for the sake of simple math, lets assume that we rise to the level of 35 billion barrels per year and then level off (this seems likely to be a vast underestimate given the recent growth of China and India that shows no signs of abating soon). This gives us projections of 57 and 85 years, respectively.
So; all in all I'd have to say that the estimate of 60 years given to me back in Nuc E 100 seems to be just about right. Even though there is obviously all sorts of assumptions being made in the above calculations, there is one truth that is inescapably clear: the age of oil is ending, and faster than most people realize. Of course, I don't really think we will physically run out of oil. I have tried to phrase this analysis in isolation of the problem of climate change, but of course in reality they are inexorably linked. We cannot burn another 2 trillion barrels of oil over the next 60 years without disastrous environmental consequences. That is why it was nice to see McCain talk about attacking climate change earlier this week. The Democrats countered (with some justification) that it is just empty rhetoric, but given that even the rhetoric has been sorely lacking from the right even empty rhetoric still represents progress.
In summary, I hope if nothing else this clarifies my statement that I believe gas at $10/gallon would be a good thing. Both the climate change and oil problems can be likened to riding on a train that is heading for a ravine where the bridge is out. Maybe the ravine is still hundreds of miles away, but it is inescapable that if we continue on the present course we are assuring our destruction. In that context, I am in favor of anything that moves us towards stopping the train as quickly as possible. All other considerations (economic and political) are important but decidedly secondary.
I remember very clearly the day we discussed oil, because I was completely taken aback by the figure presented to me. According to the latest estimates, at present consumption levels it was projected that there was approximately 60 years left of oil in the world. This included ~40 years from sources that we knew about, and a best guess of another 20 that were either undiscovered or to this point impossible to drill for (i.e. underneath the ocean floor). This was in the spring of 2000 that I was told this, and I just remember thinking "wow; we're talking about 2060 here. If I just slightly beat the national average lifespan we're talking about my lifetime here." But that was 8 years ago; a veritable eternity in terms of scientific progress. In addition, that was based on 2000 consumption levels, and with China and India on the rise that has increased markedly since then. So, I figured that this would be a good time to revisit this. Just how much oil is left in the world?
Well, to the surprise of probably no one, the answer is that no one really knows. I have tried to track down some hard numbers but all you really ever get from anyone is a range. So, I will go ahead and do what I was trying to avoid: use wikipedia for some quick, back-of-the-envelope type calcs. For the record, though, the other sources I consulted (which included American Theocracy by Kevin Phillips, Collapse by Jared Diamond, and The Weather Makers by Tim Flannery) also pretty much support the numbers in wikipedia.
Essentially, there are 2 problems that make calculating a hard number difficult and they have to do with the concept of "peak" oil and the rate of discovery. A good definition of the "peak" concept comes from American Theocracy: "Geologists define it as the point at which at least half of the field's reachable oil has been extracted. After this stage, getting each barrel out requires more pressure, more expense, or both. After a while . . . more energy is required to find and extract a barrel of oil than the barrel itself contains. By then, production becomes uneconomic - at least until the price of oil rises or the cost of extraction drops." This explanation is used to describe one particular oil field but can be expanded to discuss all oil in aggregate. Over the years, there have been numerous attempts to try and calculate the point when the world will hit "peak" oil production, and of course all of them have been wrong so far. A big part of the problem is that many of the world's largest oil fields are government-owned, and by and large these governments do not have an open-book philosophy on the data from these fields. As a consequence, we're left to largely speculate. Pessimistic projections say that oil may have already peaked or will in the next couple years, and very optimistic projections say it won't peak until 2050. The year 2030 is probably cited the most often and I imagine it is not just coincidental that it is around the mid-point of the divergent opinions. Obviously, the difference between oil peaking next year versus oil peaking over 40 years from now has tremendous implications on how urgent the situation is.
The other issue that is very speculative and causes significant variance in the overall oil supply number is the discovery rate. As the name implies, this is the measure for how often either previously unknown sites are discovered or where previously unextractable oil becomes feasible. Here again, depending on what you project the discovery rate to be has huge implications on the ultimate oil supply number.
So, with all this uncertainty, what's the bottom line? Basically, we get a huge range: between 2 and 3 trillion barrels of oil. The 2 trillion number represents the average finding of major oil surveys done since 1960. The 3 trillion estimate comes from a 2000 USGS survey. I would classify the 2 trillion estimate as generally realistic with a tinge of pessimism while the 3 trillion estimate is more on the side of wild optimism. This is because the worldwide discovery rate has been steadily falling since 1960 and the 3 trillion estimate counts on the discovery rate to suddenly and dramatically reverse itself. That seems unlikely, but of course that doesn't mean it won't happen. It should be noted, however, that the trend of falling discovery rates has continued in the 8 years since the USGS released their report.
So, if we agree that the actual amount of oil in the world lies between those two numbers, what does that mean in terms of years of oil left? Here again, we will have to make some assumptions about projected future use, but at least we have solid data on the current usage. Right now, world oil consumption from 2007 was just over 85 million barrels of oil per day. That translates into just over 31 billion barrels per year (these figures come from the US Energy Information Administration: http://www.eia.doe.gov/steo). If we apply just the current consumption to our range of estimates that works out to about 65 years (for 2 trillion barrels) and 97 years (for 3 trillion barrels). However, that figure is not very realistic since oil consumption has risen markedly from a little over 27 billion barrels per year in 2000 to the current 31 billion. That's almost a 15% increase in just 8 years. The EIA further projects global oil usage to rise by 1.2 million barrels per day in both 2008 and 2009, leading to annual global oil usage of over 32 billion by the end of 2009. Obviously the farther we get out from here, the fuzzier the numbers get. Just for the sake of simple math, lets assume that we rise to the level of 35 billion barrels per year and then level off (this seems likely to be a vast underestimate given the recent growth of China and India that shows no signs of abating soon). This gives us projections of 57 and 85 years, respectively.
So; all in all I'd have to say that the estimate of 60 years given to me back in Nuc E 100 seems to be just about right. Even though there is obviously all sorts of assumptions being made in the above calculations, there is one truth that is inescapably clear: the age of oil is ending, and faster than most people realize. Of course, I don't really think we will physically run out of oil. I have tried to phrase this analysis in isolation of the problem of climate change, but of course in reality they are inexorably linked. We cannot burn another 2 trillion barrels of oil over the next 60 years without disastrous environmental consequences. That is why it was nice to see McCain talk about attacking climate change earlier this week. The Democrats countered (with some justification) that it is just empty rhetoric, but given that even the rhetoric has been sorely lacking from the right even empty rhetoric still represents progress.
In summary, I hope if nothing else this clarifies my statement that I believe gas at $10/gallon would be a good thing. Both the climate change and oil problems can be likened to riding on a train that is heading for a ravine where the bridge is out. Maybe the ravine is still hundreds of miles away, but it is inescapable that if we continue on the present course we are assuring our destruction. In that context, I am in favor of anything that moves us towards stopping the train as quickly as possible. All other considerations (economic and political) are important but decidedly secondary.
Friday, May 09, 2008
Back to Some Random Thoughts
While I am still researching the question of how much oil is left on the planet (I've got some rough estimates but they are from wikipedia and I'd like to get some more solid sources) there are a whole bunch of other thoughts I've had over the past couple of days.
The Summer Movie Season
The Summer Movie Season
Last year's summer movie season was touted as "The Summer of Sequels" and it certainly lived up to that name. Of the 16 summer movies that made over $100 million, 12 of them were either direct sequels, remakes, or were based on long-running tv shows (in other words, they were not original works). This included Spider-Man 3, Shrek the Third, Transformers, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, The Bourne Ultimatum, The Simpsons Movie, Rush Hour 3, Live Free or Die Hard, Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer, Evan Almighty, and Hairspray. If you're curious, the 4 that did represent "original" works were Ratatouille, Superbad, I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry, and Knocked Up. I have nothing specifically against sequels, and I will admit that I have seen all but 3 of the previously mentioned films (Evan Almighty, Hairspray, and Harry Potter because that was the one book in the series I hated). I figured if Hollywood was going to advertise it as "Summer of the Sequel", that must mean it was a rare, near fluke occurrence that all these just happened to come out in one summer. Well, now here we are heading into the next summer and, appropriately, this looks to be "Summer of the Sequel II: Even Sequelier" (or "Sequel Harder" if you are a Kevin Smith or Die Hard fan). This summer we get: Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, The Incredible Hulk, Speed Racer, Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian, Sex and the City, Get Smart, Hellboy 2, The Dark Knight, X-Files 2, and The Mummy 3. Even one of the "original" works is Iron Man and considering it's the umpteenth summer superhero movie and is based on a 45-year old comic book character I'm not sure how "original" you can claim it is. Balanced against that, I could only find 7 other likely hits coming out this summer (Kung-Fu Panda, You Don't Mess With the Zoltan, The Happening, Hancock, Step Brothers, Pineapple Express, and Tropic Thunder).
I remember in 1997 when I heard that the movie Good Burger had just been released I asked "Has Hollywood just completely run out of ideas?" And now I ask the same question again. Unfortunately, the answer is actually worse than that. Now moreso than ever, big studios are hesitant to dump big money into something that may turn into a colossal failure. It doesn't take many Waterworlds to make you gunshy. At the same time, executives hold on with an icy death grip the rights to any film that ends up profitable and has any form of sequel potential (i.e. every film in the eyes of studio execs). Maybe it was just my perception, but it used to be that you made a movie and if it turned out to be a success, you'd see if maybe you could get everyone back together and catch lightning in a bottle again. Sequels were the exception. Now, they are the rule. Almost every major film and tv deal has a clause locking them up for a number of sequels just on the off chance the studio decides it wants to make them. This becomes particularly frustrating for fans of a show like Firefly that was cancelled by Fox after 6 episodes; yet they own the rights to it for 10 years. Thus even if a network like Sci-Fi wanted to pick it up, they can't because Fox would rather see the show dead than have it become a hit somewhere else and make them look stupid(er). Fortunately, at the same time all this is happening in the major studios, technology has progressed to the point where really high quality films can be made for progressively cheaper and as a result we are seeing some of the best independent films ever made. The only problem is that unless you are a hardcore film geek (like me) you aren't seeing any advertising for them and you probably don't even know that they exist.
And now, just to undercut everything I've just said, I've heard that Iron Man is really good and I'm excited to go see it this weekend.
Obamania!
Well, Indiana couldn't quite come through for me with a Barrack victory, but the result is much the same and the race is, for all intents and purposes, over. A lot of people are wondering why Clinton hasn't already dropped out. There's actually a couple legitimate reasons why she hasn't (well, one legitimate, and one selfish). The selfish reason is that she loaned her campaign over $11 million, and if she drops out now it's all a complete loss. She's in a position now where she can continue to raise money and not have to spend a lot since she's heavily favored in both West Virginia and Kentucky and they are small media markets anyway. The hope on her part will be that after 2 weeks she will have enough campaign cash to pay herself back. Let me just add that even though I said this was selfish I don't blame her. $11 million is a lot to eat, even for millionaires like the Clinton family. The legitimate reason for her to stay in the race is, ironically, as a courtesy to Obama. Much like it was a little embarassing for McCain when Huckabee kept winning southern states after the race was over, it would be embarassing to Obama to still lose West Virginia and Kentucky with Clinton gone (which he still would). With her still as a candidate, she can give one more victory speech next Tuesday in West Virginia (which should also help fundraising) and then go out on a semi-high note the following Tuesday when they split Kentucky and Oregon on May 20th. May 20th is really the key date here, because that will be the day that Obama is projected to go over the halfway mark of all delegates (pledged and super), thus finally making it mathematically impossible for her to catch him. Hence, we should be looking towards the evening of May 20th or the afternoon of May 21st for her to officially withdraw from the race. The only possible reason she would have to stay in after that point is to make good on her commitment to make sure Michigan and Florida delegates are seated (which they will be regardless, now that it won't matter). That meeting occurs on May 31st. Well, I guess there's another reason she could choose to stay in after that: just to be a bitch.
So now that the field looks to be officially set for November, the next question will be who the VP picks will be. I have absolutely no idea who McCain is going to pick. The hip pick of the moment from pundits is Condoleeza Rice, which would make sense in a weird sort of way, but I don't see it happening just because it gives the Democrats way too much fuel to continue to hammer that McCain represents "a 3rd term of George Bush". On the Obama side, though, I see a clear front runner, and it's Pennsylvania governor Ed Rendell. It makes a ton of sense to me (much moreso than the "dream ticket" of Obama-Clinton) but rather than expound on the reasons, since I'm getting long-winded anyway, the reasons are laid out very nicely in this article (http://tinyurl.com/69xyq6) so you can read it if you are interested.
Also, just to finish my thoughts on the Democratic primary, there is a good article describing the mistakes that Clinton made here: http://tinyurl.com/3za5nd. Nothing mind-blowing here, but it's a good summation.
Books
As I mentioned before, one of the things I was most looking forward to after being done with the CPA was getting back to reading. In the last 2 weeks I've finished two books, and they were both excellent. The first was The Teapot Dome Scandal by Laton McCartney. It is a fascinating true story about a political scandal that most people only know by name. It is about how Big Oil literally bought the Republican nomination for Warren Harding in exchange for an agreement that he would make one of their people Secretary of the Interior, who would in turn open up the Teapot Dome oil fields (they were naval reserves at the time) for private drilling. It is all the old-time, smoke-filled room, underhanded bribes with stacks of money in suitcases changing hands that people imagine when they thing corrupt politics. One of the most amazing things comes right at the beginning. At the 1920 Republican convention, the clear favorite was General Wood. After the first round of votes he had far more votes than any candidate, just not enough to get the nomination. Here's the thing, though; he wouldn't cut a deal. The party leaders and members from the oil company came to him and tried to make the same deal with him that Harding had. He refused. Then they said, over a phone call, "Ok, well just give promise us any 3 cabinet posts." At this point, his political advisor covered the phone up and said to Wood, "with one word here, you will be the next President". His response was "I am my own man, and I will make my own decisions. I promise nothing." And with that, the nomination went to Harding. I read that and had great ambivalence. On one hand, I thought "What an idiot! He had it wrapped up!" and at the same time I thought "Wow! That's some amazing ethical principles to turn that down. Think of what kind of a President someone with those kind of morals could have been!" Unfortunately, we'll never get to know, and General Wood will forever just be a small footnote in U.S. history.
The second book I read was The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch. This story has gotten a lot of press lately, but for those that may not have heard about it here's a quick recap. A lot of universities have professors give a "last lecture". It's supposed to be a hypothetical situation where if you knew you were dying and that this would be your final lecture what would you say that you would want to be remembered for? Well, in the case of Randy Pausch, there was nothing hypothetical about it. He had recently been diagnosed with terminal pancreatic cancer and knew he had less than a year to live. This book is an expansion of the lecture he gave and, really, is a gift to his kids (who are 6, 4, and 18 months) to try and teach them the things he would have tried to if he had lived another 20 years. He gave the lecture in September of 2007 and is, as of today, still alive. It is one thing to read about someone post-humously who exhibited tremendouns bravery when facing death. But there is something even more surreal to read about someone and to know that this person is still doing it right now. The book is all at once touching, wise, uplifting, sad, happy, and heartbreaking. You can read about his story at http://www.thelastlecture.com/; he also has a link to his blog and health report there too.
The book I have just begun now is The Post-American World by Fareed Zakaria, who is one of my favorite political pundits. I highly recommend that you read the book if you have any interest at all in global politics and economics and the place the U.S. is likely to have in it in the 21st century. For a great summary of the main ideas in the book, though, head on over to http://www.charlierose.com/ and catch the interview with him from May 1st. Truly fascinating stuff (at least to me).
OK, I think that does it for me today. Should find out about the CPA in ~ 1 week. Have a good weekend everyone and Happy Mother's Day!
Monday, May 05, 2008
Drilling in Alaska
Since Weir brought it up in the comments I decided to post my thoughts on this rather than just commenting back to him.
I have long held the contrary opinion that gas in this country does not cost too much; it actually costs way too little. Honestly, $10 a gallon would make me pretty happy. And I'm not just saying that because we own a hybrid (even at 45 MPG, $10/gallon would put a real healthy dent in our pocketbook). The reason is that it will take that amount of hardship for this country to finally get itself off its oil addiction. By the way you may want to mark this date down because the term "oil addiction" was popularized by President Bush and this may be one of the only times you'll catch me agreeing with him. The bottom line is that whatever your feelings on global warming are, there is a finite amount of oil left in the world and thus it seems to make sense to realize sooner rather than later that we need to switch to some form of sustainable, renewable resource for our power needs. But people are creatures of habit, and our post-WWII suburban migration has left us particularly dependent on our gas guzzlers, so this is not a change that most people are willing to make easy.
So now, as gas prices have been rising to new highs, we have seen the predictable political football getting thrown around. It seems that everybody has a plan for "helping" middle america shrug off the increasing burden of high fuel costs. Whether it's grass roots e-mails calling for boycotts of certain companies or a convoluted nation-wide economic solution, they all have one thing in common: they are temporary (at best) and ultimately they are all bogus. That's because the oil situation we find ourselves in right now follows some of the simplest economics of all; aggregate supply is going down every day and demand is increasing every day. Hence, each barrell of oil should sell for slightly more than the previous barrell of oil did, and this should continue to be true all the way through the last barrell of oil that will ever be sold.
It therefore follows logically that the single best course of action that this or any country can take is to immediately begin to reduce their oil use immediately and do whatever necessary to develop sufficient alternative resources.
Now, with all that being said I am going to go contrarian again and say that I am 100% in favor of opening up Alaska for drilling.
OK, maybe that's not true. Let's say instead that I'm 90% in favor of opening up Alaska for drilling because there are some important caveats that I need to add. The first is that the purpose of Alaskan oil wouldn't be to supplement or replace our current oil supply. I don't know for sure the accuracy of the oil taking 15 years to be usable, but it certainly would take multiple years before we ever saw anything and by that point if we have not already significantly decreased our dependence on oil the little bit from Alaska is not going to do anything more than stop the bleeding for a couple months. So why am I saying we should drill for it? As I said before, the current economic situation is such that each barrell of oil should sell for progressively more and more. Hence, we have a veritable diamond mine underneath our feet and I believe that it would be foolish to waste it. However, this is where the second caveat comes in. Believe it or not, it is actually possible to extract oil from a wilderness area with very minimal disruption to the environment. It typically doesn't happen because it's obviously a lot more expensive and most oil companies are only interested in doing the bare minimum mandated by the margins of the law. In fact, I probably wouldn't have even believed the statement I just made before I read Collapse by Jared Diamond. He is the Pulitzer-Prize winning author of Guns, Germs, and Steel and is also a staunch conservationist. He visited the drilling sites of a major oil company (I am pretty sure it was either Chevron or Shell but I'm not positive) and said it was remarkable how little had been changed. You would never even know you were on a drilling site. And when they are done drilling, they will dismantle all the equipment and replant native vegetation over the area. Drilling oil is not like clear-cutting a forest. The ecosystem doesn't depend on the petroleum for anything and really could care less if it's there or not.
So, basically I am saying that within the confines of the scenario I have laid out (where we are drilling basically as speculation instead of consumption and that extreme care is taken to minimize environmental destruction) I submit that given that oil is only getting more and more valuable I don't see a compelling reason to not drill for it.
But I'm sure Weir will let me know . . .
I have long held the contrary opinion that gas in this country does not cost too much; it actually costs way too little. Honestly, $10 a gallon would make me pretty happy. And I'm not just saying that because we own a hybrid (even at 45 MPG, $10/gallon would put a real healthy dent in our pocketbook). The reason is that it will take that amount of hardship for this country to finally get itself off its oil addiction. By the way you may want to mark this date down because the term "oil addiction" was popularized by President Bush and this may be one of the only times you'll catch me agreeing with him. The bottom line is that whatever your feelings on global warming are, there is a finite amount of oil left in the world and thus it seems to make sense to realize sooner rather than later that we need to switch to some form of sustainable, renewable resource for our power needs. But people are creatures of habit, and our post-WWII suburban migration has left us particularly dependent on our gas guzzlers, so this is not a change that most people are willing to make easy.
So now, as gas prices have been rising to new highs, we have seen the predictable political football getting thrown around. It seems that everybody has a plan for "helping" middle america shrug off the increasing burden of high fuel costs. Whether it's grass roots e-mails calling for boycotts of certain companies or a convoluted nation-wide economic solution, they all have one thing in common: they are temporary (at best) and ultimately they are all bogus. That's because the oil situation we find ourselves in right now follows some of the simplest economics of all; aggregate supply is going down every day and demand is increasing every day. Hence, each barrell of oil should sell for slightly more than the previous barrell of oil did, and this should continue to be true all the way through the last barrell of oil that will ever be sold.
It therefore follows logically that the single best course of action that this or any country can take is to immediately begin to reduce their oil use immediately and do whatever necessary to develop sufficient alternative resources.
Now, with all that being said I am going to go contrarian again and say that I am 100% in favor of opening up Alaska for drilling.
OK, maybe that's not true. Let's say instead that I'm 90% in favor of opening up Alaska for drilling because there are some important caveats that I need to add. The first is that the purpose of Alaskan oil wouldn't be to supplement or replace our current oil supply. I don't know for sure the accuracy of the oil taking 15 years to be usable, but it certainly would take multiple years before we ever saw anything and by that point if we have not already significantly decreased our dependence on oil the little bit from Alaska is not going to do anything more than stop the bleeding for a couple months. So why am I saying we should drill for it? As I said before, the current economic situation is such that each barrell of oil should sell for progressively more and more. Hence, we have a veritable diamond mine underneath our feet and I believe that it would be foolish to waste it. However, this is where the second caveat comes in. Believe it or not, it is actually possible to extract oil from a wilderness area with very minimal disruption to the environment. It typically doesn't happen because it's obviously a lot more expensive and most oil companies are only interested in doing the bare minimum mandated by the margins of the law. In fact, I probably wouldn't have even believed the statement I just made before I read Collapse by Jared Diamond. He is the Pulitzer-Prize winning author of Guns, Germs, and Steel and is also a staunch conservationist. He visited the drilling sites of a major oil company (I am pretty sure it was either Chevron or Shell but I'm not positive) and said it was remarkable how little had been changed. You would never even know you were on a drilling site. And when they are done drilling, they will dismantle all the equipment and replant native vegetation over the area. Drilling oil is not like clear-cutting a forest. The ecosystem doesn't depend on the petroleum for anything and really could care less if it's there or not.
So, basically I am saying that within the confines of the scenario I have laid out (where we are drilling basically as speculation instead of consumption and that extreme care is taken to minimize environmental destruction) I submit that given that oil is only getting more and more valuable I don't see a compelling reason to not drill for it.
But I'm sure Weir will let me know . . .
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