X-Message-Number: 29236
Date: Sun, 04 Mar 2007 15:10:04 -0500
From: Keith Henson <>
Subject: Re: Fullercrap

At 10:00 AM 3/4/2007 +0000, Mark Plus wrote:

>Charles Platt writes,
>
> >As soon as the price of oil becomes a real disincentive, there will be no
> >shortage of substitutes. Desperation is a great fuel for innovation.
>
>What "substitutes" do you have in mind, Charles? The corn-into-ethanol
>fiasco that doesn't make sense therrmodynamically, and that threatens to put
>poor Mexicans on involuntary caloric restriction as their corn crop heads
>north?

Correct me if I am wrong, but as I recall the poor Mexicans have been fed 
on corn shipped south from Iowa in exchange for Mexican oil.

snip

>Desperation for the energy to perpetuate human genes also turns on the
>warrior program in male human brains, as Keith Henson has pointed out.

That's not exactly what I said.

Bleak prospects seen society wide turn up the gain on xenophobic 
memes.  The xenophobic memes eventually synch up the warriors to an attack 
on neighbors.  Google evolutionary psychology memes war, it's the first 
link.  What is amazing it that the mechanism works from 50 person tribes to 
500 million nations.

>I see
>more evidence for this kind of response to contracting net energy supplies
>(dare I mention the two I-words much in the news lately?) than the more
>benign one expected by cornucopians.

There is no lack of energy, just a lack of engineering and investment.  One 
of the two methods for non-carbon central power, nuclear reactors has an 
unrecognized potential for abuse.  (Next post)

The other SEPS (space elevator-power satellites) is an early nanotechnology 
project that could easily meet all energy requirements for humanity.

Keith Henson

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