Thought for the day

I read this beautiful piece of writing today and it gave me enough clarity to think through the day.

• Worrying does not empty tomorrow of its troubles. However, it does empty today of its strength.
  
• Keep your head and your heart going in the right direction and you
  will not have to worry about your feet.
• If something is wrong, fix it if you can. But train yourself not to worry. Worry never fixes anything.

Remembering Paul Gauguin

“Peak Oil” has been eating my brains out for the last couple of days.

Except a few chemical engineers around me who atleast seem to understand the enormity of the problem, most people around me seem blissfully ignorant and completely unaware. I even heard about some one saying “Oil can’t ever run out, it gushes out from under the earth.”

History seems all set to reverse itself.

I’m reminded of Gauguin’s words: “In order to do something new we must go back to the source, to humanity in its infancy.”

The human kind surely does not need oil to survive.

Great empires were established without a single drop of oil. Even though Rome was not built in a day, it was built before refineries were built.

In lieu of oil, humans will need to work harder, but that can’t be very bad. For centuries, our forefathers have done that.

But of course, working harder was never an acceptable solution to the human race. What we want is a simple magical energy solution will present itself to the human race so that the laziness can prevail and all can watch TV sitting on fat couches eating chips and drinking cola. It could be a simple wave of Harry Potter’s wand or a wierd gravity defying perpetual motion machine installed and maintained by Mickey Mouse. The solution has to come from somewhere.

People, atleast some of them, need to take up the role of artists to create the ultimate energy solution…and the painter should not paint what he sees, but what will be seen.

Gauguin said : I shut my eyes in order to see

This means that if a painter limits himself to the mundane sight of the world, his ability to create things beyond the mundane sight is lost.

What I learn from this is that for one to arrive at a truly creative solution, one has to stop worrying about the norm. Creative solutions are obtained more easily if the norm is discarded and the mind is free to seek and try means that are new, different or innovated.

I’m going to close my eyes now, so that I can find a solution to the energy crisis. Check this space tomorrow

Industrial age ends in 20 years?

Truly, I cannot imagine the day when there will be no more petrol in the world or LPG for our kitchens. I’ve always liked to believe that our planet had enough oil for us to last atleast our life time. But the information I find on the internet is increasingly disturbing.

I’ve read about the Hubbert peak before.

But I happened to to stumble upon these articles today :

1. http://www.lifeaftertheoilcrash.net/
2. http://www.usnews.com/usnews/biztech/articles/051219/19energy_2.htm

3. http://www.thebulletin.org/article.php?art_ofn=mj05cavallo

All these articles are very interesting and discuss what can possibly happen when oil reserves are depleted.

The primer http://www.energybulletin.net/primer.php provides a good starting point to understanding what happens to the world economy when oil reserves are depleted.

But what came as a surprise was the time scale predicted by some people. http://www.energybulletin.net/19701.html.

Chevron has a beautiful website http://www.willyoujoinus.com/ that discusses these issues. Cant help but wonder if the end really near?