Hypocrisy?

You're not wrong, DEN71.

See my previous post.

Cheers.

Geoff, your ‘cornucopians’ and ‘doomers’ are not the only camps on the subject of peak oil. It’s not as polarised as that.

Indeed, the most sensible position (well of course it is, because the one I hold!) is the eotsocs camp.

That’s the camp for those who don’t know but can see a potentially ominous future if we just keep going merrily along in the same old way. They wish to err on the side of caution, be careful, pull back on rapid expansionism, and be as ready as we can to make changes to alternative energy sources when we need to, if not well before we actually need to.

Erring-on-the-side-of-caution-sceptics. Eotsocs!

Now, no one in the doomers camp can really know that we are heading towards doom and gloom. And no one in the corny’s camp can really know that we can continue on regardless of the ever-increasing demand for oil and the ever-more-difficult-and-expensive supply capability.

So that means that they should ALL be sceptics!! … and should all be supportive of the concept of erring on the side of caution… or just being plain cautious.

They should all be eotsocs!

The denialist or cornucopian position doesn’t make any sense when you really look at it! The doomers or worriers camp makes more sense. But the eotsocs camp really does win the day for logic and common sense!

Almost there. One more step - everyone has...

ODDSOCKS

Opportunists & Denialists & Doomers & Skeptics for a Cautionary Knowledge Stance.

I have never seen such a confused thread here on OLO previously !
The whole "Carbon Tax" government action has no relation to peak oil.
The proof of that is quite simple.
The government does not acknowledge peak oil exists.
Note I said acknowledge not deny.

The government even goes to the extent of suppressing its own reports
warning of oil supply problems. Unfortunately it escaped.
www.aspo-australia.org.au
Halfway down page Govt should release 2009 “Peak Oil” report .

Some here have fallen for the propaganda from a number of sources that
insist that we (US actually) have lots of oil in shale sources.
What they do not tell you is that those shale wells have very steep
depletion rates like 50% a year so that most of them last about two years.
The shale oil business in the US has become a Ponzi scheme requiring
continuous input of money. They have to keep drilling and this is
putting up the marginal cost of their product.
Anyone that believes in the plenty of oil should read some of reports
on the Oil Drum. I could go and find the links for you but why can't
you do your own searching ? It is plentiful enough.

The facts are clear, crude oil production has been on a plateau for
six years already. Other sources, such as tar sands, shale oil are
a small fraction of the total consumption.
Old cheap fields are depleting at about 4% to 6% a year.
Note, our depletion rate is 15% a year, not long to capping them.
New expensive fields are only just keeping up with demand.
How long can this go on ?
No one is certain, but expert estimates are one to five years.

As the cheap/expensive ratio changes will you be able to afford it ?

As others have said, the peak oil issue isn't about running out of oil and other hydrocarbons. It is about running out of cheap oil and cheap energy in general. This graph shows world crude oil prices since 1947 in 2010 dollars

http://www.wtrg.com/oil_graphs/oilprice1947.gif

If Bazz et al. are wrong about peak oil, then why has it become so expensive, especially if demand is subdued, as Curmudgeon says?

So far as AGW is concerned, the truth isn't decided by majority vote of the public. In this context, 'denialist' is a useful term. Sceptics demands more evidence, while denialists are impervious to evidence; they believe what they want to believe. No imaginable evidence would ever convince runner of evolution, even if he had a scientific education. Some aspects of the AGW case involve really basic science, such as the physics of how greenhouse gases work, well explained by our own Steven L. Meyer. If you dispute these, then you can fairly be called a denialist.

http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=11244&page=0

Fred Singer, a well known sceptical scientist, has actually written an article accusing denialists of giving sceptics a bad name on this and other points.

http://www.independent.org/newsroom/article.asp?id=3263

Where there is room for dispute and where there is the possibility of a significant threat is in the very complicated interactions of the positive and negative feedbacks that determine climate. My opinions on this are worth about as much as my opinions on the taxonomy of sunflowers or the history of the Old Kingdom in Ancient Egypt. Nevertheless, I do know something about how science works.

(cont'd)

(cont'd)

Scientists get kudos, grants, and promotion from coming up with interesting new findings and ideas, and from shooting down the ideas of other scientists. Anyone who follows the science news magazines or websites knows that scientists come up with startling findings and ideas all the time. Most of them are shot down quite quickly. If anyone came up with a really convincing argument against AGW, it would get published, if only to allow other scientists to shoot it down. If they couldn't, the author would almost certainly be on his/her way to a Nobel Prize and unlimited grant money. Science is self-correcting, as has been shown with continental drift and a host of other issues.

The idea that there is some sort of global conspiracy uniting all scientists around the world to prevent such publication is just daft. Nobody wants AGW to be true. We have God's own plenty of environmental problems without it. Climate scientists will be paying carbon taxes just like everyone else. If governments want to frighten people to get more power (and why would they all agree?), there are far less economically damaging ways to do it.

I'm with Ludwig. Err on the side of caution and listen to the overwhelming majority of experts, without believing that they are necessarily infallible.