Dear readers,
Due to the incorporation of a growing number of readers from diverse backgrounds to blog, and the extension you are taking the same after of only one year, during the recent past is producing a discussion and renewed discussion of concepts that had already been spoken previous posts (although it is fair to recognize that not always with a possibly required). This is normal, and you can not blame the new readers to reach exactly the middle of the discussion when the aim is gradually extending it to all of society. Fortunately, one of the advantages of a dynamic system such as a blog is to be able to go linking concepts discussed above without cutting the current discourse, so, for example, every time I write for the first time in a expression post "Peak Oil " bind soil, as now, a wikipedia article explaining the concept, or our syllabus on the website of OCO (failing, as I have noted, to have a text specific presentation that I hope to write to calm a day now, God and my commitments through.) That is why I strongly encourage readers, even if this requires many minutes of reading, to be attentive to the fractions of the text marked with the color of hyperlinks, to follow if the link text refers to a concept they deem important, whether he referred to the problems of a fully electric society, the practical problems the gap between the feasible and profitable , how to resolve the dilemma of whether or must react and not before the threat of Peak Oil why the current crisis will never end (within our paradigm, that is) or how it might occur the end of the economy or of democracy (leaving aside the more porn trials - and probably why most popular - on what he look like a collapse and what would be the worst case scenario if everything conspired against us, our stupidity included). Each link text refers in turn to others, themselves and others, and finally getting an accurate picture can take hours and hours of reading, which discourages many readers who, spoiled by society of "anything now," the childish impulse, not attribute value to the effort and introspection. However, what is the point made when discussing complex issues, claiming that their solution will come from an idea that has occurred after thinking about it a few minutes? It is likely that the obvious solutions have already been discussed and discarded by many very capable people who have spent years studying the issue, and although this does not prevent an occurrence of sudden personal and may have value, before going to insist on its merits it is better to some literature search and see if it was discussed and what problems have been identified to date in its detriment. When one makes the effort of technical analysis is often just not realizing that avoids an conspiracy between corrupt politicians and corporations to destroy the world satanic (with them inside, such is its evil who do not mind going to hell too), but simply the laws of physics, with the executive arm of thermodynamics, are preventing the engine miracles water or the use of zero-point energy, and are severely limiting the deployment of fast breeder reactors and use thorium that would lead us to an era of nuclear renaissance (not to mention that electricity is not what we need most , but other uses of energy). Start
have in society is a growing perception that the economic crisis that surrounds us going for long (this is the first thing I told the taxi driver who took me on Friday at Madrid Chamartin station), and even some suspicion that in fact can not end. Some less well begin to sense that the energy shortage is the key piece in this puzzle, in part because almost inadvertently mainstream media are getting more news on the subject, related mainly with the need to save energy or look for new sources. That concern still a little drowsy corporate which is possibly bringing some new readers here at once makes many of them, still infected by the magical thinking of tecnooptimismo that dominates our society, react in front of the unpleasant conclusions that emerge from some analysis here presented and are released to the counter, trying to impose further demonstrate that there are many solutions to our defeatism (sometimes implies "ecologeta") have not considered. This reaction also find it normal, because one of the vices of partisan installed in our political system leads to see if the reasons above there is an interest weighted "party" and that there are no universal arguments, but membership option A or B, without the possibility of non-alignment (and alienation). Therefore, all the arguments presented in a discussion (and not just here, everywhere) are always suspect, and never truly objective. It is interesting to see how everyone sets out to propose this or that option without first consider whether you really understand a question that was answered here: what is the energy .
We have a curious relationship with our technology. Man field of a hundred or two hundred years no large studies needed to understand the technology around him. He had the hoe, which was given the curved shape better suited to penetrate and remove soil properly. The mill had crushed the seed or squeezing the fruit. Her spinning wheel to spin, to light the candle, pencil or pen to write the few who knew it. All objects used in their day to day had a precise function and a trivial mechanism, which could only improve efficiency through a more streamlined design. However, we move in a world where our understanding of everyday technology is limited or null. We use computers to write or read these writings, but do not understand the operation of its circuitry, or even know how the monitor where they appear. We call for mobile phones that are able to negotiate quickly with the antennas near their bandwidth for the transmission of our voice and our data. We drive cars that would not be able to repair, even if we had the tools, if you break down. Nuesto every day is full of magic, of a suspension of the critical capacity to ask: "And how will this work?". This suspension of critical thinking came to a head when we see or we explain how of our great facilities, from the processing station to a power plant, from aircraft to ships and trains. Our life is full of things that work without knowing why. And on top are very efficient. This high efficiency, combined with the aura of mystery that always surrounds the technology, fills us with awe and delight us, but produces a perverse effect: give up our responsability on the implementation of technology, an absolute delegate our supervision to others always identified and sometimes not in fact exist. And the consequences of this attitude can be catastrophic.
few weeks ago, it was still winter was on the train to my workplace. At one point I looked up and saw the image that I open this post. The monitor inside the car showed the time, the destination, a label stock with the seasons in which we had to pass and the temperature outside the train. As always. But something caught my attention and made me smile. "Wow, I thought," today it seems that it's cold. " The monitor showed a temperature of -47 degrees Celsius. Obviously, despite the untimely hour of the Alt Empordà not suffer as freezing temperatures at any time of year, just the outside temperature sensor gave a false reading, perhaps porque se habría estropeado, o porque estaba sucio o cubierto de hielo. Quizá la lectura era correcta y lo que funcionaba mal era la transmisión. La verdad es que no tengo ni idea de qué era exactamente lo que estaba fallando, porque lo desconozco todo sobre la tecnología que la compañía de trenes RENFE utiliza para medir la temperatura exterior, lo único que puedo saber a ciencia cierta es que el dato era completamente erróneo; fuera estaríamos quizá a cero grados, pero a -47...
Este fallo anecdótico en el monitor revela muchas cosas sobre nuestra actitud hacia la tecnología. De entrada, el que diseño el sistema no consideró importante implementar una revisión de los valores registrados, so if the reading was considered very wrong was not dumped on the screen at the end of the day, that figure is offered as a courtesy to the traveler, and does not matter if it is wrong. In short, the person you have entrusted to design the system that will provide important data has not believed that warn against otherwise harmless error. On the other hand, this same person is not considered that the failure was worthy of being reported for analysis and correction (traveled on trains several days gave the wrong value, do not know if it was always the same train). This is less safe, because the temperature sensor problems could be symptoms of something more serious, particularly if failure is caused by an error in the transmission subsystem, which could have major flaws then others, for example, in announcing the stop stations, which of course actually tend to fail and it is less safe. Moreover, the company that produces the defective system probably recycle the technology and sell it for a multitude of other applications, and in some cases, the malfunction can cause major problems, and just find that not surprise me to publicize their effectively the company boasts a client to RENFE and is responsible for commissioning these devices.
funny thing is that a regular user I'm from RENFE I can report a number of failures that often occur, particularly in the latest rolling stock, which introduced less than two years. Heating / air conditioning excessive or nonexistent, decks dislodged, leaving the light masses of cables, pour water toilets, doors that do not open ... little things without much importance, until in the summer of 2009 gave them all the time, one day that the catenary had fallen and the train, which came out 3 hours late, took three or four times its normal passage in a steamy afternoon in August to 40 degrees Celsius in the platforms of Barcelona Sants. On arrival at each station, the driver will have get off the train back to fit a door did not close one ... Fortunately, nobody fell off the train, it is not derailed and no one gave a faint, but gave me much to think. Those who went on that train (which was soon removed to make way for the new trains, which have begun to water before the former) we delegate our responsibility to "them", which deal with things, and assume that nothing bad could happen to us because they never let anything bad happen. The truth is that many things could have been quite unpleasant to be avoided among other reasons thanks to the skill of the operator (that kept to sprinting or abrupt braking, although that meant to slow down at times).
The problem with technology is that moves us to put ourselves in situations in which our animal instinct tells us to go out running, to flee, while our ratio of adults tells us: "Do not be kid there is nothing to worry about have it all calculated. The problem, as observed in the RENFE train and in many other contexts, is that economic decline is giving priority than ever to reduce costs over and above any other consideration. Or was no reduction in total costs which led to bad design of the nuclear Fukushima which compounded the problems of the earthquake and subsequent tsunami? And our blind faith in the technology we do not understand, which we do not know whether it is acting rightly or wrongly we do not know what to do, that faith in which we have been indoctrinated makes us flee rather than concentrate on the worst possible place , increasing human ravages caused unimaginable. If you do not understand that technology is a human fruit and as such is exposed to conditions that plague humans, starting with economic hardship and ending with the incompetence and meanness, then we foolishly increasing our exposure to risk.
Reflection today that Brent is now at $ 119 per barrel: Are the technicians in charge and responsible authorities to address the threat posed by Peak Oil? Can we trust their technical criteria? Do we follow like sheep also gets us to the slaughter of technical failure "unexpected" but predictable?
Salu2, AMT
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