[ExI] what did we learn?

Tue Nov 3 17:58:50 UTC 2020

> On Behalf Of William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat

Subject: Re: [ExI] what did we learn?

>…Spike, I read journalists fairly often…

Ja, common ailment in our benighted times, me lad.

>…I look to them for facts and opinions…

They are a good source for neither.

>…not as a source of what to believe…

That’s a start.  We don’t need them.  News should be written by scientists and technology people.  All of it.

 >…A great many things I read about I wind up with no opinion at all, because it would take so much research to find out all the facts and evaluate different views that I just give up…

Ja same here.  I gave up on them some time ago.  I browse occasionally for entertainment value.

>…In any case, there are very few instances in which I need to take some action.  The big questions,like global warming, I read about a bit, but leave to experts.  I have no votes…

None of us do BillW but do think on that question early and often.  Reason: in our current numbers, humans need energy sources.  Study up on how much land would be covered and where it would be covered if we go with renewable energy sources such as wind and solar.  Note that falling water is already exploited to its capacity with very few exceptions.  So our fully renewables are wind and solar.  

Once we get that, and we get that wind and solar are both enormously environmentally unfriendly as well as bad neighbors… we are on the way to recognizing we have two major alternatives, BillW, only two major alternatives, only two: fossil fuels and nukes.  

There are plenty of arguments about coal and fracking and dependence on foreign bad actors with regard to energy, but keep in mind these are all fossil fuels, and we already know those are dirty and create a lot of carbon dioxide.  Everybody gets that.

In general the renewables are intermittent and most of the populated parts of the globe are unsuitable for it.  So they are not desirable baseload carriers.  For baseload carriers, we have only fossil fuels and nukes.  Only those two options for the baseload carriers.

Do pardon my repetition, but until we filter away the noise and focus on these matters, we can’t even start to solve the really big problem facing our species: we need energy, we need lots of it.  The fully renewables cannot and will not carry the baseload in the foreseeable.  So we have fossil fuels and nukes.  We either burn something or we nuke something.  

Journalism majors are not intellectually equipped to grasp this fundamental concept, which is why they get all tangled up in trivial political matters.

>…You like Reason?  What makes them superior?  Because you agree with them the most?  We have to look out for this persistent bias.  bill w

I like Reason because they recognize that government cannot and will not solve our energy problem.  Markets must solve our energy problem.

News should be written by scientists and technology people.  All of it.

spike

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