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Some Stories are too Scary

By Henri - Posted on 14 February 2009

Or How the End of Civilization May Really Happen

Reading the prophecies of doom is an old hobby of mine. My kids and grandkids watch horror films for the same reason. Being scared when you are really safe is just another stimulating experience.

On the other hand there are some prophets of doom that may have it right. The difference between a true story and the Blair Witch Project should be easy to discern. In real life it turns out to be a lot more complicated.

What if, in the pursuit of the outrageous, you trip over a piece of reality too scary to contemplate? How do you get it out of your mind? For five years I have read a lot of serious books about the end of oil. That is going to happen someday soon. The oil we have used so profligately will run out; possibly within a couple of decades. The question is what we will do then? No one really has a theory that answers all of the questions that I have come up with related to that event.

Survival of the human race is still likely after the end of oil as a cheap commodity. But the coal and natural gas and other possible fuel resources will also run out eventually. Now I am being forced to face the fact that other commodities like iron and copper and titanium may also turn out to be in short supply soon. How will humans survive and thrive in a world without cheap energy and the low cost commodities on which our technology is based?

You see books like Thomas Friedman’s “The World Is Flat” are probably missing some pieces of reality. The consumer based model of society may be spreading but sustaining it is going to be impossible without some major breakthroughs in science. Those are just around the corner according to Ray Kurzweil and other futurists of a more positive bent. I’m not as sure of that fact as they seem to be in their writings.

Goblins and Ghosties and Things That Go Bump in the Night are fun in stories. Thinking about the reality of the end of civilization is a whole lot scarier.

I think I’ll go back to bed now. Sharing is such a sweet thing, it makes the whole problem easier to contemplate. I’ll probably sleep just fine the rest of the night. How about you?

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