In addition to global warming and the threats that we have just examined, OFDK also compounds dangerously a number of other ecosystemic issues, namely the boundaries within which Earth-Life (including humankind) can safely evolve. Figure 3 summarises key matters.

The diagram on the left visualises the key thresholds humankind should not cross. Humankind has already crossed or is in the process of crossing five out of the eleven listed: genetic diversity (with rate of biodiversity loss now above 10 species lost per million species/year), climate as we have already seen in our previous post, Nitrogen (Nitrogen extracted from the atmosphere for human use above 35Mt/year), Phosphorus (Phosphorus flowing into oceans reaching 11Mt/year), land systems degraded beyond repair. Humankind is also approaching the safe limit for ocean acidification.[11] The authors advocate the need for a Great Transition, another name for something else than what we presently have. With humankind using this year 1.7 times the resources that Earth-Life renew annually, there should be no doubt that something else is needed (http://www.footprintnetwork.org).

There is the known danger that each boundary crossing turns out to be one that results in an abrupt change, one that is irreversible (a so-called “tipping point”). The fact that several key boundaries have already been crossed or are being crossed and that humankind is already approaching the threshold of others raises the prospect of something much more ominous that is sketched on the top right corner of Figure 3. This is the danger of the whole of Earth-Life restructuring very abruptly. Individual ecosystems can shift abruptly and irreversibly from one state to another when they are pushed across critical thresholds or boundaries by various phenomena. Barnosky et al. have shown the dangers that the global ecosystem is approaching a planetary-scale critical transition as a result of human influence.[12] This is yet another way of considering the self-destructive course the GIW placed itself on, under the sway of the Tooth fairy (see Post 3).[13]

These researchers do their utter best to alert about the dangers of boundary crossing and abrupt and irreversible systemic change for the whole of Earth-Life. However, what they fail to consider is the advent of OFDK. Under OFDK and its BigMES effects we are no longer contemplating possibly tipping over this or that boundary or of approaching a “state shift” for the whole of Earth-Life over a long, protracted, period of time (i.e. on a scale of a century or more). We are also not just considering the disintegration of the Petroleum Production System (PPS) and in consequence that of the GIW. Under OFDK we are in high danger that the avalanche (or S.O.C.) that we are already engulfed in (see Post 8) not only disintegrates both PPS and GIW in short order but also precipitates abruptly the whole of Earth-Life into a chaotic and irreversible transition, the end point of which we cannot anticipate except that it is unlikely to be viable for humankind as we presently know it.

On the other hand, there is also the possibility that, notwithstanding BigMES impacts, an abrupt disintegration of PPS and GIW brings about an abrupt halt to the mad boundary crossing trend currently underway, in which case it may turn out that humankind turns away from whole Earth-Life state shift in extremis. This would be a case of “the operation was successful, unfortunately the patient died”… Prof. Tim Garrett, had reached a similar view, albeit prior to OFDK first strike: “Effectively, it appears that civilization may be in a double-bind. If civilization does not collapse quickly this century, then CO2 levels will likely end up exceeding 1000ppmv; but, if CO2 levels rise by this much, then the risk is that civilization will gradually tend towards collapse”.[14]

In 2013, David Spratt, having reviewed in great detail the scientific literature on climate, Earth System and tipping points up to this point in time, concluded bluntly: “we face an unavoidably radical future… no longer is there a non-radical option… We are in an emergency.”[15] Now that we have begun to tumble, carried away by the OFDK avalanche, his assessment is even more critical.

We know that we are in an emergency, but we do not know where exactly we are in this mad course, which makes acting effectively all the more challenging. As Barnosky et al. stress, “detecting early warning signs of critical transitions on global as well as local scales”… and “detecting feedbacks that promote such transitions” is crucial. This requires large data capture systems, information networks, and analysis means that presently the GIW does not have. Acting decisively to extricate ourselves from the OFDK avalanche also requires large amounts of energy that presently are not available… And as we have seen repeatedly in previous posts, under OFDK we are also in the process of losing access to the sources of energy that we do have… In short, we know we are in big trouble but we do not know exactly how and we do not have the means to get out of trouble.

We acknowledged it. The challenges are daunting and mounting by the day. At GB we have known this was coming for over 20 years. Addressing ODFK as it progressively appears in full sight may sound like an impossible task. However, in our assessment, it is not only doable, it is also somewhat simple once one has let go of the Tooth Fairy-like beliefs and ways of doing things that have led us into this mess. The point is not to try and tackle the whole mess all in one go and to focus instead on what’s most critical to change the game.

Humankind is amazingly creative. Worldwide millions of people are currently developing initiatives in all directions as part of attempts to change course, in response to the various pressures and difficulties that they face, mostly flying blind re OFDK. What they all miss most and what they need to succeed is novel, sustainable access to affordable energy that can scale to national and planetary levels in replacement of the legacy ones that we are in the process of losing (we will examine in a subsequent post why current so-called “renewables” do not cut it). They also need means of energy and information networking that present infrastructures do not provide, and by a wide margin (in Post 2 we assessed, as a first approximation, a requirement of some 70 billion points-of-use, with low latencies, fully decentralised, wholly sustainable — no current technology can achieve this). And they need means of value exchange, accounting, and value storage, also networked, that current fiat currencies and financial systems can’t provide (see also Post 2), hence the vital importance of cryptocurrencies. This set of means is in our view the core of the demand for something else that we have been exploring to this point.

Provide this package of means affordably, let global creativity work its way on a global scale and there are good chances that at least a sustainable population make it through OFDK. Think of the creativity by myriad entrepreneurs that ensued the releases of the transistor, then the PC and then the take-off of the Internet. There have been many negative side effects as all of this took place within the GIW, in Tooth Fairy mode. Now, under OFDK, GIW/Tooth Fairy dynamics have no future. We are in the Gold Spot that we have identified in post 6 — How is an Oil Fizzle Dragon-King created?, just past the cusp, as we have begun to slide down a steep thermodynamic cliff. In this Gold Spot, the sole initiatives that have any chance of success are those that are resolutely out of the Tooth Fairy sphere of influence and that are thermodynamically viable. Those two closely related constraints will eliminate a great deal of nonsense. No doubt, a large number of mistakes will be made. However, extricating oneself out of an OFDK avalanche is not something one can plan. Instead one can leverage the momentum of OFDK by giving everyone the means to act.

It is in the above sense that we have found it possible to address OFDK and all that it entails, profitably, affordably for all and extremely rapidly. We have found how to do this relying at the outset only on the available “Lego set”, that is, using only existing, proven, technology components, albeit integrated in novel ways. Not only is this doable with the present Lego set, but also it is necessary to use only this set, because within the remaining timeframe this is the only one that is available. Like it or not, we have to make do with that. This is what some of us realised some 20 years ago, and yes, it has taken us that long to put it together, notwithstanding quite a number of spanners thrown into our wheels… For now we call it GB.

So, this is a long story. We know from experience that many aspects of GB are counterintuitive. For GB to be understood we need to progress step by step with our explanations. In our next posts we will pursue the review of some of the main impacts that OFDK is precipitating, highlighting for each how they shape effective responses to OFDK and ways to address the corresponding demand for something else concerning new means to access and use energy, new class of networking and new means of transacting value in cryptocurrency mode, all sustainably that we are building into GB — recall GB is about the wager that we put forward at the end of Post 9.

* * * * * *

If you have followed our posts to this point, a reminder:

This series focuses on the emerging global demand for something else than what we currently have concerning energy and all other aspects of living in the globalised industrial world (the GIW). Most importantly it concerns money, the end of fiat currencies over the next few years and their unavoidable replacement with cryptocurrencies backed with sustainable energy supplies.

The posts gradually explain the rationale for the solutions that we are developing to address that global demand for something else. A subsequent series will explain our solutions themselves and our entire approach to creating a sustainable and scalable energy backed cryptocurrency.

GB’s next post will focus on OFDK’s causes and internal dynamics in order to refine further our something else specs concerning new means of access to energy, new class of networking and new means of transacting value.

GB’s previous posts in the demand for something else series are:

Post 1: Hello, this is GB…

Post 2: Elephants in the cryptocurrency room — current fiat currencies have no future; however, cryptocurrencies can’t scale to the global demand for something else; in particular they require far too much energy and are overlaid on top of an Internet also requiring far too much energy; and, like fiat currencies, they are also disconnected from the sole reliable and necessary anchor of value into the thermodynamics of any social activity.

Post 3: Looking down the barrel — the Tooth Fairy and the Dragon-King; Part 1: Loss of access — humankind is rapidly losing access to all the sources of energy it depends on; the threats are dual, loss of access to bioenergy and loss of access to net energy from oil; those losses translate into loss of access to all other energy forms; Post 3 focuses on the loss of access to bioenergy; this loss will be complete by about 2030; this loss frames in stringent ways how to address the demand for something else, not just concerning energy but also all economic activity and all the way to finance and all currency matters.

Post 4: Looking down the barrel — Part 2 — The threat of an Oil Pearl Harbor — the oil price crash of late 2014 onwards marks the entry on the world scene of the Oil Fizzle Dragon-King (OFDK), a high probability, high impact process that almost no one saw coming; at the heart of OFDK is the rapid fizzling out of net energy from oil; net energy in the form of transport fuels is what enables the entire economic activity of the globalised industrial world (GIW); by about 2022 net energy per average barrel is expected to be about nil — zero net energy means zero value; in consequence oil prices are highly unlikely to ever recover durably; instead they are in the process of crashing to the floor — a kind of protracted Oil Pearl Harbor heralding the disintegration of the oil industry as we know it; which sets out the time frame for addressing the demand for something else.

Post 5: Looking down the barrel — Part 3 — The end of the Oil Age, as we knew it — this post examines the dynamics of the oil industry and of OFDK; it explains how and why the GIW entered the end of the Oil Age in about 2012 and how this process will be complete by about 2030; it then shows that an increasing number of industry and finance players have begun to intuit the dire situation and what are the implications for the GIW at large; it concludes in stressing that the oil industry is not going to vanish, as the GIW will keep requiring high energy density molecules for transport, and instead will have to transform drastically; which frames further the demand for something else. We also noted that under OFDK we cannot see how fiat currencies as we know them could survive much beyond 2022, which translates into a huge demand for cryptocurrencies able to scale past the size of fiat ones.

Post 6: Looking down the barrel — Part 4 — How is an Oil Fizzle Dragon-King created? — this post shows that the GIW is presently “running on empty”; it examines why, in consequence, while oil prices are crashing to the floor transport fuel prices can be expected to increase substantially and supply of transport fuels be increasingly erratic; examines how OFDK was engendered, where the present terminal dynamics lead and what are the defining energy characteristics of the demand for something else in response to ODFK. In short, OFDK forces a re-think of everything we do, especially what we take for granted, and most specifically a re-think of money, finance, currencies, investments and cryptocurrencies. In this matter we are not commenting from the sideline. We mean business… The opportunities at the heart of this re-think are simply huge. Just past the cusp of the “mother of all Senecas” we call this set of opportunities the Gold Spot.

Post 7: Looking down the barrel — Part 5 — The Tooth Fairy versus Thermodynamics — this post examines the Big Question of not only how but also why we came to fall into the present OFDK mess. We find the answer in the weird mix of magical thinking, belief in myth concatenated with bits and pieces of science that still prevails over two hundred years after the beginning of an Industrial Revolution based on thermodynamics = the same kind of mix that prevailed in preindustrial societies continues in ours. We call it the Tooth Fairy syndrome after Bedford Hill who exclaimed: “It is interesting that not one analyst has yet come to the very obvious conclusion that it requires oil to produce oil. Perhaps they think it is delivered by the Tooth Fairy?” (B.W. Hill, 9–3–15). We examine the growing gap between Tooth Fairy myth and OFDK reality to conclude that it is high time to orient towards something else focused on novel means to access and use energy, a new class of networking and new means of transacting value in cryptocurrency mode, all sustainably and completely outside magical and mythical thinking — leading to novel ways of sustainably living and doing business, highly profitably; the kind GB is involved in.

Post 8: Looking down the barrel — Part 6 — OFDK’s falling dominos — previous posts have shown how the rapid fizzling out of net energy from oil is the trigger for OFDK and how this affects all other energy sectors, the whole of transport and all domains of economic and social activity. This posts shows that OFDK is not just about oil. It has many ramifications and is triggering further, largely unexpected, disruptions globally in falling domino fashion. In fact those disruptions interlink under OFDK’s impulse to form an almighty avalanche that has already become unstoppable. The matter is no longer to try and stop it or even change its course. Instead, the matter is to use its momentum and extricate ourselves from it. As investors, scientists, engineers and entrepreneurs, this is what we focus on. We are intent on changing the global game by redefining how we access and use energy… and thus money.

Post 9: Looking down the barrel — Part 7 — OFDK versus the Climate — nearly all parties working on “energy transitions” to address climate change are acutely aware of the disconnect between what science uncovers on the one hand and on the other hand what people believe and what decision-making elites do. Most see that current action, under the Paris Agreement of CPO21 or otherwise, is woefully insufficient to successfully address the climate change challenge. Nearly all remain largely blind to an OFDK that is nonetheless unfolding under their very eyes. So, instead of placing one’s hope in a moral awakening or instead of trying to be better at communicating or convincing, elites or deniers as they do, we propose a simple wager of the Pascalian kind… This is an “inverse Shadok” wager. It is GB’s wager — never mind whether climate change is for real or not, never mind OFDK, why live as we do presently, in hard, complicated, often dangerous, expensive, insecure, polluted conditions, when we could live prosperously in vastly improved, safe, secure, inexpensive, enormously simplified fashion?

[1] Aiguo Dai, 2010. Drought under global warming: a review. wires.wiley.com/climatechange. DOI: 10.1002/wcc.81

[2] For example, James Hansen, Makiko Sato, Paul Hearty, Reto Ruedy, Maxwell Kelley, Valerie Masson-Delmotte, Gary Russell, George Tselioudis, Junji Cao, Eric Rignot, Isabella Velicogna, Blair Tormey, Bailey Donovan, Evgeniya Kandiano, Karina von Schuckmann, Pushker Kharecha, Allegra N. Legrande, Michael Bauer and Kwok-Wai Lo, 1016, Ice melt, sea level rise and superstorms: evidence from paleoclimate data, climate modeling, and modern observations that 2 ◦C global warming could be dangerous. Atmos. Chem. Phys., 16, 3761–3812, 2016 www.atmos-chem-phys.net/16/3761/2016/ doi:10.5194/acp-16–3761–2016.

[3] Mitchel, Alanna, 2008, Seasick, the hidden ecological crisis of the global ocean, Murdoch Books, Millers Point, Australia.

[4] See also: Waking Science, 2017, Massive ocean DIE OFF foreshadows the era of global human population collapse. March 21. http://wakingscience.com/2017/03/massive-ocean-die-off-foreshadows-era-global-human-population-collapse/.

[5] Ellis, Erle C., Kaplan, Jed O., Fuller, Dorian Q., Vavrus, Steve, Goldewijk, Kees Klein and Verburg, Peter H., 2013, “Used planet: A global history”. PNAS, vol. 110, no. 20, 7978–7985.

[6] Gerardo Ceballos, Paul R. Ehrlich and Rodolfo Dirzo, 2017, Biological annihilation via the ongoing sixth mass extinction signalled by vertebrate population losses and declines. PNAS, www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.1704949114; Gerardo Ceballos, Paul R. Ehrlich, Anthony D. Barnosky, Andrés García, Robert M. Pringle, Todd M. Palmer, 2015, Accelerated modern human–induced species losses: Entering the sixth mass extinction. Sci. Adv. 2015;1:e1400253 19 June.

[7] Boulter, Michael, 2002, Extinction, Evolution and the End of Man, Fourth Estate, HarperCollins, London.

[8] For example, Waking Science, 2017, Op. Cit.

[9] Jean Baudrillard. The Vital Illusion. New York: Columbia University Press, 2000:15–16.

[10] Louis Arnoux. “West of the Dateline, Entrepreneurship as Poesy”, in Baudrillard West of the Dateline, Edited by Victoria Grace, Heather Worth and Laurence Simmons. Dunmore Press, 2003; Louis Arnoux. “Critical Futures”, International Conference on Environmental Justice, Global Ethics for the 21st Century, University of Melbourne, Australia, October 1–3, 1997.

[11] See for example, Rockström, J., Steffen, W., Noone, K., Persson, Å., Chapin, III, F.S., Lambin, E., Lenton, T.M., Scheffer, M., Folke, C., Schellnhuber, H., Nykvist, B., De Wit, C.A., Hughes, T., van der Leeuw, S., Rodhe, H., Sörlin, S., Snyder, P.K., Costanza, R., Svedin, U., Falkenmark, M., Karlberg, L., Corell, R.W., Fabry, V.J., Hansen, J., Walker, B.H., Liverman, D., Richardson, K., Crutzen, C., Foley. J. , 2009, A safe operating space for humanity. Nature 461: 472–475 DOI 10.1038/461472a. Will Steffen, Katherine Richardson, Johan Rockström, Sarah E. Cornell, Ingo Fetzer, Elena M. Bennett, Reinette Biggs, Stephen R. Carpenter, Wim de Vries, Cynthia A. de Wit, Carl Folke, Dieter Gerten, Jens Heinke, Georgina M. Mace, 2015, Planetary boundaries: Guiding human development on a changing planet. Science. Vol 347 ISSUE 6223. sciencemag.org; and Johan Rockström, “Bounding the Planetary Future: Why We Need a Great Transition,” Great Transition Initiative (April 2015).

[12] Anthony D. Barnosky, Elizabeth A. Hadly, Jordi Bascompte, Eric L. Berlow, James H. Brown, Mikael Fortelius, Wayne M. Getz, John Harte, Alan Hastings, Pablo A. Marquet, Neo D. Martinez, Arne Mooers, Peter Roopnarine, Geerat Vermeij, John W. Williams, Rosemary Gillespie, Justin Kitzes, Charles Marshall, Nicholas Matzke, David P. Mindell, Eloy Revilla & Adam B. Smith, 2012, Approaching a state shift in Earth’s biosphere. Nature, Vol 486. doi:10.1038/nature11018.

[13] In recent years, numerous researchers have reached the same stark conclusion, for example, McPherson, Guy R., 2011, Walking Away from Empire: A Personal Journey, Baltimore, Maryland, Publish America, 230 pp., ISBN 978–1–4626–3887–1; New Scientist, 2008, “Special report: How our economy is killing the Earth”, Issue №2678; MacKenzie, Debora, 2008, “Why the demise of civilisation may be inevitable”, New Scientist, 02 April; Lovelock James, 2009, The vanishing face of Gaia, Basic Books; Lovelock, James, 2006, The Revenge of Gaia, Basic Books..

[14] Garrett, Tim, J., 2012, “No way out? The double-bind in seeking global prosperity alongside mitigated climate change”, Earth System Dynamics, 3, 1–17, www.earth-syst-dynam.net/3/1/2012/, doi:10.5194/esd-3–1–2012.

[15] Spratt, David, 2013, Is climate change already dangerous? Climate Code Red, Carlton, 3053 Australia). See also, Spratt, David, 2014, The real budgetary emergency and the myth of burnable carbon, http://www.climatecodered.org/2014/05/the-real-budgetary-emergency-burnable.html. See also for example, Anderson, Kevin, and Bows, Alice, 2012, A new paradigm for climate change. Nature Climate Change 2, 639–640, doi:10.1038/nclimate1646; Hulme, Mike, 2012, What sorts of knowledge for what sort of politics? Science climate change and the challenges of democracy, 3S Working Paper 2012–15, Norwich: Science, Society and Sustainability Research Group.