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Comment by tokenadult | Hacker News Reader

The post kindly submitted here links to the UN report with the projection,[1] and that page links also to a detailed report with projections of total world population, given various assumptions, titled "World Population Prospects: The 2012 Revision."[2]

[1] http://esa.un.org/wpp/Excel-Data/fertility.htm

[2] http://esa.un.org/wpp/Documentation/pdf/WPP2012_Volume-I_Com...

Projections of world population come to much smaller total population figures now than they did when I was a child. Fertility rates have dropped much more than many people could imagine over the last few decades, and are below replacement rates in many developed countries.

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No doubt you got the "OMG 10 billion people by 2010, we'll never be able to feed them!" stuff I was exposed to as well.

The interesting thing about this to me is that it implies we will also reach 'peak energy' which is to say that once everyone in the planet is at the agreed upon 'median' lifestyle/perks we will have a fixed number for the amount of energy we need from that point forward. Kind of weird thinking about a planet with humans in equilibrium.

I think you might want to consider non-renewable energy sources, non-recyclable waste and so on before throwing words like 'equilibrium' around :)

I get that it's in the context of population though.

I was preparing to completely disagree with you, but then looked at the data[1] and it seems the energy consumption per capita in the US and the UK is sort of stable over the last 20 years. That said, world average is about a quarter what it is in the US, so it may be growing for a long time to come.

[1]: http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/EG.USE.ELEC.KH.PC

unfortunately, a planet with humans in equilibrium is but a wishful thinking, considering peak oil and soon uranium and methane, too, so 'peak energy' will likely soon be upon us, with solar, wind and geothermal energy only partially replacing them.

Humans are incredibly resourceful when pushed into a direction.

See the average consumption of gasoline/diesel fuel for cars in Europe especially over the last 3 decades. And to make things even more impressive, graph out the average horsepower, weight and overall features added to cars in the same time frame. A car these days uses 1/3 the fuel it used to use in 1980 while having probably 2x the horsepower and 10x as many features, many of which have greatly improved passive and active security.

Of course, not all improvements are good, but the overall trend is nice.

Exactly. Americans are complaining about petrol hitting $4/gallon in some states, but if they had to pay $9-10 per gallon like some European nations do, they would drop the massive 6.0L V8 engines and switch to 1.6L turbocharged diesels tomorrow too. It's only a matter of price.

Note that Europe pays the same market price for raw petroleum that America does, it just taxes the refined petrol and diesel (and uses far more of the latter) much higher.

This does have the effects of suppressing demand for fuel that you note, but the financial effect is that the money remains in-country and can be spent on other things.

Unless the US were to suddenly double its fuel taxes, a likelihood I estimate somewhere between nil and never, the only way US fuel prices would hit $9-$10/gallon would be for the cost of extracting oil to rise to that extent -- probably somewhere in the neighborhood of $200-300/bbl prices.

There you start running into the question of just what you're getting for your barrel of oil in terms of economic output. $GDP/BBL runs from a low of around $490 in India to nearly $2800/bbl in Sweden. It's around $1000, for most of Europe around $1500.

My thought is that there's a lot of marginal economic activity in China and India which will cease if the cost of oil doubles. Quite possibly elsewhere as well.

Price matters, but so does cost.

I disagree.

My grandfathers Wartburg from soviet era takes 7 to 10 liters on 100 kms. Most modern cars have around 5 liters on super-economy mode. Sure they are much heavier and saver, but overall fuel consumption is not much improved.

You should also calculate energy needed to produce and maintain the car. Wartburg engine has only 7 moving parts and can be disassembled and fixed with screw-driver. Most modern cars are thrown away after 10 years, because it is too expensive to maintain them.

I think we could easily reduce energy consumption 5x by making simplier and lighter cars. I am not saying to give up computers and other modern stuff, but keep it standardized and replaceable.

If your Wartburg would hit a modern car you would be squashed. At this point they're a hazard on the road. They're cool and have their appeal but if a modern car company would design the Wartburg today it wouldn't pass safety or environmental regulations.

And most modern cars are not thrown away, they are sold as second hand cars in my country or other developing countries :)

They are only partially replacing them because at the moment they are more expensive. The very moment producing electricity by burning coal becomes more expensive than by using solar or wind energy, we will see a huge spike in the number of solar/wind farms built. And burning coal will become more expensive the less we have of it.

Equilibrium lifestyle for humans? It amounts to saying that we could run out of problems. Since we can't, we'll continue to create new ideas and new technologies. And then deal with the unforeseen consequences. Etc.

> The interesting thing about this to me is that it implies we will also reach 'peak energy' which is to say that once everyone in the planet is at the agreed upon 'median' lifestyle/perks we will have a fixed number for the amount of energy we need from that point forward.

I doubt that. Reminds me of a concept of Malthusianisms [0].

Some quotes:

Why are even some affluent parts of the world running out of fresh water? Because if they weren’t, they’d keep watering their lawns until they were.

Why does it cost so much to buy something to wear to a wedding? Because if it didn’t, the fashion industry would invent more extravagant ‘requirements’ until it reached the limit of what people could afford.

Again and again, I’ve undergone the humbling experience of first lamenting how badly something sucks, then only much later having the crucial insight that its not sucking wouldn’t have been a Nash equilibrium.

[0] - http://www.scottaaronson.com/blog/?p=418

Great link. It's annoyed me to no end that people think they can 'feed the world' with just 'one more [dangerous and unsustainable] science hack'. (Hint: the world will find a way to get hungrier)

Except that Malthusianisms have been shown to be completely bogus.

Let's use an example from that page to deconstruct that:

   > Why can’t everyone just agree to a family-friendly,
   > 40-hour workweek?  Because then anyone who chose to
   > work a 90-hour week would clean our clocks.

Except that more and more people do work a family-friendly 40 hour week even with the opportunity to do more. They have "enough" so they want to spend more time with family than at work. The implication is that the pursuit of "money" presumably would allow the person working 90 hours a week to make more than twice or three times as much. But what do they get out of that? Where is their motivation? So that they are rich enough not to work at all?

What has been demonstrated repeatedly through history is that that once the 'need' it met the behavior stops. And the example at hand here is population growth. Why do "industrialized" populations have a lower population rate than "pre-industrial" populations? They both have functioning genitalia, they both have time. But when you can't count on being able to work until you are 70 and being able to live off your savings until you die, you really really want family that is younger than you so that you can move in with them. But when you don't perceive a 'need' for children to support you in your golden years, many people forego the obvious cost and bother of having them in the first place. There is no sudden new use for children that substitutes in.

Affluent parts of the world aren't running out of fresh water, they can recycle it or desalinate it. When the costs for doing that are connected with the water they choose to use it differently (like not watering a lawn in Las Vegas for example). We're low on water in California at the moment due to weather, not due to outrageous consumption by individuals.

Similarly with energy, we use less and less. Our stuff gets more efficient, our use gets more refined. From a 350 watt tube TV in the living room to a 50 Watt LCD to a 5 watt tablet/phone. We still consume news and entertainment but we don't consume it using the same methodologies at the same energy costs.

People make extrapolations and hold technologies and attitudes constant, it has been shown time and time again that you always get the wrong answer if you do that.

Last time I looked at the population numbers, they do not expect an equilibrium. They expect a contraction, as the population bulge we've created starts dying off, and then a resumption of growth, albeit as far as I know most projections assumings that when growth resumes it will be slower.

Interesting. Still, we don't know any possible peak for energy consumption yet. Energy consumption has been steadily growing until now.

We get might become more efficient and need less energy to do the things we are doing today, but may need to produce more for newly found applicationspurposes as well. Let's hope we will be able to produce more energy from less ressources.

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