I say we shove all these variables through a NN or Bayesian Network and let
it crunch for a while and sort them out once and for all. Everybody is just
standing around going "Oh no, but what about this... oh no, but what about
them... oh no, but what about my back yard..."
If you ask me, our fundamental problem is our turning our backs on the
scientific method. (And no, I'm not talking about the Wired article.) I've
been fuming about this for years.
Let the damn price of oil get to $200 as the Saudi's predicted... THEN maybe
everyone will scream for their mommies loud enough for our anti-science,
anti-progress, self-promoting, self-agrandizing, anti-change bloated gasbag
of a government to yank their thumbs out of their mouths (as well as
elsewhere) and tell us what we need to hear for our own good.
We made our voices heard loud and clear in the 60's and 70's. Why not try
some more of that? Are we all getting so old and complacent and rigid in our
ideas that we cannot call this for what it is... preserving the status-quo?
Quick true story: Around my neck of the woods (Westchester County in NY), we
have a little nuke plant everyone just loved to hate a few years back. Oh
the signs and posters and protests were beyond belief. But science?? The
hell with science... tear the thing down and put up a gas fired plant...
ohhh... what do you mean our electricity rates will double? So... put up a
coal fired plant... ohhh... what do you mean CO2 footprint... and
electricity rates will still double? And so on... Lately, I think I've seen
ONE bumper sticker declaring "Close Down Indian Point". Must have something
to do with all those $100 fill-ups of SUV tanks.
This whole issue of energy revolves too much around partial answers, fuzzy,
unscientific, almost religeous based thinking, and selfish wishful thinking.
What am I doing? I've been putting my mouth where the money is. I assure you
it doesn't win me any friends, but so what, I always hated the "mooing"
sounds from all the lines in Disney World anyway.
Regards,
Gene