Exponential Economist Meets Finite Physicist (2012) • Hacker News Board

Re: Exponential Economist Meets Finite Physicist (2012)

#81

Post by cinquemb » Thu, May 30, 2019, 4:42 AM UTC

fallingfrog wrote: post #75

bshipp wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed. Take a look at cars, for example. My little 2.0L engine makes more power than a 1970's V8 behemoth could have dreamt of, while simultaneously getting fantastic fuel mileage with minimal pollutants (in comparison). It's by no means perfect, but by any objective measure it's providing me with more value at a lower energy cost. Energy cost to operate, energy cost to build, energy cost to maintain. And that trend…

There is a physical limit to the efficiency of a heat engine though. If your powertrain is 25% efficient, you can double it to 50%. But if it's 50%, you cannot double it to 100% unless the engine is operating at a temperature of absolute zero. You're going to reach a point- and current model cars are probably just about there- where the engine is operating about as efficiently as the laws of physics permit, and then…

>- and current model cars are probably just about there-

Very true, in order to get more progress, one would have to develop systems that are sufficiently different and more efficient at some level which may be odds with how we currently allocate resources.

Re: Exponential Economist Meets Finite Physicist (2012)

#82

Post by Kalium » Thu, May 30, 2019, 4:44 AM UTC

paraschopra wrote: post #74

ThrustVectoring wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The less cynical interpretation is that "real goods and services" captures the value people derive from them , rather than some objective measure like "energy consumption". There's no innate reason why we can't figure out more and more valuable ways to do things pretty much indefinitely.

It depends what you call and measure as value. If it’s production or goods, there’s obviously an upper limit. Even if in distant future, we begin assembling atoms into making novel rare elements, all that process consumes energy and possibly would produce waste. Production is not free. In the exponential limit, we will hit some constraint. If we are talking about services, we should realise that even they cost energy…

> If it’s production or goods, there’s obviously an upper limit.

Is there? I have a difficult time imagining any meaningful inherent upper limit to the value of creative works. Perhaps you intend a narrower point?

Re: Exponential Economist Meets Finite Physicist (2012)

#83

Post by dosy » Thu, May 30, 2019, 5:52 AM UTC

jbay808 wrote: post #68

dosy wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It does seem like physicist enjoys spreading the pessimism of that position in a condescending way, which makes me think the allegedly "faithful" write up of the dinner conversation, was in fact compensating for one where the physicist felt they had been beaten, and was so annoyed by that they have re-written the conversation in this more favorable way where it appears they win the argument. Besides, I think that pes…

What if X is free for everyone in unlimited quantity? And the only constraint... is that no one uses too much? Sounds like a pricing mechanism had better appear. Fish are free for anyone to catch, as long as nobody catches the last two... I feel like the rest of your post was trolling, though, so I'm not sure you were serious about this part.

There's others ways to restrict access that aren't pricing. you can't marry more than one person, you can't take up all the space on a beach or a public park. it's not about price, is just laws and enforcement.

I wasn't trolling on the rest, just brave. I don't expect you to be able to respond without name calling tho, as I think you'll see free energy as topic you can't seriously touch lest it taint your reputation.

Re: Exponential Economist Meets Finite Physicist (2012)

#84

Post by ThrustVectoring » Thu, May 30, 2019, 6:03 AM UTC

paraschopra wrote: post #74

ThrustVectoring wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The less cynical interpretation is that "real goods and services" captures the value people derive from them , rather than some objective measure like "energy consumption". There's no innate reason why we can't figure out more and more valuable ways to do things pretty much indefinitely.

It depends what you call and measure as value. If it’s production or goods, there’s obviously an upper limit. Even if in distant future, we begin assembling atoms into making novel rare elements, all that process consumes energy and possibly would produce waste. Production is not free. In the exponential limit, we will hit some constraint. If we are talking about services, we should realise that even they cost energy…

Yes, in current and recent economic regimes, the primary way of providing more value is simply by doing more of the similar valuable work. Instead of manual production of a shirt, a factory worker makes orders of magnitude more.

Increasingly though, modern economies are shifting away from this sort of work. Instead of the energy-constrained primary and secondary sectors, more things are being done on the knowledge and attention-constrained tertiary sectors.

Like, economic growth through giving people better advice is much less energy constrained than you're suggesting. There's still some limits, but overall it's not something that needs anything as drastic as economic growth limits for their own sake.

Re: Exponential Economist Meets Finite Physicist (2012)

#85

Post by Amboto2205 » Thu, May 30, 2019, 6:21 AM UTC

Doesn’t the definition of a “steady-state” economy mean that there will be no real GDP growth, but only nominal growth? I don’t understand the assertion that GDP can grow indefinitely just because the arbitary “utility” can. There will still be physical limits inside a steady-state which would be subjected to price, which will affect GDP.

Re: Exponential Economist Meets Finite Physicist (2012)

#86

Post by stouset » Thu, May 30, 2019, 6:30 AM UTC

cinquemb wrote: post #72

jbay808 wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure this is quite a takedown of the author's point. In fact, I'm surprised at how many people on HN seem to be misunderstanding this. The author is saying that physics puts a fairly solid cap on the amount of power we can produce on earth. That's the basic point. What does a finite energy-consuming, exponentially growing economy look like? If we accept that all economic transactions consume some energy, and…

> then once we've hit our physical constraint on power generation Are we supposed to accept this? Because I do not. I think the way that we allocate resources towards energy collection/generation/consumption is a bigger constraint than what physics can currently allow.

This is covered in an earlier post of his. At current growth rates, we’ll start noticeably heating the Earth in only a few hundred years. Not from the greenhouse effect, but from literally saturating the Earth’s capacity to radiate excess energy as heat into space.

This is a raw physical limitation. How we use and how we generate the energy are irrelevant details. The only thing that matters is Earth’s ambient temperature, the additional wattage being used planetwide, and the Earth’s radius. Past a certain point, Earth’s equilibrium temperature will rise well past current levels, and rapidly.

Re: Exponential Economist Meets Finite Physicist (2012)

#87

Post by AstralStorm » Thu, May 30, 2019, 6:31 AM UTC

bshipp wrote: post #47

Terr_ wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's more about self-unfulfilling prophecies. I mean, a happy ending for Ebeneezer Scrooge doesn't necessarily mean that the Ghost Of Christmas Yet To Come was a liar.

Malthusian advocates tend to view the economy as static. One of the most recent surges in that line of thinking was the worlds impending doom at the hands of Peak Oil. Every single trendline in the early 2000's showed us running into a supply wall with no possibly salvation. And here we are, not even 20 years later, and America could potentially become a net exporter of oil. economics is hard because supply and deman…

Come on. We haven't tried any other emerging solutions such as global government or full on ochlocracy. Yet always people cousin capitalistm is best we got only because it's the thing we currently have, committing the same mistake of being static, just on the higher level.

Not to mention capitalism is an umbrella term with many variants making it a works claim. As if you said "the best we have is cars".

Re: Exponential Economist Meets Finite Physicist (2012)

#88

Post by AstralStorm » Thu, May 30, 2019, 6:33 AM UTC

philipkglass wrote: post #29

jbay808 wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think we'd need to look globally, because it's easy to outsource your energy intensive activities. If I buy my bread from a baker, I can say I don't need any energy to run an oven anymore, but that doesn't imply that when the baker gets as wealthy as I am the world won't need ovens anymore.

Chathamization linked to a graph of energy use per capita in the US, showing that it peaked in the 1970s. In 2015 it was 6804 kgoe per capita, well below the peak of 8438 kgoe recorded in 1978. CO2 emissions are a decent proxy for primary energy in our present fossil-dominated era, and when accounting for CO2 embodied in imports, the US does look worse. But it doesn't make a big difference: https://www.carbonbrief.or…

It should be moved some from China to USA because of trash exports too. (Also probably Malaysia.)

Anyway, it's great when you compare yourself to second worst.

Re: Exponential Economist Meets Finite Physicist (2012)

#89

Post by cinquemb » Thu, May 30, 2019, 6:34 AM UTC

stouset wrote: post #86

cinquemb wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> then once we've hit our physical constraint on power generation Are we supposed to accept this? Because I do not. I think the way that we allocate resources towards energy collection/generation/consumption is a bigger constraint than what physics can currently allow.

This is covered in an earlier post of his. At current growth rates, we’ll start noticeably heating the Earth in only a few hundred years. Not from the greenhouse effect, but from literally saturating the Earth’s capacity to radiate excess energy as heat into space. This is a raw physical limitation. How we use and how we generate the energy are irrelevant details. The only thing that matters is Earth’s ambient temper…

> How we use and how we generate the energy are irrelevant details.

Just as irrelevant as assuming the basis behind current growth rates where it is impossible to mitigate agaisnt "literally saturating the Earth’s capacity to radiate excess energy as heat into space".

All of this is based on assumptions. You can't just accept one set of assumptions that underlie a model and throw out others that could refute it (well one could, but it isn't intellectually honest).

Re: Exponential Economist Meets Finite Physicist (2012)

#90

Post by AstralStorm » Thu, May 30, 2019, 6:40 AM UTC

cinquemb wrote: post #81

fallingfrog wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a physical limit to the efficiency of a heat engine though. If your powertrain is 25% efficient, you can double it to 50%. But if it's 50%, you cannot double it to 100% unless the engine is operating at a temperature of absolute zero. You're going to reach a point- and current model cars are probably just about there- where the engine is operating about as efficiently as the laws of physics permit, and then…

>- and current model cars are probably just about there- Very true, in order to get more progress, one would have to develop systems that are sufficiently different and more efficient at some level which may be odds with how we currently allocate resources.

Such as series hybrids and electric cars. (Dropping complex transmission for batteries, but using a more efficient engine.)

At some point though friction against road and minimum weight for safety and comfort come into play, and once you optimize these you end up with a train. :)

It's the same problem electronics face right now, when they really butt into quantum physics and consequently have huge yield issues - and you can scale horizontally (more transistors) only for subset of problems.