WTF Happened in 2023?
notboring.co
WTF Happened in 2023?
1–10 of 32 posts
Re: WTF Happened in 2023?
#2I've long thought any supposed economic/technological stagnation was illusory, or at least greatly overstated. The third industrial revolution began several decades ago and we're now in the middle of it. I like to stay grounded so I look at basic metrics. Pick almost any raw resource or simple good, and its extraction or production is through the roof, while the energy intensity to obtain it is decreasing.
In fact most trends become quite preposterous, sooner rather than later. (Whole planet turned into ICs by the 22nd century, at this rate.) So all manner of wildness is sure to soon happen. This is certainly not stagnation, whatever it will ultimately mean:
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f9/Copper_-...
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/43/Zinc_wor...
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/58/Nickel_w...
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/96/Aluminiu...
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/48/Vanadium...
Re: WTF Happened in 2023?
#3I've long thought any supposed economic/technological stagnation was illusory, or at least greatly overstated. The third industrial revolution began several decades ago and we're now in the middle of it. I like to stay grounded so I look at basic metrics. Pick almost any raw resource or simple good, and its extraction or production is through the roof, while the energy intensity to obtain it is decreasing. In fact mo…
> while the energy intensity to obtain it is decreasing.
Correct. Infinite Growth being the north star here, but it's not sustainable indefinitely.
Re: WTF Happened in 2023?
#4I've long thought any supposed economic/technological stagnation was illusory, or at least greatly overstated. The third industrial revolution began several decades ago and we're now in the middle of it. I like to stay grounded so I look at basic metrics. Pick almost any raw resource or simple good, and its extraction or production is through the roof, while the energy intensity to obtain it is decreasing. In fact mo…
> while the energy intensity to obtain it is decreasing. Correct. Infinite Growth being the north star here, but it's not sustainable indefinitely.
Expansion into space would help mitigate a lot of things, and the more population pressure, with the accompanying increase in labour, the more likely that expansion is to take place.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-12318767/NAS...
Re: WTF Happened in 2023?
#5It's shameful to see the effect targeted media campaigns have on Republicans with the steep dropoff in support of wind/solar. But at least it's good to see nuclear gain ground on both sides.
Re: WTF Happened in 2023?
#6I've long thought any supposed economic/technological stagnation was illusory, or at least greatly overstated. The third industrial revolution began several decades ago and we're now in the middle of it. I like to stay grounded so I look at basic metrics. Pick almost any raw resource or simple good, and its extraction or production is through the roof, while the energy intensity to obtain it is decreasing. In fact mo…
I agree that stagnation was illusory and to me it feels like not only the midst of the third Industrial Revolution, but also the start of the third technological revolution. The first ending in 2000 and the second ending in 2021-2022.
Accelerate.
Re: WTF Happened in 2023?
#7What? I get that optimism feels nice, but... resources on Earth are limited, and we are starting to feel it (actually for conventional oil, the peak was in 2008, and Europe's economy has been feeling it since then). Extracting metals gets more and more expensive and harder.
Renewables are extremely far from looking like they could remotely replace fossil fuels, and given that building nuclear plants takes decades, it's starting to be short on that end too.
More fossil energy is definitely not good: it's killing us (literally), and it will get worse.
It's really not clear at all, today, that we will be able to replace fossil fuels entirely with renewable energy (meaning that we are likely to face a forced degrowth). And anyway, the more energy we have, the more we behave like humans, and that's killing the Earth's biodiversity (no need to go to Mars: we are changing Earth into something that may look like Mars eventually).
The best thing that could happen in 2023 would be to realize that less is more.
Re: WTF Happened in 2023?
#8What? I get that optimism feels nice, but... resources on Earth are limited, and we are starting to feel it (actually for conventional oil, the peak was in 2008, and Europe's economy has been feeling it since then). Extracting metals gets more and more expensive and harder. Renewables are extremely far from looking like they could remotely replace fossil fuels, and given that building nuclear plants takes decades, it…
Fissionable resources are plentiful and we've barely started to extract them.
Re: WTF Happened in 2023?
#9Fossil Fuel extraction is still growing.
In the future, I think they'll know exactly what happened in 2023. And it won't be thought of kindly.
Re: WTF Happened in 2023?
#10[deleted]