OT: The Seneca Cliff

[eridanus]

The Seneca Cliff

http://thesenecatrap.blogspot.com.es/

Why decline is faster than growth
"It would be some consolation for the feebleness of our selves and our works if all things should perish as slowly as they come into being; but as it is, increases are of sluggish growth, but the way to ruin is rapid." Lucius Anneaus Seneca, Letters to Lucilius, n. 91

The concept of the "Seneca Cliff" seems to have gone mainstream. Below, it is mentioned in a recent post by Dennis Coyne on "peakoilbarrell" as an obvious concept. Just as when you say "Gaussian Curve", you don't have to specify what shape the curve has, so it is for the "Seneca Curve". It looks like I started some kind of avalanche with my 2011 post when I introduced the term. See also my blog wholly dedicated to the subject.

Here, the projections by AEO (annual energy outlook) seem to me very optimistic; can production really keep growing until 2035-2040? If that were to happen, however, the subsequent collapse would be truly abrupt.

[Öö Tiib]

On Thursday, 28 July 2016 16:42:49 UTC+3, eridanus wrote:
> The Seneca Cliff
>
> http://thesenecatrap.blogspot.com.es/
>

What you want to say with it? Don't just copy-paste stuff like otangelo
grasso. We can't get if you mean it as not true or something you are
uncertain about or something you do not understand or something that you
consider true. I for one do not understand it.

I may be don't get what curve it is. Is it mental panic curve? How hope
grows slowly and carefully from mistrust to euphoria but then drops
rapidly to panic? That is then curve how to deceive and delude
people and rule them with panic. Why we need it? My impression is that
it is evil art used in evil places, for example stock market. ;)

[William Hyde]

On Thursday, July 28, 2016 at 9:42:49 AM UTC-4, eridanus wrote:
> The Seneca Cliff
>
> http://thesenecatrap.blogspot.com.es/
>
> Why decline is faster than growth
> "It would be some consolation for the feebleness of our selves and our works if all things should perish as slowly as they come into being; but as it is, increases are of sluggish growth, but the way to ruin is rapid." Lucius Anneaus Seneca, Letters to Lucilius, n. 91

This is the chess career of JH Blackburne:

http://www.chessmetrics.com/cm/CM2/PlayerProfile.asp?Params=199510SSSSS3S012785000000111000000000002810100

As you can see, he does not decline in strength faster than he grew. No "Seneca Cliff". Similar patterns are observed for other players, e.g. world champion Lasker. The worlds best chessplayers (and even much weaker ones such as myself) tend to grow in strength very rapidly at first, and decline only slowly unless major health problems crop up.

As for Seneca, his real cliff came when Nero forced him to commit suicide.

William Hyde

[eridanus]

I do not need to present my personal opinion. These graphics can be right,
or can be wrong. Each one had to decide if this argument has any meaning
or not.
I am not a preacher or a missionary. Any Ponzi schemes, even in the stock
exchange work this way. They are slowly going up, then they get speed up,
and later collapse. The last construction bubble worked this way in many
countries. I recalled the speculative assets bubble that started in Asia
in 1985 and burst in 1991. I was very impressed with that.
You can consider the roaring 20's of US and how stocks collapsed one day,
ruining all the little players. You can consider the graph of the EIA’s
Annual Energy Outlook and the Seneca Cliff

http://peakoilbarrel.com/eias-annual-energy-outlook-seneca-cliff/

Perhaps it has some sense, perhaps it has not. I wanted to hear comments
from other people more intelligent than me, that could argument this graphic
is just pure shit with some credible argument.

I have not credentials to dispute these graphics. But probably someone else
has ideas sharper than mine. It must be easy, for I have not any idea
about the credibility of those graphs. Makes any sense, or it is totally
senseless?
eri

[eridanus]

ok, a chess master can be great till the moment his brain would be
affected by Alzheimer, or just a few months or weeks before dying.
In this case the cliff is abrupt. The Third Reich was slowly growing
up till a moment in which stopped growing and eventually busted sort
of fast.
I am thinking about steam engine, how it went growing slowly for decades
arrived to some zenith and was eventually substituted by other machines
burning diesel or consuming electricity. Or this civilization based on
burning fossil fuels. What would be this fate? It would eventually
stop growing, and then it would come a sudden collapse in 10 or 20 years?
This would be like the cliff of Seneca.
eri

[William Hyde]

On Thursday, July 28, 2016 at 3:17:48 PM UTC-4, eridanus wrote:
> El jueves, 28 de julio de 2016, 19:57:50 (UTC+1), William Hyde escribió:
> > On Thursday, July 28, 2016 at 9:42:49 AM UTC-4, eridanus wrote:
> > > The Seneca Cliff
> > >
> > > http://thesenecatrap.blogspot.com.es/
> > >
> > > Why decline is faster than growth
> > > "It would be some consolation for the feebleness of our selves and our works if all things should perish as slowly as they come into being; but as it is, increases are of sluggish growth, but the way to ruin is rapid." Lucius Anneaus Seneca, Letters to Lucilius, n. 91
> >
> > This is the chess career of JH Blackburne:
> >
> > http://www.chessmetrics.com/cm/CM2/PlayerProfile.asp?Params=199510SSSSS3S012785000000111000000000002810100
> >
> > As you can see, he does not decline in strength faster than he grew. No "Seneca Cliff". Similar patterns are observed for other players, e.g. world champion Lasker. The worlds best chessplayers (and even much weaker ones such as myself) tend to grow in strength very rapidly at first, and decline only slowly unless major health problems crop up.
> >
> > As for Seneca, his real cliff came when Nero forced him to commit suicide.
> >
> > William Hyde
>
> ok, a chess master can be great till the moment his brain would be
> affected by Alzheimer, or just a few months or weeks before dying.

No, that is not what I said. A chess master tends to peak before the age of 40, sometimes well before, then declines. The exact opposite of Seneca's claim. Yes, the player may still be great a day before death, but much weaker than at his or her peak. Blackburne's curve, I repeat, does not look anything like "Seneca's cliff" even though he was one of the latest-peaking grandmasters I could recall.

In fact I suspect this is true for many people in many areas, including Seneca. But we often have the delusion in our late 50s that we are doing as well as ever, if not better, until "suddenly" incontrovertible evidence arrives that we are past it. The apparent suddenness is the collapse of our illusions, not our abilities.

Exceptions would be some writers and composers who seem to improve well into their sixties, seventies, and even eighties. And then they die.

I've largely been focusing on the "works" Seneca mentioned, rather than their lives. But even in this case, people now live for decades with conditions that would have killed someone in Seneca's day forthwith.

Even in his own day, Augustus and Tiberius were counterexamples to his claim.

William Hyde

[Öö Tiib]

I did just want to know what your take is about that thing you copy-pasted,
not to accuse you of preaching or something.

> They are slowly going up, then they get speed up,
> and later collapse. The last construction bubble worked this way in many
> countries. I recalled the speculative assets bubble that started in Asia
> in 1985 and burst in 1991. I was very impressed with that.
> You can consider the roaring 20's of US and how stocks collapsed one day,
> ruining all the little players.

Yes, that is how the stock market bubbles work and burst. However those
never hit zero. The price drops several times fast but never to zero.
It is because when it is at low enough then certain greedy individuals buy
it up from panicked idiots.

> You can consider the graph of the EIA’s
> Annual Energy Outlook and the Seneca Cliff
>
> http://peakoilbarrel.com/eias-annual-energy-outlook-seneca-cliff/

From where is that data taken that is on those graphs? It looks to be
graph about different thing than stock market collapse.

>
> Perhaps it has some sense, perhaps it has not. I wanted to hear comments
> from other people more intelligent than me, that could argument this graphic
> is just pure shit with some credible argument.
>
> I have not credentials to dispute these graphics. But probably someone else
> has ideas sharper than mine. It must be easy, for I have not any idea
> about the credibility of those graphs. Makes any sense, or it is totally
> senseless?

What I write are purely my opinion, I am not expert of future telling.
However my impression is that source of data on those graphs is unclear and
I doubt if there are any truth in it. Careful reacting to good news and
rapid overreacting to bad news is something that human's mind does. It
is not how real world works.

[eridanus]

I am not investing in oil, not in anything. I am 79 years old and live out
of my pension. I have not investments in stocks either. So I do not need
to worry about my future that is clear: I will die within the next 10 years.

But it had come to my mind that the future "is written in the stars". Is it?
Perhaps not. The future is written in the sources of energy of this civilization. Has it any? Not sure for so many people. We have been
living the golder years of human civilization. Would they last much longer?
Not sure. I am not a hasty seller of stocks. I have not invested. Well,
I bred two children that are already old enough. I do not worry for them,
only for the whole fucking humanity. Are those graphs true or false? I
do not know. But they look probably. Do those graphs look improbably for
you? Any concrete reason to think those are bogus projections?
eri

[Öö Tiib]

On Friday, 29 July 2016 10:22:48 UTC+3, eridanus wrote:
> El viernes, 29 de julio de 2016, 0:32:48 (UTC+1), Öö Tiib escribió:

snip

>
> > What I write are purely my opinion, I am not expert of future telling.
> > However my impression is that source of data on those graphs is unclear and
> > I doubt if there are any truth in it. Careful reacting to good news and
> > rapid overreacting to bad news is something that human's mind does. It
> > is not how real world works.
>
> I am not investing in oil, not in anything. I am 79 years old and live out
> of my pension. I have not investments in stocks either. So I do not need
> to worry about my future that is clear: I will die within the next 10 years.

Yes, then you are a good man.

>
> But it had come to my mind that the future "is written in the stars". Is it?
> Perhaps not. The future is written in the sources of energy of this
> civilization. Has it any? Not sure for so many people.

We mainly use fossil sources of energy. It is likely because chemical
energy that is accumulated in fossils is simplest and cheapest to use.
Its cheapness has attracted attention of parasites (politicians)
who in lot of counties take away wealth from other people as "fuel taxes".

When fossil fuel becomes not so cheap anymore then we have to look at
other sources of energy. There are plenty of energy, we got whole star
(called "Sun") nearby.

> We have been living the golder years of human civilization. Would they
> last much longer? Not sure.

I am also not sure. Fossil fuel will certainly run out. It is not a risk
but inevitable future. When exactly it happens is hard to tell, but that
does not happen next decade. Also human population is growing out of
control so we will reach trouble to water and feed everybody but again
it is likely not next decade. However how much longer ... is hard to tell.

> I am not a hasty seller of stocks. I have not invested. Well,
> I bred two children that are already old enough. I do not worry for them,
> only for the whole fucking humanity. Are those graphs true or false? I
> do not know. But they look probably. Do those graphs look improbably for
> you? Any concrete reason to think those are bogus projections?

Whenever I see such projections of several decades ahead then I *know* that
it is bogus. Forecasting ten years ahead is over human head hard, no one
knows future. The professional weather forecasters cant often foresee next
week correctly.

[eridanus]

There is a Chinese proverb that says "to prophetize is rather difficult,
specially about the future". But it must be rather easy to prophetize some
200 years after the facts occurred.
I read about someone talking about some concept as EROEI (energy returned
on energy investment). They pretend to say that some known alternative
ways of generating or storing energy deliver less energy than it was invested
to made it.
eri

[Rolf]

"Öö Tiib" <oot...@hot.ee> wrote in message
news:cdb975d3-e05e-47ca...@googlegroups.com...

IMHO, what should be more interesting to us about the next decade is not so
much the weather but whither climate:
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v244/n5416/abs/244395a0.html

Rolf

Rolf

[eridanus]

have you read what whither is he talking about?
I consulted who he is, or rather who he was, and well, I agree more or less
with him. But even the starting of some glacial age, could not be so sudden
if we think about the end of past interglacials... It really can suddenly
collapse as well, withing a decade, like occurred during the Younger Dryas, or
the Bolling-Allerod sudden ups and downs from 50,000 to 25,000 years ago.

But this is rather hypothetical when would occur. While at the rate we are
consuming oil, this can cause us a nasty surprise. A theory suggest the
civil war in Syria is related to scarcity of money of the government because
the oil is giving out the last barrels, and with a huge cost. The same can
be the reason for the civil war in Yemen. Oil is giving out their last
breath.
eri

[eridanus]

El sábado, 30 de julio de 2016, 18:57:43 (UTC+1), Rolf escribió:

i found this
Obituary: Professor H. H. Lamb
<http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/obituary-professor-h-h-lamb-1249739.html>

a very remarkable type.
Eri

[Mark Isaak]

I remember that quote being attributed to Yogi Berra, but it turns out
we were both wrong. The quote is first known in Danish, in a work
called "Farvel Og Tak" ("Goodbye and Thanks"), in 1948. It includes a
quote without attribution saying (translated to English), "It is
difficult to make predictions, especially about the future."

http://quoteinvestigator.com/2013/10/20/no-predict/

--
Mark Isaak eciton (at) curioustaxonomy (dot) net
"The evil that is in the world always comes of ignorance, and good
intentions may do as much harm as malevolence, if they lack
understanding." - Albert Camus, _The Plague_

[Rolf]

"eridanus" <leopoldo...@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:0dd39de8-be7e-44a9...@googlegroups.com...

Oil, and let's not forget gas from the same sources, is not in short supply.
AFAIK, there will be plenty available for decades to come, there are lots of
as yet unexplored but promising sources.
That's why oil still is cheap.

That some deposits run dry is to be expected, they all eventually will go
dry. In the meantime, the world will be dependent on oil both for energy and
manufacture of stuff poisoning the oceans. If the poisoning doesn't stop,
future generations will find a new layer added to our seabeds: A sediment of
plastics and other products of oil instead of soil.

Will evolution make life able to digest and dispose of plastics?

Rolf

[Rolf]

"eridanus" <leopoldo...@gmail.com> wrote in message

news:c8f0c062-7210-4579...@googlegroups.com...

We ought to have many more of that kind everywhere in society!

Rolf

[eridanus]

I had been collecting stories about him, and comments from people that
got influenced by him. It is great.
eri

[eridanus]

well, I had read about plastics. Some new bacteria had mutated and are now
extracting energy from plastics.
As for the gas, it is apparent there is more gas than oil. But this idea can
be related to the more cumbersome way of transporting gas. It is also
dangerous of exploding. You said gas for some decades. We have also oil for
some decades. Perhaps not for more than 2 decades. But as the oil began
to look scarce and more expansive, we would start to consume gas or more
coal. Also we would began to build more atomic centrals.
The main problem I see is that money is pursuing a short term profit. The
great inversions are always a task for the government; like when the railways
or the atomic centrals of energy, or even many developments in computers,
programming, biology, aviation, etc. Many of the great inventions that are
now the property of multinationals were breed by government financing. But
now with the government in ruin, without barely any earning, I do not see
who is going to invest in the future.

If they get nervous this would end in a global war with the aim of holding
the last oil reserves. The civil war of Syria and Yemen can be understood
in the logic of oil getting exhausted.
When some climatic catastrophe, like a lower temperature, occurs, all empires
collapse. With lower temperature the SST plunges and the rains get scarce.
This is called a drought. The Roman empire collapsed for this reason. All
sort of hungry armed bandits went to Rome for it has a fame of having a lot
of food, and balmier weather. The bronze age empires collapsed for the same
reason. The old Kingdom of Egypt also collapsed at that time, 4250 years ago
for the might Nile had become a miserable brook.
Then, the exhaustion of oil is equivalent to Nile becoming dry for the whole
planet.
eri

[William Hyde]

On Saturday, July 30, 2016 at 5:57:42 PM UTC-4, eridanus wrote:


> i found this
> Obituary: Professor H. H. Lamb
> <http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/obituary-professor-h-h-lamb-1249739.html>

His work had a huge influence on me, as I began to study climate not long after his masterwork was published. When I was a professor of meteorology it was as part of an intentionally "Lambite" rather than "Richardsonian" department (not that anyone used those words).

Of course the detailed numerical analysis of Richardson's followers has been a huge success. But it was felt, as Lamb felt twenty years earlier, that other areas were not being looked at by enough researchers.

And the two streams are not really independent. Improved understanding of cloud physics, mountain wave drag, and air-sea interactions feed into and improve the large scale models. So Lamb's influence is certainly felt today.

William Hyde

[eridanus]

thanks for the comments
eri