Collapse

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This is the place for discussing the potential collapse of modern civilization and the environment.

Collapse, in this context, refers to the significant loss of an established level or complexity towards a much simpler state. It can occur differently within many areas, orderly or chaotically, and be willing or unwilling. It does not necessarily imply human extinction or a singular, global event. Although, the longer the duration, the more it resembles a ‘decline’ instead of collapse.

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The Debt Bomb | Art Berman (www.artberman.com)

submitted 1 week ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 week ago (3 children)

A constant 2% economic growth rate implies that we expect the world economy in 2100 to be 350 times as large as the economy of today.

That means it roughly doubles every decade remaining in the century.

Insofar as prices or costs can go up, there seems to be no limit to growth.

Insofar as we have real physical resources and production increasing, I have a hard time imagining we can meaningfully double production one time.

For example, I can't imagine a world with twice the built infrastructure we have now. (Houses, roads, power dams, airports, schools, etc). Seems impossible.

If growth has ended or is ending soon, it makes you wonder how long governments will be able to try to print their way out of stagnation before the whole system becomes irrelevant and comical.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 week ago (1 children)

A constant 2% economic growth rate implies that we expect the world economy in 2100 to be 350 times as large as the economy of today.

Check your arithmetic. 100%*ln(2)/(2%/year)=34.66 years to double. 75 years until 2100, so by then the economy would be 2^(75/34.66)=4.48 times as large, not 350.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

Oops. 350% growth, not 350X growth...lost some decimal places there. Thanks for the correction.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 week ago

The thing is, it's still a huge increase.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 week ago

As physicist Tom Murphy points out, we'd eventually need all the energy in the galaxy

https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/2011/07/galactic-scale-energy/

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 week ago

We are hitting the absolute peaks of fossil fuels in possibly as little as a decade from now also. The current arrangements are only possible with a constantly high energy throughput. There's considerable limits right now on how much growth can be achieved. And there are more things than ever competing for energy consumption too - including the rise of AI (which is causing energy consumption to soar again after ~2 decades of being flat in Western countries).