Running out

[drdoug]

Has any non-living primary resource valued by humans entirely run out?

Comments

[drdoug]

Hmm - phosphorus is interesting indeed - phosphate is pretty important as a fertiliser. Wikipedia says US reserves are projected to run out in 2035 ... so while it may go in time it's not a goner yet.

Hadn't thought of the float-off-in-to-space business - helium seems like an obvious candidate. There might be plenty in the sun but we're not going to be mining that any time soon. AIUI we get most of our helium mixed up in natural gas supplies, so it's not run out yet ...

I like the idea of renegade tokamak operators, but they'd have to be pretty damn well funded. *grin*

[steer]

Have you heard of the Simon-Ehrlich bet?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wager_between_Julian_Simon_and_Paul_Ehrlich

[drdoug]

Ah - yes - it rings a bell. Interesting stuff.

[steer]

*grin* Scientists never get famous for saying "we're all not doomed".

[drdoug]

*laughs* Indeed - except perhaps Bjorn Lomborg, but he's Danish and so excluded from public debate atm.

Interesting to follow links on the Simon-Ehrlich thing and read more. Simon wanted to bet that direct measures of human welfare would get better, such as life expectancy. I think he may be starting to lose that particular one, much to my surprise - IIRC global life expectancy is starting to sink, despite it going the other way in the developed world, mainly due to HIV/AIDS.

[thekumquat]

What about metals which undergo hard to reverse chemical reaction when used - iron into rust, or uranium fission into cobalt and helium and whatever it is?

Is tin mining economic *anywhere* now?

[drdoug]

Oxidation's a good 'un - like rust, it's possible to reverse it but it'd take an awful lot of energy to do it. And uranium fission is even more irreversible-for-practical-purposes. As I implied, I'd count running out of the stuff-in-the-ground for both of those. But we're nowhere near short of iron or uranium ores, though.

Dunno if it's economic to mine tin, but shedloads of places do it, and there's no shortage of the stuff SFAIK.

[drdoug]

According to the link skibbley gave below, if it wasn't economic anywhere before it soon will be, as allegedly tin prices are soaring atm.

[skibbley]

Give 5 examples of things that are scarce, and when are they scarce

I liked Jared Diamond's book when it was given to me as a present.

[drdoug]

Interesting link, ta ... and none of those examples look like something that has actually run out :-) Even tin, which the article says has gone up in price substantially over 2002-4, is being produced in record quantities. (And what a surreal answer that summary of metals markets is to the question posed on the site!)

[blue_condition]

I was thinking of buying Collapse; I'd be very interested in seeing your review thereof (I reckon randomstring and ortho_bob would probably be interested too...)

[drdoug]

Very short precis: societies collapse because of a combination of five factors: damage they inflict on the environment, climate change, hostile neighbours, loss of support from friendly neighbours, and what they do about all that lot. We need to be careful about applying this to current global situations, and there are abundant causes for concern, but we're not doomed if we make good choices about what to do about it all.

Well worth a read if you liked Guns, Germs and Steel, but I didn't enjoy it as much. I found the grand-narrative framework less useful, and the stuff I learned along the way was a bit less fascinating and a bit less entirely-unknown. Good book though and well worth the paperback price.

[drdoug]

Oh, and there's a lot of stuff about Montana, Pacific Islands (including Easter Island) and the Norse, plus whistlestop visits of other famous and not-so-famous collapses, near-collapses, and relevant non-collapses from the past and present.