Re: GAS-L: Conquest of the Land Through Seven Thousand Years

[LINVENT@aol.com]

Dear Peter,
    Man's "progress" is really a manner of coping with internal self-doubt 
and is a manner of alleviating the internal stresses which we feel for a 
"better" life through convenience, pleasure, higher order achievements.  
Perhaps the most satisfying is that of monasticism, the highest order of 
pleasure and hedonism.  This is part of the reason why the Indian and other 
cultures have not "progressed" because they diffuse the stresses which have 
caused the changes to the environment which make "progress". All of the other 
factors are secondary to this aspect of the human condition. 
    If you can convince the masses through religion or other mechanisms to 
embrace this philosophy and "outlaw the wheel", go for it. I won't subscribe 
to it however.
    The current energy crisis is not an energy crisis, but a regulatory 
crisis.  Not for environmental issues on power generation but on gas 
transmission capacity and more subtle issues such as locating pipelines, and 
past sins of low gas costs. I know of trillions of cubic feet of shut in gas 
because the cost of putting in pipelines is too expensive from regulatory 
concerns.  If this gas were available, the cost of gas would be less and the 
crisis would not be. Texas has also deregulated power and does not have the 
present crisis which California has.  Texas knows how to do business, 
California does not. If the price of natural gas stays at this level for a 
while, more pipelines will pop up and the price will drop again. 
    This is certainly no reason to predict the end of humanity. The earth 
will certainly still be around regardless if man is here or not. 

Tom Taylor
The Gasification List is sponsored by
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