Early Retirement Extreme Forums

Landfills do have sufficient concentration of minerals to be considered sources of ore for some minerals. With present technology and power inputs the concentration required for profitable mining is very low (on the order of parts per million). Putting two and two together, this means landfills can't be mined in a low energy intensity world. It would not be possible with a shovel. While ore concentrations are high on a relative (money) scale, they're not high on an absolute (energy) scale. Better luck can be had looking above ground, tearing down and catabolizing buildings and infrastructure for wire, pipes, rebar, etc.

For more, see e.g. https://www.amazon.com/dp/1603585419/ and https://www.amazon.com/dp/1621412504 . Also I posted a video somewhere about mining platinum from road dust for shits'n'giggles. IIRC, it paid an economic wage... so apparently that idea is already "market-efficient". Ditto mining gold from old sim cards using slightly-dangerous kitchen sink chemistry. You can buy bags of old sim cards on eBay, again economically priced.

Back when the price of copper was higher the UK railways were having problems with people stealing cable from the side of the tracks. At the same time the value of all the cable British Telecom owned was more than the market capitalisation of the company.

Lead theft from buildings is also a big problem currently.

The small will disappear, the big will bloat, who you know will become more important than what, then it will fail.

Be it family, nature, corporations or nations.

@jacob:

Thanks for the book recommendations. Added to my list. Happened upon this further proof that we are now in the Anthropocene.

The mass of man made materials is now greater than all life on Earth.

https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/1 ... life-earth

I watched this yesterday, thought a few here might appreciate it too.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kySDKESt3_M

@vexed87:

Thanks for the link. It looks interesting. I read Orlov's "Five Stages of Collapse" and would recommend.

I guess the question to ask ourselves here is, ok, so we've had all these historical examples of local collapse - the Soviet Union, Iraq under sanctions, etcetera. We can study those, and it will take us far. But how will the coming collapse be different? What would be the twist?

@tony
France is a great country, of course, but the forces that have the highest chance to control it in the next 20 years are very authoritarian. Of course, if the collapse is total (no more state), it's not that bad if you like fighting. But otherwise, one is better of leaving.

@chenda
You really have no problem with jailing writter, sending dissent voice in psyhciatric internment, and taking children away from parent won't don't agree that children should wear a mask and start homeschooling? Or just the lockdown enforcing?
As you wish, but I don't see how those aren't totalitarian measures. What justifies calling poland and hungary more totalitarian than that?

Jean wrote: ↑

Wed Dec 16, 2020 2:28 am

@tony
France is a great country, of course, but the forces that have the highest chance to control it in the next 20 years are very authoritarian. Of course, if the collapse is total (no more state), it's not that bad if you like fighting. But otherwise, one is better of leaving.

And what forces are those?

Jean wrote: ↑

Wed Dec 16, 2020 2:28 am

@chenda You really have no problem with jailing writter, sending dissent voice in psyhciatric internment, and taking children away from parent won't don't agree that children should wear a mask and start homeschooling? Or just the lockdown enforcing?

I was predominantly referring to lockdown enforcing. I am aware there has been some controversial legislation in France recently but Poland and Hungry appear to have gone much further down the path of authoritarianism.

@tony
Thé actual gouvernement which is drifting toward totalitarianism, or sunni islam, which might soon bé thé religion of the majority, and is by design totalitarian, with thé added Hazard that Muslims in France a extremly racists toward whites (and toward blacks and jew in some capacity).

@chenda
They apear to, but have they?

Less than 6% of the population of France are Muslims, its hard to see Islam becoming the majority religion anytime soon.

Ethnic statistics are illégal in France, so any number is an estimation. But about 18 percent of thé newborn had a Muslim given name in 2019. This is Closer to thé impression my last visits in France left me.

ertyu wrote:But how will the coming collapse be different? What would be the twist?

In the U.S., one twist might be due to the fact that the growing gap of economic inequality is even wider in the youngest generation. Most relatively affluent Boomers and Gen-Xers do not or will not have very many grandchildren. So, wealth will become more concentrated and services, such as public education, provided to the majority of the upcoming generation(s) will diminish or weaken. Obviously, the home environments of impoverished majority children will also often be sub-par. Many low-income children do not even acquire the basic verbal vocabulary necessary to learn to read by age 5. This may contribute to something like a "collapse from below."

However, it has been my observation that even in the most severely collapsed neighborhoods, children do usually have access to smartphones. Therefore, I think a dystopia along the lines of "Ready Player One" is quite possible. IOW, global corporate technocracy continues to thrive or survive, as brick and mortar local government bureaucracies fall further apart.

7Wannabe5 wrote: ↑

Wed Dec 16, 2020 7:25 am

IOW, global corporate technocracy continues to thrive or survive, as brick and mortar local government bureaucracies fall further apart.

but let's keep cutting the taxes of billionaires, who so sorely need it!

yeah...

@Alphaville:

It's not just a money problem. Some liberal policies are also contributing to this problem due to unintended effects. For instance, I am not a huge fan of "no child left behind" as currently practiced/legislated, because I think it drains resources away from low-income kids who actually have a chance of succeeding. No affluent suburban liberal would actually let their own child attend school in the chaotic environments that ensue. Pretending that every human is capable of one day mastering calculus or appreciating "Dubliners" is a very expensive trip to fantasy land.

7Wannabe5 wrote: ↑

Wed Dec 16, 2020 8:09 am

I am not a huge fan of "no child left behind" as currently practiced/legislated, because I think it drains resources away from low-income kids who actually have a chance of succeeding.

the name may sound liberal, but wasn't that a bush ii policy? my state just recently discontinued mandatory testing under our new democratic governor i believe.

eta: yup: https://www.washingtonpost.com/educatio ... -teachers/

7Wannabe5 wrote: ↑

Wed Dec 16, 2020 8:09 am

@Alphaville: Pretending that every human is capable of one day mastering calculus or appreciating "Dubliners" is a very expensive trip to fantasy land.

Yes, and there is a widespread tendency I find to argue that poverty is somehow solvable by 'increasing opportunity', and that if 'social barriers' are lifted then the poor will all become successful graduates and millionaires. I'm all for helping people with talent in disadvantaged circumstances succeed but half the population has a below average IQ.

chenda wrote: ↑

Wed Dec 16, 2020 8:33 am

I'm all for helping people with talent in disadvantaged circumstances succeed but half the population has a below average IQ.

this is true, and i see daily evidence of it.

but what are we discussing here anyway? i mean concretely. who does what to whom? and what's the effect?

i got a bit lost with the different legislations etc.