I take it you still haven't seen that TED talk. A key point Hans Rosling makes (which he expands upon in greater detail in several of his other talks). In this talk, he explains
... there are two things that can increase the energy use. First, population
growth. Second, economic growth. Population growth will mainly occur among the
poorest people here because they have high child mortality and they have many
children per woman. ...
You may not have noticed, but China hasn't been very successful at legislating population growth. Meanwhile, some areas have slowed their population growth. Japan is actually concerned that they are losing population.
The way you control population is \to bring people up to a standard of living that no longer requires having large families (i.e. for farm work, etc). China knows this. They aren't stupid - they certainly understand the costs of allowing terrible ("equivalent to a pack/day cigarette habit") smog. China also understands that if they can stabilize their population by raising their lifestyle. Hence they are using incredible amount of coal as a short-term workaround while they work on the largest public-works infrastructure projects in the world (e.g. Three Gorges, their current breeder reactor project).
> some magic CO2-neutral power source
A nuclear power generator is not magic.
> save energy
You say this as if engineers aren't constantly creating new ways to make energy usage more efficient. Of course they have - engineers hate energy waste. We have been slowly improving efficiency. Obviously we should continue this process, but it will never be enough to significantly impact the the total energy used in the world.
> it seems to me that if "convenience X" involves a lot of energy, it will also involve a lot of nuisance
This is absolutely not true in general. Many things oonly become possible when you reach a minimum of energy.
> You may not have noticed, but China hasn't been very successful at legislating population growth.
The one-child policy was a targeted a population of around 1.2 billion in 2000. Actually population in 2000 was about 1.262 billion. I may not like the methods used by China, but calling it not very successful seems somewhat questionable.
> Meanwhile, some areas have slowed their population growth.
Like, say, China, which had a natural growth rate around 25 per 1000 when the one-child policy was adopted, dropped down to 11 and back up to around 16 in the mid 80s, then pretty consistently down since, to 7.58 in 2000, and around 5 for about the last decade.
I probably should have stated it more precisely, but that's more or less my point. China has made some impressive changes in the last few decades, with a lot more people having access to energy and the lifestyle improvements that it brings.
Without the ability to utilize energy, the China's population would be a lot further off from the 1.2B target. We still see this in some regions, as the one-child policy is harder to enforce the further you get from the metropolitan areas.
It's still a huge country with a lot of variation, of course, and I'm generalizing a lot.
I don't understand what you are trying to say. My point was that energy can be saved. I guess I tend to think more abstract than you. For example, population could be reduced by dropping a nuclear bomb - boom, energy saved. (I'm too lazy to go into details of population control here...).
That's of course not the solution I propose, it just abstractly proves the point that energy can be saved. In fact, as you mention with the washing machines example, the majority of people seem to get by on very little energy (even less than is required to power a washing machine).
All I said is that saving energy is another option, besides building more nuclear power plants or burning more coal.
And you seem to have missed that washing machines are not the major factor in power consumption that you make it out to be.
"it will never be enough to significantly impact the the total energy used in the world"
People will simply use all the energy they can get (even if you build lots and lots of nuclear power plants). That doesn't imply that they couldn't get by with less.
> population could be reduced by dropping a nuclear bomb
Some of us are trying to discuss solutions, not fantasies of genocide.
> All I said is that saving energy is another option
And I'm saying the only reason you say that is because you're living an incredibly privileged life. For most of the world, "less energy usage" means hard decisions like if they have enough food to eat. For someone who claims to think abstractly, you seem to have a serious problem thinking about energy from any other point of view than what is presumably your own ethnocentric perspective.
> And you seem to have missed that washing machines are not the major factor in power consumption that you make it out to be.
Do you know how I can tell you still haven't watched Hans Rosling's explanation of this problem?
Washing machines (and related basic-standard-of-living technology) is probably going to account for about 1/3 or 1/2 of the increase in energy usage of the world in the next several decades. Energy expensive technologies (e.g. airplanes) are not relevant, because only a small number of people will gain access to the necessary wealth in the same time period.
To be very explicit, the energy saving that are possible - which should still be done - form the tiny number of people with enough privilege to regularly pay to waste energy is tiny.
> they couldn't get by with less
Go watch that video. Look really hard at what it's like to waste your days washing your cloths instead of, say, getting an education.
What specific energy use is being wasted? What "optional" thing should they stop doing?
What, exactly, should most of the women in the world (who are currently in this situation) do to reduce their energy use?
Assuming you are not a terrible personj that says they should have to stay living in poverty or simply be bombed (your other "option"), where specifically should these people - that is, the 3-4 billion people currently living under these conditions get their energy? (there are only 3 options: nuclear, coal/gas, or "they don't get to enjoy an industrialized lifestyle")
Hopefully, answering these questions should reveal to you why "lower energy use" is not an alternative.
> People will simply use all the energy they can get
That may be true for you, but you shouldn't project your beliefs onto others.
So I finally watched that talk to the end (had only watched the beginning). I generally like Rosling, but that talk seems a bit low on details. Your interpretation seems wrong - washing machine people only use 2 units of energy, the rich use 6 units. So there seems to be a lot of potential to save right there. While more people will move up to washing machine level, at the same time things could get more efficient and more green energy could become available (it's not clear where Rosling gets his projections from...).
Rosling seems to be angry at some economics students who he claims wanted to deny the world washing machines. You adopted his anger and now you think everybody who says "save energy" wants to deny people washing machines. There is simply no basis for that (and I wonder if those selfish economic students actually exist - Rosling is a cool guy, but also a show man, perhaps he invented them for a good story).
Washing machines are actually not that sophisticated, by the way. I think the first ones even operated without electricity. It's basically a drum spinning in a bowl of water, with some fancy chemicals added to the mix. Perhaps somebody should invent a "3rd world washing machine" to help all those women out.
I take it you still haven't seen that TED talk. A key point Hans Rosling makes (which he expands upon in greater detail in several of his other talks). In this talk, he explains
You may not have noticed, but China hasn't been very successful at legislating population growth. Meanwhile, some areas have slowed their population growth. Japan is actually concerned that they are losing population.The way you control population is \to bring people up to a standard of living that no longer requires having large families (i.e. for farm work, etc). China knows this. They aren't stupid - they certainly understand the costs of allowing terrible ("equivalent to a pack/day cigarette habit") smog. China also understands that if they can stabilize their population by raising their lifestyle. Hence they are using incredible amount of coal as a short-term workaround while they work on the largest public-works infrastructure projects in the world (e.g. Three Gorges, their current breeder reactor project).
> some magic CO2-neutral power source
A nuclear power generator is not magic.
> save energy
You say this as if engineers aren't constantly creating new ways to make energy usage more efficient. Of course they have - engineers hate energy waste. We have been slowly improving efficiency. Obviously we should continue this process, but it will never be enough to significantly impact the the total energy used in the world.
> it seems to me that if "convenience X" involves a lot of energy, it will also involve a lot of nuisance
This is absolutely not true in general. Many things oonly become possible when you reach a minimum of energy.