"Collapse" - Michael Ruppert - Has anyone else seen this movie?

I watched it last night on Planet Green, and frankly, it scared the shit out of me. I'm going to watch it again today.

If this man is right, the rabbit hole goes MUCH deeper than anyone wants to believe.

It is available on Netflix as well - http://www.netflix.com/WiMovie/Collapse/70123600?strackid=79af7d78f64d7e07_0_srl&strkid=81331417_0_0&trkid=438381

Has anyone else watched this? Your thoughts/opinions?

I will today though........

we are well and truly fucked.

EVERYTHING we have comes from oil, not just fuel, but everything is dependent on oil, period.

and connecting the dots to an imminent collapse of life as we now know it.

I caught the beginning by accident last night and didn't move for 2 hours.

I don't think anyone can come away from it with a blase' attitude about our current situation.

The real scary part is that even if he is wrong, we are still screwed.

about what caused the collapse of some ancient civilizations and what that says about our modern civilizations. The movie depicts possible causes for the fall of the Mayan, Anasazi (US), Roman and other civilizations.

Diamond's point, and the point of the movie, is that the fall of these societies was accomplished through a series of choices, it didn't all happen at once or have a single cause. The movie, and book, also point to various choices we, in the modern era, have to make or our entwined civilizations will also collapse.

These choices are environmental, moral, economic and societal. The issue of energy use is a huge theme in both book and movie and the choice of how we obtain, use and seek energy is also a major theme.

Confronting Collapse: The Crisis of Energy and Money in a Post Peak Oil World

http://www.amazon.com/Confronting-Collapse-Crisis-Energy-Money/dp/1603582649/ref=sr_1_2?s=gateway&ie=UTF8&qid=1285535749&sr=8-2

a month ago and is still in my not read yet pile.

Crossing the Rubicon made a strong imprint on my mind.

Made plans to move on 2000 and moved in 2002/3 to my rural home (with water, farmland, and timber).

Wish I had paid more attention to my grandparents and parents as my domestication / dependance versus frontier life skills are lacking.

Is Ruppert politically correct at DU (given his views on 9-11 and the CIA drug trade)?

Ruppert is not perfect but connected many dots early on.

consider politically correct-- particularly when so many champion anyone that happens to put a "D" behind their name while walking a traditionally Republican platform. I think that the topics Ruppert talks about are beyond party. They will happen whether the party or the party faithful agree or disagree. No one is perfect. He personally experienced the CIA drug trade, I tend to believe him on that.

I saw it again last night as well. I had just uh, self-medicated with herbal medicine, and was frightened (again) by what he was saying. It certainly makes sense.
Its hard to dispute the fact that oil IS the blood that keeps us alive. The one thing I took away from that show was that we, as humans, have GOT to change our behavior, period. As much as it pains me to say it, having hundreds of different governments, disparity in consumption, and corporate greed, the current system just cannot last much longer. Makes me wonder what the world will be like in 30 or 40 years. I'm willing to bet it will look nothing like it does now.

You piqued my interest. Thanks.

the people least likely to be affected by it will be those that arent as "advanced" as we are.

Basically, we are consuming resources too fast and will not be able to sustain global populations at the rate we are going. The movieis well worth seeing and has a sort of neutral, "this is how it is" tone that undercuts some of the fatuous deiers on the right wing.

Case in point: Phoenix, AZ: The movie postulates that Phoenix is not a sustainable city because of it's lack of water. The city itself is badly sited and, at 3 million residents, is not in a position to be able to care for all those people in a desert environment.

by myself... I know this is going to confirm my worst fears. With a depletion of oil a zillion oil based products will be ended... and as someone said... our descents will say, what, you burned it all!!! This world is so F'en insane and backward. We haven't advanced more than a short snail's craw.

can be made from hemp/cannabis/marijuana! And made better!

check this out:
http://www.jackherer.com/hemp%20things.htm

from the 1938 Popular Mechanics magazine:

more here...
:hi:

This is the stuff that makes me wonder if we are bound to see a population bottleneck in our lifetime...

thanks for the info, i'll check back later.. :scared:

my bet is it's going to be sooner than later. These events are not linear, but exponential.

relatively flat population growth (1 billion +/-) through most of civilizations history UNTIL the invention of the combustion engine. the chart literally leaps almost straight up to 6 billion+.

COMPLETELY unsustainable.

I've been looking forward to it, but I know it'll probably scare the shit out of me.
His columns always have..
http://www.fromthewilderness.com/

listen to this: babwa wawa (walters) was saying last week that after oprah winfrey leaves the air, THEY will need to find someone to fill the time slot!
that says it all. Mister pig is so in control of pigmedia he thinks the insanely vast western cultural media infrastructure NEEDS mister pig to fill a timeslot! As if USA isn't full of guys who'd kill for an opportunity!
jesus h wow

It isn't as shocking as it would be to people who haven't been paying attention, but it is grim.

He does say that the only way to survive the transition is through community. The lone rugged individual won't make it. And that it'll all become local again. And he says what we need to do is survive the transition. Buy non-Monsanto seeds to grow food and get more seeds for more food (renewable food). You don't need to buy thousands of cans of food. When they're gone, they're gone.

His two examples of North Korea and Cuba having to make choices when the Soviet Union collapsed and how they dealt with their total dependency on the USSR oil drying up is very educational. North Korea fell into a famine where millions were assumed to starve to death but Cuba chose to grow their own food in every square inch of land. Cuba survived and the Cubans even ate better than they had for decades. North Koreans died in the millions because their leadership totally failed them.

nt

I can't remember exactly what I thought was over the top nonsense, but ...

After watching that read Eaarth by Bill Mckibbon. Then have fun sleeping.

9pm - 10pm every Sunday night. it just started 2 weeks ago and is pretty good. Tonight he is supposed to talk about transition towns.

He has a radio show on the Progressive Network
Message:
9pm - 10pm every Sunday night. it just started 2 weeks ago and is pretty good. Tonight he is supposed to talk about transition towns.

1 1/2 hours I guess. What I got out of it is we are screwed and there is nothing we can do, nothing. According to him we are hooked on oil but he talks like there are no other alternatives that are acceptable either. I think he is a nut but if he is right there is absolutely nothing we can do, we a doomed. If you don't live out in the boonies somewhere already you will die. It's to late to sell your house in an urban area and learn to live off the land. Even if you live out in the boonies and live off the land you will be killed for your food. I believe I have heard him on Coast to Coast with George Noory, I never heard anyone more pessimistic. If I honestly thought he was right I would just put a gun to my head and get it over with.

What can replace crude oil at the rate of 75 million barrels per day equivalent and why can't we put it in our cars yet? Also, if there are other materials with which to make all the stuff we make from oil, what are they and why aren't we using them?

I've been following Peak Oil for several years, though.

What a Way to Go: Life at the End of Empire is another excellent production, taking into account climate change and other factors along with peak oil.

I've been trying to bring awareness to what Mike says (I've been following Mike Ruppert for years before Collapse) in the film for years on DU and no one ever wants to hear it.

I said 3+ years ago here on DU that we're in big trouble regarding oil and that declining oil production would lead to an economic collapse. Ruppert is just one of many voices sounding the alarm. But, try as I might, DUers are for the most part indifferent to the problem or simply don't believe there's a problem at all. Because of this attitude, I rarely post on the subject these days.

I won't rehash everything I've said on DU about Peak Oil in this post. But if you do a search (I used Advanced Search on the DU search page) and enter my nick and the term peak oil you will find some rather detailed and comprehensive posts I've done on the subject back to 2009. Before we were allowed to change our nicks after the 2008 elections I also posted about peak oil under my former nick. If you would like to see those posts just PM me and I'll be glad to scare them up for you.

I will say this though: Until people accept that peak oil production is a real problem, nothing will be done about it. But it doesn't matter anyway because it's already too late. Jimmy Carter tried to warn us and we didn't listen. We needed every one of the thirty years since to transition to a less-oil-intensive way of life. Now, today, global crude oil production has been on a "bumpy plataeu" (graph below) for over five years, resulting in a 1.5% overall decline. What Mike Ruppert is saying in Collapse is indeed scary. But what's even scarier than that is the fact that there is no way to meaningfully increase production without a substantial increase in the price of oil (as seen in the run-up of prices in 2008 leading to a record high price of $147 per barrel). Then, once production begins to decline, leaving the bumpy plateau behind, no amount of money or effort will be able to reverse it. The decline in production will be terminal.



You saw a film that scared the shit out of you. When you begin to understand the situation with oil production and net energy, many things that we see happening today will become crystal clear. Once you realize what it all means you won't be scared anymore. You'll be terrified.

I remember after watching it I tried writing a long review with all the errors in it on netflix, but netflix reviews are limited and I could barely write it. now I've forgotten most of it.

But a few things come to mind:

Ruppert claims some organization saw an 8 million decline in oil production during the recession. I forget the org now, but I looked up their website. They said oil went from something like 87 million bbd down to about 84, then up to 86. Basically his facts are not supported by the agency he claims he got them from, production went down about 3 million barrels/day during the recession, then up about 2.

He said cell phone tower infrastructure may collapse so get a landline. He seems oblivious that landlines require far more upkeep than cell phones. That is why cell phones leap frogged landlines in Asia & Africa. The infrastructure & costs are much much lower. That is like me telling someone a toyota requires a lot of maintenance, so buy a Hummer H3 as a backup vehicle. It shows no real critical thinking to tell people to use a landline as a backup since cell phone infrastructure is too vulnerable.

He says world population exploded with the combustible engine. World population exploded due to advances in fighting infectious diseases & agriculture. Countries like Vietnam use far less oil but are still overpopulated.

He talks about needing oil to make things, totally ignorant that coal or natural gas can be used as substitutes. Plastics can be made of coal, and so can diesel. There is enough coal to last a long time.

He seems to overestimate how much oil goes into agriculture. We only use 2% for agriculture. I think recreational vehicles (boats, RVs, ATVs) use about the same amount. Agriculture will not stop just because of peak oil.

etc

Again, I noticed tons of flaws in the movie, but it has been a month or more since I saw it. But it was a piece of bunk coming from a guy who is consistently wrong on a very basic level.


I'm not saying peak oil is BS, I'm saying Ruppert is BS. Evenso, I don't think peak oil will be as bad as people claim. This is a good website that has counterpoints to the anarcho-primivist worldview on peak oil.

http://peakoildebunked.blogspot.com/

http://peakoildebunked.blogspot.com/2006/07/307-confessions-of-ex-doomer.html



About half or oil is used to run cars. Another 20% or so is for semis, about 10% for manufacturing (something like that). High mpg cars, car pools, buses, motorcycles, etc. can be used instead of cars. Trains and barges can be used instead of semis. Coal can be used for manufacturing.

We are dependent on oil because it is cheap and abundant. Once it isn't, we will change our lifestyles and invest in alternatives. There is nothing stopping 4 people from carpooling in a 40mpg sedan instead of everyone taking their own 20mpg SUV to work. That alone would cut oil usage by 80-90% for those people when it comes to going to/from work.

I would gander there are few here that have my background (education, experience) in natural resource economics and ecology.

Regardless of 9-11 opinions, Malthus was correct in fact but not in time; there is a bottleneck in resource base and technology. One could argue technology allowed the increase in population, delayed/denied recognition of the problem, and ascerbated the suffering that will occur to humans.

The conflict between peoples for resources and territory and manipulation of the masses is a fact of human nature.

The situation is how many and to what degree will suffer until population is reduced to a sustainable level. Seems that the "hidden hands" of the "powers that be" know this too because if the shock is too extreme (full out nuclear war), much will be lost and we will be another species anthropogically driven to extinction.

There is a lot of 'fat' that can be cut from our lifestyles w/o killing us. We use 68 barrels/day of oil per 1000 people. France uses 32. Eastern european & latin american countries use about 6.

If/when there are natural resource shortages, that doesn't mean there will be mass death. Lifestyles may change, but I don't see how/why people would die from it. It is fairly easy to keep people alive if you intend to keep them alive. People need proper nutrition, protection from microbes and protection from physical trauma. Getting those things doesn't require much in natural resources. It is just a question of whether people care enough to provide them, which I think they do.

There is almost a mentality among peak oil that says 'if we can't maintain our current lifestyle, there will be mass death and civilization collapse' which I don't agree with at all because it isn't true. Using barges & rail instead of semis to ship goods, or eating a more vegan diet, or car pooling will not destroy civilization but it will save us tons of natural resources. It won't be as fun or convenient as our current lifestyle, but it won't kill us either. Being forced to give up a lifestyle of cheap oil doesn't mean there will be mass death.

In between 1910-1953 about half of Russia died from war, violence & famine. That would be like 150 million americans dying from 2010-2050. But Russian civilization survived.

no backing data, nothing. I found it to be a poor documentary, since nothing was documented..