Big Think

Peter Hopkins on March 2, 2009, 10:53 PM

Peter Hopkins on March 2, 2009, 10:54 PM

Chad Welch on June 19, 2009, 9:49 PM

Soros seems to have hit upon a good idea. We are running out of oil  and we need to something about it. Who ever develops ways to solve this problem will get rich and many people will find jobs in the new companies that emerge, or the established ones that expand. Windpower, clean coal, ethanol its all out there- but what are we really doing with all of this?

I’m torn about the environmental issues. We need oil, but  I’m worried about accidents and pollution on off-shore drilling. As far as nuclear power plants are concerned, my initial  reaction is to build more- they cut costs and provide alot of cheap energy. France seems to be doing well with them. But then I think about Chernobyl and Three Mile Island and I worry. There are no easy answers on this one.

james lloyd on July 27, 2009, 12:40 AM

     there is an easy answer just not a globally accepted one…. new world order… the coalition of terran nations working as one driving force ensuring a fair, just, safe, free, and hospitable living envirnment for future generations of whatever “man” transgress’s onto through future evolution of technological advances in bio and nanotechnology, if people want to be amish let them be amish if people want to be muslim let them be muslim, if agnostic let them be agnostic ect. but if people want to be crazy, i.e fly planes into buildings full of innocent civialians, send letterbombs to random address’s, drown thier 5 small children in the bathtub in ascending order, order the deaths of 6,000,000,000 human beings by fire, gun, and gas, ect. then they cannot and will not coexist and must exist elswhere…..

    ahh just a fairytale, it would never work because humans are so instinctivley awful, ignorant, controllable, ingenious, territorial, and greedy that we will screw it up for the rest of us, and our children and our childrens children as the cycle will perpetuate until we are dealt with by a force which we cannot combat with a metaphorical “stick”. in other words f#%* your pocketbook, who cares about the economy we have some giant obstacles looming in front of us as a species. i would love nothing more than to see myself proven wrong, i sadly wait, as i listen to the masses talk…. oh and wtf about the sun? its gonna live longer than we are so why not figure out how to use it?

james lloyd on July 27, 2009, 12:41 AM

6,000,000*

Joe Dew on November 10, 2009, 7:10 PM

I agree with Soros’ general perspective but what’s currently missing is the economic incentive for this energy revolution. Fossil fuels are bad for the earth but its costs (especially coal) are still really low compared to renewable alternatives.

Until we reflect the true costs of fossil fuels in its pricing, there simply isn’t a large enough market to support this new engine of growth. Money will continue to flow to the cheapest provider, which will be fossil fuels for the foreseeable future.

faith fall on November 11, 2009, 6:55 AM

From a moderate, but a fiscally responsible one, I think everyone is missing the point. While it is absolutely important to be sustainable and to not be dependent on foreign anything, it will not be for the IMF rich. Sustainability is what the rich want US to do, not them. The new billionaire, Gore, is flying around in his jet, causing more pollution than I do in a my lifetime, and he’s buying carbon credits from his own company! Slick eh?

We must all do what we can to implement wind, solar, nuclear, and water power so we can be independent, but we must also be on the watch for leftist double speak about how they want US to be something they do not.

Sean Randall on November 27, 2009, 4:44 PM

FAITH FALL: I ight have to light an oil lamp, to find my way to telling the townfolk that the town is on fire. Would you prefer he spends 6 months walking from speaking engagement to speaking engagement? You would call him crazy, and you would be right. This particular criticism of his using an airplane is disingenuous at best. If you don’t know that, you need to read the Rules of Debate. Then, it won’t be so easy to hoodwink you.

Prakash Brunson on December 2, 2009, 2:36 AM

I agree, but we won’t be able to until we solve the debt/paper currency crisis. Which is why I love gold, silver. wheretobuygold.us, baby! lol I could see paper currencies ending soon.

michael swwann on December 4, 2009, 10:38 AM

Here,s one lets put our money where our mouth is , if we want to be the true leaders of this new green thing , some of them big shots are going to lets some of the money lose the way i see it is that they will get it back a 10 fold and plus some , the more you put into something the more you are going to get out of it only if you go into it knowing it means everything to you and to better mankind, we have oil here in the states , why AND I ASK WHY IN THE HE!! dont we drill where we need to drill , do we need to ask THE un FIRST TO THE HELL WITH THEM this is our counrty not theres , I say we look after our own first and do what we need to do here to take our place back as the true super power of the world, china , and all them other counrtys wouldnt be anything if we didnt help
them years ago on building there counrty , and now some of them have pasted us, and why is that
only the big shots know that one , or so they think , Greed maybe who will ever know but it does look like it i must say , to bad the some people that took from this counrty cant put back into like MR , Buffet is doing going allout now he puts his money here his mouth is a true player of the most wise people in the world, a true model of the word itself

Chaim Rubin on December 28, 2009, 6:46 AM

The problems I see with this is that it is a limited-term vision, and he addresses only savings and not production. Let’s extend the logic.

Suppose we develop the future good energy technology and implement it. All the manufacturers and installers have been paid, and we become so efficient that we burn no energy at all and produce no carbon.

Now what? We are still twiddling our thumbs. We still own nothing, owe equity, and can’t compete with China who can use their political totalitarianism to cheat in a free global by not addressing their widespread suffering.

Let’s remember that Soros is a financier, not an industrialist, and for him the world is a zero-sum game.

Derek Lodmeister on December 29, 2009, 11:50 AM

Soros has the right idea and is asking the right questions, it just needs someone to come up with the answers to fit. Whoever does will undoubtedly make a lot of money from their inventiveness, as long as it isn’t buried by existing power companies. weight loss tips

fred nienaber on January 4, 2010, 9:20 PM

There sits old fool, Soros, flattering the ignorant, opportunistic, slick and slimy Al Gore sitting next to him.

First: A GIVEN and Known FACT: Carbon and CARBON DIOXIDE are primary nutrients for the vegetable kingdom: trees and crops are growing faster, producing more lumber and food
(all of our food comes from vegetation), feeding the world and providing the lumber we need for housing, and, this increased vegetation is producing more OXYGEN for us to breatheQ…DUH!!!??
and,

Second, there is NO quantitative proof that CO2 causes global warming ! there are as many scietists denying it as supporting it!

WE NEED MORE ELECTRIC POWER ASAP!
Why are we not promoting immediate development of more nuclear reactors??
INSTEAD, Obama would shut down the coal fired power plants w/o provision for replacement…OH, YES, I know, he is promoting SOLAR and WIND….HAS HE TOLD YOU WHAT IT WILL COST PER KWH?? (at least 5 times what nuclear costs)
HAS HE SUGGESTED WHAT WILL fill the need when the wind is calm and the sun is blocked???…you gonna store it in batteries in your garage? HAVE YOU PURCHASED ANY OF THESE BATTERIES LATELY?… or asked what their useful life is?…or what they cost?…or looked into the ‘conversion’ from DC to AC?

These PSEUDO ECO DREAMERS are gonna kill us; we will be out of power and out of business. For 150 years the US industrial complex supplied the world. THE LOSS 0F OUR CHEAP (and adequate) ELECTRIC POWER will be the FINAL NAIL in the coffin of our INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX!!!
Without plentiful, cheap electricity, US manufacturing is DOOMED. OBAMA is ensuring that ALL of our industry will quickly be EXPORTED; what EFFECT will this have on JOB CREATION?….WHAT is OBAMA doing to promote JOB CREATION AND GROWTH?….HE IS DOING JUST THE OPPOSITE!

pauls paul on January 5, 2010, 5:44 PM

on the working class could focus on only one of Porter’s own “Left is rather old-fashioned tendencies? Whatever the merits of evidence are approach, it is certainly still room for the past C19th women, in my view, to such a fetish elite and middle-class experience costs may be a good use of reference-Thompson et al.
”http://orkutscrap.org/">Orkut Scraps

Jim Stiene on January 15, 2010, 12:38 AM

Well it’s nice to see you’ve stayed out of prison after France’s insider trading conviction.

JD Brown on January 31, 2010, 6:08 AM

Just found the site//Chad puts it very well from both sides, but offers no solution. My lineage (all the people who influenced my thought processes) have told me, don’t tell me there’s a problem without offering a solution, otherwise you’re just whining.
James needs therapy.
Faith is whining; see above definition.
Prakash may be right.
Michael; preach on brother.
Chaim, your points are limited.
Fred, you’re closer to the truth as reality.
Paul, what planet are you from?
Here’s how I see it. First and foremost, we must declare our independence on foreign oil. We have more oil in this country and on our coastal waterways than we can use as a nation in the next 50 years. Solve the current crisis first. Producing national oil will allow for the gross reduction in fuel costs, but only if regulators force the money-hungry, screw the common man stockholders of big oil to make fuel REASONABLE.
Of the soapbox now; while producing sufficient quantities of low cost fuel to FUEL the growth of commerce by freeing transportaion chokeholds caused by soaring fuel prices, FORCE, do not recommend, encourage, or incentivize, the development of electric power vehicles and industry by increasing our national production of electrical energy by wind farms, solar farms in the uninhabitable vast deserts of this country, nuclear, and all other non-emmissive production techniques. If electricity is cheapest, production of electric machinery will be most prolific.
Finally, FORCE, see definition above, major manufacturers to bring production back to the nation with the subsequent increase in standard of living, jobs, GNP and the like. How? 100% tariff on all goods manufactured by US companies in foreign countries and exported into this country. If that doesn’t get their attention, 500% tariff. A moratorium on all imported goods for two years while we get back on our feet.
What will all this accomplish, you ask? People will be content. They’ll have good jobs, a good standard of living, and when people are happy, they prosper.
Wait JD, you say. What about “sharing the wealth?”
I’m sorry, everything I’ve said above spells Capitalism, not Socialism (where we’re headed now) or Facism (the natural outgrowth of Socialism in a complacent society).
Which means…get rid of the Democrats? Absolutely NOT. It’s not a political thing, it’s an ideological thing. We have to get rid of the Far-left, Ultr-liberal give-the-world-away crowd.
But that’s another entire entry, longer than this one.
Peace