Posted on 04/25/2013 1:38:16 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
That was exactly what I was saying. My post said, specifically,
"The earth is finite, and so are fossil fuels. They may be renewable, however. And there might be more than we could ever use.
For that, I have been treated to several rounds of people trying to redefine infinity. My new definition of infinity is "the lengths to which people will go to redefine the language to suit themselves." I have learned that much in this discussion. Thank you for that.
Don't know what you mean by "straw man". I made a statement that is unquestionable. In fact, in the very article, it states:
"Far from being infinite, Laherrère said, petroleum supplies are finite by definition. The Earth contains only so many hydrocarbon molecules that can be extracted by human effort. “Once we have used up the easy oil, new types of cheap energy will not appear by magic. We will keep drilling for oil, and it will not be easy to get. Look at the enormously expensive equipment they use now only to keep up production.”
I agree with the part about petroleum supplies being finite by definition, and that is all I said. I disagree with Laherrere's opinion that we are advancing towards peak oil. We keep finding new source of energy, and there is a lot of evidence that the earth itself is creating more hydrocarbons. So, where is the straw man, man? I thought this was a place to discuss the article.
You should really research logic. Straw man are only one type of logical fallacies.
Unless you understand logic, finding the truth is like a blind man stumbling around. Each person has his own set of biases, and to really learn something require being objecting.
Straw man arguments illustrate bias (they essentially put forward a supposition that nobody is arguing with that in reality are not germane to the question at hand)
Of course nobody believes there is a infinite supply of anything. What is at questoin is are we in “Peak Oil”.
Read the book “Deep hot biosphere” and get back to us. (you can get it on amazon for 9-10$).
Given our current increase in reserves vs our “burn rate” and the theory that there IS reformation deep in the earth, if our “burn rate” is < production rate, we could literally burn oil for BILLIONS of years.
Jimmy Carter in the first oil crisis (76) told us that we were at peak oil.....
How foolish is the public? Bad science allows them to manipulate the price....
Thank you, oh wise child, for enlightening me in logic and now, what a straw man is. I could never have understood the concepts without the majesty of your cutting comments. I am humbled and submit to your mastery. Now, excuse me while I go back to preparing a brief responding to an appeal of a trial I won, in which facts and legal issues are laid out logically and persuasively, in the manner of my 3 decades of experience, following a Jesuit education that did in fact include logic at institutions to which you would never, in a million years, (i.e., infinity) be admitted.
and again, now you base your argument on sarcastic, ad homonym attack.
So how does this stream of attacks, combined with PRIDE affect any point at hand? It doesn’t.
I don’t care if you argue in front of the supreme court, a faulty assumption, straw man, ad homonym attack is devoid of LOGIC.
I am not a lawyer. Maybe that’s why I think the substance and logic of the subject at hand do matter.
Well the WSJ had an article about a depleted oil well that 15 years later they discovered was full again. They found a plume of oil coming up from below. The speculation is that it’s not dead dinosaurs but created in the crust. It is infinite.
As infinite as growing wheat.
Probably from another fracture zone nearby. I don’t doubt we’ve hardly tapped the top of our petroleum reserves but I don’t think crude oil just continues to be made and “burped up” to the surface...
The above is what I posted, and what I was attacked by several posters for. They seemed to take issue with the notion that oil is not infinite, by definition, just as the earth, the galaxy and the universe are not infinite. I think my second sentence was in agreement with the article, and with what I gather is your heartfelt opinion. It is really very, very silly and quite a bit ridiculous that people who agreed with me on substance felt the need to attack because they misunderstand the definition of the words finite and infinite.
So, in substance I was making two points:
1) I agree with the notion of the article that there may be more oil available then we would ever need, and it MAY be renewed inside the earth abiotically; and
2) that the use of the words "not finite" in this context was a misuse. To another poster, I suggested that a better word would be "inexhaustible", although that word would also be imprecise. The article discusses supply in both the temporal, subjective sense, and in the quantitative sense.
In sum, while agreeing with the article more or less, I took issue with a word in the title as being misleading. That is not arguing with a straw man, or illogical. To the extent I question the validity of your subsequent arguments, that is not ad hominem, although the lack of cogent reasoning throughout does point to a hominem that is in need of further training.
That is why your final claim, that you think that "substance and logic" do matter is so funny. Your arguments have never been about substance and have never applied logic.
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