There have been innumerable discussions on the use of renewable and non renewable resources online and off. I have been constantly and consistently surprised at the number of people who post such things as “but there’s enough coal for more than a hundred years” or there’s still more than enough oil for another 50 years at least”, or “And yes much less uranium in the ground than coal, but surely it is understood how little compared with coal it takes?”

I have often felt in these discussions that mine was a lonely voice, in defending the rights of unborn generations to a share of these non renewable resources.

I don’t understand why the time period matters, or that a longer period to complete exhaustion of a resource is more defensible than a short period.

“Nonrenewable”essentially means, will INEVITABLY run out, while “renewable” essentially means, will NEVER run out, although admittedly a distinction should be made between perpetual power sources: Solar, wind, wave; and renewable resources like bio mass, which obviously needs to be managed.

I have tried to condense this idea into a question I can post at Online Opinion. Here, of course, you can register your vote, as well as comment. I suspect putting my full name in the post will be considered too confrontational for some, or too much of a challenge. I would stress here the suggestion that your family should know your user name, so even distant descendants will theoretically at least be able to look you up, while protecting your current anonymity.

I believe, historically, the 20^th and 21^st centuries are going to be a ‘stand out’ period, like the Renaissance and the Industrial Revolution. Obviously, future historians are going to look back at this period, and make some judgements on the decisions we make.

But will it only be historians?

On another thread, it was suggested that we users make sure our families know our user names and passwords, ‘just in case’.

Out of idle curiosity, I checked the records OLO keeps of everyone’s posts. My first post was in April, 2006 (and I misspelt Muslim). I wonder how long will OLO continue to keep these posts?

Unlike past history, which has been largely interested in Heads of State, and people of
significance, in future it seems likely our descendants will be able to very easily and very quickly look up what we, as their personal ancestors, felt about about the issues of our day.

How are our great great grandchildren going to judge us, on issues like the use of non renewable resources?

More importantly, would awareness of personal accountability change anyone’s mind?

My name is Peter William Grimley, and I would like to state for the record, that I believe the over use of any resource -living or dead- to the point of depletion or extinction, is

STUPID.

How about you?

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