We often talk about resource depletion in terms of supply. Except supply is not really depleting, is it. The Earth has the supplies. The absolute amount of oil in the Earth’s crust is vast. Same for critical minerals like iron and copper. The problem is that most of it is inaccessible, and not just at… Continue reading The Daily: 17 October 2025
Tag: economics
The Daily: 15 April 2025
Tax Day April 15th is Tax Day for the United States. In most years taxes are due on this date, though exceptions are made for weekends and recently COVID seems to have added on extra days. I don't know anyone who puts it off until today because the penalties for missing the due date are… Continue reading The Daily: 15 April 2025
The Daily: 30 August 2024
You gotta love the energy-economics people. They really are trying so hard to understand why whatever has propelled this system for several centuries suddenly no longer works. They rightly deduce that a program of ever-increasing material use is not going to last long on a finite planet, nor in a finite universe, for that matter.… Continue reading The Daily: 30 August 2024
The Daily: 15 April 2024
Tax Day April 15th is Tax Day for the United States. In most years taxes are due on this date, though exceptions are made for weekends and recently COVID seems to have added on extra days now and then. I don't know anyone who puts it off that late because the penalties for missing the… Continue reading The Daily: 15 April 2024
The Daily: 12 August 2023
The Perseids are falling in the late night sky again. Once again, there is little chance that I can see them. This year that might be true of most of the country — except those trapped under that heat dome. And you all might even want to be awake at that time of night, when… Continue reading The Daily: 12 August 2023
Further Exegesis of A Man
In the past couple weeks I’ve encountered two new books from people who should know better claiming that our big brains and social systems are rooted in hunting. This is the bad penny of origin stories — Man the Hunter. It is time someone bites down on this one and shows once and for all… Continue reading Further Exegesis of A Man
Economics of Needs?
Last week I ranted on about Putin’s idiocy and its ramifications for human survival, focusing the question on our ability to produce food (or potential lack thereof). But a lack of food is not actually the story that is getting the most headlines in this disaster, is it. Understandably. Fortunes are not made — and… Continue reading Economics of Needs?
Couple Things…
I've had these two bits on my desktop screen for months now. I don't think I'm going to come up with anything else to say about either of these observations. However, I would like to share them. Also I think I'd like other opinions on the matter. (I've left the comments open.) So here is… Continue reading Couple Things…
Because Boomers…
I’m the mother of two millennials. I used to own a kids’ bookstore when millennials were tots and tweens and teens. I have taught millennials at both ends of their age spectrum. I have millennial friends. I am not a millennial (nor a boomer, squarely GenX here), but I think I might be a somewhat… Continue reading Because Boomers…
Dying Normal
Central Vermont is under a heat advisory today. There is also smoke from fires on the opposite side of the continent, though rains are periodically washing it out of the sky. Thus sometimes we don’t have the air quality advisory to go with the heat, though last night I could see no Perseid meteors through… Continue reading Dying Normal



