Interesting article.. Very good questions too. I have a good laugh when I hear planners or others talking about the future without taking into account the coming oil crisis..
WHY IS it that our planners and politicians understand so little of basic mathematics and its implications? Let me explain how serious the consequences of not understanding some basic mathematical concepts can be. Let us take economic growth, the basic premise of conventional economics, and the assumption that without it our economic model falls apart. It is important that we understand the implications and consequences of this assumption. To understand the implications, we need to understand the underlying exponential mathematics.
Exponential growth refers to a situation where there is constant growth. It doesn’t matter what the rate of growth is, only that it is constant. For example, our current economic strategy is aimed at achieving 6% growth over a sustained period of time. What 6% growth means is that we will be doubling the size of our economy in roughly the next 11 years.
Yes, at this rate of growth we will double our gross domestic product, which means we will double what we produce. In order to double what we produce, we will need to double what goes into what we produce.
This includes raw materials and crucially, energy. So, roughly speaking, in the next 11 years we are going to need to double the amount of energy we are currently consuming.http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/topstories.aspx?ID=BD4A377945