The Complexity Trap

<i>The point is that most of these technologies have already reaped the cheap and easy, and, indeed, almost all of the hard and expensive improvements that are ever going to be made. In this respect, we are entering a period similar to the early twentieth century when we hit the limits to coal-powered technologies. The big difference today being that there is no even more energy-dense and easily available new energy source available to us to usher in a new suite of technologies in the way that oil-based technologies rapidly replaced coal in the years after World War Two.</i><p>Disagree, we have at least two and possibly third sources of energy that can replace oil. Those being solar &amp; wind plus nuclear respectively. Historically speaking it took large investments in drilling techniques and infrastructure to allow oil to replace coal as a major energy source. It isn&#x27;t that different now.

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While a good set up the conclusion isn&#x27;t really supported by the arguments. Just increasingly bizzare assertions that complexity is somehow a trap while conflating it with energy usage (nevermind that said complexity is often used to reduce usage of energy).<p>It seems to be one of its own tiresome arrogant meme &quot;the world is too complex for me personally to understand so we should make things worse so I feel better!&quot;.

I don&#x27;t see big problem here. At some point in the future we probably can&#x27;t increase our consumption any further. Maybe even have to reduce it. It&#x27;s gonna be painful but not catastropic.<p>I don&#x27;t see this is a trap. More like an inevitability.

I&#x27;m surprised this hasn&#x27;t elicited more commentary. His thesis seemed to be pretty simple, that as we burn through our low-cost, high-return, surplus energy, our economics worsen. We then seek to remedy the problem through more energy-intensive complexity (The Complexity Trap), which doesn&#x27;t work very well. He then seemed to argue that we got kind of a pass during the Industrial Age, because of oil&#x27;s greater efficiency than coal, but that we won&#x27;t be so lucky this time.<p>I guess I&#x27;m surprised someone hasn&#x27;t come back with some well known counter theory? I kind of like this one, but I&#x27;m sure there are other interesting ones?