Hi Larry, so you have ideas to throw around?

"Anonymous, are you pulling my leg? I don't know what you're responding to. The body copy of my post seems to be lost in cyberspace. If you found it, would you email me a copy?"

I'll just write down some brief ideas because I dunno if you'll reply or not:

So when one says linear paradigm, does it mean that oil is reaching/has reached the threshold proportional to the additive world usage.

"Linear, as I use it, merely means cause and effect, billiard table thinking."

But, using the idea of usage is misleading because one may mine oil and store it in large quantity.

"I don't know if you can store enough of it to make a difference, considering the exponential effects of usage trends (ref.: The Essential Exponential by Albert Bartlet). Do you have something (or storage place) in mind?"

As for a possible acceleration of the rate at which peak oil is reached: would it be the case that as more and more oil rigs run dry, the number of oil rigs that remained would be used up at an accelerated rate? And thus, if such a situation would, the rate of approach towards peak out would accelerate...non-linear.

"I don't think that the remaining 'rigs' (I prefer fields) could only be used up at an accellerated rate if they've been underused. However, the way you express the usage idea seems to remain linear. A systems approach would (at least) include all energy used, all forms of energy now known (like sunlight, geothermal, wind, tidal, hydro, nuclear, etc.), all developing sources, all users dropping out to decentralized or locally generated renewable sources, new users arising, energy not used because it's unavailable, and more. Not as tidy but a bit more complete."

However, i don't really know exactly how oil producer operate in response to oil demand in the face of diminishing supply. And, my concept of peak oil and usage maybe incomplete and I suspect it is a bit uninformed, so....I am interested to hear what ideas anyone else has, and I will evolve from that point.

"If you are able to pick the clues out of the news, especially non-mainstream news and information sources, I think you can begin to see how the producers are already operating as we crest the Hubbert curve. I'm not willing to take this any further because we are entering new, historic territory. I don't believe the producers will react with the interests of the common person foremost in their minds. The less self-sufficient you are, the more vulnerable to what they do. The historic picture of civilizations that had similar energy problems is not encouraging."

cheers.

"Ditto. Would you mind identifying yourself? Or, are you just goofing?"