>I often think about what life will be like for our descendants in the 
>future.
> Say a thousand years in the future after we've used up all the reserves of
> petroleum and precious metals and helium and even road salt.  What will 
> life be
> like?

I'm sure there will be both metal and salt in a thousand years,
where would it go away to? Beyond a few diminished salt flats that is.

> ...The fascinating thing is I wonder if there's even the slightest chance 
> of those
> apple seeds feeding anyone ever in any moment in all time.

Johnny "Appleseed" was a real guy, they still have trees descended from
trees he spread through the USA. Though it's hard to get the story really 
correct
when mythos has attached itself.

> ...I even wonder if
> there's some scenario where it could do some kind of harm. (Besides 
> offending
> property owners who figure it out or the green's gripe with invasive 
> species.)

Apple core -> Tree + windstorm = *splat* dead baby.
It's the butterfly effect, you can't predict if a small change will do real 
harm
someday.

> If humanity is to survive here 1000 years after petroleum and platinum is 
> used
> up, will pine forests serve an ecological purpose that apple forests 
> won't.

Platinum is an element, there's no way to really use it up, it'll just be 
reclaimed
eventually, if someone is willing to pay for it.

If oil runs out they'll switch back to paper bags, made out of
firs and pines, but it looks to me like gas in some form is here to stay,
since they've figured out how to turn cellulose into sugars with bacterial
enzymes occurring naturally in geysers. That may be part of the
reason behind the recent increases in corn and wheat prices lately...

Post a reply to this message