Collapse assignment 2

Through out this unit of collapse it has become apparent that the world we live in will ultimately collapse due to a slow decline or an immediate one. The way the worlds people live today is the cause of this downfall. Looking at how dependent we are on oil and other natural resources, and at how the people of Easter Island did as there natural resources started to run out because they were not paying attention to how much they use them, it can be said that we will also face a collapse. Yet too many people are not aware of this. Everyone thinks the world will last forever and that the natural resources will never deplete. Even with all the warnings of global warming, people can not seem to be bothered because they do not think it will concern them anytime soon. But the fact remains everyone leaves a carbon footprint. The cars people drive, the gas they put into their cars are all fossil fuels and are depleting and are also the cause of global warming. According to the "Crude Impact" we use 84 billion barrels of oil a day. Most of the things we use in our everyday life also come from oil. So if people do not stop and pay attention to their oil consumption then this world and our culture will collapse and it will leave many people wondering about what happened and how did this come to be even though the signs were there all along.

For 50,000 to 100,000 years, there was a steady population of only two million people populating this earth. Once the year 1800 came around, there were one billion people living on the earth (Crude Impact). The worlds population is increasing. As the population increases so does our consumption of oil. Fossil fuels make it easier to have more people because they can grow more food. They were also able to use coal instead of timber so they did not need to worry about the trees. They started cutting down forests and many animals were left with out homes and many populations of wild life died. This as well as fossil fuels enabled more food to grow and led to more people. In 1930 there were 2 billion people. By 1974 there was 4 billion and by 2010 there will be 7 billion people. All of this leads to the increase in our oil consumption. But it is predicted that there will be a peak and after that peak the oil level will go down. And when the oil level goes down the price of that oil will go up. When there is no more oil there will be a start to our collapse because no one will be prepared for it. I think that scientists will try to come up with ways to find more oil but even if they do it would not stop the drop in oil it would only prevent it for a little while. This is not only something we are dealing with. This problem is happening all around the world.

Easter Island is an island that was isolated from the rest of the world. It holds many beautiful statues in which the habitant built from stone or wood. As time went on there were competitions between the different clans to see who could build the best statue. As this went on, many natural resources were used and many trees were cut down. With the loss of trees the soil became unhealthy and could support the crops that were planted. With the loss of their natural resources their collapse begun. America can also head in that direction. America uses many natural resources with out thinking of a consequence. From looking at what happened in Easter Island it can be said that America will follow down that path.