Tuesday, September 20, 2016

Air is Free

Just thought I would throw this out there. An individual consumes 19 cubic feet of oxygen every day. And when you put that in pounds, that’s about 1.69 pounds.

When you burn a gallon of gasoline, it consumes 23.22 pounds of oxygen and you get water and a lot of CO2.
I burn about a gallon and a half of gasoline every day going to and from work. That is about 34.83 pounds plus the air I breathe 1.69 pounds = 36.52 pounds of oxygen every day that I consume.

So if we take my total consumption per day (36.52 lbs.) and divide it by what I need to exist (1.69lbs) we get 21.61. From that we can conclude that the “average” person consumes 20 times the oxygen he needs to sustain life. Each additional person is accelerating the CO2 rate accumulation rate in the atmosphere, by a factor of 20 (I didn’t even include factory production in the calculation so it is on the low side).

The General import of the above is that global warming is a reality. Historically we can probably attribute the fall of many ancient major cities in South America from a lack of firewood. All the trees could have been consumed for fuel within a 100-mile radius. After exhausting their ability to heat and cook the inhabitants would move to where energy resources (wood) were more abundant. This would have been a logistics failure that made life economically unfeasible. Net result, they moved.

Now let’s look at US government financing of the national debt. The current interest on 21 trillion at one percent is about 210 billion. If it went to 8 percent, the interest charge would be $1,680,000,000,000. And that is about what we take in, in taxes each year. Do you get the feeling that we have run out of firewood? Common sense suggests that our financial problems, just like firewood in the above example, have solutions that are very much removed from reality, but not from the follies of man.

6 comments:

Sackerson said...

Startling way to put it.

Anonymous said...

Thinking the same thing as Sack.

Anonymous said...

Nice thinking Jim but air actually isn't free(think about a regulations and taxes), I get your thinking though. Also, I am very surprised you believe in global warming or climate change, would have never thought it.

cheers.

Anonymous said...

In addition, it's "every U.S. citizen" that fits the 20 to 1 ratio, I would guess the majority of the world does't fall under that ratio. Half of the world lives on less than a dollar per day and the majority of the world doesn't have cars with one person driving them.
Again, I understand your point but connecting it to global climate change is a bit of a reach.


Jim in San Marcos said...

Hi Anon 6:12

Global warming was not the real issue. It is kind of like two fruit flies in a bottle with a whole banana. The immediate future is not the problem. We know the final outcome.

The problem is how do we address the "minor" problems like government bankruptcy that could be a more immediate problem than global warming. We get to "enjoy" both, but one will be here a tad faster than the other.

Unknown said...

This goes to show that what Jeremiah 10:23 says is true. That "it does not belong to man to direct his step." Humans are too imperfect, too prone to arrogance, greed and deception to govern people in a way that's most beneficial. Only God's Kingdom will truly bring about a non-corrupt government.