As humans, our claim to fame has always been our ability to create and innovate. First, we invented fire. This discovery was soon after followed by the realization that, hey, if you stick meat over the flames it becomes oddly more delicious. As time passed on we progressed slowly but somewhat steadily. Some of our early inventions included tools and the wheel. Life was good, populations increased and farming became a growing concern, towns developed, and cities grew up from them. People developed communication then used it to disagree with each other about changes they were willing to make.
These days we take it upon ourselves to constantly master new versions of our favorite software and devices as the old ones fall obsolete, something that seems to happen every 6 months. Society has gone from a family pack roaming the Sahara to hierarchies of power with lords in their castles commanding legions of serfs and slaves. People were granted rights and people have had those rights taken away.
For great innovations there are often great setbacks. Throughout history empires have risen and fallen, and with them, technologies have been created and suppressed. Things have been tried which have failed sometimes even after they were counted as a success. Lead Paint, Asbestos, products which create green house gases. When you look at it, a lot of what we see as permanent parts of human knowledge and invention is actually quite insignificant and flawed. All these efforts and these innovations that have occurred over the ages have been in pursuit of one thing and one thing only: an easier life. When things take a long time and are difficult, no one will willingly do it. People with power rise up and squash the less able down beneath them.
It was only recently that a large middle class has emerged, a group that is neither downtrodden into destitution or doing the treading. What is the main reason for this? Only in the past couple centuries has life been easy enough for most. Though it started with the industrial revolution, the discovery of oil and its portable energy properties has proven to be the greatest equalizer. With machines and robots to do high risk difficult tasks there is no longer a need for disposable labour. There is a future for everyone. In places like Canada, only details like the make and model of a car speak to your economic status, not whether or not you have one. Food again is plentiful, even if it is from far away. If you can afford to buy groceries, you can afford to buy imported fruits and vegetables. Oil has created prosperity for the common man. It’s not to say it hasn’t caused suffering too; there are many great wars to attest to that. But even then, wars have lead to social discourse, civil rights and change which often favours the common man.
The future of oil is questionable. The easily accessible supply is running out. That’s why techniques once deemed too expensive are being employed in places like the Alberta Oil Sands to extract as much oil as possible. That is also the reason why companies are moving further north to the poles or deep under water where oil exists but is extremely difficult to drill. In the end, no matter the cost, we will still pay. We as a society like the convenience of our personal cars, the easy maintenance of natural gas piped directly in to our homes, and our plastic devices. We use it up, even as we are constantly told it will run out.
The thing is, oil will not run out all at once just like it didn’t pop up fully harness able at the beginning. So ask yourself, how will this go down? All those places we’ve discovered since the advent of planes and vehicles that even now rely solely on supplies being shipped in. There are all those cities without farm land and suburbs without factories or grocery stores. Not to mention the infrastructure we’ve knocked out. The train tracks converted to walking trails and family farms pressed from business by developers and cheaper imports.
What will happen to society? Who will get richer? What will we do, how applicable will the pencil pushers and desk jockeys of today be to the society of the future? The day might come that a car being driven down the street will be a cause for you to pause and watch. It might be a place where a Christmas orange is special because you will only ever see oranges at Christmas. There might come a time where you don’t waste food not because of some poor child in Africa, but because of poor children in your own back yard. For all this technology we’ve created, the future might not look so different from the less recent past. Serfdom anyone? Oh, and what was the first use for the newly discovered oil? They used it to replace whales’ oil as fuel for their lamps.
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