With gentrification came changes in pollution definitions (was Because that's)

OK, Im not gonna go throwin sources around, but I bet that a distinct percentage of that increased produce will result from vastly improved separating / refining processes. For instance, thereve been several very prosperous companies that either bought or leased old gold and silver mines or claims, and just from reprocessing the tailings from the old mines are bringing in an impressive amount of gold. The whole thing was that they had new and improved chemical processing that pulled out microscopic amounts that were invisible to eye, but all added together made for a lot of $.

And, Im sure that with todays intensive mining operations, they can eat a lot of ore every day, and its mostly automated, so you dont have to pay labor to get huge yields... But that doesnt mean that you can expect to keep doing that for centuries without end. You will eventually come to a point where you simply have no more feasibly accessible ore.

Hmm, do I know a lot about pollution? Well, I certainly wouldnt call myself an expert. On the other hand, I guess I know pretty much what any reasonably intelligent, adequately educated socially conscious liberal whos managed to live through the 60s, 70s and 80s without ending up shot, burned out, HIV+ or poisoned by paraquat, agent orange, kool-ade or New Coke would know! Ive been around for right close to 60 years, and I guarantee that POLLUTION (however you want to define it) and damn near everything else has gotten worse. Ive always had an interest in The Environment globally and in its parts, as did half my generation (fact is I think we INVENTED it). Were (not me specifically) the gen that started Greenpeace, and tree huggers everywhere trace their roots back to people like me doing things back then. I spent days chained to a tree to try to get a grove of 100 year old oak trees set aside as parkland for housing development instead of just bulldozing the grove as was called for in the plans. Totally non violent, but it illustrates the fact that Im about as informed as any inquisitive layman with an interest in the subject is likely to be, at least in so far as generalities go, Id have to research the specifics on a case by case basis. Why, do you consider yourself an expert?

From: hitssquad
Sent: Friday, March 09, 2012 4:14 AM
To: spacesettlers@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [spacesettlers] With gentrification came changes in pollution definitions (was Because that's)

--- In mailto:spacesettlers%40yahoogroups.com, "Victor Smith" wrote:
> > > Getting to them on Earth is NOT though getting easier [...] but more difficult
> > Then why aren't the prices rising?:
> Jeremy Grantham (GMO Quarterly Letter, July 2011) noted that if the bet were from 1980 to 2011, Ehrlich would have won

I just calculated the basket for 1980 and 2010 (the latest year for which I have data) using USGS ds140 data:
http://minerals.usgs.gov/ds/2005/140

...and the basket (copper, tungsten, tin, chromium, nickel) rose 1.42%. Much of the time during that 30-year period, it was below the 1980 price. We should expect the basket to fall, century by century.

More importantly, the volumes of extracted metals have exploded, contrary to the predictions of Ehrlich and others. For example, only 300 grams of copper were mined per person in 1900 (when there were only 1.65 billion people). In 2010, over 2.3 kilograms of copper were mined per person, even though the population was more than four times as high. The total ever mined per person is over 80 kg and rising at an ever faster rate, and none of it has ever been used up. We're simply collecting it. There's far more copper on Earth than in the entire rest of the solar system, outside of the cores of the gas giants and the sun.

> of the original five, he is only one for five, having won the least significant of the five: tin.)

As of the 2010 prices, Simon also won tungsten. It dropped from $36,600/t to $19,500/t.

> > Then why are pollution levels falling?: I'm not even gonna bother with your source, since it's SIMONs book.

...Then you won't know how Simon and I are defining "pollution", and your answer therefore won't be relevant.

> Only in those nations that are most technologically (and societally) advanced are levels falling

Since you have no idea what I'm talking about, you can't know if the levels are falling.

> The report from 2009 has stated that six out of ten Americans live in urban areas where air pollution can cause major health problems.

You don't actually know much about the history of pollution, do you?