Kenneth S. Deffeyes Quotes

#1. Of course, the methods for human population control are enormously controversial. One contraceptive measure seems to be humane and acceptable: If you teach calculus to teenage girls, they go on to have far fewer babies. Calculus is the contraceptive of the future. It doesn't work for boys.

Kenneth S. Deffeyes

#2. Once supply begins to dwindle, the years to follow will see shortages that at best will cause global recession, possibly worse than the 1930s Great Depression, ... war, famine, pestilence and death.

Kenneth S. Deffeyes

#3. Through our inattention, we have wasted the years that we might have used to prepare for lessened oil supplies. The next ten years are critical.

Kenneth S. Deffeyes

#4. Running out of energy in the long run is not the problem ... The bind comes during the next 10 years: getting over our dependence on crude oil.

Kenneth S. Deffeyes

#5. In a sense, the fossil fuels are a onetime gift that lifted us up from subsistence agriculture and eventually should lead us to a future based on renewable resources.

Kenneth S. Deffeyes

#6. The economists all think that if you show up at the cashier's cage with enough currency, God will put more oil in ground,

Kenneth S. Deffeyes

#7. The least-bad scenario is a hard landing, global recession worse than the 1930s. The worst-case borrows from the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse: war, famine, pestilence and death.

Kenneth S. Deffeyes