Mr. Rawles,
I found this article informative. A quote: “Cheap, plentiful fossil fuels discovered in the last hundred years (or so) spurred a food bubble, which led to a population bubble. Cheap oil, in other words, created the temporary conditions necessary to support a runaway population explosion that is, without question, unsustainable without cheap energy.” Here is another quote: “complex civilizations are quite fragile, and short-terming thinking can easily doom a society or civilization to irreversible collapse.”
The author believes that world population will be reduced to 1/7th of its current size in a post-oil economy. BTW, there are lots of other links on that web site that are worth exploring. I enjoy reading your blog. Regards, – I.L.