Very interesting discussion! I'm already broadly familiar with most of these points, but via different sources. Are you familiar with the work of Gail Tverberg (ourfiniteworld.com), Art Berman, Dr Chris Martinsen (peakprosperity.com), and Dr Nate Hagens? Unfortunately, I don't share Dr Michaux's optimism about future solutions to the problems humanity faces. I think our predicament is somewhat bleaker than he suggests.
Ultimately, it's a physics problem: it all comes down to EROI. Fossil fuels have allowed the human population to grow beyond the pre-industrial carrying capacity of the planet; as global fossil fuel supply becomes economically unviable to extract (due to EROI) and decreases, the global system will break down and the global population will likely revert to pre-industrial levels.
To get an idea of just how horrific this will be, consider the example of Africa. In the year 1900, Africa's population was approx. 140 million whereas today is over a billion people and growing. This increase in population is only possible due to the import of external inputs dependent on the global trade system/logistics supply chains (which hare also dependent on fossil fuels). Much of the cultivated land on the African continent is marginal and requires imported fertilizers (made from petrochemicals), Etc. And global industrial agriculture is itself now almost entirely dependent on petrochemicals.
Massive levels of debt have allowed us to kick the can down the road, but we seem to be finally reaching the limits of how much debt we can take on before the global financial system buckles. Many people believe that technology can save us from this fate; however, counter-intuitively, technological advancements actually lead to increased energy consumption (as per Jevons Paradox).
But this is all beside the point. My interest in GRL lies in financial speculation and the making of money (or, more accurately, the losing of money so far). I agree with gc2016's view that GRL should have stuck to gold and base metals in the LFB and not jumped on the REEs bandwagon (which likely occurred because J.O. thought that REEs were going to be the next lithium--and looking at the current price of lithium, I suppose she was kind of right in that regard).
