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The hell?
1. If you can't find a resource, you've run out of it. Regardless if it's in some super secret dimension that you can't get to it, there's still no more available. If you can't get any more essentially, you've run out.
2. It doesn't matter if an alternative is created. Just because you've found an alternative doesn't mean that what you used to use isn't still gone.
1. The people touting the "gone in 40-50 years" figures are basing their calculations off of current known reserves. The reason the predictions are such a load is because we always find more reserves. This again goes back to economics: if a resource becomes scarce, the value of the resource goes up. This results in increased effort to find more of said resource. The result? We end up excavating brand new reserves and the predicitons go to hell.
2. As was said before, you will NEVER run out of a resource, simply because the value of a resource increases as supply decreases. Who the hell is going to use gasoline to run their car when it costs $1000 a gallon?
P.S. I have no idea where people get the "40-50 years" figure. Based on current consumption, reserves and efficiency, we won't run out of fossil fuels for 700 years.
Edited, Sep 25th 2006 at 6:33pm EDT by nekio