Yes. I knew it was a typo but I had to exploit it. My bad. I simply cannot agree with you about the Earth's remaining oil supply. Logically, once oil is burned, its gone. Our oil supply is definitely finite. It's a known, undenyable fact. Also, I said I "am" done trying to guess, because frankly, I have no idea which technology is going to replace fossil fuels. But replaced they must be, because our supply is not infinite. If the wheels of commerce grind to a halt....... It's over for us. So we need to start now and keep pushing till we've found a viable replacement. That's it.
Wrong again. Oil reserves are a quantity we know. It is not the same as quantity available. So we don't know how much is ultimately available.
Crude oil is a complex hydrocarbon. And the molecular structure changes from all the different sources.
What we also don't know is from where Crude actual originates. Is it like natural gas a complex of methane and other elements that the earth creates? Or is there just so much coming out of the ground and it is gone?
I remember a tower of flame coming out of the ground near Seattle/Tacoma back in the early fifties. When my wife and I went to see it back in the late 1990's it was but a flicker. However, today it continues to be supplied fuel from the earth.
Most of the surface life on our planet is carbon based. As Jimbo explained, carbon is the key element of crude and it is recycled through that surface life. It does not go away. Carbon dioxide is the building block of most plant life. Greenhouse operators literally burn natural gas and exhaust it into their buildings to promote plant growth. Using solar energy as an energy source, plants combine CO2 and hydrogen to create complex sugars and structures. The amount of carbon does not change. Only it's state of existence.
The wheels of commerce will not stop because we run out of oil. It is far more likely they might stop because the government shuts down it's production and use. If supplies of economically available crude begin to dwindle, other sources will become attractive. And Industry/Commerce will adapt.
And 40 decades from now those new resources will be the fear mongered choice of politicians wanting to control every aspect of the live of their subjects.
Last time I was in New England, I was amazed at the acreage of productive farmland converted to solar panels. How many farmers no longer getup in the morning to feed livestock and grow carbon sucking crops? Instead the walk to the mailbox to get a check from the utility company .
Or the Gubmit.
Meanwhile, energy sucking pumps drain the aquifers out west to grow food on mechanical farms in the cheap land of former deserts. All because of government incentives. Elon Musk is a billionaire because our Gubmint gave him $40,000 of taxpayer money for each car he produced. And each one only uses 60% of the original coal and natural gas fuel energy to run down the highway past fields of solar panels and windmills where, once, food was grown.