I consider myself one of your biggest fans, but sorry, I feel you're letting your emotions cloud your um...you know.

Is technology the first mover in this? Isn't the first mover a climate favorable to technology? If the Earth was in an ice-ball mode there'd be nowhere warm enough for us to build mining equipment, let alone operate it. We can only mine minerals and fossil fuels because the planet has the climate to do it, and that climate (avg 57 degrees) is historically rare.

Is it a real problem that we have too many buildings, roads and vehicles? As much as I don't like much of it, I don't see it as a problem, per se. The problem, as you point out, is that mined resources are finite.

The other problem is that our activity is changing the climate back to an unfavorable one. Your story about what it would be like if we started from scratch, mining today, is one of the best pieces I've read.

To me, this story conflicts with that. (BTW mentioned you in my last piece).

What I think you mean to say is that we won't have the energy to counter-act the two problems of finite resources and increasingly deadly-to-humans climate.