[chessplayer]

“Nevertheless, the majority of people on the planet have not yet achieved the material abundance enjoyed by Americans, Europeans, and the Japanese. Can humanity find, transform, and deploy enough resources to lift”

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Might be possible if we strip mine every square inch of the planet.

[dasboot]

 Can humanity find, transform, and deploy enough resources to lift those people into affluence? No. Only a free market and a free, armed, educated and moral society can do that. And ya can't 'deploy' it.

[Foundahardheadedwoman]

I will give you an example of the expansion of known reserves in any mineral or anything else for that matter. In the coal business, coal at one time could be stripped at a profit when the ratio was 1” of coal for 1’ of overburden, when the price of coal doubles or triples due to a shortfall of supply, then 2’ of overburden can be taken for one inch of coal. Same goes for low quality coal, it becomes mineable when the price increase allows for the purchase of higher quality coal to mix or sweeten the low quality coal to a useable level. No real increase in the total amount of coal reserves just the law of supply and demand in action.

Years ago very little coal was considered mineable at heights 24” or less, with the invention of new equipment and techniques, that coal became recoverable at a profit.

Fracking is another tech that when the price reached a certain level it became possible to obtain that oil and gas at a profit.

There are a lot of things you can argue about but the law of supply and demand aint one of them.

I do like the guy’s numbers of average useage of materials and its connection to pulling people out of poverty at a certain point. The world needs more people that think out of the box. Maybe I am slow but I had never looked at it from that angle.

[SkyPilot]

I never trust anyone who uses the word “biosphere” in a sentence.

[Balding_Eagle]

There was a recent thread (which I am unable to find) here on FR about a politician who predicted the poor could be raised out of poverty in the next few decades.

This columnist is essentially making the same argument.

[pieceofthepuzzle]

I’m not too worried about us figuring out a way to sustain production of material goods. What I wonder about, however, is what human beings need to be happy. I don’t mean “how much stuff or how many material goods are enough?”. I mean what are the essential elements for people to feel fulfilled and happy? It’s an open question, and I raise it because my personal experience recently has been that there are a lot of unhappy and very stressed out people out there. I know this is a little off topic, and I apologize for that.

[Excellence]

srbfl

[Wuli]

“While the ever more efficient use of energy and materials results in relative dematerialization—less stuff yielding more value—the overall trend has been to extract more and more materials from the earth and the biosphere. “There can be no doubt that relative dematerialization has been the key (and not infrequently the dominant) factor promoting often massive expansion of material consumption,” Smil writes. “Less has thus been an enabling agent of more.”

same way with gas mileage, it does not reduce total consumption, as many people benefiting from better gas milage ofen increase the number of miles they drive BECAUSE they’re getting better gas mileage

same way with electricity - “electricity saving apoliances and devices” do not necessarily lower total electricity consumption, as, to some degree, some people will take the position that because they are saving electricity “here”, they can afford to use some more “there” without raising their electric bill

[American Constitutionalist]

One thing there is plenty of ? land, yes, some of that land is desert, or polar cap, but still land.
Most of the world's population is centered around densely congested cities near water.
If there is one resource that we should be of concern and may lead to future wars is water, clean drinking water.
One thing that once bothered me, but not so any more is the metal is getting thinner on the body of washing machines and dryers, I remember those things were built like a tank but why build them like they were back in the 50s 60s so heavy ? it's not like people are going to stand on them.... so I can understand why they roll the metal thinner now for them.
I can see it if not already here is that they make the body of washing machines and dryers out of heavy duty durable plastics.

[Lurkina.n.Learnin]

Great discussion here. These guys bet on this before.

Simon–Ehrlich wager
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon-Ehrlich_wager