[maest]

> because the modern automobile is a wonder of transport speed, comfort, and convenience.

It's also heavily subsidised and its cost does not include a signficant chunk of externalities.

Also, this has been discussed to death, but a large chunk of car usage can be replaced by other modes of transportation. However, that transition requires upfront infrastructural investment.

Sadly, arguments like yours ensure that investment won't happen. So, externalities will keep piling up, until the situation will get dire enough that 1. it can't be ignored anymore and 2. it's too late to meaningfully undo the damage.

[Tostino]

Think of how differently the 20th century would have played out if we didn't have such a demand for oil.

[ZeroGravitas]

For example if you google "why did Japan enter WW2" the summary answer is:

> "Faced with severe shortages of oil .. Japan decided to attack the United States and British forces in Asia and seize the resources of Southeast Asia."

[ffgjgf1]

It’s the other way around. They lost access to oil because they entered WW2.

Had they not decided to invade Indochina (and China before that) US wouldn’t have embargoed oil exports to Japan.

[fsckboy]

and while we're on the subject, we didn't go to war with Iraq (either time) for oil. Iraq wanted to sell us oil, and Iraqi oil on the international market would have driven oil prices lower for us. The reasons lie elsewhere.

It's OK to be against the Iraq war or all war, but it's not OK (or at least accurate) to say it was so we could get their oil, pretty much the exact opposite.

[fsckboy]

energy is what replaces human labor and also makes things possible that human labor can't even provide. Our energy desires in the future will grow even higher. It's not a defect in human nature, it's a defect in the laws of thermodynamics.

Stop fighting it, you're wasting energy.