[api]

I look at this as a technical problem. We just aren't very good at this yet. We are, in fact, slowly getting better. Renewable energy was the largest category of new installed energy for the last few years at least, and that's a start. The question is whether we can get good at this fast enough to outrun ourselves.

My issue with at least some of green ideology is that it's viewed as a moral problem. We are sinning by asking for more than we deserve and, if you really scratch the surface, by trying to give too much to the unwashed hordes. Beneath the surface I think you find romanticism, and beneath that you find nostalgia for a fantasy world that never really existed. That fantasy world is the fantasy of the old aristocracy. It's the story they told themselves.

I think those kinds of greens are "trads" who don't know it yet. The only thing keeping them from going down that road is an attachment to the idea of equality and things like LGBTQ rights. If you give up those things, the rest aligns perfectly. If you want a world of rare authentic things enjoyed by cultured people and all of it to fit within present techno/ecological limits, you have to put the masses back in feudal serfdom and establish a rigid, religious, traditional system to hold everything in stasis that way. It would be sustainable.

But as I said a few levels up, there is another side of the critique that I think has more legs. That's the critique of engineered addiction and manipulation. Those are not mandatory effects of scale. They're engineered to maximize short term profits or for other purposes like political manipulation, which I guess is another kind of profit (power rather than money).

[jdmn89]

For things like strawberries and housing I think that you're right that this can be a technical problem.

But some things are inherently scarce. Not everyone can sit courtside at the NBA Finals. We can't all summit Everest. Celebrities don't have the capacity to give a personalized experience to every fan.

We can't all visit Venice at the same time. Maybe we can make more and better versions of the Venetian, but it's not the same thing.

Limiting these things to only a new aristocracy is absolutely gross. Allowing no one these experiences would also be doing a disservice to humanity. I think pursuing abundance where it is an option is the right thing to do. But I don't think we're close to any good solutions for the inherently scarce experiences.

Maybe some day there's a fair lottery system? Everyone gets a ration of limited and authentic experiences coupled with an abundance of commodities?

[eszed]

Good points. I expect you're familiar with the Abundance Agenda folks? They're mostly talking right now about energy and infrastructure, which I think is a correct choice, but there is a next step to take with consumer goods, so that we can end up with an abundance of quality and not more engineered addiction.