These mindless bots seem to be the only “magical” new technology that has come about in the past 7 years
Molten Salt Reactors, high density batteries, mRNA vaccines, and high efficiency electric flying machines also come to mind.
Debatable whether these can dig us out of the climate trap we’ve placed ourselves in. But we’re definitely still advancing technologically.
No argument there. But the investor class will always find ways to burn more resources because of their growth addiction. I think the only way out of the climate trap is via social transformation (e.g. Green New Deal).
But the investor class will always find ways to burn more resources because of their growth addiction.
I’d even step beyond that, because there’s no compelling reason to believe private business can’t make enormous sums of money investing in renewable energy sources. This really does boil down to which investors are in charge. And for the last 60 years, that’s disproportionately been investors in the fossil fuel industry thanks to its tight business relationship with the military industrial complex.
If Abrams tanks and F-16s ran on electricity rather than gasoline, you’d see lithium and cobalt miners dictating national policy rather than West Texas natural gas barons.
I think the only way out of the climate trap is via social transformation (e.g. Green New Deal).
I agree, to an extent. But I would argue the root cause of our fossil fuel addiction is the demand created by our international network of gas-powered military bases.
I largely agree with you, with the caveat that we need to separate climate emergency from growth addiction and capitalism at large if we’re going to talk about the military industrial complex.
We will inevitably end our reliance on fossil fuels because even an intransigent sect of fossil fuel barons will eventually fall prey to free market economics. And then we’ll have a bunch of great power competition incentivizing carbon-free military tech, and we’ll be desalinating the oceans to build our sodium battery-powered UAVs whose autonomous targeting systems are trained by blowing up coral atolls.
I hope you see my point. Joel Kovel did a masterful job laying this out in The Enemy of Nature (2008). When I say social revolution, I mean some way to organize society so that we can get the psychopaths out of positions of power, i.e. a society that rewards cooperation instead of competition.
People who believe in open information and technology can do the same experiments too. They’ll just be at different steps.
Tesla already solved a lot of this on his own.
