Well, yes, but I was speaking on the short term of the next few trillion years. For that matter, we have the power to cause irreversible collapse today. I would prefer to see a future that is capable of sustaining something worthwhile for as long as physics allows.
Sustainable is a badly used term for this reason. Lots of inefficient things are sustainable for the short term of a few hundred thousand years. “Unsustainable” should be limited to things that are either collapsing now (climate change) or obviously short term, like low paid workers for essential jobs when demographically the population is slowly losing workers.
Well, yes, but I was speaking on the short term of the next few trillion years. For that matter, we have the power to cause irreversible collapse today. I would prefer to see a future that is capable of sustaining something worthwhile for as long as physics allows.
Sustainable is a badly used term for this reason. Lots of inefficient things are sustainable for the short term of a few hundred thousand years. “Unsustainable” should be limited to things that are either collapsing now (climate change) or obviously short term, like low paid workers for essential jobs when demographically the population is slowly losing workers.