Thank you for clarifying the definition you’re using for “proportionately more”.
Two points come to mind:
The material waste products of the electronics ecosystem between 1990s and now has shifted from mass/toxic atoms (cathode-ray tubes/lead, mercury) to less mass but more rare(er) earth elements such as indium and cobalt. 1 The problem of “this can’t go on” may not be limited by total of all atoms but by total of electronically important elements that can be mined “sustainably” on earth. All atoms are not equal. As you’re probably aware, “rare earth” is not always about the total amount of atoms of said element in the earth but of how the element is dispersed (or not) and, thus, how “easily” it can be mined. (“easily” includes physical as well as political impediments2)The electronic waste stream efforts are very likely to shift from dealing with mass/toxicity to harvesting the rare earth elements from electronic waste. I can imagine the trade-off graph between all of the costs of more pit mines in more politically diverse areas for harvesting virgin rare earth elements vs harvesting electronic waste. I can’t imagine either being anywhere close to all of the atoms on earth much less the entire universe. Orders of magnitude seem likely but I could be persuaded otherwise.
The idea of “modern technology (=value)” seems to have a presumption of that value being only positive. When I see that kind of blanket statement about technology I am reminded of the 2012 cover of The MIT Technology Review with Buzz Aldrin saying “You promised me Mars colonies. Instead, I got Facebook”. No argument from me that use of atom-light applications are valued in the stock market. No argument from me regarding the excitement/”value” of block-chain and it’s use of more electricity than many countries. Humans used to be pretty thrilled about tulips, too. Maybe the point of downsides of modern technology, including the exploitation of human nature wrt self-image (Instagram), in-group/out-group (Facebook), metabolic balance (Ultra-Processed Food), and attention (video games), fall to the stagnation/collapse buckets of the OP.
The second point plays into the first: modern technology value of human nature exploitation diverts technology from going off-planet to get more electronically important atoms.
I hope the two links can be followed. I’m new to this commenting tool. I’m open to advice if I’ve linked incorrectly (or inelegantly).
Thank you for taking the time to explore this domain.
There is at least one additional aspect of lipid structure consumption that is not part of your list of mechanisms. Lipid shape affects the shape of membranes. This paper illustrates the concept (tldr: Figures 3 & 4):
https://dasher.wustl.edu/bio5357/readings/naturerevmcb-19-281-18.pdf “Understanding the diversity
of membrane lipid composition”
Figure 3 in the following review paper shows a table of different physical properties for the endoplasmic reticulum (ER), Golgi apparatus, and plasma membrane (PM) and their % of different lipid shapes that drive their function:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9892264/ “Regulation of membrane protein structure and function by their paralipidomes”
Not commenting on the 5 mechanisms explained above. Just noting another possible mechanism for an effect of ingesting different proportions of lipid structures. Ingested lipid shape shapes membrane shapes and, subsequently, lipid-lipid and lipid-protein interactions.
Agree with the complexity aspect of biology.