45
No cities on the Moon: a billion tons of water is not enough for sustainability
(www.frontiersin.org)
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
this post was submitted on 24 Oct 2026
45 points (95.9% liked)
Science
22501 readers
40 users here now
Subscribe to see new publications and popular science coverage of current research on your homepage
founded 7 years ago
MODERATORS
That's just a contradiction of our current mode of production. The negative effect is sure there, but it's outweighed by the positive outcomes. This gigantic mechanized monolithic production system that turns the whole humanity into one big voracious machine is what eventually will allow us to fully decentralise the way we produce things while keeping the automation and thus avoid the destruction we've been causing for so long.
Think of this: you don't need packaging if you consume in the same place where you produce. You can also much more easily recycle used materials if you don't need them to travel for thousands miles and can instead use them right where you are. If you use local small and natural sources of energy instead of burning millions of tons of coal, you also don't pollute the enviranment as much. All of this will only be possible thanks to this destructive phase we're currently in. So ultimately we do cater our actual needs - somewhat contradictory at times, but still.
That’s a lot of wishful thinking to digest ;-). There’s zero evidence to support this vision , and human egoism (wars, revenue-focus, …) seem to be IMHO completely ignored. I witnessed these type of predictions in the 70s, 90s, 10s… they never materialized.
The ongoing automation is the evidence. The trend is to fully automate the whole production chain and that will lead to decentralisation, because centralisation only makes sense with human labour.
Human egoism isn't bad in itself. The problem is that it conflicts with altruism. That's where it gets destructive. But this can be solved. If everyone can automatically produce what they need themselves, there's no more competing for who's going to be the one providing and the one taking. The roles merge. Egoism and altruism become the same thing and neither stays destructive.
But that’s all theory. Fact is that automation costs energy, and energy creates CO2. So climate change is the force that works against your plan, and since we are heading to 2.8C, time is quickly running out. In addition, trends such as urbanization (which has been taking place for about 5000 years), the rise of fascism etc also don’t seem to be in favor. Taken together, humanity may very well collapse first. So instead of working on your dream, become active; vote, protect.
I've talked about this above: "If you use local small and natural sources of energy instead of burning millions of tons of coal, you also don't pollute the environment as much."
Burning isn't the only possible source of energy and it's really effective only with centralisation. Some niche attempts at creating means of local power generation already exist. For example, getting power from living plants. I think switching to such decentralised and eco-friendly forms of energy production is the solution to climate change.
Fascism is another manifestation of "human egoism" which I adressed above. Urbanization doesn't exist on its own either. It is a consequence of the centralised mode of production, which to my mind, as I said earlier, is something we are going to move away from.
Voting and being politically active isn't going to invent and adopt new means of decentralised production. It is us, regular citizens, who should do it.