Yeah. Sounds a lot like the dig-up-all-the-carbon-burn-then-bury-it-again civilizational project going on the past 100, and next 100 years.
What exactly was the purpose to "re-arranging small bits of matter near the surface of the earth" again? [1]
Basically I wanted to make a comment about greedy exploitation-exploration trade-off strategies here but will stop short at this kind of eliptical passing remark.
[1] paraphrasing Russell in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_Praise_of_Idleness_and_Othe... it is appropriate given current moment
From the same man that proposed the idea of "re-arranging small bits of matter near the surface of the earth".
>It would, indeed, be more sensible to build houses and the like; but if there are political and practical difficulties in the way of this, the above would be better than nothing.
It's a social hack to get around idiotic situations. It's like moving to mars because you are worried about a nuclear war or climate change. Dumb games require dumb players.
> and presumably created infrastructure jobs
Usually you hear people complain about dig-a-hole-then-fill-it-up jobs. But if we're going to start supporting those, it would be best not to tie them to scams, I think.