Re:60 years later, is it time to update the Drake equation?
by LatteLazy on Wednesday May 19, 2021 @02:36PM
(#27212605)
Our lives are shocking similar to those of a 1400 merchant. We have houses with a few rooms, a coach (car) or two, we eat meat a lot.
The big differences between us and those merchants (healthcare, communications etc) are matters of technology not energy.
Proper sewers and drinking water has added much more to our lives than cars vs coachs.
And that's what I see going forwards too: I want a longer healthier life. But that will be a matter of medical discovery, not a CAT scanner than uses 1 million times more power...
Re:60 years later, is it time to update the Drake equation?
by michaelmrose on Wednesday May 19, 2021 @04:38PM
(#27214169)
We use almost 300x the energy we did in 1800 despite only having 8x as many people. When you order something casually that was manufactured by machines that were manufactured by machines that were manufactured by machines and its shipped across the planet for you to consume that too is energy.
We are nearly 40x as energy intensive per capita as as were just 2 centuries ago. If we rewind the clock to 1400 it becomes harder yet to compare because we actually captured so very little energy.
Maybe we will consume vast resources of energy sending people or machines to explore the universe. Maybe we will need it to reshape our home environs. Maybe we will want to produce more people than can be supported on planet earth and profit in the arts and sciences from their contributions?
Never in human history has any amount of energy been enough so is simple extrapolation that if civilization continues to grow it will consume more energy.