On Mon, Feb 27, 2012 at 9:09 AM, <[email protected]> wrote: > > > > Therefore this breakthrough is potentially an example of how > quickly technology can be advanced if society puts its > resources behind it. The problem is: why are they doing it? > Not because they want to prevent climate catastrophe. They > are doing it in order to be able to continue growing > although supplies of crude oil are no longer growing but are > likely to decline. A rational strategy would view electric > cars as part of a complete revamping of the transportation > system: they cover the last mile between the home and the > train station. This should go along with higher density > walkable communities etc. But this is not what the Federal > government is trying to do with electric cars. They want to > leave intact today's extremely wasteful transportation > system with suburbia and everything, with the only change > that electric cars are substituted for gasoline driven cars. > Because they do not want economic growth strangulated by > spikes in oil prices as has been the case in the last > several years. In other words, they are using electric cars > as a bandaid to continue business as usual, they are trying > to avoid stepping on the brakes while the entire system is > heading for the cliff.
No technology is inherently good. Some, like coal can be inherently bad. But the best any means of doing things can be is neutral, usable for either to make life for most better or worse in the long run. But there is no technology that can't be implemented in a way that makes life worse instead of better - at least I can't think of one offhand. > > Hans G Ehrbar > > _______________________________________________ > pen-l mailing list > [email protected] > https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l -- Facebook: Gar Lipow Twitter: GarLipow Solving the Climate Crisis web page: SolvingTheClimateCrisis.com Grist Blog: http://grist.org/author/gar-lipow/ Online technical reference: http://www.nohairshirts.com _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
