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Comment by Comevius | Hacker News Reader

Software needs hardware to create economic growth, namely data centers and disposable computers (smartphones, notebooks, smart watches, routers and so on). It doesn't matter if they are more energy efficient either if you keep making more and more of them. Just the environmental impact of making them is unsustainable. Similarly it doesn't matter how much value new paradigms like Bitcoin or AI adds to the economy, it's just more environmental impact. Replacing hundreds of millions of cars with electric cars is just more impact too.

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When I was in high school, the standard weeknight entertainment was driving up and down main street in vehicles that got about 8 mpg.

Today, standard weeknight entertainment for high school boys is multi-player video games.

Yes, multi-player video games are still slightly carbon positive. But they're about a million times better than driving up and down main street. That's massive progress.

Next, what's the environmental and economic impact of a forest ranger? They're adding significant economic value to the economy and also hopefully doing significant good for the environment.

It's not a hard stretch to imagine that the economy of 2200 will consist mostly of holodeck's and forest rangers. It's very possible that GDP will be growing and the environment will be getting better in most ways. Just like the rivers and forests of North America are better than they were 80 years ago.

On the contrary, consumption and energy use went up, not to mention waste. That video game needs 600-700 watts per client and most of it is created very inefficiently, using fossil fuels.

People still drive up and down too, and there are more people.

> the economy of 2200

The planet will be barely habitable, if at all.

Sorry I exaggerated. Video games are only 1000x better than driving an 80s car, not a millions.

I don't even know what are you talking about, most teenagers didn't own a car in the 80's. In fact there are more cars now than there were back then, more people too. I don't see how the video game industry helped the environment, on the contrary it had a measurable negative impact on it thanks to the energy consumption and the waste.

The only thing video games have going for them is that they don't get you laid.

Minor correction but consumer game consoles tend to cap out at 220 watts, and even for PCs 600-700 watts is on the higher end.

And the average of both is under 100 watts.

That's fair, but you have a game console, a TV, a desktop, a notebook, a smartphone, e-book reader, router and so on.

The average electric power consumption per capita more than doubled in the last 40 years, and keeps growing almost linearly.

Those are negligeable compared to their physical counterpart they are replacing though, they so replace a lot of car trips and expensive manufacturing which is now unneeded

Demand for cars is higher than ever, so is the manufacturing of almost all goods, as proven by the supply chain bottleneck in the last 2-3 years. The demand is still there, and is growing thanks to millions of people in places like India, China and Africa getting out of poverty.

What exactly have smartphones been replacing lately? Other than PC computers, which ironically also saw a comeback thanks to WFH?

You're probably seeing things only from your own tiny bubble, not from the global perspective.

We're talking about developed countries here so yeah tons of stuff has been dematerialised, I call my doctor by video instead of driving there, I download movies instead of driving to the cinema, I get deliveries which are batched instead of going to the mall, I no longer need to send letters and buy paper maps, I don't need to drive to the library anymore to get books, the electricity company does not need to drive on the whole city just to read the electric meters... The list is endless, and this is just individual stuff, whenever you get to the whole supply chain, that gets compounded at every level.

Let me guess, you live in the US/North America? I also live in a developed country in Europe and here you have to go to the doctor in person for almost everything except COVID, people still go to the cinema (at every new blockbuster the cinema is almost full), people still go shopping for groceries as grocery deliveries aren't a thing here or most people can't afford the extra costs, WFH is very rare so everyone still goes to work in person, car sales are up, etc.

Your bubble does not reflect the worldwide situation.

No I live in western Europe.

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