These days "conservation" is more likely to be an expensive and inefficient political bone tossed both to those with treehugger leanings to secure their votes and the researchers, suppliers, manufacturers, distributors, and all-too-necessary finger-waggers to eat up Keynes' "idle money" and promote more opportunities for taxation through maintained velocity and what they still, somehow, call "economic growth."
It seems to be a truism among these people that any and all energy consumption is inefficient to the point that it demands improvement. Unfortunately, resolving that inefficiency is frequently, if not usually, not economically viable. Thus, Uncle Sugar and his Tabernacle of the Holy Printing Press must step in and stimulate it. But dear Uncle has his own goals, and one of those is economic growth.
In other words, the assumption that humans consume the energy they have saved _may_ only be correct insofar as we live in a centrally influenced, if not managed, economy that relies upon both appeasement of the people who demand improvements that are not economically warranted as well as the perception of economic growth.
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These days "conservation" is more likely to be an expensive and inefficient political bone tossed both to those with treehugger leanings to secure their votes and the researchers, suppliers, manufacturers, distributors, and all-too-necessary finger-waggers to eat up Keynes' "idle money" and promote more opportunities for taxation through maintained velocity and what they still, somehow, call "economic growth."
It seems to be a truism among these people that any and all energy consumption is inefficient to the point that it demands improvement. Unfortunately, resolving that inefficiency is frequently, if not usually, not economically viable. Thus, Uncle Sugar and his Tabernacle of the Holy Printing Press must step in and stimulate it. But dear Uncle has his own goals, and one of those is economic growth.
In other words, the assumption that humans consume the energy they have saved _may_ only be correct insofar as we live in a centrally influenced, if not managed, economy that relies upon both appeasement of the people who demand improvements that are not economically warranted as well as the perception of economic growth.