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Comment by kristianc | Hacker News Reader

That assumes that technological progress is static, which it patently is not. We are now able to make more out of the limited resources we have.

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I believe being able to make more out of the resources does not necessarily translate into actually making more. There are arguments that building infrastructure today is slower than 30 years ago due to regulations/political constraints, despite the technological progress.

I think we surface more of the consequences of infrastructure construction in terms of health and safety and pollution, which appears to be slower, but in fact means much more is done.

Technological progress cannot create more land; housing in more expensive due to lack of land in many places, limited size of woods makes wood furniture more and more expensive, farming becomes more and more intensive. In the time of my grandfathers finding a place to build a house was very simple (and cheap) and there was more than enough wood to make everything out of the best quality wood. Even heating in the winter was done on wood as it was plenty for everyone. But population quadrupled since, the land and wood per capita is a quarter and decreasing.

> Technological progress cannot create more land

The Netherlands did reclaim land from the sea.

That is trolling; the land that can be claimed from the sea is irrelevant on a global scale, especially into the landlocked countries.

> more out of the limited resources we have

Compared to 10 years ago? Maybe.

Compared to... 200 years ago? Absolutely not.

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