> The idea that we're at some fundamental limit where we can't keep building technology without destroying the environment seems wrong.

It is wrong. Technology fundamentally requires the destruction of the environment, to make a spear you must nap flint and harvest a hard, straight stick. That’s resource destruction on a very small scale.

We have scaled up to Billions of people and near ubiquitous hi-tech. So the scale is what’s eating us, the earth is big, but 8 Billion people is a heck of a lot when every one of them requires highly refined goods.