I'm not sure what the message is here. Is the author suggesting that we shouldn't seek further progress, now that these solutions to old problems exist? I think

I'm not sure what the message is here. Is the author suggesting that we shouldn't seek further progress, now that these solutions to old problems exist? I think he overlooks the fairly obvious fact that today's solutions are tomorrow's problems, and that this is the march of progress. One day people will be reading that, before [innovative new material], we had to use PLASTIC everywhere! Imagine how terrible it would be to go back to those bad old days, with plastic infiltrating all stages of the food chain and causing all manner of problems. So everyone criticizing [innovative new material], you should become industrially literate so you can see how bad plastic was before you go trying to limit or improve [innovative new material].