Quite simply, moving up the Kardashev scale need not harm the desires of those who want to live in their own version of harmony with nature, while satisfying th

Quite simply, moving up the Kardashev scale need not harm the desires of those who want to live in their own version of harmony with nature, while satisfying the desires of those who prefer continually advancing technology. Maybe it needn't, but if history is any indication it does. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/02/opinion/02diamond.html?pagewanted=all http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/02/opinion/02diamond.html?pag... Preserving the status quo, forcing urbanization, or reverting to a more agrarian society also will satisfy the naturists/locavores/etc., but at the expense of the technologists/futurists. Thus, from a utilitarian perspective, technological advancement provides greater net satisfaction than technological stagnation. Either the interests of the two groups are compatible, or they are not. You can't say that they are when one group gets what they want, but they aren't when the competing group does. Of course in reality there's a vast spectrum of coexistence and compromise. Your argument boils down to a carefully selected excluded middle. Not that it matters, since your conclusion begs the question anyway by equating technological progress (presumably as measured by the proxy of energy consumption) with utilitarian satisfaction. Certainly there's a correlation up to a point (vaccines, plumbing, healthcare, etc). But if you look at quantitative happiness metrics in the US they've been stagnant for the past 60 years, while per-capita energy consumption has doubled. It's naïve linear thinking to say that additional energy/stuff consumption will increase our happiness. I call it the Drinking Undergrad Fallacy. The eponymous poor sap tells himself, "if three drinks makes me feel good, then 9 drinks will make me feel three times as good!"