[AnotherUnixGeek]

We live better and healthier than any humans in the world's history. Our lives have never been longer or easier, we have access to an enormous number of utensils and applications which eliminate drudge-work and enhance our lives. No humans before us ever had the mobility we have. Life is great for modern Westerners, and it requires energy consumption. Small wonder the people of China and India are working to join us - and any decent person should wish them every success.

But the environmentalists can't or won't understand this - they look back to some pre-industrial utopia which never existed, full of epizootic biological diseases transmitted by the animals who served as a crude first attempt at relieving manual labor.

[CobraJet]

As someone pointed out.. Life without energy would be brutal - and short.