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realname, I don't hate my world. I *love* my world. That's why I'd love to see us limit the use of fossil-fuels. Don't you get it at all? Don't you see what's happening here? Look around and try to SEE what's going on.
There aren't going to be any fossil fuels to use, at least, not at any kind of cheap price, in the next decade or two. That's not even arguable.
Better to delay that bad day by conserving now. And the only way we could possibly keep the rest of the developing world from using the fuel we conserve, is by taking a leadership role and shaming the rest of the world into doing what we're willing to do: tax fossil-fuels so steeply that we're all forced to find more efficient ways to get from point A to point B.
The issue of horse-power is one I'd thought of before. It is absolutely insane that we've taken ICE refinements and turned them into increased horse-power, instead of increased fuel efficiency. We could all drive refined, comfortable cars that have 40 horse-power engines, like the old VW bug and bus did (but far more refined, now) and be perfectly fine, getting from point A to point B in plenty of time, in total comfort.
I know around Los Angeles, where I live, no-one has much use for all the horsepower most of the time anyway. And I imagine that is increasingly true in most urban centers.
What's happened is that car companies figured out long ago that to sell more cars, they appeal to our lizard-brains by making cars bigger, higher, and faster. It's purely a way to sell cars, it has nothing to do with quality-of-life, this has everything to do with giving drivers a constant low-level flood of brain-chemicals that makes them feel good. Can we really afford that now?
The whole situation is insane, and when you say the ridiculous things you do, realname, it doesn't help.
