[tylerdurden]

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I would rather have our government spend money today on technology that isnt yet economical (insurance policy) so that it will be in X years, regardless of what happens with the price of oil.

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That's what private industry does. Better than government.

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Another thing the pure capitalists are missing is the fact that innovation takes time. Without the "unprofitable" government funding of alternative energy over decades, many of the key advances weve made wouldnt have materialized yet,

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Such as?

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simply because it isnt profitable for companies to research in fields with 40 or 50 year outlooks.

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This is demonstrably false.

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One thing capitalism doesnt take into account is HUMAN SUFFERING.

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That's flat out wrong. People hate suffering, and they are willing to spend their own money to reduce their suffering, therefore there is money to be made in providing goods and services that reduce suffering. In fact, human suffering is probably the number 1 driver of progress.

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Eventually we will have to wean ourselves from fossil fuels. But by sticking to pure capitalism, there will inevitably be more suffering in the process. With government funding, on the other hand, there will be more waste and unprofitablility, but much less chance of suffering.

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How do you figure that?

You seem to be assuming that unless nanny government steps in, people will just blindly keep using oil and never look at anything else until the last drop is extracted from the ground.

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As a last note, lets say the U.S. government starting tomorrow invests $20 billion a year in alternative energy. When the energy crunch comes, all those countries that relied on capitalism to solve the problem will be behind the U.S. We will then have a tremendous economic advantage on these countries (such as china). We will be producing products cheaper using abundant energy while they are just beginning to invest in the "now profitable" infrastructure needed to create and transport this energy.

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Wow. China is relying solely on capitalism. Interesting.

Seriously, you are making a ton of incorrect assumptions.

First, you assume the $20 billion will actually be allocated intelligently.

Secondly, you assume that we will actually discover something. It's entirely possible that researchers will burn through the cash and find nothing. Of course, that's possible with private funding as well, but it's more likely with government funding since the money will be centrally directed.

Thirdly, you're assuming that the private sector will do no research on their own, because it's "unprofitable". Your definition of unprofitable is wrong.