- Many economically useful materials are nonrenewable
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If materials cannot be obtained somewhere other than Earth, people will eventually be unable to accomplish what they need to accomplish
The argument is saying that we sometimes use nonrenewable resources to get stuff done yet, because these resources are nonrenewable, we eventually won't be able to get that stuff done anymore. This makes sense. I mean the nonrenewable resources will eventually run out and so it seems okay to conclude that we will eventually be hindered by this. Yet there is a big assumption here: who's to say that what we need to accomplished cannot eventually be accomplished with other, renewable, resources. Maybe the nonrenewable resources aren't necessary!
- (A) This is kind of like a premise booster. We know that most economically useful materials are nonrenewable and, while we cannot definitely prove it, we can assume that this would mean that there are some useful resources that are renewable.
(B) If we can get more resources from outer space, the difficulty really doesn't matter. However, we need to know the nature of these "raw materials" we are getting. Are they renewable? Non-renewable? This leaves too much in the air and - as I said - difficulty doesn't matter so this answer is no good.
(C) Absolutely! This is what I predicted. If we can substitute renewable resources for nonrenewable resources than this really hurts the argument that says that we will eventually be unable to accomplish stuff.
(D) We don't need to make a value judgment on what we are accomplishing. It is worth accomplishing / it's not worth accomplish...who cares?
(E) So? We are saying that we eventually won't be able to accomplish what we need to. It could be a bajillion years before the nonrenewable resources run out and this doesn't impact the argument whatsoever.
