Was oil, a good or a bad discovery?

Question

Like, oil brings huge benefits in energy and materials, but at a cost to the planet. Like, is it a good or a bad discovery? What do you think.

Answer 1

At a huge cost the the planet, and yet at a huge advantage to us.
I think it was a good discovery, but now we do need to cut back.

Answer 2

I'd say a good discovery, oil has made it a lot easier for us to develop our industrial civilisation (biomass and then coal did start it but oil is what really got it going) and if we manage things properly will be a useful transition fuel to whatever synthetic fuel we use in the future (which will probably be manufactured using nuclear energy which we've got millions of years available).

The environmental consequences of oil burning should for now be manageable and in the future probably reversible (there are already proposals for dealing with global warming, some of which may actually be workable).

Answer 3

All discoveries have potential to be in the duality of our deeming them positive or negative, depending on the intent of their use after finding them. For all intent & purpose, oil served well for a time...but now we know better/wiser...we have made other more effective discoveries that would more beneficially serve our purposes...however, now the intent has changed, since the powers that control the technologies cannot find equal or greater monetary gain of these new methods, they are squelched until such time as they can...now oil is a control factor--it is good for those controlling it, not so good for the healthfulness or positivity of anything else.

Answer 4

Society's progress is not a straight line meeting at infinity.
But circular only.
At different stages of progress different inventions and discoveries were made and they helped man to make further progress.For example, to irrigate lands from well Persian Wheel was used. then big buffalo hide buckets were pressed into service,.
Later wind mills and punpsets were used.
So the discovery of petroleum some eighty years ageo opened new vista for mankind.Lack of planning to mainatin balance between demand and supply and political interferences have made its price rise undesirable!
Now alternate sources of energy would be sought and the world will keep running !

Answer 5

i think it was a bad discovery it would have been better if we some how could have invented a way to exploit the resources like lighting which dont produce polution