Humanity: Okay, so we have this new synthetic material that is: non-degradable, can be made very resilient, can be made into any shape or form, good at insulating both heat and electricity, its physical properties can be widely manipulated, it can be flexible and hard both at the same time, and, best of all, it's dirt-cheap!

Me: Wow. That's like a dream material, straight up space age stuff! What are you using it for?

Humanity: Disposable food packaging, mostly.

Me: Are you fucking kidding me?

@drq It's lighter, more compact, more durable and easier to integrate in the production process, all of which increases overall throughput. Even if we were a perfect hive-mind that never produces more than necessary, we might still want to tool up with plastic, in case higher throughput becomes necessary at some point, like some kind of an emergency, we would perhaps just have a much better recycling plan/process. Advantage in present is always more important than problems of distant future, only an all knowing god can transcend this reality.