I definitly agree that we as a race that depends so much on these finite resources must invest our efforts in creating better ways to use the resources that we have already aquired.  We must not only smartly use the resources that we have, but also smartly re-use these resources.  As technology furthers and old tech's become obsolete we need to properly recycle and reuse the resources from the outdated products.  If we can be efficient at this then the need for mining new resources will decrease.