My WiFi router (recently reverted to a WRT54G with Tomato from a WRT300N, but for less noble reasons than environment preservation: the 300N was crashing way too often) is on only when we need it.

... on the other end, one can't even conceive human beings as energy-consuming creatures using energy-consuming devices. We are ALSO that. But we are more.

To use a trivial example, if I am a creative mind and I find that for some reason it is only as I wake up that I find inspiration for my art/science by browsing the net, then the energy I consume in keeping my wifi on, to that purpose, would be used to generate art, or brilliant scientific ideas that may allow me to contribute to the creation of a very power efficient generation of electronics/photonic devices.

This is a quite simplistic example. But the principle I am trying to express is that we should probably ask ourselves what really matters and what is the value of things, for us. Keeping the wifi on for no reason is environmentally wrong. But the benefit of commodities is often way deeper than it appears. Rather than less science or technology, I'm in favor of better ones.

I am not taking sides here, but just thinking out loud.