Humans have been adapting to nature BY SUFFERING MAJOR HARDSHIP  for all of history.<p>No, cheap energy is not &quot;essential.&quot; It&#x27;s essential to living like a suburban American, but when you see Europeans living more comfortably than Americans, while consuming far less energy, that ought to give you pause.<p>It also should give you pause to notice how &quot;essential&quot; it is for the sea not to force you to relocate, something global warming is slowly doing to hundreds of millions of people.