but the Earth surface is not a closed system. Life, an incredibly organized machine risen from just photosynthesis or chemosynthesis, is an exceptional example of entropy locally decreasing because of external influx of energy from the Sun and the center of the Earth.

yeah, my understanding of this is the earth's surface is generally at an energy equilibrium (combining sunlight, geothermal heat, dissipation to space, etc) which results in the current climate. adding energy to that system via heat changes that equilibrium.

Secondly, he justly warned about gathering energy from outer space and importing in on Earth, something that I had never considered. But what if we used this energy in outer space as well? This seems like a good motivation for space colonization. That’s a (probably foolish) dream that could be compatible with exponential growth beyond what is available on Earth.

wow this is an incredible idea! we could easily use all the energy we want in space or on another body that is less sensitive to heat (moon, mars, etc)