....and I have a healthy skeptism about the altruistic nature of making these plentiful resources availble to humanity based on a free market.

Altruism is just selfishness in costume.
The free market is selfish. Thankfully.

If it wasn't, it would be called socialism, lol.

Using any metric you like, free markets make everyone wealthier.
(not to be confused with what we have had since 1913 and the fed. res.
A central bank is_communism through the back door - if you take the central ownership 'means of production' to mean total money control...)

Selfish free markets free everyone..