PAULB. SEARS 111 



pattern of highly integrated use of that energy, to sustain life and 

 maintain the system in working order, was developed. The interval 

 between energy fixation and its final dissipation to increase the en- 

 tropy of our solar system was prolonged by the way in which life 

 and environment were organized. Residual effects, such as soil, top- 

 ography, and productive plant and animal communities, were the 

 expression of this relatively efficient process. The appropriate anal- 

 ogy is an industrial plant which utilizes a suitable fraction of current 

 income to maintain its productive efficiency instead of expending it 

 all in dividends. 



Here, in the thermodynamic steady state we observe in nature, we 

 have a model which should be taken very seriously in the shaping of 

 human culture. Speaking purely as a scientist and ignoring so far as 

 I can my own ethical and aesthetic preferences, few things disturb 

 me more than our general neglect of what I regard as the physical 

 basis of our whole enterprise. 



Our choice lies between that of an expanding economy (a con- 

 cept without physical warrant so far as I know) and that of a steady 

 state such as prevailed during all of prehuman biological time. It is 

 most gratifying to note that Professor Galbraith, in his comment on 

 the report of the President's Materials Policy Commission and that 

 of The Twentieth Century Fund, has sensed the gravity of this fun- 

 damental decision. He might well have added the report of the Presi- 

 dent's Water Policy Commission, with its initial assumption of an 

 expanding economy, as well as numerous other more ebullient pro- 

 nouncements. 



And finally, while he has left the thorny population problem to 

 the demographers, it is supremely encouraging to see how squarely 

 he has faced the issue of unnecessary and artificially stimulated con- 

 sumption. 



