Book review
With his book "250 Years of Industrial
Consumption and Transformation of Nature: Impacts on
Global Ecosystems and Life" the geologist
Engelbrecht offers a scientifically precise overview of
the diversity of sources of natural commodities, and the
consequences resulting from their
extraction, translocation, denaturation, use, and
disposal. Expecially for younger colleagues and students
of material matters, this work offers a
valuable review of the complex relations between two
nonlinear complex systems: the ecosphere and the
anthroposphere. Students of political
science, business, legal matters, theology, and the
humanities, in general, will find a wealth of details
that can enrich their understanding of the
material basis of life.
According to the opinion of a growing number of
scientists, the stepwise tenfold reduction of the actual
extreme utilization of natural resources
is the basic requirement to approach sustainable
wellbeing for humans as well as future viability of
industry. From a technical aspect, no significant
loss of wealth would be expected for endconsumers as a
consequence. In sharp contrast, technology cannot rebuild
the ecosphere's functions and
services that were damaged or destroyed by our present
kind of consumptive economy. Other than in the case of of
the research invested for
understanding climate change, the necessary preconditions
for a rational organization of the unavoidable resource
transition are not as yet satisfactory.
This applies also to understand the fundamental relation
between the economy and the stability of the ecosphere,
as much as it relates to social and
political options for realizing the dematerialization of
the human society. The vulnerable spot of economy
consists in its extreme intensity in utilizing
resources.
January, 31, 2018
Professor Dr. Friedrich Schmidt-Bleek (*1932 †2019),
Chemist, founder of the Wuppertal-Institute for Climate,
Environment and Energy and of the Factor 10 Institute,
initiator of the World Resource Forum in Davos.
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