COMMENT ⊗   VALID 00002 PAGES
C REC  PAGE   DESCRIPTION
C00001 00001
C00002 00002	THE SCIENTIFIC BASIS FOR TECHNOLOGICAL OPTIMISM
C00008 ENDMK
C⊗;
THE SCIENTIFIC BASIS FOR TECHNOLOGICAL OPTIMISM


	%2On the basis of present scientific knowledge, we can confidently plan
a technology that can maintain a world population several times larger
the present population at a material standard of living several times that
of present day America as long as the sun continues its present output
of energy, i.e. for several billion years.%1

	This article is an analysis of the available scientific evidence
concerning the above proposition.  The evidence turns out to support the
proposition, but there remain several gaps, e.g. concerning technology for
extracting minerals from low grade ores, that will have to be filled
by future research.  The article was written, because the proposition has
important consequences for policy, and many people are basing policy
proposals on its negation.  Here are some of the consequences:

	1. If we want an even higher standard of living, we can have it.
Arguments for a lower standard must be based on other grounds than the
idea that the present standard of living is a temporary golden age.
Policy should be based on solving problems like the "energy problem"
rather than on using them as "an excuse and an opportunity" for changing
our way of life.

	2. If other countries want a high standard of living, they can
have it too, provided they control their populations.  America need not
feel guilty about its material consumption, provided it takes steps
to make itself dependent only on its own resources.

	It is also important to understand what is not being asserted:

	1. No arguments connecting a high standard of living with human happiness
are given, although I believe there is such a connection.

	2. It is not asserted that humanity will inevitably adopt the
necessary technology or will control its population or avoid a nuclear
war, although I think it probably will.

	3. It is not asserted that there need not be any temporary declines
in standard of living while new sources of energy, etc. are being
developed.  We seem to be in a mild decline of this kind now.

	4. The article does not attempt to define the %2best%1 technology.
One of the features supporting optimism is that the problems can
be solved in several different ways, and the policy makers of even fifty years
hence will have only historical interest in our ideas, while our descendants
10,000 years hence may find them extremely curious.

	5. We limit ourselves to technology based on present science, because
we want to prove the existence of a solution.  New scientific discoveries
will lead to additional choices of technology.

	6. We discuss only briefly ways of improving our standard of living
based on present or imminent technology, even though we can expect that most
technological effort will actually go into such improvement rather than
into simply maintaining the present way of life.
	

	The following problems have been seen as limiting the material
standard of living: energy, food, mineral resources, and pollution.
In each case, we shall give one or more long term solutions together with
references to the literature.

	The article will conclude with a polemical section discussing
the views of various authors who think that we cannot further improve
the world as a whole cannot reach the present American standard of living.
In the first part of this section we will deal directly with the arguments
presented and in a second part we will argue that the prevalence of these
views is a psychological and ideological phenomenon worthy of separate
study.