Focus
It focuses on the energy cost of problem solving, and the energy-complexity relation in manmade systems. This is a mirror of the negentropic tendencies of natural evolution, according to ecological economics, notably the arguments of Donella Meadows and her colleagues on the economic constraints of contemporary problem solving.
The Limits to Growth, 1972, argued that "to raise world food production from 1951-1966 by 34%, for example, required increasing expenditures on tractors of 63%, on nitrate fertilizers of 146%, and on pesticides of 300%. To remove all organic wastes from a sugar-processing plant costs 100 times more than removing 30%. To reduce sulfur dioxide in the air of a U.S. city by 9.6 times, or particulates by 3.1 times, raises the cost of pollution control by 520 times." All environmental problem solving will face constraints of this kind, Tainter argues. It is not a question of expending a lot of energy to discover "more efficient" ways to do these things - that process amplifies the decline.
Read more about this topic: Complexity, Problem Solving, And Sustainable Societies
Famous quotes containing the word focus:
“I don’t have any doubts that there will be a place for progressive white people in this country in the future. I think the paranoia common among white people is very unfounded. I have always organized my life so that I could focus on political work. That’s all I want to do, and that’s all that makes me happy.”
—Hettie V., South African white anti-apartheid activist and feminist. As quoted in Lives of Courage, ch. 21, by Diana E. H. Russell (1989)
“If your child is going to develop a healthy personality with the capacity to remain intact and grow, she must learn how to test reality, regulate her impulses, stabilize her moods, integrate her feelings and actions, focus her concentration and plan.”
—Stanley I. Greenspan (20th century)
“If we focus exclusively on teaching our children to read, write, spell, and count in their first years of life, we turn our homes into extensions of school and turn bringing up a child into an exercise in curriculum development. We should be parents first and teachers of academic skills second.”
—Neil Kurshan (20th century)