An online review from Amazon.com, March 10, 1998
Tim Campbell, Economic Historian,
02/23/98, rating=10:
Easy-to-understand review of mineral resource depletion.
Should be required reading for anyone attempting to understand the significance of
mineral resource depletion to the modern global economy. This book is a direct
complement to the work of the eminent geophysicist M. King Hubbert and exploration
geologist Colin J. Campbell. More current information can also be found in
the March edition of Scientific American in an article by C.J. Campbell.
Geologist Youngquist provides definitive proof of the allegation by economist Nicholas
Gerogescu-Roegen, in The Entropy Law and the Economic Process (1971), that natural
resources (including industrial metals and oil) are not unlimited. This rather
obvious point is not acknowledged by the vast majority of professional economists.
Youngquist provides an authoritative and comprehensive review of why this
view is not only illogical but outright dangerous. In Chapter One he provides an excellent
review of how natural resource depletion has inevitably lead to the decline
of all major nations/empires. Chapter 27 comprehensively and rationally explodes the
myths promoted by those who don't believe that natural resources are limited
and Chapter 28 addresses the extreme;y difficult tasks of converting the economy to the
emerging paradigm of sustainability. This book should be required reading
for anyone attempting to understand why all of us should be concerned about natural
resource depletion and how it will affect all of us in the coming century.