Energy, complexity and wealth maximization
著者
書誌事項
Energy, complexity and wealth maximization
（The frontiers collection）
Springer, c2016
- : [hardback]
大学図書館所蔵 件 / 全2件
-
該当する所蔵館はありません
- すべての絞り込み条件を解除する
注記
Includes bibliographical references (p. 547-575) and index
内容説明・目次
内容説明
This book is about the mechanisms of wealth creation, or what we like to think of as evolutionary "progress." The massive circular flow of goods and services between producers and consumers is not a perpetual motion machine; it has been dependent for the past 150 years on energy inputs from a finite storage of fossil fuels. In this book, you will learn about the three key requirements for wealth creation, and how this process acts according to physical laws, and usually after some part of the natural wealth of the planet has been exploited in an episode of "creative destruction." Knowledge and natural capital, particularly energy, will interact to power the human wealth engine in the future as it has in the past. Will it sputter or continue along the path of evolutionary progress that we have come to expect? Can the new immaterial wealth of information and ideas, which makes up the so-called knowledge economy, replace depleted natural wealth? These questions have no simple answers, but this masterful book will help you to understand the grand challenge of our time.
Praise for Energy, Complexity and Wealth Maximization:
"... people who run the modern world (politicians, economists and lawyers) have a very poor grasp of how it really works because they do not understand the fundamentals of energy, exergy and entropy ... those decision-makers would greatly benefit from reading this book ..." - Vaclav Smil, Distinguished Professor Emeritus, University of Manitoba
"... A grandiose design; impressive, worth reading and reflecting!" - Prof. Dr. Ernst Ulrich von Weizacker, Founder of Wuppertal Institute; Co-President of the Club of Rome, Former Member of the German Bundestag, co-chair of the UN's Resource Panel
"... The book is a must read for concerned citizens and decision makers across the globe." - RK Pachauri, Founder and Executive Vice Chairman, The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI) and ex-chair, International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)
目次
Preface.- Glossary of terms.- Glossary of people.- PART I.- CHAPTER 1. A BRIEF HISTORY OF IDEAS: ENERGY, ENTROPY AND EVOLUTION.- 1.1. Aristotle, Descartes, Newton and Leibnitz.- 1.2. Heat: caloric vs phlogiston.- 1.3. The birth of thermodynamics and statistical mechanics.- 1.4. Chemistry: from Lavoisier to Gibbs.- 1.5. Electricity and electromagnetism.- 1.6. Geology and Earth science.- 1.7. Darwin and biological evolution.- 1.8. Ecology.- 1.9. Entropy, exergy, order and information.- 1.10. Monism, "energetics" and economics.- CHAPTER 2. THE COSMOS, THE SUN AND THE EARTH.- 2.1. Relativity, quantum mechanics and astronomy.- 2.2 The black hole in physics.- 2.3 Nucleosynthesis: Love among the nucleons.- 2.4. The Sun and solar system.- 2.5. The elements needed to sustain life (and technology).- 2.6. The terra-forming of Earth.- 2.7. The long-term future of Planet Earth.- 2.8 Summary of pre-biotic evolution.- CHAPTER 3. THE ORIGIN OF LIFE.- 3.1. Exogenesis?.- 3.2. The origin of organic monomers.- 3.3. From monomers to polymers.- 3.4. Self-replication of macromolecules (genes).- 3.5. Genetic code: RNA and DNA.- 3.6. Information transfer: the genetic code.- 3.7. Oxygen photosynthesis.- 3.8. The "Great Oxidation" and the "invention" of respiration.- 3.9. Evolution before the Cambrian explosion.- 3.10. The "Cambrian explosion".- 3.11. Since the asteroid.- 3.12 Down from the trees.- CHAPTER 4. ENERGY, WATER, CLIMATE AND CYCLES.- 4.1. The Earth's energy (exergy) balance.- 4.2. The hydrological cycle.- 4.3. Ocean currents and atmospheric circulation.- 4.4. Climate change.- 4.5. Bio-geochemical cycles.- 4.6. The carbon-oxygen cycle.- 4.7. The nitrogen cycle.- 4.8. The sulfur cycle.- 4.9. The phosphorus cycle.- 4.10. Thermodynamic dis-equilibrium.- Summary of Part I: From the "Big Bang" to nutrient cycles.- PART II.- CHAPTER 5. ENERGY AND TECHNOLOGY.- 5.1. The enhancement of skin.- 5.2. The taming of fire.- 5.3.Transmission of knowledge: writing and replication.- 5.4. The dawn of civilization and the beginning of agriculture.- 5.5. Agricultural surplus and cities.- 5.6. Slavery and conquest.- 5.7. Money and coinage.- 5.8. Productive technology.- CHAPTER 6. THE NEW WORLD - AND SCIENCE.- 6.1. The discovery of the New World.- 6.2. From charcoal and iron to coal and steel.- 6.3. Gunpowder and cannons.- 6.4. Steam power.- 6.5. Town gas, coal tar, aniline dyes and ammonia synthesis.- 6.6. Petroleum.- 6.7. The internal (infernal) combustion engine.- 6.8. Electrification and communications.- 6.9 Telecommunication and digital technology.- 6.9. The demographic transition: the final disproof of Malthus or a prelude?.- CHAPTER 7. ENERGY, TECHNOLOGY AND THE FUTURE.- 7.1. This time is different.- 7.2. "Peak Oil".- 7.3. More on fracking: Is it a game changer?.- 7.4. The inevitable decline of the internal combustion engine.- 7.5 On opportunities for energy efficiency gains by systems integration..- 7.6. Renewables for heat and electric power generation.- PART III.- CHAPTER 8. MAINSTREAM ECONOMICS AND ENERGY.- 8.1. Core ideas in economic theory.- 8.2 On credit, collateral, virtual money and banking.- 8.3 On externalities.- 8.4. Economics as social science.- 8.5. Resources and economics.- 8.6.Resource discoveries as technology incubators.- 8.7. On the geology of resources: scarcity again?.- 8.8. The special case of petroleum.- 8.9. The role of resources in standard economic theory.- CHAPTER 9. NEW PERSPECTIVES ON CAPITAL, WORK, AND WEALTH.- 9.1. Active vs passive capital.- 9.2. Exergy, useful work and production functions.- 9.3. Wealth as "condensed" work and useful complexity.- 9.4. Debt: The downside of financial wealth creation.- 9.5. The direct costs of economic growth.- 9.6. More on economic growth: cycles and bubbles.- 9.7. Planetary limits: The downside of material wealth creation.- 9.8. The "circular economy" and the limits to growth.- 9.9. A Trifecta?.- Epilogue.- APPENDIX. ENERGY IN GROWTH THEORY.- A.1. Introduction.- A.2. Growth equations.- A.3. A new variable: Useful work U.- A.4. The choice of production function.- A.5. Statistical analysis of the time series.- A.6. Results.- A.7. Conclusion.- References.
「Nielsen BookData」 より
