Energy, Complexity and Wealth Maximization

• Main Author: Ayres, Robert (Author)
• Corporate Author: SpringerLink (Online service)
• Format: Electronic eBook
• Language: English
• Published: Cham : Springer International Publishing : Imprint: Springer, 2016.
• Series: The Frontiers Collection,
• Subjects: Physics.; Energy policy.; Energy and state.; Thermodynamics.; Sociophysics.; Econophysics.; Economics.; Natural resources.; Socio- and Econophysics, Population and Evolutionary Models.; Energy Policy, Economics and Management.; Economic Systems.; Natural Resource Economics.

This book is about the mechanisms of wealth creation, or what we like to think of as evolutionary “progress”. For the modern economy, natural wealth consists of complex physical structures of condensed (“frozen”) energy – mass - maintained in the earth’s crust far from thermodynamic equilibrium. How...

Table of Contents:

• Preface
• Glossary of Terms
• Glossary of People
• Part I.
• A Brief History of Ideas: Energy, Entropy and Evolution
• The Cosmos, the Sun and the Earth
• The Origin of Life
• Energy, Water, Climate and Cycles
• Summary of Part I: From the “Big Bang” to Nutrient Cycles
• Part II
• Energy and Technology
• The New World – and Science
• Energy, Technology and the Future
• Part III
• Mainstream Economics and Energy
• New Perspectives on Capital, Work, and Wealth
• Epilogue
• Appendix. Energy in Growth Theory
• References.