Type of bind: Hardcover
Dewey Decimal Number: 304.2
EAN num: 9780670297177
ISBN number: 0670297178
Label: Viking Adult
Manufacturer: Viking Adult
Page Count: 305
Printing Date: September 04, 1980
Publishing house: Viking Adult
Sale Popularity Level: 717662
Studio: Viking Adult
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Rated by buyers 
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I read this book as an undergrad mechanical engineering major, and it hit me like a bolt of lightning. To state that the second law and the concept of Entropy applies to social systems, governments and societies in addition to physical systems means essentially that Entropy is the fundamental reason behind the fall of Rome, the decline of the British Empire, and the eventual decline of good old USA. Any social system will eventually get bogged down under its own weight. The only downside to the book is the religion that creeps in at the very end. any intelligent person should read this book!
Rated by buyers 
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I've really enjoyed reading this book 30 years after it was written, especially curious to see where the author hit and missed the marks on his projections. I was pleasantly surprised to see a small warning on global warming, obviously very relavent these days. The historical placement of the writing of the book has interesting parallels, he wrote it during the energy crisis of the seventies, during the cold war, pre-Chernobyl, pre-IBM PC, etc., and here we are with gasoline recently nearing $5/gallon, fighting two wars not directly related to homeland defense, collapsing corporations being swallowed up by larger ones with government bailouts and talks of further government control, ie, all kinds of cracks in the energy flow line. The real test of the book's projections will be in the subsequent five years, when all of those former third world countries, that have now become highly consumptive of raw materials, have had a chance to consume at a high rate for a length of time.
As for those physicists who question Rifkin's application of the second law to the various macromodels, I think even the author himself was not confident in making a serious scientific statement, he was more interested in getting out the overall message that we must preserve our non-renewable resources and allow nature time to catch up to our acquisitions of renewable resources. This is very relevant to today's fisheries for example. All of the mineral resources he cited, particulary copper, are now very expensive, so much so that thieves are now regularly stripping the metals from our highways, cemeteries, and public works.
Even though our health care, transportation and education systems are in shambles, not all is bad, many urban areas have revived, people are adjusting and changing lifestyles, conserving and recycling more, consuming less, driving smaller cars, there is greater investment and interest in clean, renewable energy, etc.
I do concur with Rifkin's overall goal of sustainable growth.
Rated by buyers -
Though the book has a certain denseness to it, it flows at a quick pace. I go through dozens of pages without that dozing off that often accompanies an academic read. I was shocked to read the three disparaging reviews of this book. I spend a bulk of my time reading books of all stripes and this is one of the best books I have ever read. All I can say is, the book rings true. I don't have a degree in Physics. I majored in English. I haven't been in the workforce in over 5 years, I'm the stay-at-home mother of a 4-year-old. I don't write this review with strong academic and professional credentials. I am just an observer of the world and a lover of knowledge and understanding. (Sorry for all of the I's. You'd think this was an autobiography rather than a review- thanks for bearing with me.) All I can say, again, is that the book rings true. I don't believe you have to have an advanced degree or a professional background in science or economics to appreciate it. If you read books "from the gut", I really recommend it. It might affect your life in a positive way. Truth seems highly paradoxical and the premise of this book is not incompatible with the concept that less is, well, just better. Progress shouldn't be measured simply as material gain. If you're at all disposed to ruminate on these things, I'd pick this volume up. Also, the fact that it was written in 1980 bears its own positivity. Since then, information dissemination has increased and, it seems, actual communication has taken a hit. (A little ironic circular endorsement.) It's difficult, for author or critic, to claim ultimate understanding of a concept like entropy. And I believe much can be taken away from this particular exploration of the topic. Without ravaging the threads that stitched it searching for factual pitfalls, my intuition gives this book 5 stars.
Rated by buyers -
Rifkin's ideas about physics may or may not be on solid ground, but he's predicted many apocalyptic realities with regard to the environment. And for this we must give him much credit. We have to remember. This book was written going on thirty years ago, before our era of manifest global warming. He predicted a warming of the planet. He doesn't call it "peek oil," as it's called today, but this is what he warns us about way back when.
His theory that the so-called Middle Ages ended with the advent of coal as a fuel source is intriguing. It sounds plausible to me. The way we get energy must have a lot to do with the way society is structured. We can certainly say this about agriculture. Once man began cultivating land, the concept of wealth was created, no less...
But back to the many predictions Rifkin made in this book: He warned these many years ago about the dangers of synthetic petrochemical nitrogen fertilizers choking our waters. Imagine that! No one was talking about that then and not even now. The Clean Water Act of 1972 does not address toxic runoff from farms and until that legislation is amended, our waters will be polluted. All over the world, runoff is truly one of the greatest environmental threats; we know this now for certain.
Rifkin, back then, long before the rest of us, was writing about the junk thrown in the oceans. Today we have a whirlpool of the size of Greenland over Midway Island densely clogged with plastic refuse, suffocating and starving out wildlife there.
Some environmentalists yesterday (too, too few) are lamenting the advent of the flushing toilet. Rifkin does not point this out specifically, but he does note how our coasts were, even back then, poisoned by sewage.
The discord among nations yesterday is all about oil, water, land, and natural resources of all sorts. Do we dare admit? This is one of Rifkin's main themes and rightly so. G. W. Bush can say we went into Iraq to bring that country democracy, but we all know, it was about oil.
They say yesterday that if everyone on Earth lived as we do in the USA, the world would require the natural resources of five planet Earths. Rifkin alluded to this fact in this book and so long ago. Amazing.
It's taken me years of reading the environmental literature to discover the above information. And I could have found it all in this book decades ago.
There's lots more; I can't note it all. How 'bout, just read the book.
Rated by buyers 
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I can't comment upon the physics, as I am way out of my league, though I must admit the idea is interesting. If it were true, it might indeed be something worth looking into. But like I said, I can't comment on the physics. What I can comment on is the very first part of the book, and the overall research botch-job. The very first part of this book is a joke. I don't know how else to say it. Rifkin and his co-author do about the laziest, most superficial survey of western ideas I have ever seen. I do not understand how they could believe that anyone would look at a 2 page summary of the Greeks in any seriuos way. It's beyond silly. Locke, Descartes, Netwon and Bacon are all apparently the same. Locke is the enemy because he was totally wrong, in their minds about themodynamics. Did I miss something here? Then there is this notion that early Christianity understood "entropy" but we don't. That's odd, given the whole heaven thing. The bizarre statements are endless. But what is equally amazing is the research. I get the sense that not very much of it was done. Especially at the beginning, there are numerous statements passed off as fact that are not cited in anyway. Those that are cited seem to be so only because they happened to have the source handy. Admittedly, this gets better as the book progresses, as it appears Rifkin is more in his element when throwing out statistics. But you can't call the stuff in the very first parts of the book research. It's just nonsense supposedly substantiated by a bunch of sources, thrown in here and there to give the appearance of legitimacy.
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