Man Cannot Influence In This Respect The

[the Human Control Of Atomic Energy Could] Virtually Provide Anyone Who Wanted It With A Private Sun Of His Own.

The Laws Expressing The Relations Between Energy And Matter Are, However, Not Solely Of Importance In Pure Science. They Necessarily Come First In Order ... In The Whole Record Of Human Experience, And They Control, In The Last Resort, The Rise Or Fall Of Political Systems, The Freedom Or Bondage Of Nations, The Movements Of Commerce And Industry, The Origin Of Wealth And Poverty, And The General Physical Welfare Of The Race.

The Ruling Passion Of The Age Is To Convert Wealth Into Debt In Order To Derive A Permanent Future Income From It - To Convert Wealth That Perishes Into Debt That Endures, Debt That Does Not Rot, Costs Nothing To Maintain, And Brings In Perennial Interest.

But What Sin Is To The Moralist And Crime To The Jurist So To The Scientific Man Is Ignorance.

In So Far As Such Developments Utilise The Natural Energy Running To Waste, As In Water Power, They May Be Accounted As Pure Gain. But In So Far As They Consume The Fuel Resources Of The Globe They Are Very Different. The One Is Like Spending The Interest On A Legacy, And The Other Is Like Spending The Legacy Itself. ... [there Is] A Still Hardly Recognised Coming Energy Problem.