Books by Robert U. Ayres

It is true that economic growth has accelerated in recent centuries, and it is true that billions of people have been lifted from poverty.

Eminent physicist and economist, Robert Ayres, examines the history of technology as a change agent in society, focusing on societal roots rather than technology as an autonomous, self-perpetuating phenomenon. It evolved from a need to pump water out of coal mines, driven by a need to burn coal instead of firewood, in turn due to deforestation.

If the first industrial revolution was the substitution of steam power for human and animal muscles, the present revolution is the substitution of electronic sensors for human eyes and ears, and computers for human brains, at least in a certain category of routine 'on-line' manufacturing operations.