Development of a Superculture
A quarter, perhaps a third, of the human race has moved toward a kind of world superculture of skyscrapers, automobiles, airplanes, and intercontinential hotels. The rest of the human race still remains close to subsistence. ... The development of the superculture is the result of the knowledge explosion, which led not only to new theories and processes, but to new discoveries, especially of fossil fuels and rich ores. In 1859 the human race discovered a huge treasure chest in its basement. This was oil and gas, a fantastically cheap and easily available source of energy. We did, or at least some of us did, what anybody does who discovers a treasure in the basement -- live it up and we have been spending this treasure with great enjoyment.
Ecodynamics: A New Theory of Societal Evolution, Sage, 1978, pp. 292-93.
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