ABSTRACT
In Chapter 10, we saw that the Malthusian arguments on limits to economic growth are primarily based on the fear of depleting some key natural resources, including the natural environment’s capacity to assimilate waste. In Chapter 11, we learned that this fear has been vigorously challenged by mainstream economists on the basis of resource substitution possibilities and other technical advances. That is, to the extent that resource substitution is possible, exhaustion of a particular resource need not cause major alarm (Solow 1974). Furthermore, if the possibility of infinite substitution of natural resources by human-made capital and labor is to be taken seriously, the existence of absolute limits to economic growth would become rather meaningless (Rosenberg 1973; Goeller and Weinberg 1976).
