The economic science that we have inherited is inappropriate for meeting the challenges of sustainability. Starting with Stanley Jevons, almost all leading mainstream theorists have excluded uncertainty and higher values from its scope. Here we review that perspective and introduce ideas where human values have a place, as in the visions of Maslow and Schumacher. Those insights are implemented in the analyses of Ecological Economics, which provides a strong foundation for a future transformational sustainability economics. The need for a further enhancement is shown by the ‘precision challenge’, where even Ecological Economics has not resolved the problem of excess precision in numerical data. But within Ecological Economics, and in a variety of other initiatives, the way is opening to a genuinely transformational economic science that will serve sustainability.