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APPENDIX I ABBREVIATED INDEX OF PROBLEMS AND RESEARCH NEEDS IDENTIFIED IN THE CONFERENCE I. PRESENT SITUATION (Including unsolved questions and inadequacies) (1) Need to estimate world needs (White, p. 105) (2) Need to establish a ''posture" (Irving, p. 99) (3) Need to assess human resources (Pike, p. 106) (4) Need to allocate human effort as a resource (Schaefer, p. 102) (5) Youth burden in developing countries (Notestein, P- 96) (6) Failure to exploit what we know already (Hubbert, p. 106) (A) Nutritional Aspects (a) Energy, plant growth, ocean products (1) Optimum distribution of crop plants (Went, p. 46) (2) Need additional information on aspects of plant growth (Allaway, p. 20) (3) Problem of dissipation of incident energy (Russell, p. 56) (4) Unproductive character of oceans (Went, p. 46) (5) Irregularity of water supply (Thornthwaite, p. 56) (b) Efficiency of conversion - livestock, algae (1) Efficiency of livestock production (Byerly, p. 24) (2) Relative efficiencies of algae cultures (Allaway, p. 23, 23) -107-
committee will need this as an important rhetorical device in presenting its case. It is a question of how to get valid data on these points. In any event, resource use is easier to arrive at than resource supply; we should not attempt the latter. Comments by Dr. Pike Four items come to mind that deserve special emphasis: (1) An assessment of human resources in our country, using the present situation as an impetus for the analysis. Persons differ widely in ability; there are splitters and lumpers in science, which may call for a corps of administrators to integrate. (2) A major push in the nature and utilization of lignin, perhaps subsidized in part by industry. (3) Studies of tropical forests and soils. (4) An inventory of what we have in the oceans which, after all, occupy three-fourths of the globe, and an analysis of what can be done with it. Not enough is known at present even to evaluate the problem. Comments by Dr. Hubbert We must recognize that the event through which we are living has no precedent whatsoever in human or geologic history, and that it cannot be repeated. It is a change which we cannot possibly stop or reverse and which is now proceeding at the steepest gradient; it is not a normal state of affairs, by no means a steady state. It is a man-made upheaval of the world ecology, perhaps made possible by the introduction and exploitation of fossil fuels. For the first time in human history we have energy supplies over and above those in the food we eat. This is truly a crisis stage in evolution. How then can we avoid a catastrophic outcome ? Our ignorance is not half so vast as our failure to use what we know. The integrative view is very difficult to find. It is not organized. There are no university jobs or courses for those who aspire to this view. How can we achieve this goal and persuade the universities to aim toward it? Most of what we have been considering has happened in our own lifetimes. The problem is how to influence the course of events. -106-
