About This Site
Originally this website was planned as an information source to show ways of saving fuel. But at the end of 2007, I realised that this alone would not be enough. You could say I was “enlightened”!
My journey began last autumn when I found a book which I have owned for about 30 years but have never read until now. The title was “The Economic History of World Population” by Carlo M. Cipolla, who was a Professor at the University of Pavia and Berkeley, California. He wrote the book in the early 60’s and it was originally printed in 1964. The version I have was from 1974. It’s a dry but fascinating read with a lot of statistics and diagrams.
He explains in detail, our transformation from hunter/gatherer societies through the agricultural and industrial revolutions. The gist of it is, with each of these “changes” human kind has managed to improve conditions enough to enable an increase in human population. This was true of the Agricultural Revolution but it took several thousand years to establish itself throughout the world.
The Industrial Revolution brought about prosperity for all. Which also brought an increase in population as many more people were sustainable. This only took about 150 years and is still in process in some parts of our planet.
Looking back on that book I don’t think that Carlo Cipolla held much of modern man. Here’s why, he wrote;
There is no escaping man’s origin – a carnivorous and cannibalistic animal – and disgustingly so. Man, the greatest of all scavengers, whether pre-sapient or sapient, could cope with the flesh of any and every other competitor – even if it happened to be his own flesh and blood.
That is a very hard opinion and looking at a lot of the misery that exists on our planet, even today, I tend to agree with him.
But, it was this book which took me on a journey of discovery, which has given me a much better understanding of how we evolved. And why our evolution will be our downfall if we do not make a change today. If you will allow me, I would like to take you on that journey with me.
Michael Holdcroft
February 2008
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