Page 19 - Between light and shade

A knowledge base

its interrelationship with the planet’s ecosystem. I
should like to draw your attention, among many
recent works, to the following books: The Third
Industrial Revolution by Jeremy Rifkin 10 and Col-
lapse by Jared Diamond 11. I mention the second of
these because its anthropologist author’s analysis
adds, if it were needed, even more weight to the
arguments of the first, which serve as a backdrop
for the following thoughts.

The economist Rifkin analyses the implosion
of global society, which we all feel to varying
degrees, based on the model originating from
the second industrial revolution.

Nevertheless, he perceives the strong emer-
gence of the third industrial revolution and
defines its five pillars (renewable energy, low
energy buildings and/or electrical energy-produ-
cing buildings, energy storage, electrical power
distribution using smart grids following the
example of communication distribution grids,
electric cars or vehicles with fuel cells).

Dynamics, 1961, and Urban Dynamics, 1969, Cambridge, MIT
Press; Principles of Systems, 1968, and World Dynamics, 1971,
Cambridge, Wright-Allen Press). World Dynamics is one of
the subjects of my studies at MIT in 1971-1972 and is equally
as decisive as the refined structural calculation theories in the
composition of my intellectual roadmap.
10 Jeremy Rifkin, The Third Industrial Revolution, New York,

Palgrave Macmillan, 2011.
11 Jared Diamond, Collapse : How Societies Choose to Fail or
Succeed, New York, Viking Press, 2005.

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