Growth (From Microorganisms to Megacities)

From one of Bill Gate's favorite authors, a systematic investigation of growth in nature and society, from tiny organisms to the trajectories of empires and civilizations.

In this magisterial book, Vaclav Smil offers a systematic investigation of growth in nature and society, the prioritization of boundless development on a finite and limited planet. An unspoken and explicit aim of our individual and collective striving, growth governs the lives of microorganisms and galaxies, and it shapes the capabilities of our extraordinarily large brains and the fortunes of our economies. Growth is manifested in annual increments of continental crust, a rising gross domestic product, a child's growth chart, the spread of cancerous cells. Smil considers the challenges of tracing the growth of empires and civilizations, explaining that we can chart the growth of organisms across individual and evolutionary time, but that the progress of societies and economies, not so linear, encompasses both decline and renewal.