Time on Earth

About the Book

Billions of years passed in the formation of the earth. Billions more passed before man rose to his present state, with probably five catastrophic events along the way. Early man was limited to his instincts for survival; the environment was hostile; tools were primitive; communications were limited, and life span was short. Even in the earliest days, mans desire for knowledge and life improvements was there. As difficult as it was, man spread out across the earth. In the last 2000 years, the world population has increased almost 70 fold.

Today our population is doubling every 50 years. Demand is growing for everything that improves life quality. With this high demand, we are depleting our natural resources and polluting our environment at an unacceptable rate. Fossil fuel sources for energy will be seriously low within 5-10 generations. Alternate non-carbon energy sources, however, will be developed that will produce a major fraction of our electricity and significantly reduce carbon dioxide air pollution. While these will be developed, the cost and human effort will be enormous. The problems of water pollution, and forest difficult future problem will be the development of a renewable alternative for the 50 million barrels a day of oil used to make plastics, rubber, fertilizers, lubricants, soaps, drugs, roofing and road materials, etc..., as well as a liquid fuel for non-electric applications requiring energy. Broad international cooperation will be required for success in this undertaking.

About the Author

The author graduated from the Catholic University of America in 1950 with a Bachelor degree in chemical engineering; graduated from the University of Delaware with a Phd degree in chemical engineering in 1953, and then worked in research and development for the Dupont chemical company for 47 years. This is his first book, and it has been undertaken with a hope of giving an overview of the current beliefs about our universe, the formation of our solar system, the earliest records of man, and mans achievements and setbacks over his developing years.

The book goes on to point out man's two new and major challenges of natural resource depletion, and environmental pollution - coupled with a high population growth. The author believes that we will need major new technology advances and reductions to practice in this century. Major social changes will also be needed. The author further believes that the world leaders today are caught up in addressing short term problems; unaware of the magnitude of the coming problems, and unaware of the necessity for international cooperation