"In 11 short pages Boulding gave an account of the economy and its relation to the environment that distinguished between open and closed systems in relation to matter, energy, and information; described the economy as a sub-system of the biosphere; considered the significance of the second law of thermodynamics for energy, matter and information and the extent to which they are subject to entropic processes; argued that knowledge or information is the key to economic development; noted that fossil fuels are a short-term exhaustible supplement to solar energy and that fission energy does not change this picture; considered the prospects for much better use of solar energy enhanced perhaps by the biological revolution; argued that human welfare may be better understood as a stock rather than a flow; presented an ethical basis for conservation; acknowledged that human impacts on the environment have spread from the local to the global; observed the limited contribution that corrective taxation might play; and commented that technological change has become distorted through planned obsolescence, competitive advertising, poor quality, and a lack of durability."