MAN THE CREATOR
Kennedy, Kenneth R.
Man the Creator THE PURSUIT OF PLENTY. by A. G. Mezerik. Harper and Brothers. 203 pp. $2.50. Reviewed by Kenneth R. Kennedy MEZERIK provides a long-needed answer to the neo-Malthusian cult...
...He points to the queer quirk in the gloomy Malthus who, while contending that population tends to outrun the food supply, opposed measures in England intended to increase the food supply, particularly for poor people...
...But, warns Mezerik, "the way will be rough...
...In this country, it takes the form of enforcing a "piecemeal" approach to the problem of interrelated resources, for which Mezerik takes as his prime example the division of responsibility in the Missouri Valley among many agencies...
...3 The extension of the benefits,of} technology to the backward areas of the world should have the double...
...Reviewed by Kenneth R. Kennedy MEZERIK provides a long-needed answer to the neo-Malthusian cult which, viewing the undoubted damage already done to the natural resources of the world through rapacity and misuse, looks upon man as a destroyer—and the fewer of him the better...
...This quality of innovation has made Man more valuable to nature's whole system of interrelationships...
...An improved race of Man and a culture so rich we cannot even conjecture its varied texture await us ahead...
...Synthetics, plastidi made from what have been regard* w&st$,"nitrates drawn from the air—these are some of the developments which Mezerik sees as expanding resources to a universal status, replacing limited and local resources which breed strife and war...
...It is he who finds the uses and the values which are inherent in all the other resources...
...He sees as clearly as William Vogt (Road to Survival) or Fairfield Osborn (Our Plundered Planet) the inroads which have been made on soil, forest, water, and mineral resources through greed, ignorance, and mismanagement...
...result of making more of the means* of livelihood available and, by raising the standard of living, tending to restrict the growth of populations...
...In Mezerik's view, what stands in the way of full development of the talents of man in bringing himself into harmony with nature is the attitude of "old-fashioned men" determined to maintain the status quo for the benefit of narrow and individual interests...
...What Mezerik has done has been to look at the other side of the coin described in such fearsome detail by the neo-Malthusians...
...For, as Mezerik shows, there is plenty of positive encourage...
...Mezerik takes the stand that if man has been a destroyer, he also has been a creator...
...Atomic fission promise* new sources of energy, as well as destruction...
...But what he sees does not lead Mezerik into angry misanthropy...
...Man has emerged as a new geo^ logic force...
...Nor does he object to feedi*| the starving or extending the bea| efits of technology to backward areas without demanding that the$ first take steps to reduce theif populations...
...More than this, man creates new resources which never before existed—and since he has opened up the fields of science and technology he does this increasingly...
...Mezerik yields nothing to those who survey the damage...
...ment...
...He sees, too, the need for restricting population growth through birth control since "the era of biological necessity that many children be born so that a few might live is receding into history...
...Man, the creator, still stands a good chance of winning over Man, the destroyer...
...Men can remake themselves and their culture...
...Man is the background resource," says Mezerik...
...He does not, as Vogt did, question the wisdom of the medical proW siori in prolonging the human 1«| span...
...Populations have grown but' so has man's ability to provide more^ food per plant and per acre...
Vol. 15 • January 1951 • No. 1
