Is the Entropy Law Relevant to the Economics of Natural Resource Scarcity?: Comment
Author(s)
Townsend, Kenneth N.
Abstract
Jeffrey T. Young’s critique of the work of Nicholas Georgescu-Roegen and Herman E. Daly questions the relevance of the entropy law for economic analysis and provides a concise, faithful summary of the positions of Georgescu-Roegen and Daly. Along the way, however, Young produces an alternative model of natural resource depletion that is based upon questionable interpretations of the laws of thermodynamics. In particular, Young’s claim that natural resource economics can be divided into conservation-law orientations and entropy-law orientations and his claim that the entropy law pertains to energy but not to matter seem unsupportable from a scientific view. [Note: Young’s original article is also in the SSL.]
