Abstract
This chapter examines the historical development of the energy orthodoxy. It first substitutes ‘paradigm’ for ‘orthodoxy,’ because modern energy is part of a new scientific understanding of reality. Next, the chapter explores the work of Leslie White, a mid-twentieth century anthropologist of energy. He offers a conceptual and normative framework that relates the scientific paradigm of energy to a social and ethical imperative. Progress means commanding more energy to produce an ever-greater “Factor M” or the means of subsistence.
For what is the heart, but a spring; and the nerves, but so many strings; and the joints, but so many wheels, giving motion to the whole body, such as was intended by the Artificer?
Thomas Hobbes, 1651
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Briggle, A. (2021). Factor M. In: Thinking Through Climate Change. Palgrave Studies in the Future of Humanity and its Successors. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-53587-2_8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-53587-2_8
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