And, finally:
(3) The application of power. Different sources of natural energy and power are known. The most [pg 082] important available source of energy for this globe is the sun—the heat of the sun. This solar heat is the origin of water power, of wind power, and of the power bound up in coal, of the chemistry, growth and transforming agency of plants.[10]
All foods which the animals as well as the humans use are, already, the result of the solar energy transformed into what may be called chemical energy. Transformation of energies is building up of life.
It is to be clearly seen that the only source of energy which can be directly appropriated and used by man or animal is vegetable food found in the wilderness; no other sources of power are available [pg 084] for direct use; they have first to be mastered and directed by human brain. The same is true in regard to the getting of animal food, the creation of a water- or windmill, or a steam engine, or the art of using a team of horses, or a bushel of wheat; these are not available except by the use of the human “time-binding” power.
This short survey of facts, known to everybody, brings us to the conclusion that all problems of production come ultimately to the analysis of
(1) Natural resources of raw material and natural energy, freely supplied by nature, which, as we have seen, in the form as produced by nature alone, have very little or no value for humanity;
(2) The activity of the human brain (because human muscles are always directed by the brain) which gives value to the otherwise useless raw materials and energies.
Hence, to understand the processes of production, it is essential to realize that humanity is able to survive only by virtue of the capacity of humans to exploit natural resources—to convert the products of nature into forms available for human needs. If humanity had only the capacity of apes, depending exclusively on wild fruits and the like, they would be confined to those comparatively small regions of the globe where the climate and the fertility of the soil are specially favorable. But in the case supposed, [pg 085] humans would not be humans, they would not be time-binders—they would be animals—mere space-binders.
There are other facts which must be kept constantly in mind. One of them is that, in the world in which we live, there are natural laws of inorganic as well as organic phenomena. Another of the facts is, as before said, that the human class of life has the peculiar capacity of establishing the social laws and customs which regulate and influence its destinies, which help or hinder the processes of production upon which the lives and happiness of mankind essentially and fundamentally depend.
It must not be lost sight of in this connection that the human class of life is a part and a product of nature, and that, therefore, there must be fundamental laws which are natural for this class of life. A stone obeys the natural laws of stones; a liquid conforms to the natural law of liquids; a plant, to the natural laws of plants; an animal, to the natural laws of animals; it follows inevitably that there must be natural laws for humans.