Sax Debates Mather Over World Riches

"Mother Earth is rich enough to nourish every man in freedom," asserted Kirtley F. Mather, professor of Geology last night at a discussion meeting of the Boston-Cambridge Chapter of the American Association of Scientific Workers in Philips Brooks House.

According to Professor Mather, the world need have little worry regarding its supply of every kind of natural resources for "several thousands of years"--even if a tremendous expansion of our economy should take place, as seems highly probable. All the basic essentials of life--energy, ore deposits, vegetable fibers, and food--will be available in adequate supplies for everyone on the earth, with only the one essential requirement that world "interdependence is inescapable."

Increasing Population

In a rebuttal to Professor Mather's arguments, Karl Sax, professor of Botany, pointed to the immense populations of Asia, particularly India and China, where an increased standard of living must point inevitably toward overpopulation far beyond any possible supply of resources. But Mather countered with his belief that these countries, if given encouragement from the rest of the world, would be able to solve this difficulty. The science of economic botany, he said, "is not bankrupt in Cambridge, in Chungking, or in Calcutta."