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Trajni, jednosmjerni procesi ne odvijaju se ni u prirodi, a još manje u društvu. Stalno se mijenjaju trendovi, rađaju se novi i zastarjevaju stari problemi. Linearno mišljenje je udobno i stoga izrazito tvrdokorno u primjerima kad se računa da će to što je željeno i vrijedno trajati i u budućnosti. Civilizacijska dogma o eksponencijalnom ekonomskom rastu, povezana s eksponencijalnim znanstveno-tehničkim napretkom, izrazit je primjer ekstrapolacijske linearne sigurnosti da ćemo sa znanošću i tehnologijom uspješno rješavati probleme, pa nek dođu ma kakvi oni bili. Tuđa i strana čini se mogućnost, da bi novovijeki eksponencijalni znanstveno-tehnički napredak lako mogao biti samo kratka epizoda u razvoju civilizacije. Rastući sistemski konflikti između biosfere i tehnologije, te iscrpljivost prirodnih izvora moguće su znakovi konačnosti našeg znanstveno-tehnološkog doba. Svjetska rasprava o »granicama rasta« iz 70-tih godina ni danas nije prošlost. Naprotiv, trajno ćemo morati živjeti sa svješću o mnogim fizičkim i ekološkim granicama razvoja čovječanstva na ograničenoj planeti. Ključne veze europske integracije su ekonomsko-tehnološke naravi. Njihova ekološka osobina je nova uspješna preobrazba biosfere u antropo-tehnosferu, uspješno korištenje prirodnih izvora za bogaćenje, za čovjekove potrebe i užitke., Permanent, one-way processes do not occur in nature, and even less so in society. Trends are continually changing new problems are arising and old ones becoming outdated. Linear thought is comfortable and thus extremely persistent in cases when it is considered that what is desired and valued shall last into the future as well. The civilizational dogma of the exponential economic growth linked with the exponential progress of science and technology is a distinct example of the extrapolational linear certainty that with science and technology we shall solve problems successfully, and therefore, let come what may. Strange and repulsive seems the possibility that the new-world exponential scientific and technical progress could easily be just a short episode in the development of civilization. The growing systemic conflicts between the biosphere and technology and the exhaustion of natural resources are perhaps signs indicating that our era of science and technology is a limited one. Even today, the world-wide debate of the seventies about the »limits of growth« is not yet considered the past On the contrary, we shall have to live constantly with the awareness of many physical and ecological limits to the development of mankind on a limited planet. The key bonds of the European integration are economic and technological in nature. Their ecological feature is a new successful transformation of the biosphere into the anthropo-technosphere, a successful use of natural resources for acquiring wealth, for the fulfillment of man’s needs and pleasures.