''Nine Chains to the Moon'' is a book by R. Buckminster Fuller, first published in 1938. The title refers to the observation that, when the book was written, the world population of humans (Fuller calls them "earthians"), if stood one atop another, could form chains that would reach back and forth between Earth and the Moon nine times. The book presents Fuller's overview of technological history. It proposes the author's vision of future prosperity driven by

ephemeralization Ephemeralization, a term coined by R. Buckminster Fuller in 1938, is the ability of technological advancement to do "more and more with less and less until eventually you can do everything with nothing," that is, an accelerating increase in the ef ...

, Fuller's term for the process of doing more with less. Fuller believed that this would lead to ever-increasing standards of living and ever-growing population despite finite resources. Fuller uses

Henry Ford Henry Ford (July 30, 1863 – April 7, 1947) was an American industrialist, business magnate, founder of the Ford Motor Company, and chief developer of the assembly line technique of mass production. By creating the first automobile that ...

's assembly line as an example of how ephemeralization can lead to better products at lower cost with no upper bound on productivity.

Editions

* * * * 1938 non-fiction books Books by Buckminster Fuller Futurology books Technology books {{Future-book-stub