Purposes beyond imagination...

Did the visionaries of fifty years ago foreshadow the environmental movement of today? That movement generally understands Earth as a closed system and not able to furnish power in its traditional forms forever.

Well, Earth is a gigantic sphere full of resources for life-forms to use, but the harvesting of energy in space as a low-cost and clean alternative to fossil fuels is logic in its most pristine and absolute form.

From the World Book Encyclopedia's Science Year 1975, this view postulates a large rotating space habitat with cemtral farming cylinder and solar collectors providing the energy.