Deja Vu??
April 22, 2008
John Barnes
http://www.wa****ngtonpolicy.org/pressroom/pressreleases/4_22_2008.html
Earth Day 2008: Predictions of Environmental Disaster Were Wrong
"By 1985...air pollution will have reduced the amount of sunlight
reaching the earth by one half" - Life magazine, January 1970
Seattle - Another Earth Day is upon us. This is a good time to look back
at predictions made on the original Earth Day about environmental
disasters that were about to hit the planet.
Most Earth Day predictions turned out to be stunningly wrong. In 1970,
environmentalists said there would soon be a new ice age and massive
deaths from air pollution. The New York Times foresaw the extinction of
the human race. Widely-quoted biologist Paul Ehrlich predicted worldwide
starvation by 1975. Do***ented examples are below.
On this Earth Day 2008, new predictions will again be made about looming
environmental disasters about to strike our planet. If past experience
is any guide, most of these predictions are wrong. People concerned
about our planet's future should be wary of statements from activists
and other interested groups, so we stay focused on real environmental
concerns, and don't waste time on fearsome predictions that will never
happen.
.. "...civilization will end within 15 or 30 years unless immediate
action is taken against problems facing mankind," biologist George Wald,
Harvard University, April 19, 1970.
.. By 1995, "...somewhere between 75 and 85 percent of all the species of
living animals will be extinct." Sen. Gaylord Nelson, quoting Dr. S.
Dillon Ripley, Look magazine, April 1970.
.. Because of increased dust, cloud cover and water va**** "...the planet
will cool, the water va**** will fall and freeze, and a new Ice Age will
be born," Newsweek magazine, January 26, 1970.
.. The world will be "...eleven degrees colder in the year 2000. This is
about twice what it would take to put us into an ice age," Kenneth Watt,
speaking at Swarthmore University, April 19, 1970.
.. "We are in an environmental crisis which threatens the survival of
this nation, and of the world as a suitable place of human habitation,"
biologist Barry Commoner, University of Wa****ngton, writing in the
journal Environment, April 1970.
.. "Man must stop pollution and conserve his resources, not merely to
enhance existence but to save the race from the intolerable
deteriorations and possible extinction," The New York Times editorial,
April 20, 1970.
.. "By 1985, air pollution will have reduced the amount of sunlight
reaching earth by one half..." Life magazine, January 1970.
.. "Population will inevitably and completely outstrip whatever small
increases in food supplies we make," Paul Ehrlich, interview in
Mademoiselle magazine, April 1970.
.. "...air pollution...is certainly going to take hundreds of thousands
of lives in the next few years alone," Paul Ehrlich, interview in
Mademoiselle magazine, April 1970.
.. Ehrlich also predicted that in 1973, 200,000 Americans would die from
air pollution, and that by 1980 the life expectancy of Americans would
be 42 years.
.. "It is already too late to avoid mass starvation," Earth Day organizer
Denis Hayes, The Living Wilderness, Spring 1970.
.. "By the year 2000...the entire world, with the exception of Western
Europe, North America and Australia, will be in famine," Peter Gunter,
North Texas State University, The Living Wilderness, Spring 1970.
By being skeptical about routine ****tents of doom, we can stay focused
on the real threats that face our planet, and on the reasonable and
achievable actions we as a society can take to meet them.
--
Warmest Regards
Bonzo
"America in Longest Warm Spell Since 1776; Temperature Line Records a
25-year Rise" New York Times, March 27, 1933
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