Earth Day and the False Prophecies of Ecological Apocalypse

Earth Day is a good time to look back and reflect upon the more dire predictions regarding the environment and life on earth. Here are some from 1970, Earth Day’s inaugural year.

“…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 vapor “…the planet will cool, the water vapor 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 Washington, 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 [sic] 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.

This is not to say that human action poses no threat to the environment. As Christians, we have a responsibility to be good stewards of creation and to respect the created order. But much of what drives the eco-hype today is an anti-human ideology that sees our presence as a cancer on the planet. An editorial cartoon from a Seattle media outlet captured the raw morbidity of the extreme environmentalist agenda message nicely:

We can be good stewards of our environment (and we must always remember that we are part of the environment, not a parasite attached to it), taking common-sense and fact-based approaches to making sure the resources of today are available for future generations to use and enjoy. There is a role for the public sector, private sector, and individuals in this. And in my experience, the less that politics has to do with it, the better.

Here are two Earth Day reading recommendations from two authors with whom I’ve had the privilege of working over the years.

This is Dr. Patrick Moore’s engaging firsthand account of his many years spent as the ultimate Greenpeace insider, a co-founder and leader in the organization’s top committee. Moore explains why, 15 years after co-founding it, he left Greenpeace to establish a more sensible, science-based approach to environmentalism.

Confessions details Moore’s vision for a more sustainable world. From energy independence to climate change, genetic engineering to aquaculture, Moore sheds new light on some of the most controversial subjects in the news today. In Confessions Moore persuasively argues for us to rethink our conventional wisdom about environment and, in so doing, provides the reader with new ways in which to see the world.

Wherever we turn, politicians, businesses and activists are promoting the latest fashionable “green” policy or product. Green buildings, electric cars, compact fluorescent lightbulbs and a variety of other technologies are touted as the next key step in protecting the environment and promoting a sustainable future. Increasingly, however, scientific and economic information regarding environmental problems takes a back seat to the social and personal value of being seen and perceived as “green.” As environmental consciousness has become socially popular, eco-fads supplant objective data. Politicians pick the latest environmental agenda in the same way we choose the fall fashions – looking for what will yield the largest benefit with our public and social circles.

Eco-Fads exposes the pressures that cause politicians, businesses, the media and even scientists to fall for trendy environmental fads. It examines why we fall for such fads, even when we should know better. The desire to “be green” can cloud our judgment, causing us to place things that make us appear green ahead of actions that may be socially invisible yet environmentally responsible. By recognizing the range of forces that have taken us in the wrong direction, Eco-Fads shows how we can begin to get back on track, creating a prosperous and sustainable legacy for our planet’s future.

Take the day to enjoy God’s beautiful creation, and learn how you can help sustain our environment without falling for fads and politically-driven hype. Happy Earth Day!

So-called environmentalism is a vile, anti-human racist and fascist movement that comes straight to us from Hitler’s Nazi Germany, in word, law and deed.

“Green” does not refer to chlorophyl, it refers to the Green Committees of Correspondence that split from the Red Committees of Correspondence in 1947 in order to use environmentalism as a weapon against capitalism and the free world.

The so-called ‘Greens’ are then best compared to a watermelon:

Green on the outside and red on the inside.

“Population will inevitably and completely outstrip whatever small increases in food supplies we make.” -Paul Ehrlich, interview in Mademoiselle magazine, April 1970.”

This statement was made in the wake of the introduction of disease resistant crops to third world countries, and in the same year that Norman Borlaug had won a Nobel Prize for his pioneering work in this field. In other words, it was already well known that starvation in third world countries had become a thing of the past when Ehrlich made his “prophetic” announcement.

Paul Ehrlich was the mentor of Obama’s science czar John Holdren.

I have a few predictions they left out:
1) In the year 2015 al gore will be attacked and eaten by a giant polar bear.
2) In the year 2020 the AGW/IPCC CO2 scam will have collasped so far that millions of leftist climate scammers will have to actually go out and get a real job to earn a living.

Don’t forget the most egregious factoid about Earth Day: it was founded on April 22, 1970 because that day was the 100th birthday of Vladimir Lenin! Communists the world over are laughing at the ignorance of Americans who think it’s all just about recycling.

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