Growls

Although Earth Day (aka Lenin’s birthday) was celebrated Tuesday, it’s not too late to recall some of the hysteria from the original celebration in 1970. Carpe Diem reminds us that not only were most of the predictions wrong, they were “stunningly wrong.”

He also points to a press release from the Washington Policy Center, which has a list of “predictions made on the original Earth Day about environmental disasters that were about to hit the planet.” Here are some of them, including their source:

• “...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.”
• “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.”
• “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.”

The conclusion of the Washington Policy Institute is worth noting:

“By being skeptical about routine portents 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.”