Posted by mike on July 10, 2001 at 20:54:37:
In Reply to: and if i can't trust the u.n.'s opinion... posted by kelphead on July 10, 2001 at 19:11:33:
for Mr Ehrlich's rebuttal to this essay, Check out the Ehrlichs' recent book "The Betrayal of Science and Reason". Mr Ehrlich is quite capable of serving his own high-velocity hollowpoint of a rebuttal, but that aside, the above author is full of crap. Many of Ehrlich's predictions did come true, just not to the extent that he had predicted. anybody remember "We are the world" ??
food production, due among other things, to genetic engineering and mechanized agriculture (which brings about its own set of social and environmental ills). There is no indication whether or not this food production will continue to monotonically increase, so again, many Cornucopians (you will run across this term in your attempt to disprove Ehrlich) have what really amounts to a near religous faith in the future efficacy of science and technology to keep solving these problems. I hope it's not the same faith they put in their tech stocks on the NASDAQ.
If water quality "is steadily improving", then why are so many people now dying from simple diseases and maladies that could be eliminated by good, clean sources of fresh water? Does the author of the above essay see an improvement in LADWP water quality or the construction of a dam in Paraguay (oops, which brings about more social/environmental issues) as great strides in global water quality? Have him tell that to the folks in Calcutta or Tijuana.