This rubbishing of the idiotic Greenies continues...16. Sen. Gaylord Nelson wrote in Look that, “Dr. S. Dillon Ripley, secretary of the Smithsonian Institute, believes that in 25 years, somewhere between 75 and 80 percent of all the species of living animals will be extinct.”
17. In 1975, Paul Ehrlich predicted that “since more than nine-tenths of the original tropical rainforests will be removed in most areas within the next 30 years or so, it is expected that half of the organisms in these areas will vanish with it.”
18. Kenneth Watt warned about a pending Ice Age in a speech. “The world has been chilling sharply for about twenty years,” he declared. “If present trends continue, the world will be about four degrees colder for the global mean temperature in 1990, but eleven degrees colder in the year 2000. This is about twice what it would take to put us into an ice age.”
MP: Let’s keep those spectacularly wrong predictions from the first Earth Day 1970 in mind when we’re bombarded tomorrow with media hype, and claims like this from the official Earth Day website:
The fight against climate change is at an impasse and life on Earth hangs in the balance. Help us save polar bears and other wildlife as their habitats disappear and their food sources become scarce. Like the polar bear, human life is under threat, too. Storms are becoming stronger, droughts are becoming more severe, and rising sea levels encroach on our cities. We need an active informed public to stand tall, stop and reverse climate change and protect our children’s future!
Finally, think about this question, posed by Ronald Bailey: What will Earth look like when Earth Day 60 rolls around in 2030? Bailey predicts a much cleaner, and much richer future world, with less hunger and malnutrition, less poverty, and longer life expectancy, and with lower mineral and metal prices. But he makes one final prediction about Earth Day in 2030: “There will be a disproportionately influential group of doomsters predicting that the future–and the present–never looked so bleak.” In other words, the hysteria and apocalyptic predictions will continue, promoted by the “environmental grievance hustlers.”
Discussion:Jeffery April 21st, 2014
Gaea is angry at Mankind, and Mankind needs to go, so say some of the Utopians. That’s why we have population control and stability movements, and of course Planned Genocide Clinics.
Seattle Sam April 21st, 2014
It’s odd that when forecasts of “end days” from apocalyptic religious prognosticators are made, the media dutifully brings out how wrong they have been in the past. Yet every Earth Day similar failed predictions don’t get the same attention.
BTW, I wonder if we’ll be reminded of Al Gore’s prediction in 2008 that “the entire North ‘polarized’ cap will disappear in 5 years.”
kleht April 21st, 2014
You are certainly correct that the cataclysmic changes predicted around 1970 turned out wrong. And most, including today’s will be mostly wrong – mainly, probably, because dates have been assigned, which is certainly plain baloney. No one, that I am aware of, has ever predicted when an event of such nature will occur by a certain date, let alone whether the event itself will actually occur.
I’ve always felt that humans have an excellent way of predicting the past and the present, but not the future. And I’ve always been a skeptic regarding what I hear, especially when a human says it.
But there are things that can reasonably be predicted, if we leave out the dates, such as:
The number of humans on this planet will level out and not keep rising as it is still doing. All forms of life on this planet are subject to limitations as to numbers. Theoretically, any form of life (from bacteria to the highest forms) could fill every inch of the planet. But it can’t happen for obvious reasons – lack of food, energy, predators, viruses. Humans are not immune to this.
The earth will heat up, regardless of cause. An ice age is in our future and with it the near (or complete) destruction of the human race. Why? Because the history of the earth always follows this course of events, one way or another.
But attempting to date any prediction is a bit foolhardy. But then, so is ridiculing past ill-conceived predictions. After all, hindsight does have its benefits. Instead of simply high-lighting the wrongful predictions (as if we are all-seeing, all-knowing Gods), why not high-light those in the 1970’s who had the foresight to claim the forecasts as foolhardy?
Ken April 21st, 2014
But attempting to date any prediction is a bit foolhardy. But then, so is ridiculing past ill-conceived predictions….
… why not high-light those in the 1970′s who had the foresight to claim the forecasts as foolhardy
Julian Simon’s predictions were pretty good. Paul Ehrlich found that out. We should in fact ridicule “ill-conceived predictions”. We know what many of them are and they cause all sorts of damage to society. It’s foolhardy to simply embrace “ill-conceived predictions”.
Sadly, many think the bet was a fluke and Julian Simon is ridiculed. He was the 20th century Cassandra and still today is ridiculed because he put on display the foolishness of the leftist philosophy.
https://www.aei.org/publication/18-spectacularly-wrong-apocalyptic-predictions-m...