Fifty years of apocalyptic global warming predictions
and why people believe them
As others have done, I have chosen to begin with the
first Earth Day “Celebration” in 1970. Now who can be
against Earth Day? It’s a charming idea, and I have
been an enthusiastic supporter since my college days
in Ann Arbor, when we celebrated the event on the
campus of the University of Michigan.
Here’s what the experts were saying almost a half
century ago on Earth Day, 1970:
“Civilization will end within 15 or 30 years unless
immediate action is taken against problems facing
mankind.”
— Harvard biologist George Wald
“It is already too late to avoid mass starvation,”
— Denis Hayes, Chief organizer for Earth Day
“We are in an environmental crisis which threatens
the survival of this nation, and of the world as a
suitable place of human
abitation.”
— Washington University biologist Barry Commoner
“Population will inevitably and completely outstrip
whatever small increases in food supplies we make.
The death rate will increase until at least 100–200
million people per year will be starving to death
during the next ten years. … Most of the people who
are going to die in the greatest cataclysm in the
history of man have already been born. … [By 1975]
some experts feel that food shortages will have
escalated the present level of world hunger and
starvation into famines of unbelievable proportions.
Other experts, more optimistic, think the ultimate
food-population collision will not occur until the
decade of the 1980s.
— Stanford University biologist Paul Ehrlich
“Demographers agree almost unanimously on the
following grim timetable: by 1975 widespread famines
will begin in India; these will spread by 1990 to
include all of India, Pakistan, China and the Near
East, Africa. By the year 2000, or conceivably
sooner, South and Central America will exist under
famine conditions …. By the year 2000, thirty years
from now, the entire world, with the exception of
Western Europe, North America, and Australia, will be
in famine.”
— North Texas State University professor Peter Gunter
“In a decade, urban dwellers will have to wear gas
masks to survive air pollution… by 1985 air pollution
will have reduced the amount of sunlight reaching
earth by one half.”
— Life magazine
“At the present rate of nitrogen buildup, it’s only a
matter of time before light will be filtered out of
the atmosphere and none of our land will be usable. …
By the year 2000, if present trends continue, we will
be using up crude oil at such a rate … that there
won’t be any more crude oil. You’ll drive up to the
pump and say, ‘Fill ‘er up, buddy,’ and he’ll say, ‘I
am very sorry, there isn’t any. … The world has been
chilling sharply for about twenty years. 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.”
— Kenneth Watt
Global Warming and Massive Starvation
I will focus my attention on the two most important
predictions: Global Warming and Massive Starvation.
If we return to the failed prediction of global
cooling noted above, we can put the temperature data
in a wider perspective. NASA data show that a period
of warming in the 1920’s and 30’s was followed by two
or three decades of cooling temperatures, from the
1940s to 1970. At that time many experts, including
Carl Sagan, warned us of a possible ice age—only to
have the climate change on them. From the 1970s to
the late 1990s, scientists began to record slightly
warmer temperatures. Curiously, as we look back at
this period NASA sounded the alarm for global warming
while a short time later the New York Times cited
NOAA [National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration] data showing no warming over the past
100 years in the US.
In contrast to the dire Earth Day predictions of
1970, climate-related deaths have been declining
strongly for 70 years. Notice that this decline in
the absolute number deaths occurred while the global
population increased four-fold. Thus, the individual
risk of dying from climate-related disasters has
declined almost 99% from the 1920s to the present
day. Our increased wealth and technological capacity
to respond to natural disasters has greatly reduced
our collective human climate vulnerability – Good
news for rational beings, bad news for Democrat
candidates.
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