.
Just as Thomas Malthus, Ehrlich did not understand the power and initiative of the free market system to solve global problems.
In his book “The Population Bomb”, Ehrlich stated “The battle to feed all of humanity is over. In the 1970’s and 1980’s hundreds of millions of people will starve to death in spite of any crash programs embarked upon now”.
Peter Huber in his book “Hard Green” provides examples of how mankind, with the freedom and ability to address problems through the free market, has provided solutions to the dire forecasts…
“To grow more food, you can add more oil instead of more land. Oil, packed with (fossilized) solar energy, can be used to produce fertilizer, which makes crop yields soar”… page 4...
Huber provides more examples of dire predictions such as the 1972 study by the Club of Rome who stated in The Limits of Growth “Humanity was scheduled- almost as precisely as a Swiss train-to run out of gold by 1981; mercury by 1985; tin by 1987; zinc by 1990; petroleum by 1992; and copper, lead, and natural gas by 1993.” page 4...
Huber then shows how many of those from the “Sky is Falling” crowd tend to make no real allowance for mankind to find solutions to problems such as noted above. Many like those with the above bumper sticker will state that there is only a finite amount of any one natural resource and it will be consumed in a given time at the rate of consumption now…
Unfortunately they do not understand how the free market system, supply and demand, and the allocation of valuable resources, have solved many of the problems predicted by some…
The Club of Rome predicted that copper supplies would be depleted by 1993 due to world demand. “They never imagined that pounds of sand might soon displace tons of copper. Corning Glass did, and gave us fiber optics”… Page 11...
