the population bomb revisited

8/3/2019 The Population Bomb Revisited

1/9

Electronic Journal of Sustainable Development

Te Electronic Journal of Sustainable Development(2009) 1(3)

Te Population Bomb Revisited

Paul R. Ehrlich* and Anne H. Ehrlich

* Paul R. Ehrlich is Bing Proessor o Population Studies in the department o Biology at Stanord University.Anne H. Ehrlich is associate director and policy coordinator o the Center or Conservation Biology at Stanord University.

Tey co-authored Te Population Bomb in .

Email: Pre =a= stanord.edu

(replace =a= with @)

Abstract

Te Population Bomb has been both praised and vilied,but there has been no controversy over its signicancein calling attention to the demographic element in thehuman predicament. Here we describe the books originsand impacts, analyze its conclusions, and suggest that itsbasic message is even more important today than it wasorty years ago.

It has now been orty years since we wrote Te PopulationBomb (Ehrlich ). he book sold some million copies,was translated into many languages, and changed our lives. hereis not much disagreement about the signiicance o the volume whether a person agrees with it or not, he Population Bombhelped launch a worldwide debate that continues today. It intro-duced millions o people to the undamental issue o the Earthsinite capacity to sustain human civilization. We believe thatdespite its laws, the book still provides a useul lens or viewingthe environmental, energy, and ood crisis o the present time.

On a more personal level, it got Paul labeled the populationbomber and categorized as someone who thought overpopula-tion was the sole problem o humanity. o this day when he lec-tures or appears on the media, he is pursued by inaccurate or outo context quotes rom he Bomb. Such quotes are requentlyassumed to represent our current thinking on many topics including ones on which we have subsequently written entirebooks.

Te Population Bomb was written in response to arequest that Paul summarize arguments he had beenmaking in the media that the population issue should be

taken up by the growing environmental movement. Tatmovement had been triggered in no small part by RachelCarsons Silent Spring (Carson ). Te suggestion

came in early rom David Brower o the Sierra Cluband Ian Ballantine o Ballantine Books. Tey hoped to

get the population book out in time to inuence thepresidential election (how nave we were!), and we wrotethe book in a ew weeks o evenings. Although the pub-lisher insisted on a single author, it was rom the beginning a jointeort. And the publisher exercised his right to select the title; our

preerence was Population, Resources, and Environment.

Reaction to the Population Bomb

he book has been seen, at the very least to some on the lunaticringe, as o some enduring importance. It was listed by the

Intercollegiate Reviewas one o the y worst books o theth century, along with John Kenneth Gailbraiths Te

Auent Society, John Maynard Keynes General Teoryo Employment, Interest, and Money, and John Rawls ATeory o Justice. InHuman Events list o the en MostHarmul Books o the Nineteenth and wentieth Cen-turies, it came in th place (honorable mention); evenso, it bested Charles Darwins Te Origin o Species andSilent Springby Rachel Carson, though it was outranked

by Keynes (again), Marxs Das Kapital, and Te KinseyReport, among others.

Much o the negative response to Te PopulationBomb, rom both the ar right and the ar le, was clearlya reaction to its main message that it can be a very badthing to have more than a certain number o people aliveat the same time, that Earth has a nite carrying capac-ity, and that the uture o civilization was in grave doubt.

Originally Marxists thought that Te productivepower at mankinds disposal is immeasurable (Engels), and thus they simply couldnt envision overpopu-

lation. Te ar le in modern times ound the advocacyo limiting population growth immoral. Tey saw thebasic issue not as overpopulation but as maldistribution


2/9

The PoPulaTion BomB RevisiTed

64

o resources and worried that the ar right would useoverpopulation as an excuse to promote births o onlythe right kind (skin color, religion, national origin) o

people as was demonstrated by the eugenics movementand racist elements in the population control movement.

Te latter problem has caused Paul to put great eortinto reuting the idea, once expressed by William Shock-ley, that people are color-coded or quality (Ehrlich andHolm , Ehrlich and Feldman , Ehrlich ).Conservatives, wed to the idea that ree markets couldsolve any problem, didnt like the idea that populationsize was a legitimate area or government intervention.

Tose opposed to contraception, abortion, and sexeducation in the United States o course hated it, whilethe sexually repressed simply didnt like any discussion oreproductive issues in their sex-soaked society. None o

those constituencies seemed to understand that the un-damental issue was whether an overpopulated society,capitalist or socialist, sexually repressed or soaked, egali-tarian or racist/sexist, religious or atheist, could avoidcollapse. Four decades o largely ignored populationgrowth and related issues -- especially patterns o risingconsumption and their environmental eects -- sincethen make collapse now seem ever more likely and pos-sibly sooner than even many pessimists think.

In late June James Hansen, a top NASA scien-tist, told Congress the climate situation has gotten sobad that the civilizations only hope is drastic action.He asserted that the world has long passed the danger-ous level or greenhouse gases in the atmosphere andmust get back to levels. In his view, the volume oman-made carbon dioxide already injected into Earthsatmosphere can remain or no more than a couple moredecades without causing changes such as mass extinc-tions, ecosystem collapses, and dramatic sea level rises.In summary, he said, Were toast i we dont get on a

very dierent path. And, o course, any path that satis-

actorily deals with climate disruption would necessarilyinvolve control o human numbers.

Perhaps the biggest barrier to acceptance o the centralarguments oTe Bomb wasand still isan unwilling-ness o the vast majority o people to do simple math andtake seriously the problems o exponential growth. Tisis not just the man in the street it includes individuals

who otherwise might be considered highly educated. Aclassic example was the statement by a proessor o busi-ness administration, specializing in mail-order market-ing, Julian Simon, who ound prominence as a critic o

environmental science: We now have in our hands inour libraries, really the technology to eed, clothe, andsupply energy to an ever-growing population or the

next billion years (Myers and Simon , p. ). In, when that was written, the world population wasgrowing at . percent annually. At that rate it wouldonly take some years or the mass o the human

population to equal the mass o the universe.

A similar lack o understanding o the power o expo-nential growth in population and consumption was dem-onstrated by Wilred Beckerman, Proessor o PoliticalEconomy at University College London beore movingto Oxord. According to Beckerman, the problems asso-ciated with exponential growth in the use o any niteresource were just as true in Ancient Greece. Tis didnot prevent economic growth rom taking place sincethe age o Pericles. []here is no reason to supposethat economic growth cannot continue or another

years. (Beckerman ). Assuming slow economic

growth at a little over one percent per year, i Englandhad existed in Pericles time (ca. BC), the averageamily income would have had the annual buying powero about a millionth o a penny (Parsons )! Tat is, ione started with a millionth o a penny in ancient Greece,and invested it at an interest rate o one percent annu-ally, it would have generated about the same amount omoney as a British amilys income in .

Equally silly statements are made about the relation-ship o human numbers to prosperity. As late as ,echoing Chairman Mao and Julian Simon, demogra-

pher Nicholas Eberstadt called people the wealth omodern societies (Eberstadt ). People, o course,can be regarded as productive assets (embodying, aseconomists would put it, human capital), but it is anerror to consider increases in human numbers as auto-matically expanding real wealth the capacity or well-being. Given the growing scarcity o natural resources,

population growth normally reduces per capita genuinewealth, and can even shrink a nations total wealth (e.g.,Arrow et al. ). I wealth were a unction o popula-

tion size, China and India each would be three to ourtimes as rich as the United States and more auentthan all the nations o Europe combined, Aricas wealth

would outstrip that o North America or Europe, andYemen would be three times as well o as Israel (Popula-tion Reerence Bureau ).

Population since Te Bomb

World-renowned scientist James Lovelock, whose

invention o the apparatus that allowed discovery o thethreat to the ozone layer and saved humanity, recentlystated: We have grown in number to the point where


3/9

65

the electronic journal of sustainable development

www..g

our presence is perceptibly disabling the planet like adisease. When Te Population Bomb was written, there

were roughly . billion people in the world. Four decadeslater there are . billion people (Population ReerenceBureau ), meaning that the world population has

nearly doubled since Te Bomb rolled o the presses.Despite this growth, there have been some remark-able advances on the population ront. Birthrates havedropped in most o the world, partly in response to gov-ernment-sponsored programs in education (especially o

women), giving women job opportunities, making con-traceptive inormation and materials accessible and toeconomic actors.

Some o the lowest birthrates are now ound in therich, ully industrialized nations o Europe and in Japan.Tats ortunate in one respect because it is the high-

consuming rich nations that place the greatest pressureon humanitys staggering lie-support systems (Ehrlichand Holdren , Ehrlich and Ehrlich ). Te bigexception is the United States, which is a center o over-consumption and whose population continues growingbecause o a relatively high birthrate (average amilysize about . children, compared with . in Italy andSpain and . in Germany and Japan) and high immigra-tion rate ( per thousand, with Italy the same, Spain ,Germany , and Japan ). Te nation has recently beenin the strange position o debating immigration policy

without ever discussing population policy.Sadly, the United States has also been plagued by

administrations, rst under Ronald Reagan and thenunder George W. Bush, that have in eect encouragedhigh birthrates by withholding aid to amily planning

programs that allow women access to sae abortion. Evenso, the majority o developing countries have adoptedamily planning programs, and many have substantiallyreduced their birthrates as the perception o children as

valued arm labor has changed with urbanization to one

in which children do not join the labor orce early and areexpensive to educate. Meanwhile some high-consumingEuropean populations have even started shrinking in size ironically accompanied by complaints about aging

populations. Tat the change in age distribution is inevi-table as population growth stops, and is oen benecialand easily managed, is ignored (Ehrlich and Ehrlich). More importantly, so is the vast benet o lessen-ing pressure on our already battered lie-support systems.

Tus the central goal o Te Population Bomb, toencourage the adoption o policies that would gradually

reduce birthrates and eventually start a global declinetoward a human population size that is sustainable inthe long run, has been partially achieved. Rather than

doubling the population in years, as continued growthat the rate would have done, we may not reach thatlevel billion until , years aer Te Bomb was

published.Fortunately, the implications o population growth

or our uture overall well-being are gradually workingtheir way back into the public and political conscious-ness today (e.g., Feeney ), especially in terms o theharm growth does in retarding the development o poornations (Campbell et al. ). Tats very ortunatebecause the depressing act is that, even with the goodnews on the population ront, humanity may add some. billion people to the population beore growth stopsand (we hope) a slow decline begins.

It is essential to try to minimize those additionsbecause they will have a disproportionate negative

impact on our lie-support systems. Our ancestors natu-rally armed the richest soils and used the most acces-sible resources rst (Ehrlich and Ehrlich , p. ).Now those soils, where people rst settled as they tookup arming, have oen been eroded away or paved over,and societies are increasingly orced to turn to marginalland to grow more ood. Instead o extracting rich oreson or near the surace, deeper and much poorer depositsmust be mined and smelted today, at ever-greater envi-ronmental cost. Water and petroleum must come romlower quality sources, deeper wells, or the latter oenrom ar beneath the ocean, and must be transportedover longer distances. Te environmental and resourceimpacts o past and uture population growth will haunthumanity or a long time.

Where Te Bomb was on the right track

Aside rom its general emphasis on the perils o popula-tion growth, the book also drew early attention to over-

consumption as a problem (p. )

, something thatis increasingly seen as a pattern that may be more di-cult to alter than over-reproduction (see, e.g., Ehrlichand Goulder , Ehrlich and Ehrlich ). Te U.S.share o global consumption has dropped substantiallysince Te Bomb was published; as the book predicted, itsshare o world population has also dropped rom a littleunder percent to less than percent. Yet the UnitedStates still consumes nearly a quarter o Earths resourceows. While the actors inuencing reproductive pat-terns are now relatively well recognized, and thus the

ways in which amily-size choices can be altered, equiva-lent understanding o consumption choices has not beenestablished.


4/9


66

What about the oen-cited warnings about worldpopulation outstripping ood supplies? Our skepticismon the oceans as a source o increased ood has beenmore than borne out. We wrote, reerring to a claim inan editorial in the January , issue o Saturday

Evening Post(p. ): What about those unmeasurableriches o the sea? Unhappily, they have been measuredand ound wanting. Te notion that we can extract vastlygreater amounts o ood rom the sea in the near utureis quite simply just another myth promoted by the igno-rant or the irresponsible (p. ). Te wild seaood catchhas not kept pace with populations rise. Despite escalat-ing (and environmentally dangerous) eorts at herdingshes in the oceans (sh arming), the total yield romthe seas (wild plus armed) has only increased about

percent per person, mostly in less desirable sh species

with no sign o unmeasurable riches. Te long-termcosts o attempting to continue increasing the wild shharvest are projected (e.g., Pauly et al. , Jackson) to be disastrous, and even the popular press isbeginning to realize that the uture o the oceans is trulyat risk (Renton ). Only a combination o reducedshing pressures, a ban on bottom trawling, restorationo sheries coastal nursery ecosystems, establishmento large networks o marine reserves, and (probably)stabilization o the climate through great reductions othe ow o CO into the atmosphere (and thus reducingthe acidication o the seas) would likely brighten thatuture.

Similarly, our view o the panacea potential o novelood sources such as single-cell protein rom bacteria oralgae cultured on petroleum or sewage (e.g., Marx ),lea protein (Pirie ), or ood production by nuclearagro-industrial complexes (Oak Ridge National Labo-ratory ) has proven entirely correct (pp. ),as has our estimate that high-yield grains held the mosthope or increasing human ood supplies (pp. )

and our concern about the environmental downsideso what was termed the Green Revolution (Dahlberg, Ehrlich and Ehrlich , Ehrlich and Ehrlich).

Te book was ahead o its time in its attention to newthreats o vast epidemics connected to population size,coming out as it did just as Surgeon General WilliamH. Stewart was declaring that vaccination and antibiot-ics had conquered inectious diseases. Decades beoreAIDS began to kill millions o people, we wrote o ourconcern about the deterioration o the epidemiologi-

cal environment and the possibility o a super u(pp.), which are ar more serious worries today thanthey were orty years ago (Daily and Ehrlich a, Daily

and Ehrlich b). And it gave ample attention to theoveruse o pesticides, especially DD, which remains aserious problem, despite knowledge that oen, maybealways, integrated pest control is a more economically(Cowan and Gunby ) and ecologically rational

approach (Ehrlich and Ehrlich , pp. ).

What did Te Bomb get wrong?

From a personal point o view, the worst aspect o thebook was its title, which was taken (with permission)rom General William H. Draper, ounder o the Popu-lation Crisis Committee and a pamphlet issued in by the Hugh Moore Fund. Draper was, in tune with thetenor o the times and his riendship with George H.W.

Bush, most concerned with the control o the popula-tions o dark-skinned people (or an overview o the lesssavory aspects o population limitation, see Connelly). Te publishers choice o Te Population Bomb

was perect rom a marketing perspective but it ledPaul to be miscategorized as solely ocused on humannumbers, despite our interest in all the actors aectingthe human trajectory.

Perhaps the most serious aw in Te Bomb was thatit was much too optimistic about the uture. When it

was written, carbon dioxide was thought to be the onlygas whose greenhouse eect might cause serious globalheating (the roles o methane, nitrous oxide, and chlo-rouorocarbons were not recognized until a decade orso later). When the book was published, some clima-tologists thought that any warming rom carbon dioxideemissions would be counteracted by anthropogenic dustand contrails rom high-ying jets, which would havea global cooling eect. As a result, we could only writethat exploding human populations were tampering withthe energy balance o Earth and that the results globally

and locally could be dire. Since Te Bomb was written,increases in greenhouse gas ows into the atmosphere, aconsequence o the near doubling o the human popula-tion and the near tripling o global consumption, indi-cate that the results likely will be catastrophic climatedisruption caused by greenhouse heating.

In Sherwood Rowland and Mario Molina hadnot yet discovered the potential o chlorouorocar-bons to destroy the ozone layer and make lie on Earthssurace impossible. Norman Myers was years rom calling

world attention to the destruction o tropical rainor-

ests; when Te Bomb was written, the possibility thatthe tropical moist orests o the Amazon basin, Arica,and Asia might be destroyed was essentially unknown.


5/9

67


www..g

Also unknown were the threats o endocrine disruptingcontaminants (pollutants that mimic hormones), com-

pounds with non-linear dose-response curves that maybe more dangerous in trace rather than high concentra-tions (Myers and Hessler , Narita et al. ). Polar

bears were not having reproductive difculties blamedon pollutants then, nor were they losing their habitat dueto melting sea ice. And we did not anticipate the largelysuccessul attempts o the Reagan and George W. Bushadministrations to roll back environmental regulations,

promote over-reproduction globally, and (in the case oBush) start a resource war over ossil uels (Klare ,Ehrlich and Ehrlich ). Te rst post-World War IIresource war was over water the Israeli-Arab war.Tose two wars may have been precursors o many moreresource wars with intimate connections to overpopula-

tion (Klare , Klare ).Tere were o course aws in Te Population Bombs

analysis o known threats. Te rst lines o the Prologue(p. ) proved to be among the most troublesome in thebook: Te battle to eed all o humanity is over. In thes the world will undergo amines hundreds o mil-lions o people are going to starve to death in spite o anycrash programs embarked upon now. We are oen asked

what happened to the amines Te Bomb predicted, as ithe last our decades were a period o abundant ood orall. But, o course, there were amines, essentially con-tinuously in parts o Arica. Perhaps million peopleoverall have died o hunger and hunger-related diseasessince . But the amines were smaller than our readingo the agricultural literature (Paddock and Paddock) at the time had led us to anticipate. What hap-

pened? Te central actor, o course, was the medium-term success o the green revolution in expanding ood

production at a rate beyond what many, i not most, agri-cultural experts believed likely. As a result, there wasnta general rise in the death rate rom hunger although

there have been periodic regional rises in South Asiaand Arica, and the world now may be on the brink oanother major rise.

As was suggested in the same paragraph o the Pro-logue, many lives were saved by dramatic programs tostretch the carrying capacity o the earth by increasingood production. Te success o expansion o Indiasgrain production was ar beyond that oreseen by expertssuch as Raymond Ewell (pp. ) and Louis L. Bean(pp. ). On the other hand, the cautious optimismo Lester Brown (then administrator o the International

Agricultural Development Service) was justied or theshort term, although Brown has subsequently becomemuch more pessimistic.

Te analysis o the ood situation in Te PopulationBomb was thus wrong in that it underestimated theimpact o the green revolution. At the same time it didrecognize that serious ecological risks would accom-

pany the spread o that revolution (p. ), although

missing the overdras o groundwater, declines in thegenetic variability o crops, and some other problems. Itemphasized the importance o both curbing populationgrowth and attempting to expand ood production, andit is worth noting that alling population growth rates inthe rich nations o Europe have played a signicant rolein the creation o agricultural surpluses in those coun-tries. Nevertheless, the absolute numbers o hungry

people by (around million) were somewhatless than they were in . Tat was a cheering result,but the numbers o under- and malnourished people

may now have risen again by million or more in thecurrent ood shortage crisis. Even so, the reduction o thehungry portion o the world population may well havebeen bought at a high price o environmental destruc-tion to be paid by uture generations. It should be notedthat in , as today, there was and is enough ood toeed everyone an adequate diet i ood were distributedaccording to need. But there is not the slightest sign thathumanity is about to distribute anything according toneed, and it is uncertain how long there will be enoughood or everyone even i there were more equitabledistribution.

Te Bomb was also somewhat misleading in statingthat the birthrate in the United States might soon rise asthe post-World War II baby boomers matured into theirreproductive years. Instead, it actually dropped signi-cantly in the early s. One interesting question raisedby this is how much o that change was the result o risingconcern about overpopulation generated in part by Te

Bomb itsel. And in the critical importance or low-ering birthrates o providing women with education and

job opportunities, as well as access to contraception andabortion, was under recognized, and we did not properlyemphasize their potential role in reducing birthrates.

Te biggest tactical error in Te Bomb was the use oscenarios, stories designed to help one think about theuture. Although we clearly stated that they were not

predictions and that we can be sure that none o themwill come true as stated, (p. ) their ailure to occuris oen cited as a ailure o prediction. In honesty, thescenarios were way o, especially in their timing (weunderestimated the resilience o the world system).

But they did deal with uture issues that people in should have been thinking about amines, plagues,

water shortages, armed international interventions by


6/9


68

the United States, and nuclear winter (e.g., Ehrlich et al., oon et al. ) all events that have occurred ornow still threaten. We also didnt realize that many com-mentators would assume that our analysis in Te Popula-tion Bomb comprised our last thoughts on the subject

and would never bother to look at the many hundreds osubsequent articles and books in which we updated andrevised our conclusions (e.g., Ehrlich and Holdren ,Ehrlich et al. , Ehrlich et al. , Ehrlich and Ehrlich, Ehrlich and Ehrlich , Ehrlich and Ehrlich, Ehrlich and Ehrlich , Ehrlich and Ehrlich, Ehrlich et al. , Ehrlich et al. , Ehrlich andEhrlich ).

Back to fundamentals

Te essential point made about population growth is asvalid today as it was in : Basically, there are onlytwo kinds o solutions to the population problem. Oneis a birthrate solution, in which we nd ways to lowerthe birthrate. Te other is a death rate solution, in which

ways to raise the death rate war, amine, pestilence nd us (p. ).

Te answer to the question o whether uture substan-tial rises in death rates could have been avoided i morecomprehensive action to reduce birthrates had been initi-ated in the late s, will probably never be clear. Tosedeath rate rises seem ever more likely today as hunger

wracks millions o poor people and causes ood riots(Anonymous ) and as the agricultural enterprise inmany regions is threatened by massive climate disruption(Fogarty ), although the uncertainties are great andare likely to remain so or a substantial period o time.In any case, one only need look at current projectionsor population shrinkage by mid-century due to AIDSin countries such as Botswana and widespread increases

in hunger because o rising ood prices (Lean ) torealize that i we continue on a business-as-usual course,a ull-scale death rate solution may soon be upon us.

Much o the ocus oTe Bomb was on avoiding a col-lapse o humanitys global civilization rom three o theour apocalyptic horsemenwar, pestilence, and amine(p. ). Tose horsemen were also doubtless involved inmost o the past local and regional collapses o which weare aware civilizations o Akkadia, Sumeria, Babylonia,Nineveh, Rome, the Classic Maya, Easter Island, NorseGreenland, and so on (e.g., ainter , Diamond ).

Te same horsemen, joined by a ourth, toxication, rep-resent increasing threats today as globalization destroysthe saety valve o modularization and the civilization

acing collapse is or the rst time truly global (Ehrlichand Ehrlich , Ehrlich and Ehrlich ).

Te undamental point o Te Population Bomb isstill sel-evidently correct, we believe: the capacity oEarth to produce ood and support people is nite.

More and more scholars have realized that as our popu-lation, consumption, and technological skills expand,the probability o a vast catastrophe looms steadilylarger (Homer-Dixon ). James Lovelock believesglobal warming is now irreversible, and that nothing can

prevent large parts o the planet becoming too hot toinhabit, or sinking underwater, resulting in mass migra-tion, amine and epidemics. Britain is going to becomea lieboat or reugees rom mainland Europe, so insteado wasting our time on wind turbines we need to start

planning how to survive. Lovelock ears we wont invent

the technologies necessary to save us in time and expectsabout % o the worlds population to be wiped outby . Prophets have been oretelling Armageddonsince time began, he says. But this is the real thing(Aitkenhead ). British astronomer Sir Martin Reessuggests similar possibilities as the title o a recent bookindicates: Our Final Hour: A Scientists Warning: Howerror, Error, and Environmental Disaster Treaten

Humankinds Future In Tis Century On Earth and

Beyond(Rees ).Signs o potential collapse, environmental and politi-

cal, seem to be growing. Te pattern is classic popu-lation grows to the limits o current technologies tosupport it, ollowed by technological innovation (e.g.,long canals in Mesopotamia, green revolution in India,biouels in Brazil and U.S.) accompanied by more popu-lation growth and environmental deterioration, while

politicians and elites ail to recognize the basic situationand ocus on expanding their own wealth and power.

On the population side, it is clear that avoidingcollapse would be a lot easier i humanity could entrain

a gradual population decline toward an optimal number.Our groups analysis o what that optimum populationsize might be like comes up with . to billion, less thanone third o what it is today. We attempted to nd anumber that would maximize human options enough

people to have large, exciting cities and still maintainsubstantial tracts o wilderness or the enjoyment o out-doors enthusiasts and hermits (Daily et al. ). Evenmore important would be the ability to maintain sus-tainable agricultural systems and the crucial lie supportservices rom natural ecosystems that humanity is so

dependent upon. But too many people, especially thosein positions o power, remain blissully unaware o thatdependence.


7/9

69


www..g

Conclusions

Te Population Bomb certainly had its aws, which is tobe expected. Science never produces certainty. None-theless we are all, scientists or not, always attempting to

predict the uture (will the stock go up or down? Willhe be a good husband? Will it rain later?). And when weplan, we do the best we can.

One o our personal strategies has always been to haveour work reviewed careully by other scientists, and Te

Population Bombwas no exception. It was vetted by aseries o scientists, including some who became topleaders in the scientic enterprise. Tat is one reason thatlong ago the undamental message oTe Bomb movedrom a somewhat heterodox view to a nearly consensus

view o the scientic community. Consider the ollowing

two statements. Te rst was the World Scientists Warning to Humanity, released by the Union o Con-cerned Scientists () and signed by more than o the worlds leading scientists, including more than halo all living Nobel Laureates in science. Te second wasthe joint statement by o academies participating inthe Population Summit o the Worlds Scientic Acad-emies, including the U.S. National Academy o Sciences,the British Royal Society, and the Tird World Academy(National Academy o Sciences USA ).

Te World Scientists Warning said in part: Humanbeings and the natural world are on a collision course.Human activities inict harsh and oen irreversibledamage on the environment and on critical resources. Inot checked, many o our current practices put at seriousrisk the uture that we wish or human society and the

plant and animal kingdoms, and may so alter the livingworld that it will be unable to sustain lie in the mannerthat we know. Fundamental changes are urgent i weare to avoid the collision our present course will bringabout.

Part o the Academies pronouncement read: themagnitude o the threat is linked to human populationsize and resource use per person. Resource use, waste

production and environmental degradation are acceler-ated by population growth. Tey are urther exacerbatedby consumption habits. With current technologies,

present levels o consumption by the developed worldare likely to lead to serious negative consequences orall countries. As human numbers urther increase, the

potential or irreversible changes o ar-reaching magni-tude also increases.

Tese statements recognized that humanity hasreached a dangerous turning point in its dominationo the planet (Ehrlich and Ehrlich ), a view even

more common in the scientic community today (e.g,,Hall and Day ). Te same genius that allowed usto achieve that dominance now must be harnessed i weare to prevent our very success rom sealing our doom.

We think, with all its warts, Te Bomb did exactly what

we had hoped alerted people to the importance oenvironmental issues and brought human numbers intothe debate on the human uture. It was thus a successultract, and were proud o it.

Notes

1. See http://www.listsobests.com/list//.

2. See http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=.

3. See http://thinkexist.com/quotation/nature_has_color-

coded_groups_o_individuals_so/.html.4. See http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/ap_sci_

warming_scientist.html

For a more technical treatment see Hansen et al.,

5. Simon was also instigator o bets on the uture o the

environment. For those interested in this episode a

detailed account with reerences can be ound in Ehrlich

and Ehrlich (), pp. .

6. See http://webdiary.com.au/cms/?q=node/.

7. O all things in the world, people are the most precious.

Under the leadership o the Communist Party, as

long as there are people, every kind o miracle can be

perormed. (Te Bankruptcy o the Idealist Conception

o History.) http://www.marxists.org/subject/china/

peking-review/PRc.htm.

8. Who thought the ultimate resource was the human

mind.

9. Quoted inAica Geographic, no. (August ): p.

.

10. All page reerences in Te Population Bomb are to the

rst edition.

References

Aitkenhead D. . Enjoy lie while you can Te Guardian.

March.

Anonymous. . Te silent tsunami: ood prices are

causing misery around the world. Radical solutions are

needed. Te Economist April: .

Arrow K., Dasgupta P., Goulder L., Daily G., Ehrlich P., and

others. . Are we consuming too much? Journal o

Economic Perspectives : -.

Beckerman W. . Economists, scientists, andenvironmental catastrophe. Oxord Economic Papers :

-.


8/9


70

Campbell M., Cleland J., Ezeh A., and N. Prata. .

Return o the population growth actor. Science :

-.

Carson R. . Silent Spring. Boston: Houghton Miin.

Connelly M. .Fatal Misconception: Te Struggle to

Control World Population Cambridge, MA: Harvard

University Press.

Cowan R. and P. Gunby. . Sprayed to death: path

dependence, lock-in and pest control strategies. Te

Economic Journal: -.

Dahlberg K. .Beyond the Green Revolution. New York,

NY: Plenum.

Daily G., and P. Ehrlich. a. Global change and human

susceptibility to disease.Annual Review o Energy and the

Environment: -.

. b. Impacts o development and global change on

the epidemiological environment.Environment and

Development Economics : -.Daily G., Ehrlich A., and P. Ehrlich. . Optimum human

population size.Population and Environment: -.

Diamond J. . Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or

Succeed. New York, NY: Viking.

Eberstadt N. . Chinas One-child mistake. Wall Street

Journal September: A.

Ehrlich A. and P. Ehrlich. .Earth. New York, NY:

Franklin Watts.

Ehrlich P. . Te Population Bomb. New York: Ballantine

Books.

. .Human Natures: Genes, Cultures, and the Human

Prospect. Washington, DC : Island Press.

Ehrlich P. and R. Holm. . A biological view o race. In

Te Concept o Race, edited by A. Montagu, -. New

York, NY: Free Press o Glencoe.

Ehrlich P. and J. Holdren. . Impact o population growth.

Science : -.

Ehrlich P. and S. Feldman. . Te Race Bomb: Skin Color,

Prejudice, and Intelligence. New York: New York imes

Book Co.

Ehrlich P. and A. Ehrlich. .Extinction: Te Causes and

Consequences o the Disappearance o Species. NY: Random

House.. . oo many rich olks.Populi : -.

. . Te Population Explosion. New York: Simon and

Schuster.

. .Healing the Planet. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley.

. .Betrayal o Science and Reason: How Anti-

Environmental Rhetoric Treatens Our Future.

Washington, DC: Island Press.

. . One with Nineveh: Politics, Consumption, and the

Human Future, (with new aerword). Washington, DC:

Island Press.

. . Enough Already.New Scientist: -.__. . Te Dominant Animal: Human Evolution and the

Environment. Washington, DC : Island Press.

Ehrlich P. and L. Goulder. . Is current consumption

excessive? A general ramework and some indications or

the U.S. Conservation Biology : -.

Ehrlich P., Ehrlich A., and J. Holdren. .Ecoscience:

Population, Resources, Environment. San Francisco: W.H.

Freeman and Co.

Ehrlich P., Bilderback L., and A. Ehrlich. . Te Golden

Door: International Migration, Mexico, and the United

States. New York, NY: Wideview Books.

Ehrlich P., Daily G., and L. Goulder. . Population

growth, economic growth, and market economies.

Contention : -.

Ehrlich P., Ehrlich A., and G. Daily. . Te Stork and the

Plow: Te Equity Answer to the Human Dilemma. New

York: Putnam.

Ehrlich P., Harte J., Harwell, M., Raven P., Sagan C.,

Woodwell G., and others. . Long-term biological

consequences o nuclear war. Science : -.Engels F. . Outlines o a Critique o Political Economy.

Deutsche-Franzsische Jahrbcher http://www.marxists.

org/archive/marx/works//d-jahrbucher/outlines.

htm

Feeney J. . Return o the population bomb. Guardian.

May.

Fogarty D. . Farmers ace climate challenge in quest

o more ood.Reuters http://www.reuters.com/article/

environmentNews/idUSSP.

Hall CAS, Day Jr. JW. . Revisiting the limits to growth

aer peak oil.American Scientist: -.

Hansen J., Sato M., Kharecha P., Beerling D., Masson-

Delmotte V., Pagani M., Raymo M., Royer D., and J.

Zachos . . arget atmospheric CO: Where should

humanity aim? Te Open Atmospheric Science Journal:

-.

Homer-Dixon . . Te Upside o Down: Catastrophe,

Creativity, and the Renewal o Civilization. Washington,

DC.: Island Press.

Jackson J. . Ecological extinction and evolution in the

brave new ocean.Proceedings o the National Academy o

Sciences :-.

Klare M. .Resource Wars: Te New Landscape o GlobalConict. New York, NY: Henry Holt.

. .Blood and Oil: Te Dangers and Consequences o

Americas Growing Dependency on Imported Petroleum.

New York, NY: Henry Holt and Company.

. .Rising Powers, Shrinking Planet: Te New

Geopolitics o Energy. New York, NY: Henry Holt and

Company.

Lean G. . Multinationals make billions in prot out o

growing global ood crisis

Speculators blamed or driving up price o basic oods as

million ace severe hunger. Te Independent/UK May http://www.commondreams.org/

archive/////.


9/9

71


www..g

Marx J. .A Revolution in Biotechnology. Cambridge, UK:

Cambridge University Press.

Myers N. and J. Simon. . Scarcity or Abundance: A

Debate on the Environment. New York: W.W. Norton.

Myers P. and W. Hessler. . Does the dose make the

poison?: extensive results challenge a core assumption in

toxicology. Environmental Health News April -.

Narita S., Goldblum R., Watson, C., Brooks, E., Estes D.,

Curran E., and . Midoro-Horiuti. . Environmental

estrogens induce mast cell degranulation and enhance

IgE-mediated release o allergic mediators.Environmental

Health Perspectives : -.

National Academy o Sciences USA. .A Joint Statement

by Fiy-eight o the Worlds Scientifc Academies.

Population Summit o the Worlds Scientic Academies.

New Delhi, India: National Academy Press.

Oak Ridge National Laboratory. .Nuclear Energy

Centers, Industrial and Agro-industrial Complexes.ORNL-: Summary Report.

Paddock W. and P. Paddock. .Famine -- 1975. Boston:

Little Brown & Co.

Parsons J. .Population Fallacies. London, UK: Elek/

Pemberton.

Pauly D., Christensen V., Dalsgaard J., Froese R., and F.

orres Jr. . Fishing down marine ood webs. Science

: -.

Pirie N. . Lea protein as human ood. Science :

-.

Population Reerence Bureau. .2008 World Population

Data Sheet. Washington DC: Population Reerence

Bureau.

Rees M. . Our Final Hour: How error, Error, and

Environmental Disaster Treaten Humankinds Future

in Tis Century -- On Earth and Beyond. New York, NY:

Basic Books.

Renton A. . How the worlds oceans are running out o

sh. Te Guardian. May.

ainter J. . Te Collapse o Complex Societies. Cambridge,

UK: Cambridge University Press.

oon O., Robock A., urco R., Bardeen C., Oman L., and G.

Stenchikov. . Consequences o regional-scale nuclearconicts. Science : -.

Union o Concerned Scientists. . World Scientists

Warning to Humanity. Cambridge, MA: Union o

Concerned Scientists.

the population bomb revisited

Documents