Message-ID: <3.0.32.19970212063043.0075d154@ilhawaii.net> Date: Wed, 12 Feb 1997 06:38:17 -1000 From: "Jay Hanson mailto:mailto:j@qmail.com" <j@QMAIL.COM> Subject: The economics of killing. To: mailto:DEVEL-L@AMERICAN.EDU
At 05:19 PM 2/11/97 -0500, mailto:EUNSteve@AOL.COM wrote:>The shortest account of their predictions and what actually happened that I
>have is in the thin book of 1993, ECO-SCAM, by Ronald Bailey. Bailey is a
>science writer, as was Rachel Carson, but he cites authorities and quotes the
>predictions and actual occurrences in a way that his accuracy can be checked.
>
>"On nonrenewable resources, they have been proven to be spectacularly wrong.
>In 1972, THE LIMITS TO GROWTH predicted that at exponential growth rates, the
>world wuld 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."
Ok, let's check Bailey's accuracy. I just happen to have the books that Baily mentions.
On page 55 of LIMITS TO GROWTH:
"Table 4 lists some of the more important mineral and fuel resources, the vital raw materials for today's major industrial processes. The number following each resource in column 3 is the static reserve index, or the number of years present known reserves of that resource (listed in column 2) will last at the *current* rate of usage. This static index is the measure normally used to express future resource availability. Underlying the static index are several assumptions, one of which is that the usage rate will remain constant."
So it was not a prediction, it was merely an extrapolation of known reserves at current rates -- it was arithmetic. ^^^^^ ^^^^^^^ Why would "brownlashers like Ronald Baily, Rush Limbaugh, S. Fred Singer, Dixie Lee Ray, Lou Guzzo, Julian Simon, Gregg Easterbrook, George Reisman, and so on, misrepresent the work of the Club of Rome, Worldwatch, and Paul Ehrlich?
It is because it is "economical" for artificial people (corporations) to kill natural-born people (your kids).
"Cigarette smoking causes about 435,000 American deaths each year. During the last 40 years, roughly 17 million Americans have been killed by tobacco smoke while tobacco companies have pocketed something like a thousand billion dollars." [RHWN #321]
Let's see, if my math is correct, that's about $58,000 per body. Needless to say, more bodies = more profit.
And it's not just cigarettes, consider the economics of killing Africans:
"I think the economic logic behind dumping a load of toxic waste in the lowest wage country is impeccable...because foregone earnings from increased morbidity" are low. He adds that "the underpopulated countries in Africa are vastly underpolluted; their air quality is probably vastly inefficiently low compared to Los Angeles...." World Bank's chief economist, Lawrence Summers [The Economist, Feb. 8, 1992].
These cold-blooded calculations expose a global system of economic homicide where human lives are viewed only as footnotes to the capitalist market.
So when the brownlashers call for "more of the same", it is exactly like the Chairman of Phillip Morris calling for "more of the same" -- they just doesn't care if it kills you or your family.
Jay -- http://csf.Colorado.EDU/authors/hanson/ ---------------------------------------------------- For more on the brownlashers: http://www.islandpress.com/categories/books/BeSciRes.html http://www.islandpress.com/Eco-Compass/ECOCOMP14.htm