Here are some of the hilarious, spectacularly wrong predictions made on the occasion of Earth Day 1970......
“We have about five more years at the outside to do something.” • Kenneth Watt, ecologist
“Civilization will end within 15 or 30 years unless immediate action is taken against problems facing mankind.” • George Wald, Harvard Biologist
“We are in an environmental crisis which threatens the survival of this nation, and of the world as a suitable place of human habitation.” • Barry Commoner, Washington University biologist
“Man must stop pollution and conserve his resources, not merely to enhance existence but to save the race from intolerable deterioration and possible extinction.” • New York Times editorial, the day after the first Earth Day
“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.” • Paul Ehrlich, Stanford University biologist
“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.” • Paul Ehrlich, Stanford University biologist
“It is already too late to avoid mass starvation,” • Denis Hayes, chief organizer for Earth Day
“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.” • Peter Gunter, professor, North Texas State University
“Scientists have solid experimental and theoretical evidence to support…the following predictions: 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, January 1970
“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.” • Kenneth Watt, Ecologist
Stanford's Paul Ehrlich announces that the sky is falling.
Stanford's Paul Ehrlich announces that the sky is falling. “Air pollution…is certainly going to take hundreds of thousands of lives in the next few years alone.” • Paul Ehrlich, Stanford University biologist
“We are prospecting for the very last of our resources and using up the nonrenewable things many times faster than we are finding new ones.” • Martin Litton, Sierra Club director
“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.’” • Kenneth Watt, Ecologist
“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.” • Sen. Gaylord Nelson
“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, Ecologist
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Dear Mr. President:
Please find below my suggestion for fixing Americas economy.
Instead of giving billions of dollars to companies that will squander the money on lavish parties and unearned bonuses, use the following plan.
You can call it the Patriotic Retirement Plan:
There are about 40 million people over 50 in the work force.
Pay them $1 million apiece severance for early retirement with the following stipulations:
1) They MUST retire. Forty million job openings - Unemployment fixed.
2) They MUST buy a new American CAR. Forty million cars ordered - Auto Industry fixed.
3) They MUST either buy a house or pay off their mortgage - Housing Crisis fixed.
It can't get any easier than that!
If more money is needed, have all members of Congress pay their taxes...
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There was a 10 year old boy walking down the sidewalk dragging a flattened frog on a string behind him.
He walked up to a house of ill repute and knocked on the door.
When the Madam answered it, she saw the little boy and asked what he wanted. He said, 'I want to have sex with one of the women inside. I have the money and I'm not leaving until I do.'
The Madam figured, why not, so she told him to come in.
Once in, she told him to pick any of the girls he liked.
He asked, 'Do any of the girls have any diseases?'
Of course, the Madam said no, but the boy replied, 'I heard all the men talking about having to get shots after making it with Amber. So THAT'S the girl I want!'.
Since the little boy was so adamant and had the money to pay for it, the Madam told him to go to the first room on the right.
He headed down the hall dragging the squashed frog behind him.
Ten minutes later he came back, still dragging the frog, paid the Madam, and headed out the door.
The Madam stopped him and asked, 'Why did you pick the only girl in the place with a disease, instead of one of the others?'
He said, "Well, if you must know, tonight when I get home, my parents are going out to a restaurant to eat, leaving me at home with my babysitter. After they leave, my babysitter will have sex with me because she just happens to be very fond of me. She will get the disease that I just caught. When mom and dad get back, dad will take the babysitter home. On the way, he'll jump her bones, and he'll catch the disease. Then when dad gets home from the babysitters, he and mom will go to bed and have sex, and mom will catch it. In the morning when dad goes to work, the milkman will deliver the milk, have a quickie with mom and catch the disease...and HE'S the son-of-a-***** who ran over my frog."
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Do you know what the worst part of having a lung transplant is?
Knowing that the first couple of times you cough that the phlegm isn't yours.
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I don't know who this woman is, but she seems to know some of you guys.....
On the other hand, in at least three cases I'm sure she's exaggerating.....