X-Message-Number: 5483 Date: Wed, 27 Dec 1995 15:15:23 -0600 From: (Rodney Perkins) Subject: A very happy new year The doom and gloom scenarios presented in the "Happy New Year?" message have been percolating for the past 30 years. In the end, these scenarios have been (so far) proven wrong; Famine 1996, anyone? I suggest reading "The Ultimate Resource" by Julian Simon for good counter arguments. While the book was published in 1980, its basic premises still are valid; doomsayers have proven themselves to be consistently wrong and tend to disregard facts that don't jibe with their misanthropic world view. One thing that is disturbing is that despite the inaccuracy of many of these "prophet's" predictions, they are still taken seriously. One of the chapters in "Engines of Creation" by K. Eric Drexler also presents some very good criticisms of these types of ideas. I think its entitled "Limits to Growth". Yet another resource is John McCarthy's WWW page called "Sustainability of Human Progress" at http://www-formal.stanford.edu/jmc/progress/ Rodney Perkins () Texas Center for Superconductivity at the University of Houston (TCSUH) Office of Public Affairs PGP mail is preferred. For my public key, send message to with "get " as subject. Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=5483