True State of the Planet [Paperback]

Ronald Bailey (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 1, 1995

In the 25 years since the first Earth Day in 1970, the environmental movement has spawned a new generation of scientists asking vital questions about the true state and fate of the planet. But, surprisingly, some of their answers -- and even the questions themselves -- contradict the movement's deepest beliefs. Why are reserves of oil, precious metals, and other natural resources more plentiful than ever before? Why has the population growth of the twentieth century brought rising standards of living for nearly all? In The True State of the Planet ten premier scholars shatter the myths of overpopulation, food, global warming, and pesticides, while redirecting environmentalists' concerns to the far more urgent problems of fisheries, fresh water, and third-world pollution -- and the political causes behind them.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Bailey, the noted (or notorious, to some ecologists) author of Eco-Scam! (1993), here enlists a dozen scientists to explain what is and isn't known about the changing environment. Contrary to this year's silver jubilee of Earth Day sloganeering, the atmosphere is cooling, not warming; world population is not outstripping food production or most material resources; however, the activists are correct about tropical deforestation and overfished oceans. The question is how to ameliorate problems. The prominent green organizations adhere to regulatory and prohibitionist principles; whereas this set of writers favor the private management of resources, believing that to be the path to green benefits and material wealth. Prescriptions aside, this info-rich work is crammed with tabular data about biodiversity, pesticides, and air quality and is supported by a guarded, footnoted text. As its views compete with those published by the Sierra Club and Worldwatch Institute, among others, libraries may want to include this book in their acquisition plans, which BKL's Earth Day feature [Ap 1 95] might guide. Gilbert Taylor

About the Author

Ronald Bailey is producer of the national weekly public television series Think Tank with Ben Wattenberg and author of Eco-Scam: The False Prophets of Ecological Apocalypse.

Product Details

• Paperback: 472 pages
• Publisher: Free Press (May 1, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0028740106
• ISBN-13: 978-0028740102
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 7 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #629,338 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An excellent book addresses common sense solutions, May 17, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: True State of the Planet (Paperback)

An excellent book that addresses common sense solutions for food production, rescuing the oceans, conserving biodiversity, water options, the economy and the environment, population trends, pesticides, forests, cancer, among others. Lots of useful, well documented information for speeches, letters, etc...

8 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Balance to Malthusian / Neo-Malthusian Environmentalists, February 9, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: True State of the Planet (Paperback)

This volume presents a well reasoned and heavily documented balance to Malthusian and neo-Malthusian authors. Chocked full of statistical data, it is quite at odds with what many of the hyper environmentalists are saying. The author of the epilogue creatively divides the two camps into the doomsayers and the cornucopians, as he seeks for a balance between the two. This is an excellent choice for readers who are concerned about the environment!

18 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A wonderful antidote to environmental apocalytics, September 16, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: True State of the Planet (Paperback)

Journalist Bailey enlists the services of ten scientists who, one by one, expose the humbug of radical environmental apocalyptics who are trying to terrify the population into submission. Bailey deserves a prize for his courage and initiative.