by Peggy Whitcomb

One day in China the sun disappeared. It didn't go behind a cloud as it often does; it gradually disappeared, and day became night. The people panicked, babies wailed, animals bawled and trampled everyone. Suddenly a voice screamed "Beat on your pans! Grab a rock and beat the pans, make lots of noise!"  It must have been a relief to be told what to do, to quell the fear. The noise rose to a crescendo and the sun very gradually began to reappear. The precious sunlight was returning.

   I wonder who that man was? How did he think of making noise to lure back the sun? I'll bet he became famous, became known far and wide for his wisdom. And rich, as people brought their problems to him.
   Today we understand about solar eclipses. They are part of the physical, natural world, and aren't even a nuisance because we can use artificial light while the sun is hidden. Today we look to scientists to explain the physical world, not shamans or old wives tales. Or even new wives tales.

   Christians believe that Christ was born of a virgin. They cannot prove this scientifically, but they believe it, they know it to be true. This is the way of religions. Belief does not require proof. Theology is often debated, but basic beliefs are not in question or subjected to scientific testing.
   We are a sophisticated people: we understand the difference between beliefs and proofs. We've drawn that line: on the one hand are our religions and myths, and on the other hand are the proven facts of our physical world that scientists obtain through rigorous testing and retesting.
   Bjorn Lomborg, author of "The Skeptical Environmentalist: The State of the Real World"   is one of those rigorous scientists. He's a professor of statistics at Aarhus University in Denmark and he considers science a provider of reliable information which we can use to guide us in our daily lives, as well as for national and international policy decisions.

   Lomborg is a stickler for accurate information. He's probably one of those people who explain to you how the magician did his tricks, robbing you of the enchantment. Or, he is the peasant who pointed out that the emperor wasn't wearing any clothes   He may value myths in our lives, but he wouldn't consult a shaman or a priest for advice about his investment portfolio.

   In 1994 Lomborg read in Wired Magazine of an interview with American economist Julian Simon. In it, Simon said that the world is getting better and that there is proof of that in research data readily available to the public. Lomborg, a self-styled old left-wing Greenpeace member, scoffed. He knew Simon was wrong, and he decided to prove it. He and the sharpest of his graduate students at Aarhus University began to explore the data. There was reams of it from numerous United Nations research organizations as well as from the European Union, the United States, and international environmentalist organizations. The data addressed the state of the world's agriculture, the forests, the fisheries and oceans, population, food availability, pollution, illnesses, global warming, energy, and production. There were global studies, regional studies, and some covered periods of time of a hundred years or more.

   Lomborg was appalled by what he found. Those wise men in the environmental movement he'd trusted (and he names them) have, year after year, assured the world that now  the world is running out of fossil fuel, that now  grain production has reached its limits and people will begin to starve on a massive scale; that our forests are disappearing at a frightful yearly rate, especially the vital so-called lungs of the earth rainforests; that fish are disappearing from our polluted oceans; that animal and plant species are going extinct at a phenomenal rate; that massive oil spills have permanently damaged our oceans; that the world's population is out of control, and millions more are starving every year; that even in developed nations cancer is epidemic, due to our careless use of chemicals, plastics and pesticides. 

What appalled Lomborg was his discovery that none of this is true, and has not been true for many years. On the contrary, he discovered that the opposite is true: the world indeed is getting better in all categories. What Lomborg discovered is that  international environmentalism is a religion. He calls its preaching The Litany.

   He rushed to share his findings in a series of articles in a Guardian-like newspaper in Denmark. A firestorm ensued. Hundreds of articles, commentaries and speeches denounced him. The furious insistence that his data could not possibly be true made him realize how entrenched are the doomsday beliefs about our environment. A few environmentalists whispered that yes, what he said was true, but if people didn't worry about the environment, they would ignore it and carelessly abuse it. But Lomborg insists that the electorates of democracies will be able to make good decisions about the environment, about the needs of the developing countries, only if they are given honest, fact-based information about the real state of the world.

   Lomborg's book "The Skeptical Environmentalist: The State of the Real World"  fueled further debate following its publication in Denmark in 1998. That debate continues internationally. He deplores the politicization of environmental research groups around the world, the politicization of biologists who privately tell him that their results must conform to certain doomsday standards. There's money involved, many grants are at risk. (illus: Harvard)

   In his studies of environmental publications and government studies, Lomborg became aware of a second, hidden agenda: a complete change through social engineering in how people live their lives. He gives as one example the concept of cold fusion which could give the world unlimited clean fuel. Though scientists now believe it is an impossibility, in 1989 when two scientists thought they had achieved cold fusion, the responses of environmentalists were interesting, especially considering that they have forever been lobbying for us to reduce our use of polluting fossil fuels. 

   Lomborg recounts: "In April 1989 the Los Angeles Times interviewed a number of top-environmentalists about their view on cold fusion. With the assumption that the technology would be cheap and clean, Jeremy Rifkin nevertheless thought 'It's the worst thing that could happen to our planet.'  Inexhaustible power, he argues, only gives man an infinite ability to exhaust the planet's resources, to destroy its fragile balance and create unimaginable human and industrial waste."

   Also, Lomborg continues, "Stanford biologist Paul Ehrlich was cautious. While cheap, clean inexhaustible power could be a boon for mankind, the problem was that  'industrialized societies, so far, have not used power wisely,'but caused massive pollution. In summary, Ehrlich said that cold fusion, even if clean and cheap, would be 'like giving a machine gun to an idiot child.'"

   Lomborg has no problem with environmentalists having political views and goals, but he inisists that merging politics with environmentalism, not being up-front about their political agenda, damages the credibility of the environmentalists. He says "What these statements of opposition to an almost ideal energy source show is that the relevant agenda is not about energy or the economics of energy. Indeed this could not be the case, since the question from the Los Angeles Times was originally formulated 'what if cold fusion would be cheap and clean?'  Instead the opposition is based on a different agenda, focused on the potentially damaging consequences from using cold fusion. Essentially, the criticism points to other values, arguing for a change to a decentralized society which is less resource oriented, less industrialized, less commercialized, less production-oriented. Such an agenda is entirely valid, but it is important to realize that the discussion is no longer about energy."

   One part of their political agenda, Lomborg says, is for returning North America to a wilderness, with small islands of density-rich communities where people would live and work, with carefully protected paths between communities. This is social engineering with a vengence!
   What Lomborg provides in his book for the non-technical reader such as myself is a wealth of information about how research is done, the political pressures on those who do the research, the role of the media in bringing us The Litany continuously.  There are charts and graphs on nearly every page of Lomborg's book; the text smoothly guides us in interpreting them. His writing is clear and direct, making complex issues understandable. He gives us the real facts, the truth as it has been ascertained by hundreds of scientists, most of them only interested in the truth.

   Lomborg, too, notes the connection between today's environmentalism and religion. Every year the environmental organization Worldwatch Institute issues "The State of the World", which is nothing more than The Litany repeating itself, hammering its tenets into our consciousness. Numerous environmental and news periodicals endlessly repeat the mantra of the destruction of our environment by humans. 
   As we read Lomborg's book, we learn to recognize the footprints of The Litany, and we learn what the truth really is. We may or may not choose to be religious, but we do have a right to know when we're being proselytized.

(C) 2002  Peggy Whitcomb