"Premature" means arriving before the expected time. How can someone call Erlich's predictions premature when they haven't occurred at all? Of course the NYT would design a new definition implying " hasn't happened yet, but will real soon".
When your predictions are completely wrong, then your peers are complicit, but if your prediction is correct then you collect individual awards. Which of his predictions garnered the awards?
His famous formula I=PAT with John Holder, expressing the impact that humans have on the environment as a function of three factors: population (P), affluence (A) and technology (T). So, a well ordered suburban neighborhood with a surplus of luxury cars has more environmental “impact” than a homeless camp in downtown LA for constant P? That’s Science! RIP Paul, now humanity can self correct the Science.
(Kaspersky internet security warned for the below url but nothing serious - like cannibalism - happened):
Overpopulation cannibalism and racist fear in Soylent Green
While Ehrlich would not characterize it this way, it is easy to read the cancer that he says must be cut out as a metaphor for India. India figures prominently in the book as the prime example of a country with runaway population growth and inadequate food production. At the beginning of the book Ehrlich describes a trip to Delhi (which at that moment was no more densely populated than New York City).5
Riding in a taxi to his hotel, Ehrlich recounts the fear he felt as he witnessed “People thrusting their hands through the taxi window, begging. People defecating and urinating. People clinging to buses. People herding animals. People, people, people.”6 What this passage reveals is that Ehrlich was not so much afraid of too many people as he was of too many Indians. India, as Ehrlich’s worst-case example of unchecked population growth, functions in the book as the planet’s cancerous tumour, the site of “an uncontrolled multiplication of cells” that must be dealt with by “radical surgery.”
“Cannibalism May Occur…”
Having established the prominent, and problematic, fears of overpopulation in 1970s environmentalism and science fiction it is now possible to return to cannibalism. Overpopulation and cannibalism are linked by their shared concern over the availability of food and their tendency to dehumanize.
In The Population Bomb, Ehrlich mentions cannibalism only once, but his invocation of the practice is tellingly situated within a metaphorical comparison of overcrowded humans to animals. He says, “We know all too well that when rats or other animals are overcrowded, the results are pronounced and usually unpleasant. Social systems may break down, cannibalism may occur, breeding may cease altogether.”
“Here’s the key issue: modern cosmology now depends on entities that have never been directly observed and are known primarily because they are mathematically required for the dominant model to function.”
You wrong about Dr. Paul. He was a loyal and effective agent of the Revolution. This was the higher goal he served for 5 decades, and Leftists still cheer him for it.
“The Revolution is not a dinner party” - nor is it Science.
How many dwindling resources did Erlich, the humanity-hating zombie, consume by living so long?
If you are a believer in his fraudulent "science"--that the human population is poisonous to Gaia--the only logical conclusion for a believer is that your life must be as short as possible.
He probably should have been gone about 50 years ago. Imagine the harm he did to Gaia during his last 50 years.
He was a big chunk of shrapnel from the Population Bomb destroying Gaia.
But he obviously did not believe in his own bullshit that he spewed for 60+ years. A fraudulent ecology hypocrite telling others how to live their lives.
We were kids in the 7th grade enthusiastically talking about the movie SOYLENT GREEN starring Charlton Heston, when our biology teacher asked, "If life was so terrible, why did people keep having babies?" And that shut everybody up.
Good article. Call me a rigorist, but a model fails if it doesn't conform to reality (or the subset of reality under investigation). No matter how pretty it may seem on paper.
Excellent lecture William! I finally figured it out:
J(Y,P(Y|M)|W)=1: Ehrlich was a credentialed gasbag who built a career on being spectacularly wrong. Overpopulation catastrophe...wrong. Ice age...wrong. Global warming leading to palm trees in Michigan...wrong. Three decades of gasbag nonsense, and the academic establishment rewarded every failed prediction with another prize. All political not science, that's performance art. It's all about being the best gasbag it's not abouit science. The awards didn't validate Ehrlich they invalidated the awards. He was a master gasbag with a publication record. The sad part is this is more apt now then back in his day.
As I peer into my crystal ball, I can see the late Dr Ehrlich. He is sitting at a desk in one of God’s school rooms, writing out 50,000,000 lines – “I must not deceive or frighten innocent human beings.”
"Premature" means arriving before the expected time. How can someone call Erlich's predictions premature when they haven't occurred at all? Of course the NYT would design a new definition implying " hasn't happened yet, but will real soon".
His hubris of associating his correctness with peer review is astounding. Now, there's a model that needs to be done.
When your predictions are completely wrong, then your peers are complicit, but if your prediction is correct then you collect individual awards. Which of his predictions garnered the awards?
His famous formula I=PAT with John Holder, expressing the impact that humans have on the environment as a function of three factors: population (P), affluence (A) and technology (T). So, a well ordered suburban neighborhood with a surplus of luxury cars has more environmental “impact” than a homeless camp in downtown LA for constant P? That’s Science! RIP Paul, now humanity can self correct the Science.
100% chance Ehrlich is dead.
.... and I predicted it!
A Re-Look at ‘The Bet’ (Simon, Ehrlich, and Paul Sabin)
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2026/03/18/a-re-look-at-the-bet-simon-ehrlich-and-paul-sabin/
(Kaspersky internet security warned for the below url but nothing serious - like cannibalism - happened):
Overpopulation cannibalism and racist fear in Soylent Green
While Ehrlich would not characterize it this way, it is easy to read the cancer that he says must be cut out as a metaphor for India. India figures prominently in the book as the prime example of a country with runaway population growth and inadequate food production. At the beginning of the book Ehrlich describes a trip to Delhi (which at that moment was no more densely populated than New York City).5
Riding in a taxi to his hotel, Ehrlich recounts the fear he felt as he witnessed “People thrusting their hands through the taxi window, begging. People defecating and urinating. People clinging to buses. People herding animals. People, people, people.”6 What this passage reveals is that Ehrlich was not so much afraid of too many people as he was of too many Indians. India, as Ehrlich’s worst-case example of unchecked population growth, functions in the book as the planet’s cancerous tumour, the site of “an uncontrolled multiplication of cells” that must be dealt with by “radical surgery.”
“Cannibalism May Occur…”
Having established the prominent, and problematic, fears of overpopulation in 1970s environmentalism and science fiction it is now possible to return to cannibalism. Overpopulation and cannibalism are linked by their shared concern over the availability of food and their tendency to dehumanize.
In The Population Bomb, Ehrlich mentions cannibalism only once, but his invocation of the practice is tellingly situated within a metaphorical comparison of overcrowded humans to animals. He says, “We know all too well that when rats or other animals are overcrowded, the results are pronounced and usually unpleasant. Social systems may break down, cannibalism may occur, breeding may cease altogether.”
https://niche-canada.org/2021/11/09/overpopulation-cannibalism-and-racist-fear-in-soylent-green/
Ehrlich is not accused of racism but Raspail’s The Camp of the Saints is accused of racism. Hard to see much difference.
https://www.lewrockwell.com/2026/03/mark-keenan/when-models-replace-reality-in-modern-cosmology/
“Here’s the key issue: modern cosmology now depends on entities that have never been directly observed and are known primarily because they are mathematically required for the dominant model to function.”
So it’s like the US National budget.
You wrong about Dr. Paul. He was a loyal and effective agent of the Revolution. This was the higher goal he served for 5 decades, and Leftists still cheer him for it.
“The Revolution is not a dinner party” - nor is it Science.
How many dwindling resources did Erlich, the humanity-hating zombie, consume by living so long?
If you are a believer in his fraudulent "science"--that the human population is poisonous to Gaia--the only logical conclusion for a believer is that your life must be as short as possible.
He probably should have been gone about 50 years ago. Imagine the harm he did to Gaia during his last 50 years.
He was a big chunk of shrapnel from the Population Bomb destroying Gaia.
But he obviously did not believe in his own bullshit that he spewed for 60+ years. A fraudulent ecology hypocrite telling others how to live their lives.
Good riddance. To the compost-pile!
We were kids in the 7th grade enthusiastically talking about the movie SOYLENT GREEN starring Charlton Heston, when our biology teacher asked, "If life was so terrible, why did people keep having babies?" And that shut everybody up.
Good article. Call me a rigorist, but a model fails if it doesn't conform to reality (or the subset of reality under investigation). No matter how pretty it may seem on paper.
Excellent lecture William! I finally figured it out:
J(Y,P(Y|M)|W)=1: Ehrlich was a credentialed gasbag who built a career on being spectacularly wrong. Overpopulation catastrophe...wrong. Ice age...wrong. Global warming leading to palm trees in Michigan...wrong. Three decades of gasbag nonsense, and the academic establishment rewarded every failed prediction with another prize. All political not science, that's performance art. It's all about being the best gasbag it's not abouit science. The awards didn't validate Ehrlich they invalidated the awards. He was a master gasbag with a publication record. The sad part is this is more apt now then back in his day.
The palm trees would never rise above the drifts we got this week.
As I peer into my crystal ball, I can see the late Dr Ehrlich. He is sitting at a desk in one of God’s school rooms, writing out 50,000,000 lines – “I must not deceive or frighten innocent human beings.”
ROC curves are fantastic for evaluating radio receivers.
PE…often wrong, seldom in doubt.