Paul Ehrlich Predicts Cannibalism, Plot Finally And Irretrievably Lost — forbes.com

Paul Ehrlich has predicted that we humans will turn to cannibalism in the not too distant future as the only way to stop ourselves being hungry. I would take this as evidence that Paul Ehrlich has finally and irretrievably lost the plot. He’s been known for 50 years now as one of the great voices crying in the wilderness about the perils of overpopulation. The problem is that absolutely none of his predictions have come to pass. And the reason for that is that he’s reasoning from the wrong evidence base. He is, by original training, an entomologist: someone who studies insects. And human beings are not insects: we have agency for a start, as well as intelligence. A far better predictor of what is, has and will, happen about human population can be found in the work of Gary Becker, the economist, than in Ehrlich, the entomologist. The reason being that economists do attempt to explain how humans act in contrast to the entomologists who are trying to describe how insects act.

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