Betrayal of Science and Reason

by Paul R. Ehrlich, Anne H. Ehrlich

In this hard-hitting and timely book, Paul R. Ehrlich and Anne H. Ehrlich challenge those who use appealing but misleading rhetoric to downplay the reality and importance of global environmental problems. Such efforts to undermine and misinterpret environmental data, labeled the brownlash by the Ehrlichs, prolong an already difficult search for solutions and are deeply disturbing to environmental scientists.In this book, the Ehrlichs contrast anti-environmental rhetoric with the consensus view of the scientific community, tackling head-on such issues as population growth, decertification, food production, global warming, ozone depletion, acid rain, and biodiversity loss.The book provides an eye-opening look at current environmental problems and the fundamental importance of the scientific process in solving them. It presents unique insight into the sources and implications of anti-environmental rhetoric, and provides readers with a valuable means of understanding and refuting the feel-good fables that constitute the brownlash.

Genres: Science, Environment, Politics, Nonfiction, Ecology

school binding

First published January 1, 1996

About the author

Paul Ralph Ehrlich is an American biologist and educator who is the Bing Professor of Population Studies in the department of Biological Sciences at Stanford University and president of Stanford's Center for Conservation Biology. By training he is an entomologist specializing in Lepidoptera (butterflies), but he is better known as an ecologist and a demographer, specifically for his warnings about unchecked population growth and limited resources. Ehrlich became a household name after publication of his controversial 1968 book The Population Bomb.

Reviews

[Sovfedfreg · Rating 1 out of 5]

Written by Paul R Ehrlich, a writer whose only other major work was debunked long ago, this book hides behind the facade of environmentalism and is, in reality, purely Malthusian, and this is not even mentioning that this book was in fact written by Ehrlich more as a rant, after they lost a bet of 10,000 to a person who argued that natural resources aren't going to run out as Ehrlich had predicted (look up Simon-Ehrlich bet on Wikipedia).

[Fabiola Del Aguila · Rating 4 out of 5]

Though this book was written in 1996, it was ahead of its time. Noxious pathogens and global warming have been significant topics for decades. Economic interests have tried to suppress these topics, but as seen in the past decade, the world can no longer ignore the truth of environmental deterioration, which ultimately will lead to ecosystem collapse and the end of civilization as we know it.

[Russellbarabe · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was a very interesting read. It labeled right-wingers who deny global warming and over-population as the "brown lash" and their denial of science and data is the reason for the title. The book is good overall and provides many good talking points relating to environmental issues and the science that supports each issue. I would recommend to anyone.

[John]

nonfiction,science,naturalism