If anyone found such a statement preposterous—it was really like saying that, because of population pressure, we were bound to settle Mars—he kept his opinions to himself. The nearest thing to a publicly expressed doubt was the somewhat timorous suggestion of the Stanford Research Institute, which was asked to comment on the report, that a “definite price policy” would be required for “more realistic estimates of probable water sales,” and that these, in turn, might well decide “the financial outcome of the project”—that is, whether or not it would end in the greatest bankruptcy of all time.
...more
