When I was a child I often heard the story of Chicken Little and the sky is falling. The point that was being made is that Chicken Little got all excited about something small which she interpreted as "the sky is falling." Her excitement stirred up others and though there was no evidence, soon panic spread through all she encountered. At a recent meeting of the Congress in the USA, a new congresswoman loudly pronounced: "The world is going to end in 12 years if we don't address climate change." The theme of climate change abounds in our world and on March 15,2019 thousands of concerned students walked out of school to demonstrate their demand for something to be done about the cause of climate change. Scientists and experts are divided about the subject at this time, and some nations are trying to enact legislature to bring about changes in areas that are deemed to be the cause. Many dire statements come from various sources.
On the other side of the scale, single warnings are sometimes ignored and disasters that could have been avoided happen. Aboard the Titanic, the radio operator Philips was busy with personal messages from passengers when a warning about the ice field was radioed from the Californian. Because the Californian was nearby, the sound was very loud (unclear) and Philips grew angry and never passed the warning on to the bridge or the captain of the Titanic. A short time later, the Titanic, heading at full steam west toward America, came upon the ice that Evans of the Californian had tried to warn them about, struck an iceberg and sank with the loss of over 1,500 lives. The problem here was that nobody took the warning seriously and no action was taken.
Both of these stories have a moral. One speaks of the problems of over reacting and getting panicky and the other speaks of under reacting until it is too late. It seems that all too often, we humans have reacted one way or the other and responded to the words and actions of another, or to what we believe to be evidence supporting our claim. Climate change of the past is clearly evident on the surface of the earth when we consider the glacier ages and the age of giant-sized reptiles. It seems even the north was like a jungle at times and huge glaciers crept over vast areas of what is now prairie and treed ground. God worked to make the earth for humans and gave humans the ability to control and look after things on this globe, or to neglect it (Gen. 1:26, 9:2).
Our history in the Western world at least, is rife with a number of erroneous beliefs and statements that have brought about actions that were far from what was needed. Shortly before the Second World War, Neville Chamberlain who was the Prime Minister of England, visited Adolf Hitler and returned proclaiming that there would be peace. England did not prepare for war and suffered greatly from the wrong impression that was given, though it was sincere.
In 1967 William and Paul Paddock wrote a book called "Famine 1975" in which they stated that it was impossible for food production to keep up with population growth. At that time the population of the world was about 5 billion people. Today we are well on the path to 8 billion people and the warnings have subsided. That book had an impact on the Church of God.
In 1968, Paul Ehrlich published a book titled: "The population bomb." His opening statements were: "The battle to feed humanity is over. In the 1970s 1980s hundreds of millions of people will starve to death, leaving only 22.6 million starved Americans alive in 1990." This position was followed by comments from well known and respected people. On Earth Day in 1970, Biologist Barry Commoner said: "We are in an environmental crisis which threatens the survival of this nation." Harvard biologist George Wald said" Civilization will end within 25 or 30 years unless immediate action is taken against problems facing mankind." Peter Gunter, a North Texas State Univ. professor wrote in 1970: "Demographers agree almost unanimously on the following grim timetable: "By 1975 widespread famines will begin in India; these will spread by 1990 to include all of India, Pakistan, China and the Near East, Africa. By the year 2000, or conceivably sooner, South and Central America will exist under famine conditions…. By the year 2000, 30 years from now, the entire world, with the exception of Western Europe, North America, and Australia, will be in famine."
It is now 2019 and although there are places on earth where it is not easy to live in comfort, the real cause of famine and environmental crises are the wars showing the inability of man to live in peace and harmony. That is causing millions of people to try to migrate to other parts of the world. Most of the world have not experienced the better living conditions that we now have, with great advances in food production and gadgets that make life easier, but suffering continues.
There were a number of other dire predictions in early 1970 that caused great concern to many. A book with the title: "The Limits to Growth" in 1972 with about 16 million copies sold stated that projected use of resources based on the exponential growth rates they expected to continue would mean that the world supply of zinc, gold, tin, copper, oil and natural gas would be completely exhausted by 1992. The same year, a scientist at the National Academy of Sciences, published a chart in Scientific American that estimated that all of our lead, zinc, tin, gold and silver would be gone before 1990. In that era of time, the "coming ice age" was considered more of a threat than global warming because it seems the earth had cooled slightly between 1940 and 1975. One professor warned: "The world has been chilling sharply for about 20 years" and "if the present trends continue, the world will be about four degrees colder for the global mean temperature in 1990, but 11 degrees colder in the year 2000. This is about twice what it would take to put us into an ice age."
We humans do not have a good record of predicting the future because our projections are based on the evidence of past experiences. We think we know, but in fact we are guessing in many cases. Science is blind to the future to some extent but troubles surround us.
However, let us never make the mistake of shutting our eyes to what we see about us. This earth is indeed finite. There is a limit to the number of people that can live on earth. Much of the earth cannot sustain a crop and our water supply is poor in many places. We have huge deserts on earth where nothing can grow. We also know that there must be an end to materials such as zinc, copper, gold, silver and oil. All of those things are finite because the earth is finite. Our own experience has taught us that we are capable of changing the world for the better or for the worse. Mankind has destroyed many areas of the earth, built cities and poured concrete over farm land in the name of progress. We can see that we are polluting the waters of the earth including the vast oceans. We realize that our atmosphere has a balance that we can damage through overuse or pollution that increases daily. Our industries have polluted fresh water supplies in rivers and streams, and we harvest our forests with abandon as though there is no end. There are numerous species of creatures on this earth whose existence is threatened by mankind.
It is true that as the population of the world increases and people want the best of everything, we will come to a time where everything is scarce or at the edge of vanishing. That will lead to devastating wars as we see in the record of history. Greed, selfishness, pride, disregard for laws and for what is good, blinds the eyes of those who may make wise decisions (2 Tim. 3:1-7). We allow finances, self-gratification, beliefs of religion and so on to dictate our actions. All of those pressures make it impossible for the peoples of this world to work as one to solve the problems.
Thankfully, there is a Saviour promised by the Creator of this earth. Jesus Christ will return to establish the Kingdom of God on earth. All forces of evil will be removed, and humans will not be making decisions that are harmful. There will be peace and harmony as God's way will be enforced and welcomed. Jesus promises to return to save life (Matt 24:22). While we wait, let us determine to be part of the solution and not part of the problems.