Quote of the week...please share your favourite line from Ayn Rand's writings

“Happiness is that state of consciousness which proceeds from the achievement of one's values.”

Thursday, April 22, 2010

Exploit The Earth

Today is the 40th Anniversary of the Earth Day, which is a day meant to appreciate the Earth’s
environment. It is observed all over the world by anti-capitalist environmentalists. Their attitude is summed up by these words of Ayn Rand: “Do not upset the balance of nature-Do not
disturb the birds, the forests, the swamps, the oceans-Do not rock the boat-Do not experiment- Do not venture out-What was good enough for our anthropoid ancestors is good enough for us-adjust to the winds, the rains, the man-eating tigers, the malarial mosquitoes, the tsetse flies-do not rebel-do not anger the unknowable demons who rule it all.”

Craig Biddle on “The Objectivist Standard blog” is urging everyone to celebrate Exploit-the-Earth Day. He writes: “Exploiting the Earth—using the raw materials of nature for one’s life-serving purposes—is a basic requirement of human life. Either man takes the Earth’s raw materials—such as trees, petroleum, aluminum, and atoms—and transforms them into the requirements of his life, or he dies. To live, man must produce the goods on which his life depends; he must produce homes, automobiles, computers, electricity, and the like; he must seize nature and use it to his advantage. There is no escaping this fact. Even the allegedly “noble” savage must pick or perish.” He continues: “If the good is nature untouched by man, how is man to live? What is he to eat? What is he to wear? Where is he to reside? How can man do anything his life requires without altering, harming, or destroying some aspect of nature?”

Bjorn Lomberg also has written a wonderful piece on the subject: “In their [environmentalists]
view, "The world is in greater peril than ever." But consider this: In virtually every developed
country, the air is more breathable and the water is more drinkable than it was in 1970. In most
of the First World, deforestation has turned to reforestation. Moreover, the percentage of malnutrition has been reduced, and ever-more people have access to clean water and sanitation.” But, this is something environmentalists do not want to hear. They want to present the scenario as more scary than it is. Lomberg also unmasks the hypocrisy of the agenda of global warming alarmists: “In the minds of Earth Day activists, no environmental challenge is more urgent than the need to drastically cut carbon emissions in order to stop global warming. What about indoor air pollution, which happens to be the world's No. 1 environmental killer? In poor countries, 2.5 billion people rely on "biomass" — wood, waste and dung — to cook and keep themselves warm. This year, the resulting pollution will kill about 1.3 million of them, mainly women and children. Switching from biomass to fossil fuels would dramatically improve the lives of more than a third of the world's population.”

Fortunately as the alarmists are getting discredited, more and more people are waking up to the
truth.


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