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book1968

The Population Bomb

Disciplines:
ecology
environment
population
catastrophism

Summary

Paul Ehrlich's 1968 bestseller — predicting mass starvation from overpopulation in the 1970s–80s — which proved incorrect but triggered the modern environmental movement and is the most cited example of catastrophist prediction failure.

Core Contribution

Creates the modern population catastrophism argument — The Population Bomb synthesized Malthusian logic with 1960s ecology data to produce the most widely read environmental warning of the 20th century; its failure (due to agricultural technology and demographic transition) is the most important case study in how technological progress confounds linear catastrophic projections.

Historical Influences

Thomas Malthus Fairfield Osborn

Intellectual Lineage

Paul Ehrlich Sierra Club/Ballantine

Allied Works

The Limits to Growth The Ultimate Resource

Contemporaries & Peers

No recorded contemporaries.

Minds Influenced

Environmental movement Zero Population Growth movement

Intellectual Posterity

The Population Bomb Environmental catastrophism Simon-Ehrlich Wager

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