EDITORIAL
Earth Day Revisited
Editor: Russell F. Christman Associate Editor: Charles R. O’Melia WASHINGTON EDITORIAL STAFF Managing Editor, Stanton S.Miller Associate Editor: Julian Josephson Assistant Editor: Lois R. Ember MANUSCRIPT REVIEWING Manager: Katherine I. Biggs Assistant Editor: David Hanson Editorial Assistant: Karen A. McGrane MANUSCRIPT EDITING Associate Production Manager. Charlotte C. Sayre Assistant Editor: Nancy J. Oddenino Assistant Editor: Gloria L. Dinote GRAPHICS AND PRODUCTION Production Manager: Leroy L. Corcoran Art Director: Norman Favin Artist: Linda M. Mattingly -~
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It is said that today is the age of environmental realism in the U.S. The evangelism of the 1970 movement for environmental reform has subsided and in its wake lie increased awareness of pollution and a growing sense that contamination at some level and some price is an unavoidable consequence of an industrial society. We have told ourselves that we can clean up if we want to (we got to the moon, didn’t we?), and a certain caution about overregulation has settled in-clean up so long as we don’t lose things of “real” value such as energy supplies, new commodities, and industrial growth. Even the Club of Rome is softening its gloomy global predictions. Have we buried our heads in the sand and ignored the heart of the issues raised so vociferously six or seven years ago? We must admit that we haven’t seriously examined our dependence on growth and consumption as the basis of our life style. We have, instead, attempted through complex, burdensome, and costly legislation to clean up the effluvia resulting from our seemingly insatiable material appetites. We have tinkered with only one end of the pipe in cleaning our water and air. In fact, the cleanup has even been justified by the growth stimulation it has provided to the new pollution control industry. The Ehrlichs, Commoners, Carsons, and Udalls were not talking so much about dirty water and air as they were about the consumptive attitudes that created them. Can the whole world live the way we do? They cannot be blamed for wanting to, and the moral basis for our foreign policy demands that we assist them in reaching this goal. If they cannot, how will we explain to them that they should continue to supply us with the raw materials for our comfort? How long will we be able to export food to pay for resources we cannot produce ourselves? How long will our influence last in the face of these unanswered questions? President-elect Carter has promised us a national energy policy. This is long overdue and should entail deep and serious social as well as technical deliberations. Let’s hope that it will be based upon a philosophical recognition that material growth is not inherently good, and that the quality of life for each of us means much, much more than clean water and breathable air.
For author’s guide and editorial policy, see June 1976 issue, page 553, or write Katherine I. Biggs, Manuscript Reviewing Office €S&T
Volume 10, Number 13, December 1976
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