Swarming masses of humanity will consume all the earth's resources by the late '90s, and that we would all starve.	Before I've even made it to 40, I have faced and survived the End of the World three times over. First, in the '60s, I boldly prevailed over a coming Ice Age that scientists promised would exterminate all humankind. Books were written about it. People fretted and worried. Then, in the '70s, I stared down the menace of overpopulation. Serious pundits predicted that swarming masses of humanity would consume all the earth's resources by the late '90s, and that we would all starve. I'm still here. The horror of nuclear devastation seemed certain in the '80s. I met it head-on, and once again I emerged victorious. Although, I must admit, the post-apocalyptic world depicted in "The Day After" looked kind of cool, and maybe would have been fun to live in. Of course, my long battle to stay alive is not yet over. Now, according to almost everybody, including Al Gore and the pony-tailed kid who showed up at my door this morning begging on behalf of Greenpeace, I must bring down society itself in order to save the globe from the greenhouse effect. Al's book, "Earth in the Balance" -- published a few years ago, and read by several people -- says that despite populations in the decadent West living longer than ever before, enjoying far better health, and driving nicer cars, we are Doomed. The Greenhouse Effect is coming. Lots of people believe in the Greenhouse Effect, although a giant chunk of the scientific community doubts it. Not being trained in science, I employ my own infallible method to divine the rights and wrongs of the issue. And that is this: pony-tailed kids and Al Gore are wrong about most everything, so they're most likely wrong about this latest, greatest End of the Earth. Simple? Sure. I'm a simple person, with simple hopes and dreams, a simple life, and simple addictions to caffeine, tobacco, and alcohol. What I'm not is a religious person. And greenhouse is all about religion, or at least faith.
	Greenhouse is all about religion, or at least faith.	Just as Christian zealots rely on Wise Men (priests) to interpret for them something they cannot see or prove exists (God), so do greenhouse believers rely on Wise Men (those scientists who support the greenhouse theory) to interpret something they themselves cannot see or prove exists: the Effect itself. Just as most religions have as central to their beliefs mighty imagery of the earth's collapse, so do the works of Earth First!, Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth. And, just as some religions hold that mankind is fallen, so do greenhouse believers hold that mankind is responsible for all the awful changes to this planet. They are presented with the same dilemma that confronts fundamentalist Christians who believe the earth was formed in seven days: What about the dinosaurs? For the more literal-minded Bible readers, dinosaurs are a problem because they don't fit the made-in-a-week template. For Greenpeacers, who imagine man is the most destructive force on the planet, dinosaurs are a problem because somehow they all died without us having anything to do with it. Maybe we're not that important after all. The kid at the door didn't seem to much enjoy my religious analogies, mainly because I was shouting them at him as he ran away. To continue the debate, I was forced to call a hungover friend who happens to be active in environmentalism. "What is it you're trying to achieve?" I asked. He put the phone down and hunted for headache tablets before answering. "Well, it's simple," he said, eventually. "We want to minimize mankind's harm to the planet." "And that would mean returning the planet to the state it was in before man's appearance?" "Ideally, yes," he said. "That would be a perfect outcome."
	For Greenpeace, who imagines man's the most destructive force, dinosaurs are a problem because they all died without us having anything to do with it.	"But which state? The first Ice Age? Do you want the world to be as it was pre- or post-dinosaur? Would you prefer the earth to be as it was pre-life itself? Or maybe before the Big Bang? Why do you want to stop the planet changing now, in 1998, when all it has ever done -- since the dawn of time -- is change? And why is change only bad if it's caused by man instead of meteorites or volcanoes or the cooling of the earth's crust?" He hung up on me, not for the first time. He hates my arguments and regards them as intellectually dishonest. Also, I think he needed to vomit. A good question when dealing with people who claim to be acting out of concern for others is: "What's in it for you?" Journalists these days seem unwilling to ask it of environmentalists, who generally get a free run. Some on the far-right claim environmentalism is a Trojan horse commandeered by old Commies out to undermine capitalism. They call Greenpeace and other groups "watermelons": green on the outside, red on the inside. But the chanting folk who feature at the lower levels of most environmental protest movements don't look very political to me. They look religious. The more extreme celebrate something they identify as the "Earth Spirit." Being good zealots, they agree with the science that supports their beliefs and ignore the science that disputes it. Scientists who find flaws in the greenhouse theory -- and there are plenty -- are labeled "dissidents," as though they are attacking scripture instead of data.
	Scientists who find flaws in the greenhouse theory are labeled "dissidents," as though they are attacking scripture instead of data.	What's in it for environmentalists? My enviro-pals say they are motivated by the quest to preserve nature's beauty, or to keep the planet livable for future generations. They question the right of humankind to condemn various species of flora and fauna to extinction. All fine aims, I suppose. But my guess -- and it's only a guess, because no environmentalist would ever say it -- is that their true motivation lies in the same righteous feeling of superiority which infects the religious. It's the intoxicating sensation of Knowing The One Great Truth. And the fun of shoving it down everybody else's throat. Well, I don't buy it. Here is the ultimate heretical statement of the '90s: Even if the Greenhouse Effect is real, it's not important. It's just another change. Objectively, the heating of the planet by manmade means is no better or worse than any other of the billions of changes which have occurred so far in the earth's history. Change caused islands to appear; another change, caused by the Greenhouse Effect, may swamp those islands. So what? This is the earth; it changes. Change is this planet's only constant. That, and eternal predictions of the End of the World. See you in church, greenies. That is, once I've finished building my hut in the woods, where I plan to ride out the Y2K disaster which surely will bring all civilization to its knees. God, will the end never stop?