X-Message-Number: 21996 From: "Mark Plus" <> Subject: Julian Simon's fishy extrapolation Date: Sun, 15 Jun 2003 16:16:42 -0700 On page 104 of Julian Simon's book, _The Ultimate Resource 2_ (1996 edition), Simon writes: "Fish crops are not fundamentally different from field crops. Based on a few years of data, the Global 2000 Report issued the influential forecast that the world fish catch had hit its limit -- 'leveled off in the 1970s at about 70 million metric tons a year'. But by 1988 the catch had reached 98 million tons a year, and it is still rising rapidly. "No limit to the harvest of wild varieties of seafood is in sight." Basically Simon's book makes all sorts of naive, unbounded extrapolations like this. His "methodology" applied to the growth of the Internet based on mid-1990's data would have led to the prediction that 1000% of the world's population, or some comparably nonsensical figure, would be online by now. Meanwhile, back in environmental reality: http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99993829 Last chance for European cod 16:48 13 June 03 NewScientist.com news service Cod fishing in northern Europe must be totally abandoned, because fish populations are on the brink of collapse, say the scientists who advise the European Commission. Their warning is the strongest warning yet - if fishing does not stop, and stay stopped for up to 12 years, the fishery will be destroyed. The EC issued a rescue plan for the cod stocks in May, and asked the International Council for the Exploration of the Seas, based in Copenhagen, Denmark, to evaluate it. The plan's key proposal is to reduce the number and power of fishing boats fishing the North Sea, Irish Sea, Kattegat and west of Scotland, where stocks are most endangered. But the reply from ICES is blunt - the plan will not work. "While gear restrictions in the plan should help the stocks to recover, they are not in themselves sufficient to bring about the required increase in cod," ICES warns in a statement issued on Friday. Instead, "cod fisheries should remain closed until a marked increase in spawning stock biomass (SSB) becomes evident", it says. The SSB is the estimated tonnage of cod old enough to reproduce. Smallest ever In research voyages in 2003, ICES discovered that the cod SSB in various regions is even lower, by up to 66 per cent, than predictions it made in 2002 suggested. Furthermore, in the North Sea, the SSB for cod and the 2003 crop of mature cod is the smallest ever. Even on the basis of 2002's higher estimates, ICES recommended in October that cod fishing in these waters should stop completely. But fearing protests from fishermen, the EC proposed only a 65 per cent cut for North Sea cod. And in a stormy session in December, EU fisheries ministers reduced this cut to 45 per cent. Now, says ICES chief fisheries adviser Hans Lassen, the fishery may be at the point where, like the cod off Newfoundland, even if fishing stops, the fish may never come back. "We cannot guarantee these fisheries have not reached that point. We can only stop fishing, and see," Lassen told New Scientist. Even then, it would take at least five and possibly 12 years for the population to recover to sustainable levels. European fisheries Commissioner Franz Fischler warned the European Parliament on Tuesday that new scientific evidence showed the state of cod stocks was "catastrophic". He has the power to shut the fishery for six months. But even if he does, Europe's fisheries ministers could insist on a resumption immediately afterwards. Debora MacKenzie ----------------------------------------- Mark Plus _________________________________________________________________ MSN 8 helps eliminate e-mail viruses. Get 2 months FREE*. http://join.msn.com/?page=features/virus Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=21996