Just out of interest though it makes me wonder if this guy has broken any laws  as he basically advocating genocide biowarfare and terrorism.
Thats an arrestable offence in the UK under anti terror laws dont know about the US though.

I do not think it is an offense (YET) in the USA but that never stopped our Government from arresting a dissenting party.  Look at what happened to Jose Padilla.  He spent 3 years in a military jail before he was charged this year for plotting to build & detonate a "dirty bomb".  Here is some more information:

http://www.lonnypaul.com/lonny.paul/200 … etainment/

If the evidence was there he should have been charged immediately.   Waiting this long does not do anything for my confidence in the Government and its intent to do the right thing.

Regards,

Lee

When it's my time to go, it's my time to go.

Here is a related article that comes with a video

If somebody wants to release a biological agent to cull the herd, I have no control over that. All I can do is live a good life in accordance with my own true nature and the nature of the planet. It seems to me that massive numbers of people are soon going to die off anyway, due to the rate at which we've been consuming natural resources, and due to our overdependence on technology. When the crutches of civilization and technology are pulled out from under us, (which has to happen at some point in an unsustainable culture) we're going to have to deal with nature on her terms, and most of us don't know how to do that. Therefore, most of us will die. So many civilizations have overextended themselves and imploded, eating up the forests and then conquering their neighbors until there's nothing left and the citizens starve, get sick, and die. It seems that a person should know how to live off the land, not only in order to avoid such catastrophes, but in order to live according to his nature as a human being.

Top Scientist Advocates Mass Culling 90% Of Human Population
Fellow professors and scientists applause and roar approval at elite's twisted and genocidal population control agenda

Paul Joseph Watson & Alex Jones/Prison Planet.com | April 3 2006

A top scientist gave a speech to the Texas Academy of Science last month in which he advocated the need to exterminate 90% of the population through the airborne ebola virus. Dr. Eric R. Pianka's chilling comments, and their enthusiastic reception again underscore the elite's agenda to enact horrifying measures of population control.

Pianka's speech was ordered to be kept off the record before it began as cameras were turned away and hundreds of students, scientists and professors sat in attendance.

Saying the public was not ready to hear the information presented, Pianka began by exclaiming, “We're no better than bacteria!� , as he jumped into a doomsday malthusian rant about overpopulation destroying the earth.

Standing in front of a slide of human skulls, Pianka gleefully advocated airborne ebola as his preferred method of exterminating the necessary 90% of humans, choosing it over AIDS because of its faster kill period. Ebola victims suffer the most tortuous deaths imaginable as the virus kills by liquefying the internal organs. The body literally dissolves as the victim writhes in pain bleeding from every orifice.

Pianka then cited the Peak Oil fraud as another reason to initiate global genocide. “And the fossil fuels are running out,�  he said, “so I think we may have to cut back to two billion, which would be about one-third as many people.�

Later, the scientist welcomed the potential devastation of bird flu and spoke glowingly of China's enforced one child policy, before zestfully commenting, “We need to sterilize everybody on the Earth.�

At the end of Pianka's speech the audience erupted not to a chorus of boos and hisses but to a raucous reception of applause and cheers as audience members clammered to get close to the scientist to ask him follow up questions. Pianka was later presented with a distinguished scientist award by the Academy. Pianka is no crackpot. He has given lectures to prestigious universities worldwide.

One horrified observer was able to make notes on the speech and our gratitude goes to Forrest M. Mims for bringing this sickening display to the attention of the world.

Throughout history elites have invented justification for barbaric practices as a cover for their true agenda of absolute power and control over populations. Up until the 19th century, the transatlantic slave trade was justified by saying that the practice was biblical and therefore morally redeemable in nature, despite the fact that no such bible passage exists.

From 1932 until 1972, the Tuskegee Study Group (pictured below) deliberately infected poor black communities in Alabama with syphilis without their consent and withheld treatment as the diseased rampaged through the town killing families.

Pianka's doomsday warning of the population bomb, for which Mims claims he presented no evidence whatsoever, is complete pseudo-science. Populations in developed countries are declining and only in third world countries is it expanding dramatically. Industrialization itself levels out population trends and even despite this world population models routinely show that the earth's population will level out at 9 billion in 2050 and slowly decline after that. "The population of the most developed countries will remain virtually unchanged at 1.2 billion until 2050," states a United Nations report. Conservation International's own study revealed that 46% of the earth's surface was an untouched wilderness, that is land areas not including sea. It is commonly accepted that the entire world population could all fit into the state of Texas and each have an acre of their own land.

Think about the magnitude of Pianka's statements. He wants to kill nine out of every ten members of your family and he wants to kill them in one of the most painful and agonizing ways imaginable.

If Pianka, or 'The Lizard Man' as he likes to be called, is so vehement in the necessity of culling the human population will he step forward to be the first one in line? Will he sacrifice his children for the so-called greater good of the planet? We somehow doubt it.

Will the students who so enthusiastically greeted his ideas go home and kill themselves for the cause if it is so righteous?

It was noted how Pianka presented his argument with the kind of glee that you would see in a demented serial killer before dispatching his victim. This is an attitude we have encountered again and again. To discuss killing 90% of the world's population via a horrific plague is sick enough within itself but you would at least expect its advocates to be serious and sober in their approach to the subject. The opposite seems to be the case, where the subject is aired in a context of lighthearted lip-smacking and hand-rubbing as if the individual was about to sink his teeth into a T-bone steak.

This window gives us a clear view of exactly why these deranged bastards encompass this ideology. They love death and their lives are motivated by dark influences very different to you or I.

In the 21st century the elite are concerned that from over 6 billion people might spring a new elite to challenge their stranglehold on the reigns of power. This is one reason for desire to cull the population down to a manageable level. Another is control over the behavior of the existing serfs and herding them like cattle into the slaughter house.

As we have documented, members of the elite are quite open in their feverish lust to commit mass murder and ethnic cleansing. In the foreword to his biography If I Were An Animal, Prince Philip wrote, "In the event that I am reincarnated, I would like to return as a deadly virus, in order to contribute something to solve overpopulation."

National Security Memo 200, dated April 24, 1974, and titled "Implications of world wide population growth for U.S. security & overseas interests," says:

"Dr. Henry Kissinger proposed in his memorandum to the NSC that "depopulation should be the highest priority of U.S. foreign policy towards the Third World." He quoted reasons of national security, and because `(t)he U.S. economy will require large and increasing amounts of minerals from abroad, especially from less-developed countries ... Wherever a lessening of population can increase the prospects for such stability, population policy becomes relevant to resources, supplies and to the economic interests of U.S."

Kissinger prepared a depopulation manifesto for President Jimmy Carter called 'Global 2000' which detailed using food as a weapon to depopulate the third world.

One of the most chilling admissions of deadly intent came from the lips of the late Jacques Cousteau, the sainted environmental icon. In an interview with the UNESCO Courier for November 1991 the famed oceanographer said:

"The damage people cause to the planet is a function of demographics – it is equal to the degree of development. One American burdens the earth much more than twenty Bangaladeshes. The damage is directly linked to consumption. Our society is turning toward more and needless consumption. It is a vicious circle that I compare to cancer...."

"This is a terrible thing to say. In order to stabilize world population, we must eliminate 350,000 people per day. It is a horrible thing to say, but it’s just as bad not to say it."

The Melbourne Age reported on recently uncovered documents detailing Nobel Peace Prize winning microbiologist Sir Macfarlane Burnet's plan to help the Australian government develop biological weapons for use against Indonesia and other "overpopulated" countries of South-East Asia.

Pianka's ideology is in the same league as Hitler, Pol Pot, and the rest of history's despots who advocated mass extermination and had the temerity to dress it up in a 'noble' Straussian facade. We demand that he be investigated for openly calling for mass murder and in the meantime we encourage everyone to click here and e mail Pianka, enabling him to receive your feedback about his wish to kill your children.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Eric R. Pianka:

His initials are ERP, which, around these parts, means someone has 'lost their lunch'

pianka@mail.utexas.edu 512-471-7472

http://uts.cc.utexas.edu/~varanus/eric.html

http://uts.cc.utexas.edu/~varanus/obit.html (this arrogant jerk has written his own obituary; he has not died -- has two brothers, a sister, two daughters, two ex-wives... so, it's okay for this jerk to make ripples in the gene pool, but not for others ... would he exterminate his daughters? Has a small herd of American bison; the head bull is named Lucifer.) "Eric Pianka can be reached at eric.pianka@heaven/hell.com"

Pianka's Ten Commandments: http://uts.cc.utexas.edu/~varanus/moses.html

http://www.biosci.utexas.edu/IB/faculty/Pianka.htm

photo from the sixties: http://uts.cc.utexas.edu/~varanus/ERPwfalcon.gif

Born in Hilt, California, January 23, 1939 (near here)

It appears that one of his daughters is Margaret Pwerle, whose mother is an Aussie, Kathleen Petyarre, though there is no mention of Mister Pianka ever marrying Petyarre.

There is mention elsewhere on the Internet of one of his two ex-wives, Helen.

Biography
Eric R. Pianka was born in Hilt, California on 23 January 1939. Pianka earned a B. A. from Carleton College in 1960, a Ph.D. from the University of Washington in Seattle in 1965, and the D. Sc. degree or his collected works in 1990 from the University of Western Australia. He was a postdoctoral with Robert H. MacArthur at Princeton University during 1966-68. He is currently the Denton A. Cooley Centennial Professor of Zoology at the University of Texas in Austin, where he has taught evolutionary ecology since 1968.

Pianka was Managing Editor of the American Naturalist from 1971 - 1974, and was on the editorial boards of the American Naturalist, BioScience, National Geographic Research, and Research and Exploration. He has presented hundreds of invited lectures at most of the world's major academic institutions as well as a plenary lecture on the state of the art of community ecology at the First World Congress of Herpetology in 1989. During his 30+ year academic career, Eric Pianka published more than a hundred scientific papers, four of which became "Citation Classics," as well as dozens of invited articles, book chapters, and a dozen books including an autobiography. His textbook Evolutionary Ecology, first published in 1974 and currently in its fifth edition, has been translated into Japanese, Polish, Russian and Spanish and is currently being translated into Chinese and Italian. Consu lt his home page http://uts.cc.utexas.edu/~varanus/eric.html for further details.

more info here

His co-author, Laurie J. Vitt, is a guy.

See this photo, whose caption reads: "'Lizards: Windows to the Evolution of Diversity,' written by Eric Pianka and Laurie Vitt, won the top prize at the 2005 Hamilton Book Awards, given to the best book published by a University of Texas at Austin faculty or staff member in 2004. Pianka, left, shares the applause with Vitt, a professor the the University of Oklahoma. Looking on is Michael Granof, the chairman of the board of the University Co-operative Society, the sponsor of the awards.'" http://www.utexas.edu/research/profiles … ianka2.jpg

Source: "Eric Pianka and Laurie Vitt: Research Profile" http://www.utexas.edu/research/profiles/pianka.html

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

U Of Texas Professor Says
Mass Death Is Imminent

By Jamie Mobley
The Seguin Gazette-Enterprise
4-3-6

AUSTIN -- A University of Texas professor says the Earth would be better off with 90 percent of the human population dead.

"Every one of you who gets to survive has to bury nine," Eric Pianka cautioned students and guests at St. Edward's University on Friday. Pianka's words are part of what he calls his "doomsday talk" - a 45-minute presentation outlining humanity's ecological misdeeds and Pianka's predictions about how nature, or perhaps humans themselves, will exterminate all but a fraction of civilization.

Though his statements are admittedly bold, he's not without abundant advocates. But what may set this revered biologist apart from other doomsday soothsayers is this: Humanity's collapse is a notion he embraces.

Indeed, his words deal, very literally, on a life-and-death scale, yet he smiles and jokes candidly throughout the lecture. Disseminating a message many would call morbid, Pianka's warnings are centered upon awareness rather than fear.

"This is really an exciting time," he said Friday amid warnings of apocalypse, destruction and disease. Only minutes earlier he declared, "Death. This is what awaits us all. Death." Reflecting on the so-called Ancient Chinese Curse, "May you live in interesting times," he wore, surprisingly, a smile.

So what's at the heart of Pianka's claim?

6.5 billion humans is too many.

In his estimation, "We've grown fat, apathetic and miserable," all the while leaving the planet parched.

The solution?

A 90 percent reduction.

That's 5.8 billion lives - lives he says are turning the planet into "fat, human biomass."

He points to an 85 percent swell in the population during the last 25 years and insists civilization is on the brink of its downfall - likely at the hand of widespread disease.

"[Disease] will control the scourge of humanity," Pianka said. "We're looking forward to a huge collapse."

But don't tell local "citizen scientist" Forrest Mims to quietly swallow Pianka's call to awareness. Mims says it's an "abhorrent death wish" and contends he has "no choice but to take a stand."

Mims attended the educator's doomsday presentation at the Texas Academy of Science's annual meeting March 2-4. There, the organization honored Pianka as its 2006 Distinguished Texas Scientist - another issue Mims vocally opposes.

"This guy is a loose cannon to believe that worldwide genocide is the only answer," said Mims, who filed two formal petitions with the academy following the meeting.

Joining the crusade, James Pitts, who recieved a Ph.D. in physics from UT-Austin, became the second to publicly chastise Pianka when he filed a complaint Saturday with the UT board of regents. He insists a state university is no place to disseminate such views.

He writes:

"Pianka's message does not fall within the realm of his professional competence as a biologist, because it is a normative claim, not a descriptive one. Pianka is encouraged to use his ecological expertise to predict the likely consequences of certain technological and reproductive strategies, but to evaluate some as good, bad, or worthy of prevention by genocide is the realm of philosophy or political science, not science. His message falls no more within his professional competence than it would for a physicist to teach religion in class or a musician to encourage racism. ‚"

But Pianka, a 38-year UT educator, maintains he's not campaigning for genocide. He likens mankind's story to an unbridled party on a luxury cruise liner. The fun's going strong on the upper deck, he says. But as crowds blindly absorb the festivities, many fail to notice the ship is sinking.

"The biggest enemy we face is anthropocentrism," he said, describing the belief system in which humans are the central element of the universe. "This is that common attitude that everything on this Earth was put here for [human] use."

To Pianka, a human life is no more valuable than any other - a lizard, a bison, a rhino. And as humans reproduce, the demand for resources like food, water and energy becomes more than the Earth can sustain, he says.

Ken Wilkins, a Baylor University biology professor and associate dean, agrees the inevitability of a crashing point is unarguable.

"The human population is growing," he said. "We will see a point when we reach the carrying capacity - there aren't enough resources."

But resources aren't the only threat, Pianka says. It's the Ebola virus he deems most capable of wide scale decimation.

"Humans are so dense (in population) that they constitute a perfect substrate for an epidemic," he says.

He contends Ebola is merely an evolutionary step away from escaping the confines of Africa. And should an outbreak occur, Pianka assuredly says humanity will quickly come to a "grinding halt."

The professor's not the only one who can articulate this concept. Because Pianka includes his doomsday material in his coursework, Ebola and its potential play a notable role in some students' studies. A syllabus for one course reads:

"Although [Ebola Zaire] Kills 9 out of 10 people, outbreaks have so far been unable to become epidemics because they are currently spread only by direct physical contact with infected blood. However, a closely-related virus that kills monkeys, Ebola Reston, is airborne, and it is only a matter of time until Ebola Zaire evolves the capacity to be airborne."

It is here that some say Pianka ventures from provocative food for thought to, as Wilkins said, "very extreme material" that violate many people's views - including his own - about the treatment of human life. While many praise Pianka's boldness and scientific know-how, others say he crosses an ethical line in his treatment of Ebola's viability as a killer.

In an evaluation of Pianka's course - performed anonymously in keeping with university policy - one student offered:

"Though I agree that conservation biology is of utmost importance to the world, I do not think that preaching that 90 percent of the human population should die of Ebola is the most effective means of encouraging conservation awareness."

Mims says he's seen countless doomsday predictions come and go. But Pianka's is different, Mims said. Pianka, he insists, exhibits genuine cause for alarm.

Mims worries fertile young minds with a thirst for knowledge may develop into enthusiastic supporters of a deadly disease, advocating the fall of humanity.

"He recommended airborne Ebola as an ideal killing virus," Mims said. "He showed slides of the Four Horsemen of the apocalypse and human skulls. He joked about requiring universal sterilization. It reminded me of a futuristic science fiction movie with a crazed scientist planning the death of humanity."

But as confident as Mims is in his assessment, he faces one unarguable fact: Most of Pianka's former students are bursting with praise. Their in-class evaluations celebrate his ideas with words like "the most incredible class I ever had" and "Pianka is a GOD!"

Mims counters their ovation with the story of a Texas Lutheran University student who attended the Academy of Science lecture. Brenna McConnell, a biology senior, said she and others in the audience "had not thought seriously about overpopulation issues and a feasible solution prior to the meeting." But though McConnell arrived at the event with little to say on the issue, she returned to Seguin with a whole new outlook.

An entry to her online blog captures her initial response to what's become a new conviction:

"[Pianka is] a radical thinker, that one!" she wrote. "I mean, he's basically advocating for the death for all but 10 percent of the current population. And at the risk of sounding just as radical, I think he's right."

Today, she maintains the Earth is in dire straits. And though she's decided Ebola isn't the answer, she's still considering other deadly viruses that might take its place in the equation.

"Maybe I just see the virus as inevitable because it's the easiest answer to this problem of overpopulation," she said.

Though listeners like McConnell may walk away with a deadly message, Pianka maintains this is inconsistent with his lecture. One UT official said Pianka is likely well within his rights as a tenured educator.

The 1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure - a set of guidelines recognized nationwide - guarantees college professors vast classroom liberties. But Neal Armstrong, vice provost for faculty affairs at UT, said even this freedom is not without limits.

"Faculty members have the right of free speech like anyone else," he said. "In the classroom, they're free to express their views. There is the expectation, though, that in public - especially when speaking on controversial topics - they must make every effort to be clear that they are not speaking on behalf of the university."

Students should be able to discern on their own the validity of views like Pianka's, Armstrong said. But if allegations of Pianka actively advocating human death were to be confirmed, he said "there might be some discussion about the appropriateness of that subject."

"I would hope that's not what's intended," he said. "I don't think that's appropriate for the classroom, but that's my personal statement."

Robert K. Jansen, chair of the section of integrated biology under which Pianka is classified, said his understanding of the doomsday material left no cause for concern.

"It's important for students to get all opinions, and they have to do that on a daily basis," he said. To hold a classroom's attention, Jansen says educators must often "speak their mind" in a fashion bold enough to garner a bit of shock.

The Texas Academy of Science uses a similar approach in defending its decision to honor Pianka with the Distinguished Scientist award. Though TAS offered no direct comment to the Gazette-Enterprise, an email sent from TAS President David Marsh to Mims in response to Mims first letter of protest reads:

"We select the DTS speaker based on his/her academic credentials and contributions to science. We do not mandate the subject he/she decides to address, nor will we ever. I would suggest that one of the purposes of any such presentation is to stimulate discussion - which indeed it did."

In his petitions, Mims inquires about the group's stance on Pianka's talk, asking if the recent honor should be interpreted as an endorsement by TAS. Marsh responded firmly, saying the award does not represent any formal backing of Pianka's ideas.

But despite the academy's flat denial of any wrongdoing, Mims maintains his stance. He said thus far, he's seen no response to the second petition.

"I completely agree with one assertion made several times by Dr. Pianka: 'The public is not ready to hear that he hopes 90 percent of them will be exterminated by disease,'" Mims said.

McConnell said the TAS audience, unlike Mims, was in awe of Pianka ‚'s words. They offered a standing ovation, and enthusiastically applauded Pianka's position, Mims said.

"There was a good deal of shock and just plain astonishment at what he had to say," the student said. "Not many folk come out and talk about the end of the human population in as candid of a manner as he did. Dr. Pianka received a standing ovation at the end of his talk, if that says anything. What he had to say was radical, no question about it, but that is not to say that at least some of what he had to say is not true."

Though Pianka turned down requests for a sit-down interview, he maintains he is not advocating human death.

Does he believe nature will bring about this promised devastation? Or is humanity's own dissemination of a deadly virus the only answer? And more importantly, is this the motive behind his talks?

Responding to these very questions, Pianka said, "Good terrorists would be taking [Ebola Roaston and Ebola Zaire] so that they had microbes they could let loose on the Earth that would kill 90 percent of people."

As of press time, Pitts - who sent his appeal via email Saturday - had received no response from the university, but he says, "It's too early for any responses to have been made." Meanwhile, Pianka urges humanity to heed his call to be prepared, saying "we're going to be hunters and gatherers again real soon."

"This is gonna happen in your lifetime," he told his St. Edward's audience. "Do you wanna go there? We've already gone there. We waited too long."

· Read more about Pianka by visiting his lab page at uts.cc.utexas.edu/~varanus/

· Read more about Forrest Mims at

www.forrestmims.org or visit the Citizen Scientist at http://www.sas.org/tcs/index.html

Editor's note: A correction was made to this story to reflect that while Pitts got his Ph.D. from the university, he is not a professor there.

Copyright © 2006 The Seguin Gazette-Enterprise

http://story.seguingazette.com/drudge.html
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http://www.sas.org/tcs/weeklyIssues_200 … index.html
(comment link available at this site)

31 March 2006

Recently citizen scientist Forrest Mims told me about a speech he heard at the Texas Academy of Science during which the speaker, a world-renowned ecologist, advocated for the extermination of 90 percent of the human species in a most horrible and painful manner. Apparently at the speaker's direction, the speech was not video taped by the Academy and so Forrest's may be the only record of what was said. Forrest's account of what he witnessed chilled my soul. Astonishingly, Forrest reports that many of the Academy members present gave the speaker a standing ovation. To date, the Academy has not moved to sanction the speaker or distance itself from the speaker's remarks.

If the professional community has lost its sense of moral outrage when one if their own openly calls for the slow and painful extermination of over 5 billion human beings, then it falls upon the amateur community to be the conscience of science.

Forrest, who is a member of the Texas Academy and chairs its Environmental Science Section, told me he would be unable to describe the speech in The Citizen Scientist because he has protested the speech to the Academy and he serves as Editor of The Citizen Scientist. Therefore, to preclude a possible conflict of interest, I have directed Forrest to describe what he observed and his reactions in this special feature, for which I have served as editor and which is being released a week ahead of our normal publication schedule.

Shawn Carlson, Ph.D.
MacArthur Fellow, Founder and Executive Director
Society for Amateur Scientists
Special Editorial: Dealing with Doctor Doom
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Meeting Doctor Doom
Forrest M. Mims III
Copyright 2006
by Forrest M. Mims III.

There is always something special about science meetings. The 109th meeting of the Texas Academy of Science at Lamar University in Beaumont on 3-5 March 2006 was especially exciting for me, because a student and his professor presented the results of a DNA study I suggested to them last year. How fulfilling to see the baldcypress ( Taxodium distichum ) leaves we collected last summer and my tree ring photographs transformed into a first class scientific presentation that's nearly ready to submit to a scientific journal (Brian Iken and Dr. Deanna McCullough, "Bald Cypress of the Texas Hill Country: Taxonomically Unique?" 109th Meeting of the Texas Academy of Science Program and Abstracts [ PDF ], Poster P59, p. 84, 2006).

But there was a gravely disturbing side to that otherwise scientifically significant meeting, for I watched in amazement as a few hundred members of the Texas Academy of Science rose to their feet and gave a standing ovation to a speech that enthusiastically advocated the elimination of 90 percent of Earth's population by airborne Ebola. The speech was given by Dr. Eric R. Pianka (Fig. 1), the University of Texas evolutionary ecologist and lizard expert who the Academy named the 2006 Distinguished Texas Scientist.

Something curious occurred a minute before Pianka began speaking. An official of the Academy approached a video camera operator at the front of the auditorium and engaged him in animated conversation. The camera operator did not look pleased as he pointed the lens of the big camera to the ceiling and slowly walked away.

This curious incident came to mind a few minutes later when Professor Pianka began his speech by explaining that the general public is not yet ready to hear what he was about to tell us. Because of many years of experience as a writer and editor, Pianka's strange introduction and the TV camera incident raised a red flag in my mind. Suddenly I forgot that I was a member of the Texas Academy of Science and chairman of its Environmental Science Section. Instead, I grabbed a notepad so I could take on the role of science reporter.

One of Pianka's earliest points was a condemnation of anthropocentrism, or the idea that humankind occupies a privileged position in the Universe. He told a story about how a neighbor asked him what good the lizards are that he studies. He answered, “What good are you?�  Pianka hammered his point home by exclaiming, “We're no better than bacteria!�  Pianka then began laying out his concerns about how human overpopulation is ruining the Earth. He presented a doomsday scenario in which he claimed that the sharp increase in human population since the beginning of the industrial age is devastating the planet. He warned that quick steps must be taken to restore the planet before it's too late.

Saving the Earth with Ebola Professor Pianka said the Earth as we know it will not survive without drastic measures. Then, and without presenting any data to justify this number, he asserted that the only feasible solution to saving the Earth is to reduce the population to 10 percent of the present number.

He then showed solutions for reducing the world's population in the form of a slide depicting the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. War and famine would not do, he explained. Instead, disease offered the most efficient and fastest way to kill the billions that must soon die if the population crisis is to be solved.

Pianka then displayed a slide showing rows of human skulls, one of which had red lights flashing from its eye sockets.

AIDS is not an efficient killer, he explained, because it is too slow. His favorite candidate for eliminating 90 percent of the world's population is airborne Ebola ( Ebola Reston ), because it is both highly lethal and it kills in days, instead of years. However, Professor Pianka did not mention that Ebola victims die a slow and torturous death as the virus initiates a cascade of biological calamities inside the victim that eventually liquefy the internal organs.

After praising the Ebola virus for its efficiency at killing, Pianka paused, leaned over the lectern, looked at us and carefully said, “We've got airborne 90 percent mortality in humans. Killing humans. Think about that.�  With his slide of human skulls towering on the screen behind him, Professor Pianka was deadly serious. The audience that had been applauding some of his statements now sat silent.

After a dramatic pause, Pianka returned to politics and environmentalism. But he revisited his call for mass death when he reflected on the oil situation.

“And the fossil fuels are running out,�  he said, “so I think we may have to cut back to two billion, which would be about one-third as many people.�  So the oil crisis alone may require eliminating two-third's of the world's population.

How soon must the mass dying begin if Earth is to be saved? Apparently fairly soon, for Pianka suggested he might be around when the killer disease goes to work. He was born in 1939, and his lengthy obituary appears on his web site.

When Pianka finished his remarks, the audience applauded. It wasn't merely a smattering of polite clapping that audiences diplomatically reserve for poor or boring speakers. It was a loud, vigorous and enthusiastic applause.

Questions for Dr. Doom Then came the question and answer session, in which Professor Pianka stated that other diseases are also efficient killers.

The audience laughed when he said, “You know, the bird flu's good, too.�  They laughed again when he proposed, with a discernable note of glee in his voice that, “We need to sterilize everybody on the Earth.�  After noting that the audience did not represent the general population, a questioner asked, "What kind of reception have you received as you have presented these ideas to other audiences that are not representative of us?"

Pianka replied, "I speak to the converted!"

Pianka responded to more questions by condemning politicians in general and Al Gore by name, because they do not address the population problem and "...because they deceive the public in every way they can to stay in power."

He spoke glowingly of the police state in China that enforces their one-child policy. He said, "Smarter people have fewer kids." He said those who don't have a conscience about the Earth will inherit the Earth, "...because those who care make fewer babies and those that didn't care made more babies." He said we will evolve as uncaring people, and "I think IQs are falling for the same reason, too."

With this, the questioning was over. Immediately almost every scientist, professor and college student present stood to their feet and vigorously applauded the man who had enthusiastically endorsed the elimination of 90 percent of the human population. Some even cheered. Dozens then mobbed the professor at the lectern to extend greetings and ask questions. It was necessary to wait a while before I could get close enough to take some photographs (Fig. 1).

I was assigned to judge a paper in a grad student competition after the speech. On the way, three professors dismissed Pianka as a crank. While waiting to enter the competition room, a group of a dozen Lamar University students expressed outrage over the Pianka speech.

Yet five hours later, the distinguished leaders of the Texas Academy of Science presented Pianka with a plaque in recognition of his being named 2006 Distinguished Texas Scientist. When the banquet hall filled with more than 400 people responded with enthusiastic applause, I walked out in protest.

Corresponding with Dr. Doom Recently I exchanged a number of e-mails with Pianka. I pointed out to him that one might infer his death wish was really aimed at Africans, for Ebola is found only in Central Africa. He replied that Ebola does not discriminate, kills everyone and could spread to Europe and the the Americas by a single infected airplane passenger.

In his last e-mail, Pianka wrote that I completely fail to understand his arguments. So I did a check and found verification of my interpretation of his remarks on his own web site. In a student evaluation of a 2004 course he taught, one of Professor Pianka's students wrote, "Though I agree that convervation [sic] biology is of utmost importance to the world, I do not think that preaching that 90% of the human population should die of ebola [sic] is the most effective means of encouraging conservation awareness." (Go here and scroll down to just before the Fall 2005 evaluation section near the end.) Yet the majority of his student reviews were favorable, with one even saying, ” I worship Dr. Pianka.�  The 45-minute lecture before the Texas Academy of Science converted a university biology senior into a Pianka disciple, who then published a blog that seriously supports Pianka's mass death wish.

Dangerous Times Let me now remove my reporter's hat for a moment and tell you what I think. We live in dangerous times. The national security of many countries is at risk. Science has become tainted by highly publicized cases of misconduct and fraud.

Must now we worry that a Pianka-worshipping former student might someday become a professional biologist or physician with access to the most deadly strains of viruses and bacteria? I believe that airborne Ebola is unlikely to threaten the world outside of Central Africa. But scientists have regenerated the 1918 Spanish flu virus that killed 50 million people. There is concern that small pox might someday return. And what other terrible plagues are waiting out there in the natural world to cross the species barrier and to which scientists will one day have access?

Meanwhile, I still can't get out of my mind the pleasant spring day in Texas when a few hundred scientists of the Texas Academy of Science gave a standing ovation for a speaker who they heard advocate for the slow and torturous death of over five billion human beings.

Forrest M. Mims III is Chairman of the Environmental Science Section of the Texas Academy of Science, and the editor of The Citizen Scientist. He and his science are featured online at www.forrestmims.org and www.sunandsky.org. The views expressed herein are his own and do not represent the official views of the Texas Academy of Science or the Society for Amateur Scientists.

Copyright 2006 by Forrest M. Mims III.

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Let these truths be indelibly impressed on our minds--that we cannot be happy without being free--that we cannot be free without being secure in our property--that we cannot be secure in our property if without our consent others may as by right take it away. - John Dickenson