Tomorrow is Earth Day, so happy Earth Day to you and to our earth. It’s been forty years since the first Earth Day and we’ve learned a lot since then. Here are some rules to living a life that is guided by science and not by myths from the book “Whole Earth Discipline.”

1. Climate change is a huge issue today. When Earth Day was established we weren’t good climate models. We didn’t then predict it. People thought the bigger issues would be overpopulation and that this would lead to our being wiped out.

2. New technology can have side effects. Anti-nuclear power “led to more reliance on electricity generated by coal plants spewing carbon.” We got “industrial agriculture” but that “led to the lower-yield farms that require more acreage, leaving less woodland to protect wildlife and absorb carbon.”

3. Organic food – food for the rich? Organic food hasn’t been shown to be any healthier or more nutritious than non organic. If people eat organic they spend more on food and have to make tough choices. When green marketers tried to get people in Zambia to choose organic, they did — at a cost. Their children eat fewer fruits and vegetables — and sometimes nothing at all. Zambia rejected emergency food for starving citizens because the grain had been genetically engineered.

“Total reliance on organic farming would force African countries to devote twice as much land per crop as we do in the United States,” he writes. “An organic universe sounds delightful, but it could consign millions of people in Africa and throughout much of Asia to malnutrition and death.”

Want more tips for a better environment? Check out this story in the New York Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/20/science/20tier.html

Happy Earth Day from Rubberecycle! We turn recycled tires into practical and safe solutions for playgrounds, landscaping and more.