Andy Rooney_ 60 Years of Wisdom and Wit - Andy Rooney [73]
I’ve worried about that. I guess we all have, and I wonder whether it’s true or not. The real question is, will we run out of the things we need to survive before we find substitutes for them? Of course, we’re going to run out of oil. Of course, we’re going to run out of coal. And it seems very likely that there will be no substantial forests left in another hundred years.
Argue with me. Say I’m wrong. Give me statistics proving there’s more oil left in the ground than we’ve already used. Tell me there’s coal enough in the United States to last seventy-five or a hundred years. Make me read the advertisements saying they’re planting more trees than they’re cutting.
I’ve read all those arguments and I’ll concede I may be wrong in suggesting impending doom, but if doom is not exactly impending, it’s somewhere down the line of years if we don’t find replacements for the basic materials we’re taking from the earth. What about five hundred years from now if one hundred doesn’t worry you? What about a thousand years from now? Will there be an oak tree left two feet in diameter? How much will it cost in a hundred years to buy an oak plank eight feet long, two inches thick and a foot wide? My guess is it will cost the equivalent in today’s money of a thousand dollars. A piece of oak like that will be treasured as diamonds are treasured today because of its rarity.
I don’t think there is a more difficult question we’re faced with than that of preservation. A large number of Americans feel we should use everything we have because things will work out. They are not necessarily selfish. They just don’t believe you can worry about the future much past your own grandchildren’s foreseeable life expectancy. They feel someone will find the answer. Pump the oil, mine the coal, cut the trees and take from the earth anything you can find there. There may not be more where that came from, but we’ll find something else, somewhere else, that will be a good substitute.
The preservationists, on the other hand, would set aside a lot of everything. They’d save the forests and reduce our dependency on coal and oil in order to conserve them as though no satisfactory substitutes would ever be found.
It’s too bad the argument between these groups is as bitter as it is, because neither wants to do, intentionally, what is wrong. The preservationists think business interests who want to use what they can find are greedy and short-sighted. Businessmen think the preservationists are, in their own way, short-sighted. (One of the strange things that has happened to our language is that people like the ones who run the oil companies are called “conservatives,” although they do not approve of conserving at all.)
All this comes to me now because I have just returned from Hawaii and seen what havoc unrestricted use can bring to an area. To my grandfather, Honolulu would probably look like the end of the world if he could see it now.
Design 157
We have just about used up the island of Oahu. Now we’re starting on Maui. Is it right or wrong? Do the hotels crowded along the beach not give great pleasure to large numbers of us? Would it be better to preserve the beauty of Hawaii by limiting the number of people allowed to be there? Would it be better if we saved the forests, the oil and the coal in the world and did without the things they provide? If there is middle ground, where is it?
The answer will have to come from someone smarter than I am. I want to save oil and drive a big car fast, I want to cut smoke pollution but burn coal to save oil, and I want to pursue my woodworking hobby without cutting down any trees.
Design
Last summer I made a chair. The wood was maple and cherry, and I invented what kind of a chair it was as I went along. When I finished, the chair looked great, but it has one shortcoming. It tips over backwards when anyone sits in it.
My design was