Ehrlich said in 1969, "If I were a gambler, I would take even money that England will not exist in the year 2000." His view was that overpopulation would cause war, plague, or disastrous resource scarcity.
"Complaining that Ehrlich made wild statements without ever facing the "consequences of being wrong," Simon said, "I'll put my money where my mouth is" and asked Ehrlich to do the same. Rather than betting on the future existence of England, Simon challenged Ehrlich to bet on raw material prices" to test his theory that the world was running out of resources due to overpopulation.
Ehrlich chose the raw materials to be tracked. If they went up in price over the next ten years, Simon would pay the difference to Ehrlich. If the minerals went down in price, Ehrlich would pay Simon.
In October of 1990, Julian Simon received a list of metal prices in the mail from Paul Ehrlich plus a check in the amount of $576.07.
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