A Critique of Beisner's Main Arguments

In summary, Beisner (a) narrows and reduces his argument to only a couple of aspects and ignores all others; (b) ignores the human sinfulness that makes our economic activity harmful.

Here are some of his arguments, with my response (I intend to add more as I come across them).

• He argues from Genesis 1 that human beings are made in the image of God and therefore should act like God does. AB: OK.

• He argues that God is an "intelligent, creative, productive worker" (and therefore that this is what we should seek to image.) AB: But the entire Scripture reveals the True God as much more than those aspects. Is not God just, compassionate, communicative, relatable, patient, love, and much more? Beisner seems to give these much less importance, especially in his belief about what humans should be and do ...

• He argues that because God is like this, the chief and main thing that humans should be and do is to be "intelligent, creative, productive workers". AB: But that seems to trump all else. If we curb that, he seems to be arguing, we are going against what God intended for us. It means for example that we should not, our of compassion, reduce our climate emissions that are damaging the poor in Sub-Saharan Africa and will do so more in future.

• By "productivity" he especially includes economic activity, especially activity that is growing. He argues that economic growth is almost unmitigated good. AB: But a lot of our economic activity is harmful, not good and is not necessary (see Good, Harmful and Useless).

• He attacks the Ehrlich 'equation' of

  I = P * A * T

  in which I is negative impact of humans on the Earth, P is population, A is affluence and T is technology. He argues that Ehrlich is wrong in holding I to be negative, and that the impact of humans is positive, especially because in our being productive we image God and therefore it should never be curbed. AB: However, while this might be nearly true of the pre-Fall situation and even post-Eschaton, it is NOT true now, because of human sin. The economic activity we do now is sinful and harmful. That is why though some of it might be positive, it is mostly negative, because the human heart is "deceitful above all things". This is a major flaw in Beisner.

What all this means is that his arguments (that we should reject environmentaism and go against calls to reduce consumption in affluent cultures) are themselves flawed - and so we should resist his arguments. My comments above show his arguments to be based on false assumptions and presuppositions, and therefore highly dangerous if followed.

See the links below for more detailed discussion of Cornwall.

See Also

• Analysis of the Cornwall Declaration - three levels of reading it: intuitive, uncovering assumptions, and detail.
• Analysis of the Cornwall Alliance's A Renewed Call - mainly detailed.

• In Defence of Cal DeWitt and his Song of a Scientist - against Beisner's criticism of him. Especially, see the Conclusion in which I find the character of Beisner's argument deeply flawed and wonder whether Beisner is worth listening to.

• Climate Change for Those Who Love Jesus (Youtube)

• Climate Change and Global Economy - the whole site in which this page is situated.

• A [Christian] foundation for rethinking economics.

This page, "abxn.org/ccge/beisner.html", is an expression of part of a project to understand the links between climate change, global economy and other matters including society's beliefs and aspirations. It is designed to stimulate thinking and discourse. Comments, queries welcome.

This page is written on behalf of the CCGE Group by Andrew Basden, but the views expressed herein are his and not necessarily those of the other members of the Group. Written on the Amiga with Protext in the style of classic HTML. Copyright (c) Andrew Basden all dates below, but you may use this material subject to certain conditions.

Created: 30 March 2026 Last updated: 2 June 2026 some minor corrections, and more to productivity, link to ecx; code style.