For the first time in history, the natural world we
leave our children will be frightfully worse than the one
we inherited from our parents. This isn’t just
because we’re using the planet as if there were no
tomorrow — that’s been going on for
centuries. It’s because the cumulative weight of
our past and present malfeasance has brought us to
several tipping points. Nature has her tolerance limits,
and we’ve reached many of them. In some cases, very
possibly, we’ve passed them.
Consider, for example, our atmosphere. It’s not
just today’s pollution that hurts, it’s the
accumulation of fumes we’ve been pouring into the
air for centuries. This has already caused ice caps to
melt, hurricanes to gain ferocity, and the Gulf Stream to
weaken. Almost universally, the world’s scientists
warn that far worse lies ahead. The question our
generation faces is: will we change our economic system
voluntarily, or let the atmosphere change it for us?
Consider also what scientists call biodiversity. The
earth is a tiny island of life in a cold, dark universe.
We humans share this magical island with millions of
other species, most of whom we haven’t met. Each of
these species fills a niche and contributes to the web of
life. Yet little by little, we’re pushing the
others out of their living spaces. The result is a wave
of extinctions comparable to that which wiped out the
dinosaurs sixty-five million years ago. The difference is
that, while the dinosaurs’ extinction was triggered
by a freak event, the current extinctions are being
caused by our everyday activities. ...
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