Quotes by Donella Meadows

“Your paradigm is so intrinsic to your mental process that you are hardly aware of its existence, until you try to communicate with someone with a different paradigm.”

“If the world were a village of 100 people, ... there would be 60 Asians, 14 Africans, 12 Europeans, eight people from Central and South America, Mexico and the Caribbean, five from the U.S.A. and Canada, and one from Australia or New Zealand.”

“The first one was much nicer. It was spontaneous and unorganized. It went beyond what anyone in charge wanted.”

I know that war and mayhem run in our blood. I refuse to believe that they must dominate our lives. We humans are animals, too, but animals with amazing powers of rationality, morality, society. We can use our strength and courage not to savage each other, but to defend our highest purposes.

Biodiversity cant be maintained by protecting a few species in a zoo, or by preserving greenbelts or national parks. To function properly, nature needs more room than that. It can maintain itself, however, without human expense, without zookeepers, park rangers, foresters or gene banks. All it needs is to be left alone.

Scientists worldwide agree that the reduction needed to stabilize the climate is actually more like 80 percent.

Social services, not wealth per se, seem to be the key to lower birth rates. The Chinese, although among the poorest peoples of the world, have brought their fertility rate down to 2.4, partly by social coercion, but mostly by broadly available education, health care and family planning.

We dont need bigger cars or fancier clothes. We need self-respect, identity, community, love, variety, beauty, challenge and a purpose in living that is greater than material accumulation.

Every policy is shaped by two forces: background analysis and foreground politics. The political forces are loud, self-serving and, in the case of energy policy, well known.

Ending poverty calls for humility, honesty, freedom from ideology and refusal to accept cruel simplicities about anyones human potential. It requires listening to the wisdom and cutting the nonsense from both the Right and the Left.

You may be able to fool the voters, but not the atmosphere.

A knowledgeable and courageous U.S. president could help enormously in leading the worlds nations toward saving the climate.

Like the other great revolutions, an environmental revolution will require sacrifices and lead to enormous gains. It, too, will change the face of the land and human institutions, hierarchies, self-definitions, cultures. It will take centuries. If it happens. There is no guarantee, of course.

We dont need new laws that can be used by organizations with deep pockets and the ability to deduct legal expenses as a cost of doing business to intimidate individuals or organizations that voice legitimate concerns.