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Why are ecologists and environmentalists so feared and hated? This is because in part what they have to say is new to the general public, and the new is always alarming.

Garrett Hardin

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Garrett Hardin
Age: 88 †
Born: 1915
Born: April 21
Died: 2003
Died: September 14
Biologist
Demographer
Ecologist
Statistician
University Teacher
Dallas
Texas
Garrett James Hardin
Garrett J. Hardin
Public
Ecologists
Part
Environmentalists
Always
Alarming
Environmentalist
Feared
Hated
Environmental
General

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The social arrangements that produce responsibility are arrangements that create coercion, of some sort.
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Ruin is the destination toward which all men rush, each pursuing his own best interest in a society that believes in the freedom of the commons.
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Thou shalt not transgress the carrying capacity
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We can't cure a shortage by increasing the supply.
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Education can counteract the natural tendency to do the wrong thing, but the inexorable succession of generations requires that the basis for this knowledge be constantly refreshed.
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We see only what we have names for.
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The Universal Declaration of Human Rights describes the family as the natural and fundamental unit of society. It follows that any choice and decision with regard to the size of the family must irrevocably rest with the family itself, and cannot be made by anyone else.
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Throughout history, human exploitation of the earth has produced this progression: colonize-destroy-move on.
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To say that we mutually agree to coercion is not to say that we are required to enjoy it, or even to pretend we enjoy it.
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The essence of dramatic tragedy is not unhappiness. It resides in the solemnity of the remorseless working of things.
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You can never do merely one thing. The law applies to any action that changes something in a complex system. The point is that an action taken to alleviate a problem will trigger several effects, some of which may offset or even negate the one intended.
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Economists (and others) who are satisfied with nature-free equations develop a dangerous hubris about the potency of our species
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A finite world can support only a finite population therefore, population growth must eventually equal zero.
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Every plausible policy must be followed by the question 'And then what?'
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Continuity is at the heart of conservatism: ecology serves that heart.
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In an approximate way, the logic of commons has been understood for a long time, perhaps since the discovery of agriculture or the invention of private property in real estate.
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The optimum population is, then, less than the maximum.
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But it is no good using the tongs of reason to pull the Fundamentalists' chestnuts out of the fire of contradiction. Their real troubles lie elsewhere.
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A coldly rationalist individualist can deny that he has any obligation to make sacrifices for the future.
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Moreover, the practical recommendations deduced from ecological principles threaten the vested interests of commerce it is hardly surprising that the financial and political power created by these investments should be used sometimes to suppress environmental impact studies.
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