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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.

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
Interest
Commons
Society
Pursuing
Freedom
Ruin
Best
Rush
Believe
Destination
Men
Believes
Ruins
Toward

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In a competitive world of limited resources, total freedom of individual action is intolerable
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We see only what we have names for.
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The optimum population is, then, less than the maximum.
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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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Incommensurables cannot be compared.
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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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Every plausible policy must be followed by the question 'And then what?'
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Thou shalt not transgress the carrying capacity
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But as population became denser, the natural chemical and biological recycling processes became overloaded, calling for a redefinition of property rights.
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Value is a relative concept: the value of each action is determined by comparing it with other possible actions.
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Indeed, our particular concept of private property, which deters us from exhausting the positive resources of the earth, favors pollution.
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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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However, I think the major opposition to ecology has deeper roots than mere economics ecology threatens widely held values so fundamental that they must be called religious.
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The only kind of coercion I recommend is mutual coercion, mutually agreed upon by the majority of the people affected.
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In a finite world this means that the per capita share of the world's goods must steadily decrease.
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The population problem has no technical solution it requires a fundamental extension in morality.
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The god who is reputed to have created fleas to keep dogs from moping over their situation must also have created fundamentalists to keep rationalists from getting flabby. Let us be duly thankful for out blessings.
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Ecology is the overall science of which economics is a minor speciality.
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Fundamentalists are panicked by the apparent disintegration of the family, the disappearance of certainty and the decay of morality. Fear leads them to ask, if we cannot trust the Bible, what can we trust?
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Continuity is at the heart of conservatism: ecology serves that heart.
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