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I don't think we're yet evolved to the point where we're clever enough to handle a complex a situation as climate change. The inertia of humans is so huge that you can't really do anything meaningful.

James Lovelock

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James Lovelock
Age: 105
Beekeeper
Biochemist
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James Ephraim Lovelock
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More quotes by James Lovelock

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The problem is we don't know what the climate is doing. We thought we knew 20 years ago. That led to some alarmist books - mine included - because it looked clear-cut, but it hasn't happened.
James Lovelock
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The Earth's population will be culled from today's 6.6 billion to as few as 500 million, with most of the survivors living in the far latitudes - Canada, Iceland, Scandinavia, the Arctic Basin.
James Lovelock
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I have heard that the Saudi Arabians are paying Greenpeace to campaign against Nuclear Power. It wouldn't surprise me at all.
James Lovelock
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An inefficient virus kills its host. A clever virus stays with it.
James Lovelock
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Geological change usually takes thousands of years to happen but we are seeing the climate changing not just in our lifetimes but also year by year.
James Lovelock
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So-called 'sustainable development' is meaningless drivel.
James Lovelock
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If you start any large theory, such as quantum mechanics, plate tectonics, evolution, it takes about 40 years for mainstream science to come around. Gaia has been going for only 30 years or so.
James Lovelock
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We need a more authoritative world...What's the alternative to democracy? There isn't one. But even the best democracies agree that when a major war approaches, democracy must be put on hold for the time being. I have a feeling that climate change may be an issue as severe as war. It may be necessary to put democracy on hold for a while.
James Lovelock
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A billion could live off the earth 6 billion living as we do is far too many, and you run out of planet in no time.
James Lovelock
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By the end of this century, climate change will reduce the human population to a few breeding pairs surviving near the Arctic.
James Lovelock
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Science always uses metaphor.
James Lovelock
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I'm not a pessimist, even though I do think awful things are going to happen.
James Lovelock
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We rushed into renewable energy without any thought. The schemes are largely hopelessly inefficient and unpleasant. I personally can't stand windmills at any price.
James Lovelock
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You mustn't take what I say as gospel because no one can second-guess the future.
James Lovelock
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We'd never have got a chance to go outside and look at the earth if it hadn't been for space exploration and NASA.
James Lovelock
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Humans on the Earth behave in some ways like a pathogenic micro-organism, or like the cells of a tumor.
James Lovelock
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The inertia of humans is so huge that you can't really do anything meaningful.
James Lovelock
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No one who has experienced the intense involvement of computer modeling would deny that the temptation exists to use any data input that will enable one to continue playing what is perhaps the ultimate game of solitaire.
James Lovelock
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I would only have been too pleased if someone had asked me for my data. If you really believed in your data, you wouldn't mind someone looking at it. You should be able to respond that if you don't believe me go out and do the measurements yourself.
James Lovelock
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One thing that being a scientist has taught me is that you can never be certain about anything. You never know the truth. You can only approach it and hope to get a bit nearer to it each time. You iterate towards the truth. You don't know it.
James Lovelock