Monday 12 October 2015

Upton Sinclair - ‘I, candidate for Govenor’

“It’s hard to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on him not understanding it.”
This weeks Green Thoughts are taken from the 1994 book ‘I, candidate for Govenor’ by the late american author Upton Sinclair (1878 –1968).

Monday 5 October 2015

Lord Byron - Childe Harold

I love not man the less, but Nature more,

from Childe Harold, Canto iv, Verse 178
George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron [aka Lord Byron]


Monday 28 September 2015

Alfred Russel Wallace - The Malay Archipelago

We should now clearly recognise the fact, that the wealth and knowledge and culture of the few do not constitute civilisation, and do not of themselves advance us towards the ‘perfect social state’. Our vast manufacturing system, our gigantic commerce, our crowded towns and cities, support and continually renew a mass of human misery and crime absolutely greater than has ever existed before. They create and maintain in life-long labour an ever-increasing army, whose lot is the more hard to bear, by contrast with the pleasures, the comforts, and the luxury which they see everywhere around them, but which they can never hope to enjoy; and who, in this respect, are worse off than the savage in the midst of his tribe.
            This is not a result to boast of, or to be satisfied with; and, until there is more general recognition of this failure of our civilisation – resulting mainly from our neglect to train and develop more thoroughly the sympathetic feelings and moral faculties of our nature, and to allow them a larger share of  influence in  our legislation, our commerce, and our whole social organisation – we shall never, as regards the whole community, attain to any real or important superiority over the better class of savage.    


This weeks green thought comes from the naturalist, explorer, geographer, anthropologist, and biologist Alfred Russell Wallace (1823 – 1913) best known for independently conceiving the theory of evolution through natural selection. These are the final two concluding paragraphs in the book The Malay Archipelago’ [1869] – describing his 8 year scientific exploration of those islands.

Monday 21 September 2015

Professor Albert Bartlett

Can you think of any problem in any area of human endeavour on any scale, from microscopic to global, whose long-term solution is in any demonstrable way aided, assisted, or advanced by further increases in population, locally, nationally, or globally.

This weeks Green Thought comes from the late Professor Albert Bartlett (1923 – 2013), emeritus Professor of Physics at the University of Colorado at Boulder, USA.

Monday 14 September 2015

Stan Rowe - What on Earth is Life

An alternative to the view that organisms possess “life” is that “life” possesses organisms. By this hypothesis, the secret of “life” is to be sought outwardly and ecologically rather than [or as well as] inwardly and physiologically.
 
This weeks Green Thought comes from the essay ‘What on Earth is Life’ in the 2006 book ‘Earth Alive’ by the late [1918 – 2004] brilliant Canadian ecologist Stan Rowe.
 

Monday 7 September 2015

Karmapa Ogyen Trinley Dorje


Many people have grown up in urban environments and never had opportunity to experience the profound beauty of nature. This is a great loss for all concerned because surely this experience is an essential part of being human. The natural world is the essence, it is everything, and we humans are part of it.
 
 
The September entry in the Tibetan Buddhist 17th Karmapa Ogyen Trinley Dorje in ‘ Cherish the Earth’ the 2015 Environment Calendar.
 

Monday 24 August 2015

Wilhelm Ostwald - Der energetische Imperitiv

The unexpected legacy of fossil fuels leads us to lose sight of the principle of a durable economy, which needs to be based exclusively on the regular influx of energy from the sun’s radiation.
 
This weeks Green Thought comes from the 1912 book ‘Der energetische Imperitiv’ by Wilhelm Ostwald, Nobel Prize for Chemistry, 1909.


 

Monday 17 August 2015

Paul Shepard - ‘Coming Home to the Pleistocene’

 
In the absence of some new synthesis that rejoins us to our natural heritage, the world of corporate organisation pushes us towards the degenerating process of conformity, the frenzied outbreak of genetic engineering, and the pied piper’s technological tootle leading down the “information highway” toward the “networked” insanity that confuses electronic regurgitation with wisdom. This circuit-sedative turns into entertainment junkies hooked without reprieve to the economic machine and its media, a new level of confusion between reality and virtual reality.

This weeks Green Thoughts are taken from Paul Shepard’s 1998 book  ‘Coming Home to the Pleistocene’.
 
 

Monday 10 August 2015

Paul Watson

What we need if we are to survive is a new story, a new myth, and a new religion. We need to replace anthropocentrism with biocentrism. We need to construct a religion that incorporates all species and establishes nature as sacred and deserving of respect.
 
This weeks Green Thought come from  Paul Watson a Canadian animal rights and environmental activist, who was an early, influential, and outspoken member of Greenpeace and later founded the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society.
 
 

Monday 3 August 2015

Karmapa Ogyen Trinley Dorje

…..we cannot wait for governments to act. The environmental emergency is too urgent a crisis for us to wait …..Every individual must act to protect the environment, and immediately. Each of us has a responsibility to act so we can leave a lasting home for future generations.
 
The August entry in the Tibetan Buddhist 17th Karmapa Ogyen Trinley Dorje in ‘ Cherish the Earth’ the 2015 Environment Calendar.
 

Monday 27 July 2015

Neil Everndens’ - ‘Natural Alien’

‘The public expectations of the environmental movement have fallen out of register with the aspirations of thoughtful figures within that movement’.
 
This weeks Green Thoughts are taken from Neil Everndens’ ‘Natural Alien’ (2nd Edit. 1993).

Monday 20 July 2015

Naomi Orestes and Eric M. Conway - 'The Collapse of Western Civilisation'

‘Bridge to renewables’ – The logical fallacy, popular in the first decades of the 21st century, that the problem of greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuel combustion could be solved by burning more fossil fuels, particularly natural gas. The fallacy rested on an incomplete analysis, which considered only physical by-products of combustion, particularly in electricity generation, and not the other factors that controlled overall energy use and net releases of greenhouse gases to the atmosphere.

Taken from the highly plausible 2014 sci-fi history-from-the-future The Collapse of Western Civilisation by the American historian-scientists Naomi Orestes and Eric M. Conway.

Monday 13 July 2015

Karmapa Ogyen Trinley Dorje

To live simply is to be compassionate to yourself and the world. A life full of material goods and barren of compassion is quite unsustainable.
 
The July entry in the Tibetan Buddhist 17th Karmapa Ogyen Trinley Dorje in ‘ Cherish the Earth’ the 2015 Environment Calendar.
 

Monday 6 July 2015

Russell-Einstein Manifesto

There lies before us, if we choose, continual progress in happiness, knowledge, and wisdom. Shall we, instead, choose death, because we cannot forget our quarrels? We appeal as human beings to human beings: Remember your humanity, and forget the rest. If you can do so, the way lies open to a new Paradise; if you cannot, there lies before you the risk of universal death.
Resolution:   We invite this Congress, and through it the scientists of the world and the general public, to subscribe to the following resolution:
“In view of the fact that in any future world war nuclear weapons will certainly be employed, and that such weapons threaten the continued existence of mankind, we urge the governments of the world to realize, and to acknowledge publicly, that their purpose cannot be furthered by a world war, and we urge them, consequently, to find peaceful means for the settlement of all matters of dispute between them.”
 
This week is the 50th anniversary of  the Russell-Einstein Manifesto  9 July 1955 signed by
Max Born
Percy W. Bridgman
Albert Einstein
Leopold Infeld
Frederic Joliot-Curie
Herman J. Muller
Linus Pauling
Cecil F. Powell
Joseph Rotblat
Bertrand Russell
Hideki Yukawa
all (excepting Leopold Infeld andJoseph Rotblat) were Nobel Laureates.
 
 
 

Monday 29 June 2015

Thích Nhất Hạnh - ‘The Art of Power’

 
If we continue abusing the Earth this way, there is no doubt that our civilisation will be destroyed. This turnaround takes enlightenment, awakening. The Buddha attained individual awakening. Now we need collective enlightenment to stop this course of destruction. Civilisation is going to end if we continue to drown in the competition for power, fame, sex, and profit.

This weeks Green Thought comes from the 2008 book ‘The Art of Power’ by the expatriate Vietnamese Zen Buddhist monk, teacher, author, poet and peace activist Thích Nhất Hạnh.
 

Monday 22 June 2015

Herman Scheers - Energy Autonomy

Reducing all questions exclusively to price……( results in) the idea of the market economy degenerate(ing) from an economic ordering principle into organised social irresponsibility.
This weeks Green Thought is taken from Herman Scheers 2007 book Energy Autonomy. The late Hermann Scheer ( 1944 - 2010) was a member of the German Bundestag (Parliament), President of Eurosolar (The European Association for Renewable Energy) and General Chairman of the World Council for Renewable Energy. In 1999, Scheer was awarded the Right Livelihood Award for his "indefatigable work for the promotion of solar energy worldwide".
 

Monday 15 June 2015

George Monbiot - Workforce (Guardiuan Article 9/6/15)

We know that our conditions of life are deteriorating. Most young people have little prospect of owning a home, or even of renting a decent one. Interesting jobs are sliced up, through digital Taylorism,  into portions of meaningless drudgery. The natural world, whose wonders enhance our lives, and upon which our survival depends, is being rubbed out with horrible speed. Those to whom we look for guardianship, in government and among the economic elite, do not arrest this decline; they accelerate it.
This weeks Green Thought comes George Monbiots Monbiot.com article ‘Workforce’ posted on 9th June 2015
 
 
 

Monday 8 June 2015

Gilles Deleuze


 “The fundamental problem of political philosophy is still precisely the one that Spinoza saw so clearly (and that Wilhelm Reich rediscovered): Why do men fight for their servitude as stubbornly as though it were their salvation?”
This weeks Green Thought comes from the late French philosopher Gilles Deleuze (1925 – 1995) .

Monday 1 June 2015

Neil Evernden - ‘Natural Alien’ 2nd Edition

For, at bottom, nothing has changed. The natural environment remains vulnerable whenever there are short-term benefits to be had by sacrificing environmental protection…….by basing all arguments on enlightened self-interest the environmentalists have ensured their own failure……’
 
He then goes on to quote Anthony Brandt  - ‘The industrialist and the environmentalist are brothers under the skin; they differ only as to the best use the natural world ought to be put to.’
 
 
This weeks Green Thoughts are taken from page 10 of Neil Everndens’ ‘Natural Alien’ (2nd Edit. 1993).
 

Sunday 24 May 2015

Stephen Jay Gould - Eight Little Piggies


We cannot win this battle to save species and environments without forging an emotional bond between ourselves and nature as well – for we will not fight to save what we do not love.
 
From the essay ‘Unenchanted Evening’ in the American paleontologist and evolutionary biologist Stephen Jay Goulds (1941 –2002) 1993 book Eight Little Piggies
 
 

Monday 18 May 2015

Tim Jackson - ‘Prosperity without Growth : Economics for a finite planet'


The extraordinary ramping up of global economic activity has no historical precedent. It’s totally at odds with our scientific knowledge of the finite resource base and the fragile ecology on which we depend for survival.

This weeks Green Thought comes from the British ecological economist Tim Jackson’s 2009 book ‘Prosperity without Growth : Economics for a finite planet.
 
 
http://www.ted.com/talks/tim_jackson_s_economic_reality_check?language=en#

Monday 11 May 2015

Wolfgang Sachs - The Development Dictionary

For more than a century, technology carried the promise of redeeming the human condition from sweat, toil and tears. Today, especially in the rich countries, it is everybody’s best kept secret that this hope is nothing but a flight of fancy.
 
This weeks green thought comes from the introduction of The Development Dictionary (1992) edited by Wolfgang Sachs.
 

Monday 4 May 2015

Karl Polanyi - The Great Transformation

To allow the market mechanism to be the sole director of the fate of human beings and their natural environment, indeed, even of the amount and use of purchasing power, would result in the demolition of society.

This weeks Green Thought Green Thought comes from the 1944 book The Great Transformation by the late Hungarian economic historian1886 and social philosopher, Karl Polanyi (1886-1964).
 
 
 
 

Monday 27 April 2015

Stan Rowe - ‘Home Place : Essays on Ecology’

Once values are straight, everything else can fall into place. An ecocentric worldview, valuing the spinning planetary home above the organisms hitching a ride on it, elevates in importance the ecosystems that humans call land. Love of the land, love of place, love of our endangered Living Spaces, is the grassroots cure for the sin of species narcissism.

This weeks Green Thought Green Thought comes from the 1990 book ‘Home Place : Essays on Ecology’ by Stan Rowe.
 
 
 

Monday 20 April 2015

Naomi Klein - ‘This Changes Everything : Capitalism vs The Climate’.

….the policies that so successfully freed multinational corporations from virtually all constraints also contributed significantly to the underlying cause of global warming – rising greenhouse gas emissions….Put differently, the liberation of world markets, a process powered by the liberation of unprecedented amounts of fossil fuels from the earth, has dramatically sped up the same process that is liberating Arctic ice from existence.
 
 
This weeks Green Thought comes from Canadian author, journalist and social activist Naomi Kleins 2014 book ‘This Changes Everything : Capitalism vs The Climate’.  
I  have already stated that I feel that it would be unrealistic to send out the whole book [This Changes Everything] as a Green Thought, but I am trying.   JG

Monday 13 April 2015

David Choquehuanca

Traditional indigenous respect for the Pachamama is vital to prevent climate change. Our grandparents taught us that we belong to a big family of plants and animals. We believe that everything in the planet forms part of a big family.

This weeks Green Thought comes from Bolivia's Foreign Minister David Choquehuanca

In the indigenous philosophy, the Pachamama is a living being.
The draft of the new law states:
 "She is sacred, fertile and the source of life that feeds and cares for all living beings in her womb.                                                                                       She is in permanent balance, harmony and communication with the cosmos. She is comprised of all ecosystems and living beings, and their self-organisation”.

Monday 6 April 2015

Jane Goodall

 “Change happens by listening and then starting a dialogue with the people who are doing something you don't believe is right.”
This weeks Green Thought comes from Jane Goodall, the English anthropologist primarily famous for her work with chimpanzees in the Gombe Stream National Park, Tanzania.

 

Monday 30 March 2015

Naomi Klein - ‘This Changes Everything : Capitalism vs The Climate’

(When) posing climate change as the battle between capitalism and the planet…..the battle is already underway, but right now capitalism is winning hands down. It wins every time the need for economic growth is used as the excuse for putting off climate action yet again, or for breaking emission reduction commitments already made.
It wins when Greeks are told that their only path out of economic crisis is to open up their beautiful seas high-risk oil and gas drilling.
It wins when Canadians are told our only hope fo not ending up like Greece is to allow our boreal forests to be flayed so we can access the semisolid bitumen from Alberta tar sands.
It wins when a park in Istanbul is slotted for demolition to make way for yet another shopping mall.
It wins when parents in Beijing are told that sending their wheezing kids to school in pollution masks decorated to look like cute cartoon characters is an acceptable price to pay for economic progress.
It wins every time we accept that we have only bad choices available to us: austerity or extraction, poisoning or poverty.
 
 
This weeks Green Thought comes from Canadian author, journalist and social activist Naomi Kleins 2014 book ‘This Changes Everything : Capitalism vs The Climate’.  I felt that it would be unrealistic to send out the whole book [This Changes Everything] as a Green Thought, but it would be a very good idea to do so. I thoroughly recommend that everyone reads this excellent book.  JG

Monday 23 March 2015

Robert Heilbroner - Business Civilization in Decline


‘(Advertising is) perhaps the single most value-destroying activity of a business civilisation’ due to the ‘subversive influence of the relentless effort to persuade people to change their life ways, not out of any knowledge of, or deeply held convictions of the ‘good life’, but merely to sell whatever article or service is being pandered’
 
 
This  weeks Green Thought comes from the 1976 book ‘Business Civilization in Decline by the late american economist Robert Heilbroner (1919-2005).