We're in a giant car heading towards a brick wall and everyone's arguing over where they're going to sit.
David SuzukiRead
Economics and a reliance on science and technology to solve our problems has led to an unsustainable situation where continued growth in consumption is required for governments and business to be considered successful. This is a form of insanity. Economics is at the heart of our destructive ways and our faith in it has blinded us
Interpretation
The quote critiques the dependence on economic growth and technology, highlighting its unsustainable nature.
David Suzuki argues that our reliance on science and technology, driven by economic imperatives, has created an unsustainable model where constant consumption is necessary for perceived success. He suggests that this mindset is irrational and has contributed to destructive societal behaviors, urging a reevaluation of our values concerning economics and growth.
In practice
This quote can be used in a speech about environmental sustainability.
We're in a giant car heading towards a brick wall and everyone's arguing over where they're going to sit.
As parents, grandparents, uncles and aunts we need to start getting out into nature with the young people in our lives. Families play a key role in getting kids outside.
One of the joys of being a grandparent is getting to see the world again through the eyes of a child.
The medical literature tells us that the most effective ways to reduce the risk of heart disease, cancer, stroke, diabetes, Alzheimer's, and many more problems are through healthy diet and exercise. Our bodies have evolved to move, yet we now use the energy in oil instead of muscles to do our work.
Do you know how much land is under ice, rock and snow? Do you know why 90 percent of us live within 100 kilometres of the U.S. border? We have this idea we're a vast country. But the reality is that a lot of it, a huge amount, is uninhabitable.
We no longer see the world as a single entity. We've moved to cities and we think the economy is what gives us our life, that if the economy is strong we can afford garbage collection and sewage disposal and fresh food and water and electricity. We go through life thinking that money is the key to having whatever we want, without regard to what it does to the rest of the world.
You and I have a rendezvous with destiny. We will preserve for our children this, the last best hope of man on earth, or we will sentence them to take the first step into a thousand years of darkness. If we fail, at least let our children and our children’s children say of us we justified our brief moment here. We did all that could be done.
Never have I dealt with anything more difficult than my own soul, which sometimes helps me and sometimes opposes me.
When we consider reality itself we quickly become aware of its infinite complexity, and we realize that our habitual perception of it is often inadequate. If this were not so, the concept of deception would be meaningless.
The splinter in your eye is the best magnifying-glass available.
We do not have to die to enter the kingdom of Heaven, In fact we have to be fully alive. When we are truly alive we see that the tree is part of Heaven and we are also part of Heaven. The whole universe is conspiring to reveal this to us. Peace is available and when we touch it everything becomes real. We become ourselves, fully alive in the present moment.
There is no repose for the mind except in the absolute; for feeling, except in the infinite; for the soul, except in the divine.
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