If we do nothing, we still get to a post-carbon future, but it will be bleak. However, if we plan the transition, we can have a world that supports robust communities of healthy, creative people and ecosystems with millions of other species.
Interpretation
The quote emphasizes the importance of proactive planning in the transition to a sustainable future.
In this quote, Richard Heinberg points out that while the world will inevitably move towards a post-carbon future, failing to take action will result in a bleak outcome. He advocates for strategic planning and proactive measures to ensure a future where communities thrive and ecosystems flourish, highlighting the interconnectedness of human well-being and environmental health.
In practice
In a speech about environmental policy, one might quote this to emphasize the need for strategic planning.
The industrial civilisation is based on the consumption of energy resources that are inherently limited in quantity and that are about to become scarce. When they do, competition for what remains will trigger dramatic economic and geopolitical events; in the end, it may be impossible for even a single nation to sustain industrialism as we have know it in the twentieth century.
Oil depletion and climate change will create an entirely new context in which political struggles will be played out. Within that context, it is not just freedom, democracy, and equality that are at stake, but the survival of billions of humans and of whole ecosystems.
When she bleeds the smells I know change colour. There is iron in her soul on those days. She smells like a gun.
You change society by changing the wind. Change the wind, transform the debate, recast the discussion, alter the context in which political discussions are being made, and you will change the outcomes... You will be surprised at how fast the politicians adjust to the change in the wind.
A revolution is not a dinner party, or writing an essay, or painting a picture, or doing embroidery.
It is now our generation's task to carry on what those pioneers began. For our journey is not complete until our wives, our mothers and daughters can earn a living equal to their efforts. Our journey is not complete until our gay brothers and sisters are treated like anyone else under the law - for if we are truly created equal, then surely the love we commit to one another must be equal as well.
Revolutions can no longer be achieved by minorities. No matter how energetic and intelligent a minority may be, it is not enough, in modern times at least, to make a revolution. The cooperation of a majority, and a large majority too, is needed.
I need to find a catchy new word for feminism, right? Like 'bootylicious.'
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