Meditate on the world into which you are bringing new beings.



Thich Nhat Hanh, Buddhist monk

Let us begin to imagine the worlds we would like to inhabit, the long lives we will share, and the many futures in our hands.
Susan Griffin, environmental philosopher

“When do you start raising a child?” According to the bishop [of the Mennonite community], child rearing begins not at birth, or even conception, but one hundred years before a child is born, “because that’s when you start building the environment they’re going to live in.”

The third plate, Dan Baber, chef

fossil fuels, however abundant they once were, were nevertheless limited in quantity and not renewable, they obviously did not “belong” to one generation more than another. We ignored the claims of posterity simply because we could, the living being stronger than the unborn, and so worked the “miracle” of industrial progress by the theft of energy from (among others) our children. That is the real foundation of our progress and our affluence. The reason that we are a rich nation is not that we have earned so much wealth—you cannot, by any honest means, earn or deserve so much. The reason is simply that we have learned, and become willing, to market and use up in our own time the birthright and livelihood of posterity.

Wendell Berry, farmer, environmental activist...

“Why worry? Extinction is natural, isn't it?” And yes, species—as is often pointed out—have been dying through the more than 3.5 billion years of biological history without permanent harm to the biosphere. It has been estimated that 98 percent of the species that ever existed have vanished. The response then continues, “Evolution has always replaced extinct species with new ones, has it not?” But these statements, while true, conceal a terrible twist. After the Mesozoic extinction spasm 65 million years ago, which ended the Age of Reptiles, and after each of the other four greatest previous spasms spaced over 400 million years at very roughly 100-million-year intervals, evolution required about 10 million years to restore the predisaster levels of diversity. That is an extremely long time for future generations to wait because of the damage we are inflicting on the environment within a few decades. Equally serious, evolution cannot perform as in previous ages if natural environments have been crowded out by artificial ones, the phenomenon known by biologists as “the death of birth.”
... Humanity's responsibility to the rest of life and to future generations is clear: bring with us as much of the environment and biodiversity through the bottleneck as possible.

The diversity of life, Edward O. Wilson 

Soil is an intergenerational resource, natural capital that can be used conservatively or squandered. With just a couple feet of soil standing between prosperity and desolation, civilizations that plow through their soil vanish...
In exploring the fundamental role of soil in human history, the key lesson is as simple as it is clear: modern society risks repeating mistakes that hastened the demise of past civilizations. Mortgaging our grandchildren's future by consuming soil faster than it forms, we face the dilemma that sometimes the slowest changes prove most difficult to stop.

Dirt: The Erosion of Civilizations (David R. Montgomery)