Biophilia, if it exists, and I believe it exists, is the innately emotional affiliation of human beings to other living organisms.
Interpretation
Biophilia refers to the innate emotional connection humans feel towards other living beings.
E. O. Wilson's quote on biophilia highlights the intrinsic bond that humans share with nature and all living organisms. This concept suggests that our emotional and psychological well-being is enhanced through these affiliations, fostering a deeper appreciation for the interconnectedness of life on Earth.
In practice
This quote can be used in a speech about environmental conservation.
Consider the nematode roundworm, the most abundant of all animals. Four out of five animals on Earth are nematode worms β if all solid materials except nematode worms were to be eliminated, you could still see the ghostly outline of most of it in nematode worms.
Nature holds the key to our aesthetic, intellectual, cognitive and even spiritual satisfaction.
The worst thing that will probably happen-in fact is already well underway-is not energy depletion, economic collapse, conventional war, or the expansion of totalitarian governments. As terrible as these catastrophes would be for us, they can be repaired in a few generations. The one process now going on that will take millions of years to correct is loss of genetic and species diversity by the destruction of natural habitats. This is the folly our descendants are least likely to forgive us.
Humanity today is like a waking dreamer, caught between the fantasies of sleep and the chaos of the real world. The mind seeks but cannot find the precise place and hour. We have created a Star Wars civilization, with Stone Age emotions, medieval institutions, and godlike technology. We thrash about. We are terribly confused by the mere fact of our existence, and a danger to ourselves and to the rest of life.
Destroying rainforest for economic gain is like burning a Renaissance painting to cook a meal.
An Armageddon is approaching at the beginning of the third millennium. But it is not the cosmic war and fiery collapse of mankind foretold in sacred scripture. It is the wreckage of the planet by an exuberantly plentiful and ingenious humanity.
If you believe the doctors, nothing is wholesome; if you believe the theologians, nothing is innocent; if you believe the military, nothing is safe.
Thou hast a voice, great Mountain, to repeal. Large codes of fraud and woe; not understood by all, but which the wise, and great, and good interpret, or make felt, or deeply feel.
Yes, that's the way they think, these hundred thousand Kantoreks! Iron Youth! Youth! We are none of us more than twenty years old. But young? That is long ago. We are old folk.
In a crowd, on a journey, at a banquet even, a line of thought can itself provide its own seclusion.
If you want to know what a given society believes in, look at what its largest buildings are devoted to.
Christianity even when watered down is hot enough to boil all modern society to rags.
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