Destroying rainforest for economic gain is like burning a Renaissance painting to cook a meal.
Interpretation
The quote highlights the absurdity of sacrificing natural resources for short-term economic benefits.
E. O. Wilson's quote compares the destruction of rainforests for profit to the senseless act of burning a valuable Renaissance painting merely to prepare a meal. It underscores the idea that certain natural treasures, much like great works of art, hold immense intrinsic value that should not be sacrificed for temporary gains. The message is a passionate plea for the preservation of the environment, illustrating how economic motivations can lead to devastating losses that cannot be recovered.
In practice
During a presentation on environmental conservation, this quote can emphasize the importance of protecting nature.
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.
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.
It's obvious that the key problem facing humanity in the coming century is how to bring a better quality of life - for 8 billion or more people - without wrecking the environment entirely in the attempt.
The air up there in the clouds is very pure and fine, bracing and delicious. And why shouldn't it be?--it is the same the angels breathe.
If we do not save the environment, then whatever we do in civil rights will be of no meaning, because then we will have the equality of extinction.
We should continue to mobilise against the destruction of the world's great habitats, and its terrifying implications. But the most persuasive argument we can make is to show we mean it, by restoring our own lost wonders.
The ecological crisis shows the urgency of a solidarity which embraces time and space... A greater sense of intergenerational solidarity is urgently needed. Future generations cannot be saddled with the cost of our use of common environmental resources.
Now the gardener is the one who has seen everything ruined so many times that (even as his pain increases with each loss) he comprehends - truly knows - that where there was a garden once, it can be again, or where there never was, there yet can be a garden.
I wonder about the trees._x000D_ _x000D_ Why do we wish to bear_x000D_ _x000D_ Forever the noise of these_x000D_ _x000D_ More than another noise_x000D_ _x000D_ So close to our dwelling place?
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