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Wilderness is a resource which can shrink but not grow... the creation of new wilderness in the full sense of the word is impossible.
Aldo Leopold
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Interpretation

What this quote means

Wilderness is an irreplaceable resource that can diminish but cannot be artificially recreated.

In this quote, Aldo Leopold emphasizes the vulnerability of natural wilderness areas, suggesting that once they are lost or degraded, they cannot be restored to their original state. The implications of this statement underline the importance of conserving existing wild spaces rather than relying on the hope of recreating them in the future, highlighting the finite nature of these environments.

Themes

WildernessNatureConservationResourcesEnvironment

In practice

Example use cases

Use this quote while advocating for local conservation efforts during a community meeting.

More from Aldo Leopold

Our tools are better than we are, and grow better faster than we do. They suffice to crack the atom, to command the tides, but they do not suffice for the oldest task in human history, to live on a piece of land without spoiling it.
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We Americans, in most states at least, have not yet experienced a bear-less, eagle-less, cat- less, wolf-less woods. Germany strove for maximum yields of both timber and game and got neither.
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When some remote ancestor of ours invented the shovel, he became a giver: He could plant a tree. And when the axe was invented, he became a taker: He could chop it down. Whoever owns land has thus assumed, whether he knows it or not, the divine functions of creating and destroying plants.
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Recreational development is a job not of building roads into lovely country, but of building receptivity into the still unlovely human mind.
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My dog does not care where heat comes from, but he cares that it comes, and soon. Indeed he considers my ability to make it come as something magical, for when I rise in the coal black pre-dawn and kneel by the hearth to make a fire, he pushes himself blandly between me and the kindling splits I have laid in the ashes, and I must touch a match to them by poking it between his legs. Such faith , I suppose, is the kind that moves mountains.
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Individual thinkers since the days of Ezekiel and Isaiah have asserted that the despoliation of land is not only inexpedient but wrong. Society, however, has not yet affirmed their belief.
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From Nature's chain whatever link you strike,_x000D_ Tenth or ten thousandth, breaks the chain alike.
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