Top Alan Thein Durning Quotes - Quotesmemo.com

Alan Thein Durning Biography

Alan Durning (born 1964 as Alan Bresler Durning, then Alan Thein Durning from 1991 to 2008) is the founder and executive director of the Sightline Institute (formerly Northwest Environment Watch), a nonprofit organization based in Seattle, Washington, U.S.

Read about Alan Thein Durning in Wikipedia

Random Authors

Alan Thein Durning Quotes

Who would have predicted a century ago that the richest civilizations in history would be made up of polluted tracts of suburban development dominated by the private automobile, shopping malls, and a throwaway economy? Surely, this is not the ultimate fulfillment of our destiny.

Century, Civilization, Destiny, Economy, Predicted, Shopping

Economists use the word consume to mean "utilize economic goods," but the Shorter Oxford Dictionary's definition is more appropriate to ecologists: "To make away with or destroy; to waste or to squander; to use up. " The economies that cater to the global consumer society are responsible for the lion's share of the damage that humans have inflicted on common global resources.

Economists, Mean, Oxford, Resources, Waste

But the basic value of a sustainable society, the ecological equivalent of the Golden Rule, is simple: each generation should meet its needs without jeopardizing the prospects for future generations to meet their own needs.

Environmental, Generation, Meet, Needs, Simple

If we attempt to preserve the consumer economy indefinitely, ecological forces will dismantle it savagely. If we proceed to dismantle it gradually ourselves, we will have the opportunity of replacing it with a low consumption economy that can endure.

Economy, Endure, Indefinitely, Lows, Opportunity

Dispossessed peasants slash-and-burn their way into the rain forests of Latin America, hungry nomads turn their herds out into fragile African rangeland, reducing it to desert, and small farmers in India and the Philippines cultivate steep slopes, exposing them to the erosive powers of rain. Perhaps half the world's billion-plus absolute poor are caught in a downward spiral of ecological and economic impoverishment. In desperation, they knowingly abuse the land, salvaging the present by savaging the future.

Desert, Ecological, Land, Latin, Rain, Salvaging

If the life-supporting ecosystems of the planet are to survive for future generations, the consumer society will have to dramatically curtail its use of resources - partly by shifting to high-quality, low-input durable goods and partly by seeking fulfillment through leisure, human relationships, and other nonmaterial avenues. We in the consumer society will have to live a technologically sophisticated version of the life-style currently practiced lower on the economic ladder.

Currently, Durable, Ecosystems, Lower, Quality, Style

Kim Delaney

Kim Delaney

Otto Wallach

Otto Wallach

Adrienne Clarkson

Adrienne Clarkson

Kasey Keller

Kasey Keller

Neelie Kroes

Neelie Kroes

Rachel Zoe

Rachel Zoe

Randall Cunningham

Randall Cunningham

J. N. Andrews

J. N. Andrews

Eugenie Anderson

Eugenie Anderson

Kathleen Troia McFarland

Kathleen Troia McFarland

Eduard Buchner

Eduard Buchner

Julie Anne Peters

Julie Anne Peters