Friday, September 19, 2014

Oh, you must read this article by E. O. Wilson

Hard not to blockquote every last word of Masters of Earth, Alone in the Universe, but here's a taste:

Human beings are not wicked by nature. We have enough intelligence, goodwill, generosity and enterprise to turn Earth into a paradise both for ourselves and for the biosphere that gave us birth. We can plausibly accomplish that goal, at least be well on the way, by the end of the present century. The problem holding everything up thus far is that Homo sapiens is an innately dysfunctional species.

Chances are, if you visit this blog regularly, that you will find yourself saying, "Yes, I know that" many times during your reading. Read it anyway. He says what you know succinctly and well. And maybe, just maybe, you'll think of someone to pass it on to, who may not yet get the big picture Wilson paints.

(h/t: David Dobbs, who linked to part 1)

3 comments:

Ocean said...

Excellent article. Thank you for the link.

bjkeefe said...

You're welcome. Glad you liked it.

TC said...

You may know that E.O. Wilson is the world's expert on ants and has written books about them. He's a Pulitzer Prize winner. He's famous for having made a statement at a conference about the role of genetic differences between the sexes, which caused the feminists in the audience to pour a pitcher of ice water over his head. Alas the last I heard he's a believer in God and had a feud with Richard Dawkins over some genetic point. Either he or Dawkins hastened to say it wasn't over religion but over some genetic issue. In case you don't know, he writes beautiful non-pedantic prose that is at once charming and erudite. A professor at Harvard.

Incidentally, I love the new system that verifies that I'm Yooman and not a robot.

ShareThis