Environment

When asked to talk about "the environment", what do you think of first? Eurobarometer reported answers that included climate change, pollution in towns and cities, protecting nature, disasters caused by humans such as oil spills, industrial accidents, earthquakes, floods and other natural disasters, and using up natural resources. It is no surprise that the issue of most concern varied between countries, for instance water pollution in the Baltic Sea for citizens of the Baltic states, while in Malta and Bulgaria it was air pollution. This widespread concern for the state of the environment is very recent. In different cultures and throughout history there have been numerous religious and philosophical traditions regarding the relationship between human beings and the rest of nature. In the so-called "developed" world the general attitude has, until recently, been one of domination and exploitation. The wider public began to take serious notice of the extent of our destruction of the...

The salvation of the world lies in the human heart, in the human power to reflect, in human meekness and in human responsibility. We are still under the sway of the destructive and vain belief that man is the pinnacle of creation and not just a part of it… We still don't know how to put morality ahead of politics, science and economics. We are still incapable of understanding that the only genuine backbone of all our actions – if they are to be moral – is responsibility. Responsibility is something higher than my family, my country, my firm, my success. (Vaclav Havel)