251 Quotes by David Suzuki

We can no longer tolerate what’s going on in Ottawa and Edmonton. What I would challenge you to do is to put a lot of effort into trying to see whether there’s a legal way of throwing our so-called leaders into jail because what they’re doing is a criminal act.

Think about a seed. Once it lands, it’s stuck. It can’t move to find better soil, moisture or sunlight. It’s able to create every part of itself to grow and reproduce with the help of air, water and sun.

On December 7, 1941, an event took place that had nothing to do with me or my family and yet which had devastating consequences for all of us – Japan bombed Pearl Harbour in a surprise attack. With that event began one of the shoddiest chapters in the tortuous history of democracy in North America.

To me, the real challenge is the human mind, which is driving our actions: our beliefs and values shape the way we see the world, which in turn determines how we will treat it. So long as we assume that we are the centre of the universe and everything revolves around us, we will not be able to see the dangers we create. To see those, we have to recognize that our very lives and our well-being depend on the richness of nature.

I see a world in the future in which we understand that all life is related to us and we treat that life with great humility and respect.

If we call insects “pests,” then we can make war on them. And we have done that, developing powerful chemicals that kill all insects to eliminate the ones that are troublesome to us. To me, using broad-spectrum pesticides is like dealing with high rates of crime in a town or neighbourhood by removing or killing everyone in the area.

Human beings are often at their best when responding to immediate crises – car accidents, house fires, hurricanes. We are less effective in the face of enormous but slow-moving crises such as the loss of biodiversity or climate change...

That little walk powerfully reminded me that nature is our touchstone. However sophisticated and technologically advanced we may be, we are biological creatures, utterly dependent on her beneficence for clean air, water and food.

Just as human activity is upsetting Earth’s carbon cycle, our actions are altering the water cycle.