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Six Billion of Us: Boo? Hooray?
by Donella Meadows
— October 7, 1999 —
Months ago the United Nations decided to make an event out of the fact that the human population meter would soon click over another billion. They picked an arbitrary date — October 12 — and declared it the Day of Six Billion.
What kind of event should this be? A day of repentance? A celebration? [...]
So Everyone Wants Peace, So What?
by Donella Meadows
— September 23, 1999 —
Recently I invited friends around the world to ask their friends and neighbors a simple question: “What would the world be like if it were what you REALLY WANT, not what you’ve learned to settle for or what you think is possible? What do you REALLY WANT the world to be like for your [...]
If the Government Says It’s Safe, It’s Safe. Right?
by Donella Meadows
— September 16, 1999 —
The folks who bring us gene-spliced soybeans, corn, potatoes, and other foods like to make a point of the U.S. government’s approval of their products. The feds OK’d it. That must mean biotech foods are safe, right?
Right. Sure. This is the government that declared DDT safe and thalidomide and DES and dozens of other [...]
There’s What They Tell Us – And What They Don’t Tell Us
by Donella Meadows
— September 9, 1999 —
What they tell us: The income tax is unfair. The top one percent of income earners pay one-third of all income tax.
What they don’t tell us: The reason the top one percent pay so much of the income tax is that they have so much of the income. The richest 2.7 million Americans — [...]
The Latest News From the Ozone Layer
by Donella Meadows
— September 2, 1999 —
Twenty-five years ago there appeared two obscure scientific papers that rocked the industrial world. One of them, by Richard Stolarski and Ralph Cicerone, said that if chlorine atoms ever got wafted high up into the stratosphere, they could eat up the ozone layer. The second, by Mario Molina and Sherwood Rowland (who got the [...]
