Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
paths in which sacrifice is shared, the best of our collective achievements are preserved, and com-
passion is nurtured.
Darwin tells us we must evolve or die, and current circumstances bring that choice into stark
relief. A lot of people evidently think that fitness and selfishness are the same. But we've gotten
ourselves into our current fix
not
because we're too good at cooperating to achieve collective fit-
ness, but rather because, in our success, we failed to take account of the finite and fragile nature of
the natural systems that support us. It's true that individual initiative is important and that group-
think can be stultifying. Yet it is our ability to innovate socially and cooperate to increase our col-
lective fitness that has gotten us this far, and that will determine whether we survive, and under
what conditions, as we adapt to scarcity and reintegrate ourselves within ecosystems in the decades
ahead.
— AUGUST 2012
