Letters to My Grandchildren Quotes

“Why do you need to go outside? For one thing, to appreciate what it is that keeps you alive. And the more time you spend outside, the more you are able to sense change in that world. If you can smell something, chances are that unless it's flowers or food, it doesn't belong there and is not good for us. But even more profound, we have to get outside and seek nature because we need that connection for our physical and mental health.”
― David Suzuki, Letters to My Grandchildren

“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.”
― David Suzuki, Letters to My Grandchildren

“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.”
― David Suzuki, Letters to My Grandchildren

“Trees for which there is no commercial value are referred to as "weeds" that interfere with commercial harvesting. That's what alders were called until a method to make high-grade paper from them was developed, but you'd never know that alders play an important ecological role. They are the first trees to grow after an opening is cleared in a forest, and they fix nitrogen from the air to fertilize the soil for the later-growing, longer-lived, bigger tree species. Yew trees have tough wood with gnarled branches and were called weeds and burned until a powerful anti-cancer agent was found in their bark.”
― David Suzuki, Letters to My Grandchildren

“Ancient forests that took millennia to evolve are called "decadent" or "overmature," so clearing them is justified by the notion that they are finished or at an end. Sometimes the forest industry labels such forests "wild," and what is planted and grown after it has been clear-cut is called a "normal" forest. We define things in terms of human utility, not in any way that makes ecological or even biological sense.”
― David Suzuki, Letters to My Grandchildren