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Aldo Leopold

Aldo Leopold Quotes

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Famous Aldo Leopold Quotes

“Ability to see the cultural value of wilderness boils down, in the last analysis, to a question of intellectual humility. The shallow-minded modern who has lost his rootage in the land assumes that he has already discovered what is important; it is such who prate of empires, political or economic, that will last a thousand years. It is only the scholar who appreciates that all history consists of successive excursions from a single starting-point, to which man returns again and again to organize yet another search for a durable scale of values. It is only the scholar who understands why the raw wilderness gives definition and meaning to the human enterprise.”

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Author:Aldo Leopold
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“Wilderness areas are first of all a series of sanctuaries for the primitive arts of wilderness travel, especially canoeing and packing. I suppose some will wish to debate whether it is important to keep these primitive arts alive. I shall not debate it. Either you know it in your bones, or you are very, very old.”

WildernessCampingBackpackingCanoeingPrimitive Arts
Book:A Sand County Almanac and Sketches Here and There
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“Every region should retain representative samples of its original or wilderness condition, to serve science as a sample of normality. Just as doctors must study healthy people to understand disease, so must the land sciences study the wilderness to understand disorders of the land-mechanism.”

PeopleShouldStudyLandConditionsHealthyDiseaseDoctorsOriginalsRegionsWildernessDisorderMechanismRepresentativesSampleNormality
Book:For the Health of the Land: Previously Unpublished Essays And Other Writings
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“The elemental simplicities of wilderness travel were thrills. They represented complete freedom to make mistakes. The wilderness gave those rewards and penalties, for wise and foolish acts against which civilization has built a thousand buffers.”

MistakeWiseCivilizationThousandBuiltRewardsSimplicityFoolishMaking MistakesWildernessPenaltiesElementalsComplete Freedom
Book:A Sand County Almanac, and Sketches Here and There
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“I am asserting that those who love the wilderness should not be wholly deprived of it, that while the reduction of the wilderness has been a good thing, its extermination would be a very bad one, and that the conservation of wilderness is the most urgent and difficult of all the tasks that confront us, because there are no economic laws to help and many to hinder its accomplishment.”

ShouldHas BeensHelpingWould BeLawDifficultEconomicTasksGood ThingsAccomplishmentWildernessConservationDeprivedUrgentReductionHinderExtermination
Author:Aldo Leopold
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“Wilderness is a continuous stretch of country preserved in its natural state, open to lawful hunting and fishing, big enough to absorb a two weeks' pack trip, and kept devoid of roads, artificial trails, cottages, or other works of man.”

MenTwoCountryStatesEnoughBigsNaturalWeekFishingWildernessHuntingArtificialPacksTrailsTwo WeeksCottagesHunting And Fishing
Book:The River of the Mother of God: and other Essays by Aldo Leopold
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“Wilderness is a resource which can shrink but not grow. Invasions can be arrested or modified in a manner to keep an area usable either for recreation, science or for wildlife, but the creation of new wilderness in the full sense of the word is impossible. It follows, then, that any wilderness program is a rearguard action, through which retreats are reduced to a minimum.”

ActionGrowsImpossibleCreationResourcesAreasProgramWildernessMinimumRetreatShrinksInvasionArrestedWildlifeRecreation
Book:A Sand County Almanac: And Sketches Here and There
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“We abuse land because we regard it as a commodity belonging to us. When we see land as a community to which we belong, we may begin to use it with love and respect.”

MayUseNatureCommunityNaturalInspiringEnvironmentLandOceanRespectAbuseRegardGreenEnvironmentalCaringPreservesWildernessBelongingSustainabilityPollutionEcologyCommodityConservationPreservationNatural WorldOur EnvironmentWildlifeBeginningOur CommunityMother EarthNatural EnvironmentLove And RespectNature And EnvironmentSave Mother EarthNature LoveEarth And NatureNature ConservationGreen LivingWildlife ConservationEco FriendlyThe Wild NatureConservingInspiring NatureEnvironmental PollutionInspirational EnvironmentalEnergy ConservationGo GreenLand ConservationLove And NatureWhere You BelongEnvironmental SustainabilityLand UseWildlife And NatureConserving EnvironmentDeep EcologyUse And AbuseProtect NatureCommunity LivingCommunity Garden
Author:Aldo Leopold
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“Man always kills the thing he loves, and so we the pioneers have killed our wilderness. Some say we had to. Be that as it may, I am glad I shall never be young without wild country to be young in. Of what avail are forty freedoms without a blank spot on the map?”

MenMayCountryYoungGladSpotsFortyWildernessMapsBlankPioneersBe YoungLand Conservation
Book:A Sand County Almanac: And Sketches Here and There
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“For unnumbered centuries of human history the wilderness has given way. The priority of industry has become dogma. Are we as yet sufficiently enlightened to realize that we must now challenge that dogma, or do without our wilderness? Do we realize that industry, which has been our good servant, might make a poor master?”

WayHumansHas BeensMightGivenRealizingChallengesPoorCenturyMastersIndustryPrioritiesServantEnlightenedWildernessDogmaHuman History
Book:Aldo Leopold's Southwest
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“Ability to see the cultural value of wilderness boils down, in the last analysis, to a question of intellectual humility. The shallow-minded modern who has lost his rootage in the land assumes that he has already discovered what is important.”

ImportantLastsValuesLostAbilityModernLandHumilityIntellectualAssumingAnalysisWildernessShallowAbility To SeeIntellectual Humility
Book:A Sand County Almanac, and Sketches Here and There
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“Wilderness is the raw material out of which man has hammered the artifact called civilization. Wilderness was never a homogenous raw material. It was very diverse. The differences in the product are known as cultures. The rich diversity of the worlds cultures reflects a corresponding diversity. In the wilds that gave them birth.”

MenWorldCultureDifferencesKnownRichMaterialsProductsBirthCivilizationDiversityWildernessDiverseRaw MaterialsCorrespondingArtifactsHammered
Book:Aldo Leopold: A Sand County Almanac & Other Writings on Conservation and Ecology: (Library of America #238)
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“We abuse land because we regard it as a commodity belonging to us.”

NatureCommunityNaturalEnvironmentLandRespectAbuseRegardGreenEnvironmentalPreservesWildernessBelongingSustainabilityPollutionEcologyCommodityConservationPreservationOur EnvironmentWildlifeOur CommunityMother EarthNatural EnvironmentNature And EnvironmentSave Mother EarthEarth And NatureNature ConservationGreen LivingWildlife ConservationEco FriendlyConservingInspiring NatureEnvironmental PollutionInspirational EnvironmentalEnergy ConservationGo GreenLand ConservationWhere You BelongEnvironmental SustainabilityWildlife And NatureConserving EnvironmentDeep EcologyProtect NatureCommunity LivingCommunity Garden
Book:A Sand County Almanac, and Sketches Here and There
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“We all strive for safety, prosperity, comfort, long life, and dullness. The deer strives with his supple legs, the cowman with trap and poison, the statesman with pen, the most of us with machines, votes, and dollars. A measure of success in this is all well enough, and perhaps is a requisite to objective thinking, but too much safety seems to yield only danger in the long run. Perhaps this is behind Thoreau's dictum: In wilderness is the salvation of the world. Perhaps this is the hidden meaning in the howl of the wolf, long known among mountains, but seldom perceived among men.”

ThinkingMenWorldLifeWellsLongEnoughSeemsRunningBehindsKnownToo MuchDangerComfortMountainMachinesVoteSafetySalvationDollarsStriveProsperityLegsObjectivesPoisonWildernessPensYieldLong RunsTrapsStrifeLong LifeStatesmenDeerHowlDullnessMeasure Of SuccessSuppleHidden Meaning
Author:Aldo Leopold
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