Anyone who ever studied mankind by listening to them was self-deluded. The first thing they should have done was to answer the question, "Can they report to you correctly on their behavior?" And the answer is, "No, the poor bastards cannot."

You won't get cooperation out of a hierarchical system. You get enforced directions from the top, and nothing I know of can run like that.

The worst thing about permaculture is that it's extremely successful, but it has no center, and no hierarchy.

Permaculture is something with a million heads. It's a way of thinking which is already loose, and you can't put a way of thinking back in the box.

Anything that's any good is self-perpetuating.

We're only truly secure when we can look out our kitchen window and see our food growing and our friends working nearby.

That we don't design agriculture to be sustainable is totally eerie. We design it to be a disaster, and of course, we get a disaster.