An outdated view still prevails that a low-carbon lifestyle requires immense personal suffering and sacrifice. In my view, nothing could be further from the truth. All the evidence shows that people who do not drive, do not fly on planes, do shop locally, do grow their own food, and do get to know other members of their community have a much higher quality of life than their compatriots who still persist in making the ultimate sacrifice of wasting their lives commuting to work in cars.

Unless we decide to reduce greenhouse gas emissions within just a few years from now, our destinies will already be chosen and our path towards hell unalterable as the carbon cycle feedbacks... kick in one after another.

Conventional economic theory... counts the depletion of resources as the accumulation of wealth.

The worst case scenario sees the Amazon rainforest burning, huge amounts of methane being released by Siberian peat bogs and so on - by the time today's six year olds are 60, such a scenario would see global warming already out of control.

Only by advocating 'politically unrealistic' CO2 concentrations can runaway global warming be avoided. But what is politically realistic for humans is whollymunrelated to what is physically realistic for the planet.

I am also sorry that I helped to start the anti-GM movement back in the mid 1990s, and that I thereby assisted in demonizing an important technological option which can be used to benefit the environment.

Silent Summer - a never-ending heat wave, devoid of birdsong, insect hum, and all the weird and wonderful living noises that subconsciously keep us company.