“The argument of the “long view” may be correct in some meaninglessly abstract sense, but it represents a fundamental mistake in categories and time scales. Our only legitimate long view extends to our children and our children's children's children—hundreds or a few thousands of years down the road. If we let the slaughter continue, they will share a bleak world with rats, dogs, cockroaches, pigeons, and mosquitoes. A potential recovery millions of years later has no meaning at our appropriate scale.”

—  Stephen Jay Gould

"The Passion of Antoine Lavoisier", p. 365
Bully for Brontosaurus (1991)

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Stephen Jay Gould 274
American evolutionary biologist 1941–2002

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