When A Culture Destroys Its Environment

A UCLA professor travels to Greenland to find out what happends to a culture that trashes its environment. It heralds the future for the U.S.

1 minute read

August 31, 2001, 5:00 AM PDT

By Chris Steins @planetizen


"It's in Greenland, [Jared] Diamond says, that we can see what happens to a culture that trashes its environment. The Norsemen didn't just forget to recycle their beer bottles; they stripped the turf off a polar ice cap, killed all their trees and destroyed themselves within a few centuries. They show us where we, in the otherwise more sophisticated United States of America, may be headed... Surviving the jungles of New Guinea may be child's play compared to penetrating Washington policy."

Thanks to New Times LA Newsletter

Thursday, August 30, 2001 in New Times-LA

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