ANTE+PREFA+1

human population of the earth will reach ten billion.
Note:NEL 2050

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How to feed ten billion? How to provide ten billion with water?
Note:PROBLEMINI

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two individuals who established the distinct schools
Note:RISPOSTE

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William Vogt.
Note:L ECOLOGISTA

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bound by immutable biological limits
Note:VISIONE DEL DELLA NDO

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Norman Borlaug,

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the ‘Green Revolution’ of the 1960s,
Note:PADRE

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avert tens of millions of deaths from hunger.
Note:IMPRESA

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the emblem of ‘techno-optimism’

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affluence is not the problem but the solution.
Note:X GLI OTTIMISTI

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PROLOGUE
Note:PROG@@@@@@@@@@

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remember the moment when they first held their children—
Note:MOMENTO UNICO DEL FUTURO

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when my daughter is my age, almost 10 billion people
Note:UN PENSIERO PASSA X LA MENTE

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Ten billion mouths,

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shod?

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accommodated?

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I brought my children into a time of general collapse?
Note:IL DUBBIO

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What are those important events?
Note:VOLEVO RACCONTARE LE COSE PIÙ IMPORTANTE

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“discoveries in science and technology.”
Note:CANDIDATI PRECEDENTI

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curing of diseases,

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rise of computer

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mysteries of matter and energy.

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less the new knowledge than what it had enabled.
Note:ALTRI CANDIDATI...COSA CONSENTE LA PRESENZA DI TANTI CERVELLI CREATIVI

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one out of every four people
Note:I DENUTRITI NEI SETTANTA

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one out of ten.
Note:OGGI...QUATTRO DECAD DOPO

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life span has risen by more than eleven years,
Note:IN MEDIA...PRIVILEGIATI I POVERI

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Hundreds of millions of people in Asia, Latin America, and Africa
Note:DALL INDIGENZA ALLA CLASSE MEDIA

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nothing like this surge of well-being has occurred before.
Note:NELLA STORIA DELL UOMO

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by the standards of the past, wealthy people.
Note:ANCHE I POVERI

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7.3 billion inhabitants.
Note:OGGI

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world’s 10 billion souls will be middle class. Jobs, homes, cars, fancy electronics,
Note:UN IMMENSA CLASSE MEDIA CON I SUOI COMUNI

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awed by the magnitude of the task facing our children.
Note:MSTERO

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Can we provide these things?
Note:CONC.

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without wrecking much else?

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speak, from time to time, with experts
Note:LA MIA FORTUNA

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two broad categories,
Note:HO NOTATO

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the most important person born in that century
Note:BARLUG

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founder of the most significant cultural and intellectual movement
Note:VOGT

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responsible for the creation of the basic intellectual blueprints
Note:I DUE...POCO NOTI MA

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William Vogt and Norman Borlaug.

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born in 1902,
Note:VOGT

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“apocalyptic environmentalism”—the
Note:VOGT

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reduces consumption
Note:LA SALVEZZA

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affluence is not our greatest achievement but our biggest problem.
Note:X L AMBIENTALISTA

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taking more from Earth than it can give.
Note:UNA PROSPERITÀ TEMPORANEA

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Cut back! Cut back!
Note:MANTRA

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Borlaug, born twelve years later,

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“techno-optimism” or “cornucopianism”—the
Note:L EMBLEMA

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in the 1960s created the “Green Revolution,”
Note:LA SUA IMPRESA

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high-yielding crop varieties and agronomic techniques
Note:GREEN REV

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avert tens of millions of deaths
Note:ESITO

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affluence was not the problem but the solution.
Note:X I CORNUCOPIANS

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getting richer, smarter,
Note:LA VIA

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Innovate! Innovate!

Note | Location: 101

MANTRA

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by using the advanced methods of the Green Revolution to increase per-acre yields, he argued, farmers would not have to plant as many acres.
Note:UN ESEMPIO DI IPOTESI BARLAUG

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“Eat lower on the food chain.” If people ate less beef and pork, valuable farmland would not have to be devoted to cattle
Note:IPOTESI PROTESI VOGT

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Wizards and Prophets—Wizards unveiling technological fixes, Prophets decrying the consequences of our heedlessness.
Note:PERCHÈ MAGO E PROFETA

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Their first meeting, in the mid-1940s, ended in disagreement.
Note:POI PIÙ INCONTRI

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Vogt rebuked
Note:AGGRAVA IL PROB

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Borlaug derided
Note:LUDDISTA!

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Both men are dead now,

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intellectually dishonest, indifferent to the poor, even racist
Note:ACCUSE AL PROFETA

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unthinking, scientifically ignorant, even driven by greed
Note:ACCUSE AL MAGO

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at best postpones
Note:Cccccccccc

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“ecocide.”

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less two ideal categories than two ends of a continuum.
Note:CONTINUM

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the ship is too large to turn quickly.
Note:LA VIA ACELTA RICHIEDE TEMPO...X QS OCCORRE UNA SCELTA

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modified crops cannot be bred and tested overnight.

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planting huge numbers of trees
Note:IDEM

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backtracking is not easy,
Note:NN SI TORNA INDIETRO

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less about facts than about values.
Note:MA È ANCHE UNO SCONTRO DI VALIRI

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implicit moral and spiritual visions:

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Prophets look at the world as finite,
Note:UN MONDO FINITO

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Wizards see possibilities as inexhaustible,
Note:TUTTO È POSSIBILE

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humans as wily managers of the planet.
Note:IL MONDO CREATO PER L UOMO

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growth and development
Note:W...BENEDIZIONE

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stability and preservation
Note:P...QUEL CHE CONTA

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Earth as a toolbox,
Note:W

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world as embodying an overarching order
Note:P...NN DISTURBARE IL COSMO

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priority to personal liberty
Note:W

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connection.
Note:P

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capitalism, with its teeming global markets dominated by big corporations,
Note:W...ACCETTABILE

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emphasis on personal autonomy, social and physical mobility, and the rights of the individual
Note:W

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something fundamentally wrong with Western-style consumer
Note:P

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smaller, more stable communities, closer to the earth,
Note:P...QUEL CHE CI VUOLE

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freedom and flexibility
Note:P...ILLUSIONE

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atomized isolation, cut off from Nature
Note:P...IL RISCHIO

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Voltaire and Rousseau disputing
Note:UN ANTICIPO

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Jefferson and Hamilton
Note:ALTRO ANTICIPO

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Robert Malthus
Note:ALTRA OPPOSIZIONE

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William Godwin and Nicolas de Condorcet

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T. H. Huxley,
Note:ANCORA

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Bishop Samuel Wilberforce

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John Muir,
Note:ANCORA...P

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Gifford Pinchot,
Note:W

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Paul Ehrlich
Note:ANCORA

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Julian Simon

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Cut back or produce more?
Note:SINTESI

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What this book is not: a detailed survey of our environmental dilemmas.
Note:Ttttttttttttt

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The Wizard and the Prophet presents no plan,
Note:NEMMENO UN PROGETTO....NELL ERA INTERNET EVITIAMO LE OPINIONI

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chapter I
Note:Ttttttttt

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what biology suggests about the trajectory of any species—
Note:CHE FINE FAREMO

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all species, if given the chance, overreach, overreproduce,
Note:DESTINO COMUNE

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Inevitably, they encounter a wall,
Note:INEVITABILE

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Vogt and Borlaug were equally deluded.
Note:DA QS PUNTO DI VISTA

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Long Island
Note:STORIA DI V.

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near death from polio

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ecological conversion

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The Road to Survival (1948),
Note:BIBBIA DEL CATASTROFISMO

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objective science,
Note:CONIUGA 1

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a moral testament.
Note:E 2

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birth into a poor Iowa
Note:STORIA DI B

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released from what he saw as endless toil
Note:AMMIRAZIONE X I TRATTORI DI FORD

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saved more lives than anyone in history.
Note:SECONDO IL WSJ

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middle section of this book,
Note:Ttttttttttt

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four great, oncoming challenges: food, water, energy, and climate change.
Note:4 SFIDE...DA QUI PROCEDO RAPIDO...MEGLIO LEGGERE

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The Population Bomb (1968),
Note:CLASSICO

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The Limits to Growth (1972),

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I became a Borlaugian, scoffing at the catastrophic scenarios
Note:NEFLI ANNI ORRANTA

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Nowadays, though, worrying about my children, I am waffling.
Note:UN FIGLIO...TORNA LA PREOCCUP

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Maybe my optimism is as ill-founded as my previous pessimism.
Note:?

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Thus I oscillate

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ONE State of the Species
Note:1@@@@@@@@@©

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Special People
Note:Ttttttttt

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Begin with an image,
Note:NB TRENTENNE A CITTÀ DEL MESSICO

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the task of coaxing something to grow on it.
Note:LA MISSIONE SUL TERRENO ARIDO

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It is April 1946,

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He spends his days staring at dying plants.

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the work he began there
Note:PIÙ IMPORTANTE DELLA GUERRA A CUI PENSANO TUTTI

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on this land appears a second man.
Note:IL PROFETA DEL TITOLO

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twelve years older,

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legacy of polio.

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Borlaug’s project is housed at a university in Chapingo,
Note:LA BASE

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Vogt is on his honeymoon;

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the head of the Conservation Division of the Pan American Union.

Note | Location: 250

LA SUA VESTE...V.

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agriculture and its effects on the landscape.
Note:IL SUO INTERESSE

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asks what they are doing with this 160 acres
Note:V.INCONTRA IL LAVORO DI B.

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symbol of technical prowess
Note:QUEL CHE DIVERRÀ NB

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Vogt will come to regard as dangerous to human survival.

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enemy to human well-being.
Note:IL GIUDIZIO RISERVATO A WV

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This is the beginning,

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Things skirl out from Chapingo, they sprawl across the world
Note:ESPANSIONE DELLE IDEE

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to use the discoveries of modern science to spare Mexico from a future of poverty and environmental degradation.
Note:LA MISSIONE DEI DUE

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challenges they see before Mexico actually confront all of humankind.
Note:MISSIONE PIÙ AMPIA

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Vogt sees the city reaching across the dry lake bed
Note:LA MINACCIA

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Hold it back!
Note:L ORDINE

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Borlaug sees the pitiful scrim of wheat
Note:LA MINACCIA X B

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How can we give people a better chance
Note:IL PENSIERO

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the fields of maize and wheat
Note:X V UNA PIAGA

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He calls for more sustainable, land-sparing agriculture,
Note:COSA OCCORRE X V

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like trying to fight arson with gasoline.
Note:IL TENTATIVO DI NB X WV

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“tree-hugger”
Note:NOMIGNOLO DI WVG

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apostles of a new religion,
Note:ALTRI INSULTI

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fetishizes Nature.

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a holistic view that seeks to place humanity within a framework
Note:PIÙ OGGETTIVAMENTE

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Borlaug, by contrast, speaks from the point of view of genetics—an
Note:GENETICA

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Of Vogt’s natural bounds, it asks, How can we leapfrog them altogether?
Note:SUPERARE I LIMITI

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“techno-optimism,”
Note:NOMIGNOLO

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Nature knows best!
Note:MOTTO DI VW

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wants the two men to have a ringing debate,
Note:MAI ACCADUTO

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Mexican government has adopted new soil and water conservation laws.
Note:WV FA LOBBY X DISMETTERE IL PROGETTO NB

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New York Zoological Society,
Note:FONDAZIONI A SUPPORTO DI WV..POVA ROBA

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Committee for Bird Preservation,

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American Wildlife Institute.

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Rockefeller Foundation,
Note:A SUPPORTO DI NB

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he drafts and redrafts a letter to the Rockefeller Foundation.
Note:LOBBING DI V

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Rockefeller (1) is doing everything wrong and (2) should put Vogt in charge of doing it right.
Note:ACFONTENUTO

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increase populations.
Note:SALVARE DALLE MALATTIE...UNICO OBBIETTIVO

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feeding of those populations.”
Note:NULLA PER

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boosting agriculture and industry is not the answer,
Note:IL POCO CHE SI FA È SBAGLIATO

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If just ten fish remain in a pond, the solution to running out of fish is not more efficient nets.
Note:ANALOGIA

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a change in our relationship with Nature.
Note:COSA SERVE?

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The World Is a Petri Dish
Note:Tttttttttttttt

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Margulis was one of the most important biologists in the last half century—she
Note:LYNN MARGULIS

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it did not consist of two
Note:RIORDINO L ALBEROL DELLA VGITA IN 5 REGNI

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(plants, animals, fungi, protists, and two types of bacteria).

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greatest source of evolutionary creativity: the microworld of bacteria, fungi, and protists.
Note:LA NOSTRA FISSA SUGLI ANIMALI

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90 percent of the living matter on Earth consists of microorganisms,

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form giant super-colonies, reproduce either asexually or by swapping genes with others, take in genes from entirely unrelated species, merge into symbiotic beings—the
Note:COSE CHE LORO SANNO FARE E NOI NO

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giving rise to the oxygen we breathe.
Note:UNA LORO PICCOLA IMPRESA

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pandas and polar bears were epiphenomena—interesting
Note:INTERESSANTI MA INSIGNIFICANTI

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Homo sapiens, she once told me, is an unusually successful species.
Note:STRANISSIMO

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fate of every successful species to wipe itself out—that
Note:MA

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Neither conservation nor technology has anything to do with biological reality.
Note:NB E WV FUORIK STRADA

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the Russian microbiologist Georgii Gause.
Note:UN EROE DI LM

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Born in 1910,

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Gause looked with envy at Rockefeller’s funds,
Note:COME V.

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Pearl and Reed believed they were on to something.
Note:NEL 1920…STUDI SULLA CURVA DEMO DELLE POPOLAZIONI

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parallel research with fruit flies, locking a male and female in a bottle full of food
Note:ANALOGIA DELLA MOSCA

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convinced that he had found a universal law,

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discovered that the flies moved around so much that they were hard to count.
Note:GG

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Gause decided to work with microorganisms.

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a pinch—of oatmeal
Note:IL CIBO PRESCELTO

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Paramecium caudatum or Stylonychia mytilus, both single-celled protozoans,
Note:L ANIMALE PRESCELTO

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The Struggle for Existence, published in 1934.
Note:I RISULTATI

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scientists often refer to Gause’s curve as an “S-shaped curve.”
Note:ANDAMENTO POP OSSERVATO

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the line hits an inflection
Note:CONVESSO

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until the organism begins to run out of food, at which time there is a second inflection
Note:CONCAVO

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Eventually the line descends, and the population falls toward zero.
Note:ESTINZIONE

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Proteus vulgaris,
Note:STA NJEL NS INTESTINO

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Twelve hours after that, the ball of living cells would be the size of Earth.
Note:SI RIPRODUCE A VVELOCITÀ PAZZESCHE

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lack of resources prevent the vast majority of P. vulgaris from reproducing.
Note:MA MANCA IL CIBO

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to make more of themselves,
Note:LO SCOPO DI TUTTI...DARWIN DOCET

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creatures have a maximum reproductive rate:

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rate is about twenty children
Note:PER NOI

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only a few members of each generation manage to reach this rate.
Note:IL COMPITO DELLA SELEZIONE

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the size of its habitat
Note:I VICOLI POSTI AL P.VULGARIS

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supply of nourishment

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other, competing microbes.

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eats and divides, eats and divides.
Note:IL BATTERIO ALL INIZIO

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P. vulgaris experiences a vest-pocket apocalypse.
Note:QUANDO FINISCE IL CIBO

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a few species manage to escape their limits,
Note:ECCEZIONE

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in New York City, zebra mussels invaded the lower Hudson River,
Note:UN ESEMPIO

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a million eggs a year

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The species originated in the Azov, Black, and Caspian seas
Note:ARRIVATE CON LA VGLOBALIZ

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The Hudson first saw them in 1991.
Note:IN EUROPA DAL 1600

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half the mass of living creatures in the river.
Note:IN UN ANNO

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carpeted every square foot.

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covered boat bottoms,

Yellow highlight | Location: 390

Bust followed boom; the population collapsed.

Yellow highlight | Location: 393

They did exhaust their food supply, but they also were attacked by a local predator,
Note:DUE CAUSE

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I went to a park at the edge of the Hudson, I couldn’t step into the river—the
Note:15 ANNI FA TROPPE CINCHIGLIE SULLE SPONDE

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Nowadays at the park the creatures are mostly gone. Children splash happily in the shallows.

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Humans are no different, Margulis believed.
Note:UOMINI E COZZE

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Homo sapiens is just one creature among many,

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on the edge of the petri dish. Wizard or Prophet, it didn’t matter.
Note:SIAMO AGLI ESTREMI...NESSUNO PUÒ FARCI NULLA

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another briefly successful species.

Yellow highlight | Location: 401

Of Lice and Men
Note:Tttttttttttttt

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Why and how did humankind become “successful”? And what, to an evolutionary biologist, does “success” mean,
Note:IL MISTERO DEL SUCCESSO

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Mark Stoneking
Note:UNA RISPOSTA

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his son’s school warning of a lice outbreak in the classroom.
Note:1999

Yellow highlight | Location: 405

researcher at the Max Planck Institute
Note:LIPSIA

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humanus capitis,
Note:DUE PIDOCCHI...UNO IN TESTA

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humanus corporis,
Note:SULLA PELLE

Yellow highlight | Location: 413

Humanity’s great cover-up had created a new ecological niche, and some head lice had rushed to fill it.
Note:QUELLI DELLA TESTA SI SONO EVOLUTI ADATTANDOSI AI VESTITI

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a new subspecies arose.
Note:TRASFORMAZIONE E SOPRAVVIVENZA

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a rough date for when people first wore clothing.
Note:QUANDO LA MUTAZIONE?

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107,000 years ago.
Note:LA SEPARAZIONE

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Clothing is ornament and symbol;
Note:IL VESTITO...TECNOLOGIA TUTT ALTRO CHE BANALE

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a mental shift had occurred.
Note:CON L ABBIGLIAMENTO

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a realm of complex, symbolic artifacts.

Note | Location: 424

COSA È DIVENTATO L UOMO...CULTURA

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Human beings were engraving pieces of ochre and ostrich shells in southern Africa.
Note:NASCE ANCHE L ARTE

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carving elegant harpoons
Note:AFRICA CENTRALE

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ornamental beads
Note:COLLANE...CORNO D AFRICA

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burying the dead
Note:MEDIO ORIWNTE

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becoming human.
Note:IN POCHE PAROLE

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Homo sapiens, a bipedal primate.
Note:SIGNIFICATO DI UOMO...PRIMO

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relating to or characteristic of our genus, Homo.
Note:SECONDO...NUOVA CLASSIFICAZ

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Several species of Homo—the
Note:UN TEMPO

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Homo sapiens (us), Homo neanderthalensis (Neanderthals), Homo denisova (Denisovans), Homo naledi, Homo heidelbergensis, Homo floriensis
Note:ESEMPI

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ancient types of humans bred with each other—
Note:SICURAMENTE SAP E NED

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only one species of human now walks the planet.
Note:OGGI

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Human-ness is the quality—a mix of creativity, drive, and moral awareness—that transforms humans into persons.
Note:TERZO

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spark or spirit,

Yellow highlight | Location: 440

unique
Note:UNICITÀ

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Homo sapiens want to believe they are special,

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Homo sapiens seems not to have created art, played music, invented new tools, worked out the motions of the planets, or worshiped gods
Note:NON DA SUBITO...RICHIESTE DECINE DI MIGLIAIA DI ANNI

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long, skinny, string-shaped molecules.
Note:IL DNA...SIMILE X TUTTI

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molecule is composed of two chains

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links in the chains are called “bases” or “nucleotides.”

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links—segments of the DNA chain,
Note:GENE

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The totality of the genetic information
Note:GENOMA...INDIVIDUALE O DI SPECIE

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two peoples’ genomes differ in only about one out of every thousand bases.
Note:DIFFERENZE

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Escherichia coli,
Note:UN PARAGONE CON...

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one out of fifty.
Note:DIVERSITÀ

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twenty times more diverse than their hosts.

Yellow highlight | Location: 457

organisms also vary in terms of duplicated or deleted segments of DNA.
Note:MA C È UN ALTRA DIFFERENZA

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humans are less diverse than almost all apes.
Note:OMOGENEI

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differences between one chimpanzee
Note:ES...PIÙ GRANDE

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humans are at the bottom, along with endangered species like wolverines and lynxes.
Note:PIÙ UNIFORMI...PIÙ IN XICOLO

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a legacy of small population
Note:UNIFORMITÀ

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at some point our numbers must have fallen dramatically,
Note:SPECULAZIONE SULLA NS STORIA

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ten thousand people—the
Note:FORZSE

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chance can alter its genetic makeup with astonishing rapidity. New mutations can arise and spread;
Note:IN PICHI SI MUTA PIÙ IN FRETTA

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a single gene in a single member of the small group that populated Ice Age Europe
Note:ES...OCCHI AZZURRI

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something special, something that made us human.
Note:DURANTE UNA DI QS CRISI...SPECULAZIONE

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Solenopsis invicta, the red imported fire ant.
Note:ANALOGIA

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originated in southern Brazil,

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frequent floods.
Note:HABITAT

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furiously active creatures
Note:RISPONDONO SUBITO AI DISASTRI DELLE ALLUVIONI

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knitting their bodies
Note:LA TECNICA USATA

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Like criminal gangs, fire ants thrive on chaos.
Note:UNA VELOCITÀ CHE LE RENDE DOMINANTI

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In the 1930s
Note:IMPORTATA CASUALMENTE NEGLI USA

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in the port of Mobile, Alabama.
Note:SCOPERTE DA EDWARD O WILSON

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just a few thousand individuals—a
Note:UN PICCOLO NUMERO...PIÙ SOGGETTO A MUTAZIONI

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In its homeland, fire ant colonies constantly fight each other, reducing their numbers
Note:SOTTO CONTROLLO

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cooperative super-colonies,
Note:IN AMERICA

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wiping out competitors

Yellow highlight | Location: 490

Linepithema humile, the Argentine ant.
Note:PRIMO OSTACOLO ALA COLONIZZ

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now the most populous society on Earth.
Note:FORMICA ARGENTINA

Yellow highlight | Location: 494

Homo sapiens did something similar as it became human.
Note:ANALOGIA

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300,000 years ago
Note:APOARIZIONE DELLA NS SPECIE

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Until about 75,000 years ago—that
Note:RISTRETTI IN AFRICA

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People raced across the continents like so many imported fire ants.
Note:DOPO

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ten thousand years,
Note:IN AUSTRALIA

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Stay-at-home Homo sapiens 1.0,
Note:PRIMA VERSIONE

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aggressively expansive Homo sapiens 2.0.
Note:SECONDA VERSIONE DOPO IL RESTRINGIMENTO

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No more than a few hundred people initially left Africa,
Note:PRIMI COLONI

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species swung around the first inflection point, with the invention of agriculture.
Note:10000 ANNI FA

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Only when an unknown genius discovered naturally mutated grain plants that did not shatter—and
Note:PRIMA IL GRANO SI DISPERDEVA E NN CONVEGNO VA COLTIVARLO

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first in southern Turkey,
Note:CULTURE

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landscapes that, so to speak, waited for hands to harvest them.
Note:SCHIAVISMO

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Foragers manipulated their environment with fire,
Note:CAMBIA LA NS RELAZIONE CON LA NATURA

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Before agriculture, the Middle West, Ukraine, and the lower Yangzi Valley had been sparsely populated domains of insects and grass; they became breadbaskets,
Note:DALLA VARIETÀ ALL UNICITÀ

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a petri dish is a uniform expanse of nutrients, all ready for the taking.
Note:UCRAINA IN PROVETTA

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Homo sapiens 2.0A—A for agriculture—took

Yellow highlight | Location: 521

subdue the planet.
Note:SUCCESSO

Yellow highlight | Location: 524

two German chemists, Fritz Haber and Carl Bosch, discovered the key steps to making synthetic fertilizer.
Note:PRIMO 900

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literally changed the chemical composition of the earth.
Note:DUE PERSONAGGI CHE DOVREMMO CONOSCERE MEGLIO

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soil and groundwater nitrogen levels have risen worldwide.
Note:USO MASSICCIO DI FERTILIZZANTI

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Haber and Bosch enabled our species to extract an additional 3 billion people’s worth of food
Note:EFFETTI

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The improved wheat, rice, and (to a lesser extent) maize varieties developed by Borlaug
Note:ALTRA INNOVAZIONE ANNI 50

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Antibiotics, vaccines, disinfectants, and water-treatment plants pushed back humankind’s bacterial, viral, fungal, and protozoan enemies.
Note:SUCCESSI E NUMERO

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Rocketing up the growth curve,

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humans grab “about 40% of the present net primary production in terrestrial ecosystems”—40
Note:BIOLOGI DI STANFORD NEL 1986

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figure had risen to “39 to 50%.”
Note:10 ANNI DOPO

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In 2000, the chemist Paul Crutzen and the biologist Eugene Stoermer awarded a name to our time: the Anthropocene,
Note:ANTROPOCENE AGIAMO SU SCALA MNDIALE

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If we follow Gause’s pattern, growth will continue at delirious speed until the second inflection point, when we have exhausted the global petri dish.
Note:LA PARABOLA

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It would be foolish to expect anything else, Margulis thought.
Note:PER BIOLOGI È UNA LEGGE

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To avoid destroying itself, the human race would have to do something deeply unnatural,
Note:INNATURAL

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constrain its own growth
Note:MAI VISTO

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Brown tree snakes in Guam, water hyacinth in African rivers, rabbits in Australia, Burmese pythons in Florida—all
Note:TUTTE SPECIE DI SUCCESSO COLLASSATE

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Not one has voluntarily turned back.

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zebra mussels in the Hudson

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Why should we expect Homo sapiens to fence

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“discount rate,”
Note:MISURA IL VALORE DEL FUTURI X GLI ECONOMISTI

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broken stoplight up the street now
Note:CI INTERESSA QUESTO... NN IL MALCONTENTO IN CONGO CHE POTREBBE SFOCIARE

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here we are asking governments to focus on potential planetary boundaries that may not be reached for decades or even centuries.
Note:FINTA PREOCCUPAZIONE

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From this perspective, is there any reason to imagine that Homo sapiens, unlike mussels, snakes, and moths, can exempt itself from the fate of all successful species?
Note:POCO CRWDIBILE UN SUCCESSO...LO STOP E LO SVILUPPO INDEFINITO NN SI SONO MAI VISTI

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humans are simply part of evolution’s handiwork,
Note:PER UNO SCIENZIATO

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the answer to the question “Are we doomed to destroy ourselves?” is “Yes.”
Note:X IL BIOLOGO

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magical exception—it
Note:L UNICA SPERANZA

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Why should we be different?
NN RESTA CHE CHIEDERSI