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THE FUTURE OF MONEY Bernard A. Lietaer - library.uniteddiversity ...

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work for large corporations. A striking 69% of them have concluded<br />

that we are living now through the 'sixth extinction'. This species<br />

extinction seems to be happening more rapidly and affecting a wider<br />

range of biodiversity than any of the previous five. This is even faster<br />

than the last extinction, over 60 million years ago, when an asteroid<br />

may have wiped out the dinosaurs. The claim is that we are in the<br />

process of losing between 30% and 70% of the planet's biodiversity<br />

within a time span of only 20 to 30 years. The other difference from<br />

all previous extinction is that this one is due to the actions of one<br />

species our own - which also claims to be the only one endowed with<br />

intelligence and consciousness.<br />

· The following public Warning to Humanity was unanimously<br />

agreed by 1,600 scientists, including a majority of living Nobel Prize<br />

winners in the sciences: 'A great change in stewardship of the Earth<br />

and the life on it is required, if vast human misery is to be avoided<br />

and our global home on this planet is not be irretrievably mutilated.<br />

... If not checked, many of our current practices may so put at serious<br />

risk the future that we wish for human society and the plant and<br />

animal kingdoms, and may so alter the living world, that it will be<br />

unable to sustain life in the manner that we know. Fundamental<br />

changes are urgent if we are to avoid the collision our present course<br />

will bring about.'<br />

· In a separate initiative, a global meeting of 2,800 economists,<br />

including Nobel Prize winners James Tobin and John Harsanyi,<br />

unanimously agreed on the following opinion: 'Global climate<br />

change is a real and pressing danger', carrying with it significant<br />

environmental, economic, social and geopolitical risks.<br />

All these exhortations invariably seem to hit a brick wall wherever<br />

serious financial interests are involved. Financial markets focus on<br />

the; next quarter's results, and even if a particular CEO were to<br />

advocate longer-term priorities at the expense of immediate results,

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