This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
William Rees and Mathis Wackernagel
EFA [Ecological Footprint Analysis] starts from a series of simple premises: Human beings are integral components of the ecosystems that sustain us. We can therefore best assess ecological sustainability using biophysical data. Most human impacts on ecosystems are associated with energy and material extraction and consumption. These energy and material flows can be converted to corresponding productive or assimilative ecosystems areas. There is a measurable, finite area of productive land and water ecosystems on Earth. Every human population imposes an ‘ecological footprint’ on Earth equivalent to the amount of the planet’s productive capacity required to supply that population with resources and waste assimilation services. We therefore formally define the ecological footprint of a specified population as the area of land and water ecosystems required on a continuous basis to produce the resources that the population consumes, and to assimilate (some of) the wastes that the population produces, wherever on Earth the relevant land/water may be located.
Faultfinding without suggestions for improvement is a waste of time.
Improvement | Waste |
Ralph Ellison, fully Ralph Waldo Ellison
At best Americans give but a limited attention to history. Too much happens too rapidly, and before we can evaluate it, or exhaust its meaning or pleasure, there is something new to concern us. Ours is the tempo of the motion picture, not that of the still camera, and we waste experience as we wasted the forest.
Attention | Experience | Meaning | Waste |
Raymond Chandler, fully Raymond Thornton Chandler
Chess is as elaborate a waste of human intelligence as you can find outside an advertising agency.
Advertising | Intelligence | Waste |
Raymond Chandler, fully Raymond Thornton Chandler
I don't mind if you don't like my manners. They're pretty bad. I grieve over them during the long winter evenings. But don't waste your time trying to cross-examine me.
Ray Bradbury, fully Ray Douglas Bradbury
You will have to write and put away or burn a lot of material before you are comfortable in this medium. You might as well start now and get the necessary work done. For I believe that eventually quantity will make for quality. How so? Quantity gives experience. From experience alone can quality come. All arts, big and small, are the elimination of waste motion in favor of the concise declaration. The artist learns what to leave out. His greatest art will often be what he does not say, what he leaves out, his ability to state simply with clear emotion, the way he wants to go. The artist must work so hard, so long, that a brain develops and lives, all of itself, in his fingers.
Ability | Art | Experience | Wants | Waste | Will | Work | Art |
Richard Bach, fully Richard David Bach
You either plan for what's ahead or you fight with what you've got: worry is a waste of time.
Even ministers of good things are like torches, a light to others, waste and destruction to themselves.
Evil ministers of good things are as torches,--a light to others, a waste to none but themselves only.
There is a privacy I love in this snowy night. Driving around, I will waste more time.
During the fifties, for example, the American character appeared with some consistency that became a model of manhood adopted by many men: the Fifties male. He got to work early, labored responsibly, supported his wife and children and admired discipline. Reagan is a sort of mummified version of this dogged type. This sort of man didn't see women's souls well, but he appreciated their bodies; and his view of culture and America's part in it was boyish and optimistic. Many of his qualities were strong and positive, but underneath the charm and bluff there was, and there remains, much isolation, deprivation, and passivity. Unless he has an enemy, he isn't sure that he is alive. The Fifties man was supposed to like football, be aggressive, stick up for the United States, never cry, and always provide.... During the sixties, another sort of man appeared. The waste and violence of the Vietnam war made men question whether they knew what an adult male really was. If manhood meant Vietnam, did they want any part of it? Meanwhile, the feminist movement encouraged men to actually look at women, forcing them to become conscious of concerns and sufferings that the Fifties male labored to avoid.
Character | Children | Consistency | Culture | Man | Men | Model | Qualities | Question | War | Waste | Wife | Work |
Salomon ibn Gabirol, aka Solomon ben Judah or Avicebron
THE DWELLERS IN CLAY - O habitants of homes of clay, Why lift ye such a swelling eye, Ye are but as the beasts that die, What do ye boast of more than they? It is for us the wiser part To know ourselves for worms whose doom Is in the clay to find a tomb, Nor, falsely proud, exalt our heart. What shall aught profit mortal man Whose latter end adjoins the grave? Here were no change, though Nature gave A thousand years to be his span. Should he as rebel walk, behold Earth opens hot to swallow up His ashes in her flaming cup And vain is all his might of gold. Unhappy man, with chastened soul, And opened eyes, true vision win, To see thy lowly origin And thy inevitable goal. To what may be compared thy lot? Thou art, O weak and wretched wight, The gourd that shot up in the night And in the morning it was not. To be unborn were better worth Than thus to reap distress and pain, For how essay great things to gain When struggling in this snare of earth? A fallen creature from the womb, Thou sinnest for a slice of bread, And in a moment’s wildered dread, Can live through every plague and gloom While spirit with thy body links, With living light shall glow thy flesh, But should the soul desert its mesh, To mire and sliminess it sinks. Behold no jot with thee will stay Of all the glory now so great, Strangers shall seize thy loved estate, And empty thou shalt go away. Thy soul thou gavest o’er to lust, Nor pondered on this bitter truth. But if thou sinnest in thy youth, What wilt thou do when thou art dust? O let the wicked turn aside, And take, O King, the path to Thee. Perchance the Rock will heed the plea, And from His wrath the sinner hide. O haughty-souled, come gather all, Remember and stand fast and raise Your heart and hands in common praise And thus to God in heaven call: "Woe to our souls, and wellaway For all the sins that we have sinned, Alas, we have pursued the wind And like to sheep have gone astray. "What favour can we ask or grace? The wave of sin has overflowed Our heads, and heavy is our load Of guilt, how dare we lift our face? "Draw up Thy people from the pit, Thou Ruler of the depth and height, Stiff-necked were we in Thy despite, Yet of Thy mercies bate no whit "But shed Thy sweet compassion o’er The people knocking at Thy gate, Thou art the Master of our fate, And unto Thee our eyes upsoar."
Samuel ha-Nagid, born Samuel ibn Naghrela or Naghrillah
Do you remember the mountain pass of sand which I crossed alone while fleeing from you and afraid? Even today I am in transit over you,—but behind me are tens of thousands who obey me like their father And wait for my utterances as for the rain and attend to my wisdom as to prophecy. Because of this bless them for me my God,—may they follow after me willingly today.
Ever since Eve started it all by offering Adam the apple, woman's punishment has been to supply a man with food then suffer the consequences when it disagrees with him.
Rumi, fully Jalāl ad-Dīn Muḥammad Rumi NULL
Be a helpful friend, and you will become a green tree with always new fruit, always deeper journeys into love.
Waste |
One does not regret giving one's own ear-ring to one's dear friend. (One does not regret giving the best to one's friend)
Saint Isaac of Nineveh, also Isaac the Syrian, Isaac of Qatar and Isaac Syrus NULL
Through the toil of prayer and the anguish of your heart commune with those who are grieved at heart; and the Source of mercy will be opened up to your petitions.