Robert Zubrin Quotes

Human use of one resource runs squarely against human use of another resource.

When you think of all the conflicts we have - whether those conflicts are local, whether they are regional or global - these conflicts are often over the management, the distribution of resources. If these resources are very valuable, if these resources are scarce, if these resources are degraded, there is going to be competition.

War is usually fought over diminishing resources, particulary those that we perceive to be extremely valuable.

With shrinking resources, interest groups are pitted against each other.

When you're fighting for an increasingly smaller portion of the pie, you turn against each other; you create reasons to hate each other.

When resources are degraded, we start competing for them, whether it is at the local level in Kenya, where we had tribal clashes over land and water, or at the global level, where we are fighting over water, oil, and minerals. So one way to promote peace is to promote sustainable management and equitable distribution of resources.

When resources become skimpy, human beings don't suddenly cooperate to conserve what's left. They fight to the last scrap for possession of a diminishing resource.

As we move towards 8 or 10 billion people on the planet, there's a little less gold per capita. Each one of us will continue to be fighting over an ever smaller percentage of total resources. This is not a happy thought.

In an approximate way, the logic of commons has been understood for a long time, perhaps since the discovery of agriculture or the invention of private property in real estate.

The myth of unlimited production brings war in its train as inevitably as clouds announce a storm.

The problem is that the good Lord didn’t see fit to put oil and gas reserves where there are democratic governments.

There is no single theory that is used in economics that considers the finite nature of resources. It's shocking.

It's well-known that people don't respond to scarce resources necessarily in what we might consider a positive light.

All of Africa's resources should be declared resources of the state and managed by the nation. Our experience in Bolivia shows that when you take control of natural resources for the people of the town and village, major world change is possible.

We used to live in a world where the price of resources came down steadily, and now the world has changed. You have a great mismatch between finite resources and exponential population growth.

The United States has consumed in the last 50 years more natural resources than the rest of the entire human race for all of history.

Africa's mineral wealth is great; we should co-operate in its development.

Natural resources must be so distributed, by way of auction or otherwise, that they serve a larger public purpose.

Among the most important lessons to be taken from the history of oil is not taking essentials for granted. Conserve oil, but also conserve water. If our Hummers are a red flag in oil, maybe our Jacuzzis are the same for water.

What we are beginning to witness is a whole new set of rules for economics, based on rationing resources.

I think as resources become more dear, we really need to consider population.

Because we can expect future generations to be richer than we are, no matter what we do about resources, asking us to refrain from using resources now so that future generations can have them later is like asking the poor to make gifts to the rich.

Those who consume far more resources than they require destroy the life chances of those whose survival depends upon consuming more.

Poverty - the greatest cause of human suffering on the planet - is itself exacerbated by conflict, competition for resources, injustice, even the global downturn and climate change. Diseases like AIDS, TB and malaria cannot be tackled without adequate resources. So you see everything is connected. In order to address any major cause of human suffering, we have to work together across many fronts.

The American Colonies need waste people…. they are ready to eat up one another