Vaclav Smil

life dichotomy autotroph organism heterotroph

“Life’s great dichotomy is between autotrophs, organisms that can nourish themselves, and heterotrophs, or life forms that must feed on other organisms.”

― Vaclav Smil

energy currency star planet plant civilization

“Energy is the only universal currency: one of its many forms must be transformed to another in order for stars to shine, planets to rotate, plants to grow, and civilizations to evolve.”

― Vaclav Smil

complex affluent human society biosphere bacteria fungi plant

“No matter how complex or affluent, human societies are nothing but subsystems of the biosphere, the Earth’s thin veneer of life, which is ultimately run by bacteria, fungi and green plants.”

― Vaclav Smil

higher education deep well bottom sky horizon

"Everyone [in higher education] was what I call drillers of deeper wells. These academics sit at the bottom of a deep well and they look up and see a sliver of the sky. They know everything about that little sliver of sky and nothing else. I scan all my horizons."

― Vaclav Smil

survival civilizatin limit planet

“The long-term survival of our civilization cannot be assured without setting limits on the planetary scale.”

― Vaclav Smil

finite planet energy kindergarten biology

"This is a finite planet. There is a finite amount of energy. There is finite efficiency of converting it by animals and crops. And there are certain sensitivities in terms of biogeochemical cycles, which will tolerate only that much. I mean, that should be obvious to anybody who’s ever taken some kind of kindergarten biology."

― Vaclav Smil

energy conversion economy flow society

"Everything is underlied by energy. As I always say, there is no economy, there is only energy conversion. Money is only a very imperfect way how to measure energy flows in society. So what happens is we got this supercheap energy — both the fuel, and electricity, and the food energy."

― Vaclav Smil

growth material consumption biosphere capitalism

"I believe that a fundamental departure from the long-established pattern of maximizing growth and promoting material consumption cannot be delayed by another century and that before 2100 modern civilization will have to make major steps toward ensuring the long-term habitability of its biosphere."

― Vaclav Smil