No. The opposite of someone who eats a lot of animal products is someone who is attentive to how often he eats animal products. The best way to excuse oneself from a challenging idea is to pretend there are only two options.

We dramatically overstate the role of science deniers, because it allows science acceptors to feel righteous without challenging us to act on the knowledge we accept.

And we have to acknowledge that change is inevitable. We can choose to make changes, or we can be subject to other changes

The four highest-impact things an individual can do to tackle climate change are eat a plant-based diet, avoid air travel, live car-free, and have fewer children.

It’s a shame that instead of having a minority of climate atheists, we have a majority of climate agnostics.

But future generations will almost certainly look back and wonder where we were in the biblical sense: Where was our selfhood? What decisions did the crisis inspire? Why on earth—why on Earth—did we choose our suicide and their sacrifice?

“We have to do something,” we tell one another, as though reciting the line were enough. “We have to do something,” we tell ourselves, and then wait for instructions that are not on the way. We know that we are choosing our own end; we just can’t believe it.

When researchers at the Worldwatch Institute accounted for emissions that the FAO overlooked, they estimated that livestock are responsible for 32,564 million tons of CO2e emissions per year, or 51 percent of annual global emissions—more than all cars, planes, buildings, power plants, and industry combined.

According to Project Drawdown, four of the most effective strategies for mitigating global warming are reducing food waste, educating girls, providing family planning and reproductive healthcare, and collectively shifting to a plant-rich diet.