Quotes from Wade Davis

On paper I would be a rather bold individual in our culture.

Heroes are never perfect, but they're brave, they're authentic, they're courageous, determined, discreet, and they've got grit.

A language is not just a body of vocabulary or a set of grammatical rules. … Every language is an old-growth forest of the mind.

All cultures through all time have constantly been engaged in a dance with new possibilities of life.

What could be more lonely than to be enveloped in silence, to be the last of your people to speak your native tongue, to have no way to pass on the wisdom of the elders, to anticipate the promise of the children. This tragic fate is indeed the plight of someone somewhere roughly every two weeks.

Only, in Haiti, I realized, is it possible to drink rum and haggle with a god.

What could be more lonely than to be enveloped in silence, to be the last of your people to speak your native tongue, to have no way to pass on the wisdom of the elders, to anticipate the promise of the children. This tragic fate is indeed the plight of someone somewhere roughly every two weeks.

The world in which you were born is just one model of reality. Other cultures are not failed attempts at being you; they are unique manifestations of the human spirit.

All cultures through all time have constantly been engaged in a dance with new possibilities for life. Change is the one constant in human history.

The measure of a society is not only what it does but the quality of its aspirations.

Change is no threat to culture.

It's haunting to realize that half of the languages of the world are teetering on the brink of extinction.

So be patient. Do not compromise. And give your destiny time to find you.

What is science but the pursuit of the truth? What is Buddhism but 2500 years of observation as to the nature of mind?

You know, once something freezes, it's solid. That's the key to the arctic - they didn't fear the cold, they made use of it.