"It is easy to make fun of radical environmentalism. Its climatological projections are often dubious and even if they are accurate, it is not clear how a handful of enthusiasts can avert the coming apocalypse. But that is to miss the point. The green movement may speak the language of science, but what really moves it is an ethical imperative. It is an attempt to create a society in which some choices are recognised as better than others, in which nature is seen to put constraints upon the free play of desire. In short, it is a religion—a religion without God. It is to such spontaneous initiatives of the faithful, not the clunking machinery of state, that we must look for a restoration of life to the language of the virtues."
