Pigeons or Progess

"Our grandfathers were less well-housed, well-fed, well-clothed than we are. The strivings by which they bettered their lot are also those which deprived us of passenger pigeons. Perhaps we now grieve because we are not sure, in our hearts, that we have gained by the exchange. The gadgets of industry bring so many more comforts than tha pigeons did, but do they add as much to the glory of spring?"

---Aldo Leopold (1947)