Matt Ridley
Matt Ridley
Matthew White Ridley, 5th Viscount Ridley DL FRSL FMedSci, known commonly as Matt Ridley, is a British journalist who has written several popular science books. He is also a businessman and a Conservative member of the House of Lords...
NationalityBritish
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth7 February 1958
accept appetite declining economic efforts frozen people persuade recessions remind retreat sake stagnation standard whatever
I sense very little appetite for green efforts to persuade people to accept a frozen or declining standard of living for the sake of the environment. Recessions remind us that economic retreat or stagnation is painful, whatever the goal.
enable inch wide
I thought journalism would enable me to be a mile wide and an inch deep.
anytime coming convinced imagine lived
I can't imagine not coming back to New Orleans, ... We've lived here all of our lives, and we don't take it for granted. We don't know how long it's going to be before we have to make this choice. We're pretty convinced that we're not coming back anytime real soon.
changed fast life people society species
If people are all the same underneath, how has society changed so fast and so radically? Life now is completely different to how it was 32,000 years ago. It's changed like that of no other species has. What's made that difference?
means
I opted for a freelance writing career. I was lucky enough to have the means to do it.
bound faster mate meet
Nowadays, ideas can meet and mate very much faster than before, and the Internet is only accelerating this process. So innovation is bound to accelerate.
collected history natural obsession realized science spent time vaguely wanting youth
I started out wanting to be a naturalist. My obsession in my youth was with bird-watching. I collected things, I spent a lot of time outdoors. I only vaguely realized that science was a little more than natural history, but by then I was hooked.
devoted eat food growing land organic pat pay perfectly quite
I'm perfectly happy to eat organic food, but if I choose to pay more for it, I don't pat myself on the back ethically. Quite the reverse. I think I'm actually being quite greedy, because what I'm doing is essentially saying, 'I want more land to be devoted to growing my food.'
encourage government mainly
Government can encourage innovation, but mainly by doing less, not doing more.
capital hard misery people sorry television watching
Watching those people on television made it hard to feel sorry for myself, ... That was misery - capital M.
sex years ideas
This idea holds out hope that the human race will prosper mightily in the years ahead-because ideas are having sex with each other as never before.
sex ideas brain
You need to understand how human beings bring together their brains and enable their ideas to combine and recombine, to meet and, indeed, to mate. In other words, you need to understand how ideas have sex.
evolution ancient products
Society works not because we have consciously invented it, but because it is an ancient product of our evolved predispositions. It is literally in our nature.
ends
Futurology always ends up telling you more about your own time than about the future.