UN General Assembly
2021

It is time for humankind to grow up. It is time for us to listen to the warnings of the scientists. If we look at coronavirus disease (COVID-19), we have an example of the gloomy scientist being proved right. It is time for us to grow up and understand who we are and what we are doing. The world, this precious blue sphere with its eggshell crust and wisp of an atmosphere, is not some indestructible toy, some bouncy plastic romper room against which we can hurl ourselves to our hearts’ content. Daily, weekly, we are doing such irreversible damage that long before a million years are up, we will have made this beautiful planet effectively uninhabitable, not just for us, but for many other species. That is why the twenty-sixth session of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP 26) — the summit soon to take place at Glasgow — is the turning point for humankind. We must limit the rise in temperatures, whose appalling effects were visible