This year is the International Year of Biodiversity, and the past week almost 20,000 people, representing the 193 parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity that was created at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro in 1992, held a biodiversity summit in Nagoya, Japan. According to the press release at the end of the summit "A new era of living in harmony with Nature is born...."

Are you tired of all of the endless chatter about climate change? Me too. With the exception of the odd catastrophic oil spill or a plague of sea lice here and there, most of the energy being spent on environment issues these days seems to center on the changing climate and global warming. The climate surely is changing, and records do indicate we are having warmer years, only the most die-hard denialist with their head firmly in the sand would advocate otherwise. The real area of debate is about cause, more specifically about whether or how much the change is the result of human activity.

As I write, much of the world's attention is on Copenhagen where the 15th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP 15) is taking place. Prime Minister Harper is there, as is B.C. Premier Campbell, and President Obama is due to make an appearance. Functionaries in the environmental movement, assorted diplomats, and politicians are all in attendance. So are thousands of protestors.

My first introduction to Donella Meadows was in the mid-1990s after I began publishing The Record in Gold River. I found her columns on the Internet published under the title "The Global Citizen," columns that spoke clearly about our environment and our place in it. I corresponded with Dr. Meadows and she allowed me to republish them as I could so that a wider audience would have access to her knowledge and vision.

Like many people in the past, Donella was a prophet whose message, as plain and obvious as it was, went unheeded by most, and flat out denied by many.