Age of Exuberance: the centuries of growth and progress that followed the sudden enlargement of habitat available to Europeans as a result of voyages of discovery; a period of expansion when a species takes exuberant advantage of the abundant opportunities in a eminently suitable but previously inaccessible habitat.
{Imagine a roe and a buck deer placed upon an island covered with forage and where there are no predators. They will happily be fat and multiply as fast as they can. That was what it was like when the Europeans came from over the sea to the new world, the Americas. Their superior weapons and method of social organization allowed them to largely ignore the fact that the Indians were already there.}

Cornucopian Paradigm: a view of past and future human progress that disregards the carrying capacity concept, pays no attention to the finiteness of the world or to differences between takeover and drawdown, and accepts uncritically the myth of limitlessness.
{This is the way TV urges most people to think, because the big boys are always after more money, no matter what. There will never be too many people or gasoline guzzlers, too much carbon dioxide, or enough stuff to spend money on.}

Cosmeticism: faith that relatively superficial adjustments in our activities will keep the New World new and will perpetuate the Age of Exuberance.
{Thinking that nuclear and wind power, smaller cars, and better light bulbs will allow everything to just keep on truckin' the way it is.}

Realism: recognition that the Age of Exuberance is over and that overpopulation and resource depletion must inexorably change human organization and human behavior.
{Realizing that the only thing that is going to get us to the other shore beyond the darkness is a great change.}