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Look no further. It’s all the striatum’s fault. When
we become aware of the present and future impacts
of climate change, it’s the “intelligent” part of our
brain that comes into play: the cerebral cortex. All
our ingenuity, abstraction and planning comes from
there as does our ability to invent machines, tools,
planes, telephones... But when we take action, the
deeper parts of our brain are activated, the zones
that govern motivation and desire, in particular
the striatum which lives at the heart of what we
call the reward circuit. This circuit rewards us with
dopamine when we adopt certain behaviours that
enable us to survive: eating, having sex, finding ways
to preserve our strengths.
If we moderate our behaviour to reduce our
consumption, the striatum releases less dopamine.
In the very heart of the human brain lives an
element addicted to growth.
Luckily, we have a parry for the striatum, which
is the front most part of our brain: the prefrontal
cortex. Thanks to this cortex, we can temper and
moderate our behaviour, set limits and resist the
striatum’s urges to always have more. If we give
it a little help. Educating, developing the idea of
pleasure with less, promoting altruism or self-
satisfaction and even meditating are all excellent
weapons against the striatum.