Education can counteract the natural tendency to do the wrong thing, but the inexorable succession of generations requires that the basis for this knowledge be constantly refreshed.

California medicine 113 (5): 40–47. BioScience 36 (9): 599–606. S.

His exposition of the tragedy of the commons in a 1968 paper called attention to "the damage that innocent actions by individuals can inflict on the environment". [page needed]. He is also known for Hardin's First Law of Human Ecology: "You cannot do only one thing" which expresses the interconnectedness of every action.