Civilization has given us enormous successes: going to the moon

The words of Muhammad Yunus—“Civilization has given us enormous successes: going to the moon, technology. But then this is the civilization that took us to debt, environmental crisis, every single crisis. We need a civilization where we say goodbye to these things.”—resound like a trumpet call at the crossroads of history. In his voice there is both admiration and sorrow, celebration and warning. Yunus, the father of microfinance and a champion of social justice, speaks here not against civilization itself, but against the blindness of progress without wisdom. He reminds us that humanity’s triumphs in science and invention have been matched, step for step, by its failures in conscience. We have touched the moon, yet forgotten how to care for the earth beneath our feet.

The origin of this quote lies in Yunus’s lifelong pursuit to rebuild society upon foundations of compassion and equality. Having witnessed the despair of poverty in Bangladesh, he realized that the same systems that create wealth also create dependence and destruction. His vision, born from this understanding, is not to abandon civilization, but to reimagine it—to create a new model where prosperity does not come at the cost of the planet, where growth does not demand exploitation, and where human dignity is not sacrificed to the machinery of profit. His words carry the moral gravity of a reformer who has seen too much suffering to be dazzled by the glitter of modernity.

To the ancients, such wisdom would have been sacred. The philosophers of old—Plato, Confucius, Ashoka, and the Stoics—all warned that a society without virtue destroys itself. They knew that civilization is not measured by monuments or machines, but by the balance between power and morality. What Yunus calls a “new civilization” is, in truth, a return to this ancient harmony—a civilization that values wholeness over speed, care over consumption, being over having. He asks us to say goodbye not to progress, but to hubris, that old enemy of mankind, which led empires to fall and oceans to rise in vengeance.

History gives us mirrors for Yunus’s lament. The Roman Empire, at its height, built roads, aqueducts, and libraries—but it also consumed its own heart with greed and overreach. Its glory was its downfall. So too, in our age, we have created wonders: satellites circling the heavens, machines that think, and medicines that heal. Yet in the same breath, we have poisoned rivers, silenced forests, and buried nations in debt. We have created comfort for a few while leaving millions in despair. Yunus’s words ask: What kind of civilization celebrates its brilliance while its children starve and its air grows toxic?

He challenges the illusion that technological success equals moral progress. To go to the moon is magnificent—but to feed the hungry, to restore the land, to lift the poor from despair, these are triumphs of a higher order. The ancients called such wisdom Dharma, Virtue, Right Action—the alignment of knowledge with compassion. Yunus invites us to rediscover this alignment: to build an economy of kindness, a technology of stewardship, a politics of empathy. For without these, our so-called progress is but a glittering cage—a civilization speeding toward its own undoing.

His dream of a new civilization is not utopian fantasy, but moral necessity. It is the call to re-center humanity around what truly matters: relationships, integrity, and the Earth itself. He envisions an age where innovation serves life, not profit; where debt is replaced by opportunity; where the success of a nation is measured not by GDP, but by the well-being of its people and its planet. It is a civilization that learns from its errors—not with regret, but with resolve.

The lesson, then, is clear and urgent: let us not mistake advancement for awakening. The tools of civilization—science, economy, government—are neither good nor evil; it is our intention that shapes their destiny. To build the world Yunus speaks of, we must begin in ourselves: live simply, act justly, and treat creation as kin rather than commodity. Each act of fairness, each choice of restraint, each moment of gratitude is a brick in this new civilization he envisions.

So let his words be heard as both warning and promise. We have gone to the moon—now let us return to Earth with wisdom. We have built machines—now let us rebuild hearts. We have conquered nature—now let us learn again how to live within it. For the future of humanity will not be written in our skyscrapers or our algorithms, but in our ability to say goodbye to the civilization of crisis and awaken a civilization of care. Only then will our triumphs become true victories, and our progress a legacy worthy of the generations to come.