b'In the sixth century B.C., Lao Tzu wrote: What is rooted is easy to nourish. And: When you have institutions, know where their functions should end. Around the same time, the ancient Greeks offered plenty of mythic guidance that is still remarkably prescient. Icarus has waited millennia to pet the first cloned mammal, a sheep named Dolly. Pandora has waited a long time, too, to witness anti-freeze proteins from Arctic flounder being spliced into tomatoes. And to have her own Facebook page.For who knows how long, the indigenous peoples of Turtle Island have gathered near sacred trees to sing O Wakan-Tanka.A century ago, heres what L.H. Bailey, founder of the Cornell College of Agriculture, had to say: Close regard for the mother earth does not imply any loss of mysticism or of exaltationquite the contrary. Science but increases the mystery of the unknown and enlarges the boundaries of the spiritual vision. Today, as global social and ecological crises increasingly test the hege-mony of economics and the limits of technology, the wisdom of the ages from West, East, North and South gets jumbled together, spilled out on the table of civilization, pieces of a mythic puzzle. Root around in the puzzle pieces. Be on the lookout for Pericles, Nicholas Georgescu-Roegen and the occasional organic beet. 69'