In the subtitles of an interview with Mikhail Gorbachev, the former USSR premier is translated as saying that because we have strained nature to the breaking point, "we must, the generations living now, must take a principal decision that we will act differently because the ecological crisis is global." Taking "a principal decision" is an odd turn of phrase, at best, in this context. Almost certainly, Gorbachev said "we must take a principled decision."