Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Really, looking at it, in what possible way is our existence in anyway beneficial for our planet? We are constantly at war, we pollute everything, we use our own resources far beyond what we need, we destroy and kill and loot and ravage everything....So ultimately, what good have we ever done? What kind of possible net value does our planet receive by our existence? Wouldn't our planet, along with everything else on it have ultimately done far better had Humans never existed?
If we survive the impending environmental collapse.
Environmental collapse is a potential threat to human civilization, but not to Homo sapiens. We don't have an ecological niche - we're everywhere, in great numbers, and we're omnivorous super-adaptors. We are the most versatile large creature ever to walk (or swim) the Earth. If 99.99% of all of us died tomorrow - and it's hard to imagine a scenario like that that is anything but exceedingly unlikely - there would still be several hundred thousand human beings.
Short of a large impactor (it would have to be significantly larger than that which caused the K-T Extinction - we're talking a once-every-billions-of-years odds) or some sort of other extraterrestrial source of an exotic nature (gamma-ray burst, alien invasion, etc. - these range from fantastically rare to no more than speculative science fiction), Homo sapiens isn't going anywhere.
Of course, the species is one thing, and the somewhat delicate civilization it has established is another.
If we survive the impending environmental collapse.
The species has survived this and worse...It's not like we're some wild creature or something. We're more like roaches....Pretty hard to totally wipe out something like that.....
Oh come on, don't be silly. Of course I have. Everything has to eat. I'm talking about the environment. Clean water, clean air, no urban decay. Think about how beautiful a pristine forest is, or a crystal clear lake.
Oh come on, don't be silly. Of course I have. Everything has to eat. I'm talking about the environment. Clean water, clean air, no urban decay. Think about how beautiful a pristine forest is, or a crystal clear lake.
You seem to not be able to discern between pollution and climate change...we shouldn't pollute...we are NOT causing climate change. The climate does that all on it's own...has for eons.
Of course, the species is one thing, and the somewhat delicate civilization it has established is another.
Somewhat delicate? With what we are going through now, it would be damn near impossible to design anything that is more delicate and fragile than what western civilization has become with our foolish dependence on China.
Of course, the species is one thing, and the somewhat delicate civilization it has established is another.
Quote:
Originally Posted by AtkinsonDan
Somewhat delicate? With what we are going through now, it would be damn near impossible to design anything that is more delicate and fragile than what western civilization has become with our foolish dependence on China.
Yes.
Somewhat delicate.
While the current pandemic is going to directly cost a lot of lives in sheer numbers, and indirectly cause a tremendous amount of economic pain, civilization itself isn't going to miss a beat. The very civilization that is intricate and vulnerable to a pandemic also offers a lot of means to mitigate it, which is why this isn't going to be anywhere near such events as the Black Death or the 8th century smallpox epidemic in Japan, which wiped out 1/3rd of Europe and Japan, respectively.
Which is why I was discussing actual civilization-busters and not trying to shoehorn in some sort of irrelevant tangential rant about COVID-19.
You seem to not be able to discern between pollution and climate change...we shouldn't pollute...we are NOT causing climate change. The climate does that all on it's own...has for eons.
We are certainly contributing to climate change, that isn’t debatable. Carbon emissions are increasing globally,
You seem to not be able to discern between pollution and climate change...we shouldn't pollute...we are NOT causing climate change. The climate does that all on it's own...has for eons.
But they've tracked the rise of global temperatures since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution (and climatic stability prior to that), and the increase charts out to match the intensification of global industrial development and other uses of fossil fuels (invention of automobile, proliferation of cars). The increase more recently has become exponential. Not a good thing. The planet didn't just suddenly, spontaneously begin warming, then accelerate the warming coincidentally with the rise of industrialization and increased use of fossil fuels.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
