Like the illusion of Wall Street, with its vast and powerful investment banks, now shuttered, China too is an illusion perpetuated by the Globalists that gave us the 15,000 mile Caesar salad, poisoned cat food and lead based paint on babies' pacifiers. Like the illusion that money would come from thin air to always push housing prices higher, China has spent a generation pursuing its illusion. Pursuing an unattainable dream to be like the West, while 6000 years of its carefully shepherded top soil blows into the sea.
Posted: Sun Dec 17, 2006 12:15 pm Post subject: Re: Will the planet recover from our abuse?
The Earth itself has nothing to worry about.
It's existance is measured in the billions. Homo has only existed for a mere 2 million years, Homo sapien a miniscule 150,000, agriculture a teeny 10,000 and empire/civilization a smaller 6,000.
The majority of today's humans may have been able to compete with an asteroid but if Gaia had a doctor, he would probably say "Hmm. This infliction is pretty unusual. You currently have a disease that came from within your own system, rather than those other external factors. Oh, well, no matter, we'll just concentrate on sweating it out and those microbes [humans] won't be able to do that again for a long time."
It's perversely comforting to think that no matter how much damage we do to this planet, it will get better.
That's why true environmentalists are what they are for human reasons. There's no guilt for the Earth, only methods by which we have to save ourselves.
Joined: Oct 04, 2004 Posts: 5701 Location: Body in OK, Heart in TX
Posted: Sun Dec 17, 2006 1:02 pm Post subject: Re: Will the planet recover from our abuse?
django wrote:
That's why true environmentalists are what they are for human reasons.
I don't know about that; all the extinction and habitat degradation going on makes me feel sick on a daily basis. My mom was watching Winged Migration yesterday and I couldn't stand to watch it. Though I agree with your larger point, that we most likely haven't wiped out all life on Earth and eventually biodiversity may recover. Not much comfort to me, but some.
Edit: For example, those hydrothermal vent communities will probably make it. _________________ "Every junkie's like a setting sun..." - Neil Young
Joined: Oct 23, 2005 Posts: 1850 Location: East of Eden
Posted: Sun Dec 17, 2006 5:09 pm Post subject: Re: Will the planet recover from our abuse?
django wrote:
That's why true environmentalists are what they are for human reasons. There's no guilt for the Earth, only methods by which we have to save ourselves.
Disagree. Some truly love the wild and think it's senseless to destroy beauty for questionable gain, regardless of what it does to us -- though a thought to preserving our own hides would be reason enough to be an environmentalist, it's not the only reason. _________________ "If a path to the better there be, it begins with a full look at the worst." — Thomas Hardy
Joined: Dec 08, 2004 Posts: 921 Location: 145'2"E 37'46"S
Posted: Mon Dec 18, 2006 8:29 am Post subject: Re: Will the planet recover from our abuse?
The planet wont be bothered by its heat rash, these things pass. Life in some form will also almost certainly survive anything less than a planet-cracking impact. Everything bigger than ?a mouse however is going to fry if we get runaway global warming and +10C mean temp, maybe even +5C will finish off homo sapiens. Thems the breaks!
Posted: Tue Dec 19, 2006 11:48 am Post subject: Re: Will the planet recover from our abuse?
Doesn't look like happy days for all the hairy mammals. Humans shouldn't suffer much in the way of direct effects from the temperature change. Clothing makes us pretty adaptable to different temperature situations. That's why we live in equatorial deserts and on arctic permafrost. Gonna be good living for the cold blooded critters though. _________________ "So while you sit and whistle Dixie with your money and your power.
I can hear the flowers a-growin in the rubble of the towers.
I hear leaders quit their lying
I hear babies quit their crying.
I hear soldiers quit their dying, one and all." - OCMS
The world has already passed the point of no return for climate change, and civilisation as we know it is now unlikely to survive, according to James Lovelock, the scientist and green guru who conceived the idea of Gaia - the Earth which keeps itself fit for life.
In a profoundly pessimistic new assessment, published in today's Independent, Professor Lovelock suggests that efforts to counter global warming cannot succeed, and that, in effect, it is already too late.
_________________ Let us make him who shall nourish and sustain us. What shall we do to be invoked; to be remembered in the earth.
We have tried with our first creatures but we could not make them venerate us.
So let us try to make obedient respectful beings who shall
Posted: Thu Dec 21, 2006 2:55 am Post subject: Re: Will the planet recover from our abuse?
Quote:
the scientist and green guru who conceived the idea of Gaia - the Earth which keeps itself fit for life.
How egotistical is that? Imagine? I am sure most philosphers and major religions throughout time have imagined a natural world in balance with itself. Forms of nature worship were some of man's earliest relgions. But this guy 'thinks' he conceived the idea of an Earth that keeps itself fit for life? _________________ The organized state is a wonderful invention whereby everyone can live at someone else's expense.
Joined: Oct 23, 2005 Posts: 1850 Location: East of Eden
Posted: Sun Dec 24, 2006 10:11 pm Post subject: Re: Will the planet recover from our abuse?
MrBill wrote:
But this guy 'thinks' he conceived the idea of an Earth that keeps itself fit for life?
Now that you mention it, it's probably a bit overstated, yeah. But Lovelock is very important. He's the first one who presented such a concept as a scientific theory. Some of Hawking's ideas about the universe, or Schrodinger's ideas about particles, or Mandelbrot's ideas about complexity, also previously existed in philosophy. In the world of science, Lovelock formulated the first really new way of looking at life since Darwin. Ridiculed at first, the Gaia theory is now pretty well accepted (though they still don't like to call it that -- too froofy-sounding I guess -- they call it 'earth system' theory). _________________ "If a path to the better there be, it begins with a full look at the worst." — Thomas Hardy
Posted: Mon Dec 25, 2006 1:41 am Post subject: Re: Will the planet recover from our abuse?
Quote:
Because of substitutability, peak oil is not just a liquid fuels crisis.
It is an ecological crisis.
Thanks for the clarification over the Gaia theory. Also a good point you make about substitutability and the environment in general instead of framing the argument solely in terms of net energy or EROEI. Merry Christmas! _________________ The organized state is a wonderful invention whereby everyone can live at someone else's expense.
Posted: Mon Dec 25, 2006 7:52 pm Post subject: Re: Will the planet recover from our abuse?
I'm not worried about the earth. She will abide. The humans on it are another matter. I worry about the prospects for kids that were born after 2000. They could live into the next century. It could be getting nasty soon. Their long term survival depends on the earth systems staying somewhat stable. I don't think things will settle down for a while.
We have a maple sugaring place. We sometimes plant trees, or release saplings that won't start to produce sap for 40 years. I just hope that the climate is good for maples in 40 years, because I won't be tapping them, those kids will. We've planted the more warmth and wet tolerant red maple in some places. Hard to plan with what's happening. It'll be a different world.
Meanwhile the first inhabited island has been inundated by climate change. Here's the article from the Independent:
Our climate could change dramatically in a short period once this chain reaction really gets going...
Maybe this sounds ridiculous, but I sometimes wonder if it would be wiser to put less of our collective energy into trying to figure out how to save the project of civilization and more time just figuring out how to save homo sapiens and many other fauna and flora from extinction.
If it is true that our planet will become uninhabitable for humans given our present course, maybe we should undertake the sort of project that has been conceived for colonizing the moon...essentially making an uninhabitable place into a habitable place..creating an artificial life support system that could weather the rigors of the new world.
If we put our collective minds together...NASA scientists, permaculturists, eco-engineers, community planners...we could design specialized self-sustaining cities . They would be the modern version of Noah's Ark.
Perhaps, we could use climate change computer similations to determine which areas of the world will be the most suitable for these settlements. The settlements could be networked somehow. It would be better to have several settlements to increase the chances of survival.
Perhaps, we could use these settlements to reseed the planet and make it more habitable again.
How to get the resources behind such a project...I don't know...how to recruit for membership in these settlements...I don't know...how to insulate these settlements from the starving masses...I don't know...
just a brainstorm...preparing for worst case scenario makes sense to me. it may be wishful thinking to believe our civilization can salvage a small part of itself ... especially if the elites get involved.
Bill G. _________________ "It is no measure of health to be deemed sane in an insane society" J. Krishnamurti
Even if we make it with no problems (highly dubious), it's a much poorer world we'll live in. _________________ "If a path to the better there be, it begins with a full look at the worst." — Thomas Hardy
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