Our planet is being destroyed, does anybody care?

recycling perfection

Que sera sera.
We shall do what we shall do. Destroy the earth? Not likely.
Alter the balance of life on earth? Been there, done that.
Don't worry, soon enough the human population will reach critical mass, then the earth will destroy us, or most of us anyway.
Man cannot straighten what God has bent.
That is the way nature works, and will always work.
That mankind should realize he is but a beast like all beasts.
Can we, mankind, avoid the bitter end which is our lot?
Not by thinking the way we think.
We rode the wave of economic growth through the 20th century consuming as much as 80% of some natural resources.
Avoid a depression? Get ******* real.
What's really stupid is the liars who believe the money grab will save them when the **** hits the fan.

But that does not mean that we should do something that is sure to cause a world wide depression, does it?

- For once, I think Ros and I can agree on something here.

You have obviously missed the point. It isn't starving children in Africa who consume and waste ridiculous amounts of ****. It is the largest industrialized nations who are fat and ignorant. Like America. Of course, not even close to all who live here in the US are fat and ignorant, but most all of those who pull the strings are.

So no, starving children in Africa won't clean up the Earth, fat-cats in their oil suits, if labotomized, could use all of their stolen fortunes and greedy wealth for sustainable living developments in technology.

So instead of your fear of draconian measures of cutting and cutting and cutting industry, it would be a change toward industry that is not a plague of vomit on the air we breath, the water we drink, the food we ingest.

Of course, talking about protecting the environment matters very little to someone who cares only for themself, and saying they 'care' for themselves might even be a stretch, if it's chemicals and toxins they prefer.

The truest statement. I would advise everyone including myself to mentally prepare yourself for a world where your credit, debt, cash, all of it is meaningless. It can be much closer than we want to believe.

Could you please say what that statement even means? What money grab is he talking about? And what awful thing is just about to happen?

My statement is only in reference to the natural order, which is in the context of my post.
Granted, it is an assumption based on the appearance that some believe that grabbing all they can get will protect themselves and their progeny from the inevitable conclusion.

Have I effectively pointed out the natural order to which I refer?

Not at all, I am only pointing out the error of sticking our heads in the sand when it comes to the natural order. The issue of population control is of primary concern if we wish to avoid conflict with natural order in that regard.
A sustainable human existence depends on this relationship, as we are truly beasts as any other beast. We can do it ourselves, or nature will do it for us.
If you think we, as a species, can escape that fact, please tell me how.

Our existence for centuries has been focused on growth, our capitalist society is based on growth. Why is it that so few seem to realize that this flies in the face of natural order?

Yes Caroline, there is a high probability indeed that humankind will destroy itself via decimation of the very planet needed for sustenance. The reason why (for the most part) no one cares is because humankind (for the most part) is short-sighted, short-lived, forgetful, greedy, warlike, materialistic and self-centered.

Our most likely hope for the future lies with a blend of life extension, cybernetics, robotism, artificial intelligence, genetic engineering and off-earth independent colonies. With that future blend however, humankind as we know it today, will no longer exist.

Do you have any evidence for this?


What do you mean humankind will no longer exist as we know it today? More advanced technology will render humans nonexistent? Why is it not possible that in the future humans will exist as we know them to exist today, but there will just be more advanced technology?

What is?

Well - people are fixating on the use of the words "the planet" in a literal sense, rather than the sense of "the environment we are used to", which is clearly what most environmentalists mean when they talk about the risks of "destroying the planet" and the benefits of "saving" it ("save" as in "conserve", not "rescue").

It's a marketing gimmick that has gotten out of hand really. Environmentlists in the past found that they made much more converts by appealing to people's sense of feeling good about themselves for "saving the planet". Whereas "conserving the environment we are used to" strikes many as a vaguer and less heroic goal.

Though it's the truth, of course.

So the environmentalist rallying cry of:

"We have to save the planet!"

Is really just easy-to-chant-and-paint-on-banners feelgood shorthand for:

"We are convinced it would be a good idea to conserve the sort of environment we are used to (and that our bodies and societies are developed to cope with) for a variety of ethical, practical and economic reasons."

I think that is right. There are two questions, then: 1. To what extent is the environment in danger, and 2. Whether that danger is great enough to warrant the kinds of draconian measures being proposed?

Think of our economic reality as a membrane. Inflation, creating dollars out of nowhere, backed by nothing, decreases the value of our US dollars. I'm sure you're aware of inflation.

Now if you're aware of what an exponential equation looks like, you know what approaching the limit is.
When we approach the limit, we realize our money is worth less than the work we put in to get it.

Were already there, damn near.

Which makes for further exploration of what is meant by terms such as "environment" and "draconian".

The "environment" might refer to a particular habitat or ecological niche, or an ecosystem of connected habitats, which could extrapolate to the biosphere of the planet. All habitats are linked and experience the knock-on effects of changes to each other, though not all habitats suffer (or benefit) from changes to other habitats in the same way.

The deep ocean, for example, is less immediately effected by a rise in sea level than a system of coastal sand dunes - stands to reason. However, ocean acidification linked to factors that also lead to a rise in sea level might well effect the deep ocean more than the sand dunes (as a rather brute example - in reality there will be many such links, most of them almost imperceptably subtle).

It is very easy to think of particular niches that are in pressing danger due to the impact of a man made event. Three similar but different ones might be:

1) The Mexican Gulf (man made oil spill).
2) The Aral Sea (man made dessication resulting from irrigation).
3) The Gyre (man made soup of particles of plastic).

Each of these is a habitat that is very clearly under current pressure from things that, had we different sets of behaviours in regard to the delicacy with which we treat the environment in general, might not exist.

The risk to human health and prosperity depends to a degree on subjective judgements regarding what people are motivated by or happy about. So whilst there are some clear objective health benefits to things like clean air laws or waste management - I would think most people acknowledge that not everyone is moved in the same way by news of the same threat even if they believe in it.

For example, it's fairly easy to understand why a Louisianan fisherman might be upset about the Deepwater rig explosion and find it a threat to his livelihood - even if he doesn't really care about environmental damage per se.

Whereas a person who feels impoverished by the extinction of species might find what is happening in the Gyre much more upsetting, even though it hasn't had such a discernable impact on people's livelihoods (though he may well stress that it is trouble brewing).

So "the extent to which the environment is at risk" query will vary from person to person depending on what they care about. I'm a keen amateur zoologist, so I care about what happens in the Gyre because it is resulting in fewer types of animal and plant to wonder at and I believe it will have a negative knock on effect to neighbouring ecosystems. My desire to prevent such things is partly aesthetic - it strikes me as vandalism of something I find beautiful - but also practical because I am aware of issues impacting on human welfare that are being caused or exacerbated by an ocean full of floating rubbish.

Therefore whether laws to stop environmental damage are draconian or not will depend on:

1) How much a person has vested into appreciation of the environment (emotional, economic and health related investments will all count).
2) What the law actually is.
3) Whether or not the law addresses the damage in perception and fact.

For example, a given person might feel in support of all, some or none of the following laws:

1) A moratorium on whaling.
2) A moratorium on deep sea drilling for oil.
3) Laws obliging recycling.
4) Clean air laws (with have more obvious aspects concerning human health too of course).
5) Tax breaks for renewable energy concerns.
6) Laws to encourage or discourage nuclear energy.
7) Waste management regulations (again with a more direct human health impact).
8) Cap and trade laws.
9) Laws regulating use of fertilisers and pesticides.
10) and so on and so on and so on....

All these laws can be implemented to various degrees, so to dismiss them out of hand as draconian is going to alarm those who fear for the future sustainability of human propserity due to our impact on the environment at both micro and macro level.

Only a good knowledge of the issues at hand, as well as a reasoned risk analysis, gives one the perspective to decide what degree of regulation is going to solve the problem (bearing in mind that the problem will always be a somewhat subjective issue - if you don't care about whaling you don't care about whaling) and therefore whether "draconian" measures are necessary or not.

Overpopulation, pollution, war, species-extinction, deforestation, ozone-layer decimation, global warming, limited planetary resources of clean air, clean water, clean land, much more.I mean precisely what I said in that humankind will no longer exist as we know it today. Anything is "possible" so your next question has little meaning, however not everything is probable. Change is more probable then no change, witness the last 50 million years of evolution, or even the last 10,000 years of the primates of which humankind belongs.

How do you value your work CS? What is work?

We just had 25 minutes on Sky News with two ladies discussing the court appearance of Lindsay Lohan interlarded with live scenes from the courtroom showing Ms Lohan, her female counsel, and a female judge presiding, with assorted officials, some in uniform, milling about in the background and crowds being marshalled outside as the felon, she had broken the terms of her probation, (aaahh!!!), entered the building accompanied by a train of interested parties. Obviously others unseen or unheard, the TV crew, medical experts, paper processors and prison officials etc etc were involved.

All "working". Average salary probably at least double that of the average American worker.

Do you think any of them felt that their work was worth more than the money they are getting.

Not to want to get at you too much chap, because I would generally see us as being on the same side here - but I think you are missing the game that is being played with you.

All these things will probably have a dramatic impact on human life if they occur to the extremes shown in some of the more pessimistic models espoused by scientists and pundits in that particular field, or if they occur in combination to lesser extents.

However, even if they occur together to their most extreme degree it is highly likely that some humans will find some ways of coping.

So when you say "we will destroy ourselves" and are asked for evidence of such, giving a list of unpleasant things that we might well have deal with is not actual evidence. If the seas rise masses will have to migrate, if resources dwindle there will probably be resource wars, if the population increases beyond sustainability it will have to drop to a level where it can be sustained, if the ozone layer vanishes people spending time in daylight will probably develop cataracts and cancers more often.

All this and more will plague our descendants if we are damaging our environment like the environmentalist gestalt say we are (except maybe the ozone thing - because actually we have mitigated our impact here after following the advice of environmentalists and reducing our use of CFCs - the hole is currently shrinking rather than growing). I would be a dark future I think - but humans would cope. Robbed of much of what I currently find life worth living for - but there would be survivors.

Dunno - but next week they might all be slaving away to cover a humanitarian crisis or bringing a heinous crime to light, and might well feel that the job they were doing was far more important than the money they got from it.

Unless they're a dedicated Lindsey Lohan team or something.

All liberals think like that. When are they going to solve the humanitarian needs and stop heinous crimes being committed? Never is the answer otherwise they would all be out of a job.

You don't read the Guardian by any chance do you?