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Well that is depressing.
by toodlebunions 10y ago
Well that is depressing.
- astazangasta 10y agoHere is some light in your tunnel: biodiversity falls because the fitness landscape has suddenly and dramatically changed. Humans have put new and startling pressures on each and every ecosystem on this planet, especially, recently, through the changes associated with global warming. Some fitness gradients are impossible to climb: genetic diversity is currency, and you need a lot of it to overcome more difficult shifts in the evolutionary landscape. As the world changes, species spend down this genetic currency (through death and selection). Now the world is impoverished. But there is a solution: we, humans, can take our boots off the throats of the rest of God's creatures. We have the capability to be good ecological citizens of this planet, perhaps more than any other species. We can create our own energy sources; we can refine and recycle our material inputs, producing a tight, closed loop of biomass and energy around ourselves. With this light touch on the world, the negative pressure we place on the downtrodden masses of creatures by disturbing their ecological spaces will vanish. And the denizens of Earth will then reacquire the wealth of diversity that is the natural reward of merely living.
- Aelinsaar 10y agoI want you to name one time in the history of humanity, that we sustained a "Light Touch".
- astazangasta 10y agoThe history of humanity is constantly adding new chapters.
- Aelinsaar 10y agoExpecting something totally radical and new from technology is one thing, expecting it from human nature is delusional.
- mwfunk 10y agoThe last 10,000 years (hell, the last 100 years, or even the last 10 years) of societal change would beg to differ!
- Aelinsaar 10y agoPoint me to the change in human nature, and not the change in technology please.
- astazangasta 10y agoHuman nature changes constantly, because our nature is determined by culture. Culture is the difference between a society built on hate and fear and one built on mutual love and trust; human societies have taken these forms and many others. And yes, "technology" is part and parcel of culture and our nature. The people of today are hyper aware, part of and responsible to a global culture. They are vastly different from the serf of a thousand years ago or the hunter of ten thousand.
- Aelinsaar 10y agoYou're just making another claim, not offering any evidence. EDIT: At best you're making the admission that our "nature" is static, but our tech and resulting society change. It's not a fundamental change, and is subject to reversion in the absence of the tech, or in extreme stress.
- astazangasta 10y agoIf you're going to be so difficult you'd best start off by defining human nature. Do you mean our genetics? That, too, is changing constantly.
- Aelinsaar 10y agoI don't think that I'm being difficult; you're the only one to struggle with the concept of "Human nature", and only when you were unable to do anything to support your claim.
- carapace 10y agoThe reign of Good King Asoka. Also, all of human history (millions of years) before the invention of agriculture. In any event, today it is clearly do or die.
- douche 10y ago"Good" King Asoka, who conquered and burned his way across India, killing hundreds of thousands, before converting to Buddhism? In the same era that the Romans were depopulating the large fauna of North Africa, Europe and the Middle East to water the sands of the arena with their blood, and the Han Dynasty was reshaping the landscape of central China with massive irrigation projects? I think you need to try again... Not that we were any better before we settled down as agriculturalists. Within a relative eyeblink of the first humans crossing the Bering land bridge into North America, virtually all of the large mammals went extinct in short order, and that was when we were still hunting with Clovis points on the end of a stick.
- Aelinsaar 10y agoWe're going to die.
- Retra 10y agoWell, that was always true.
- thaumasiotes 10y agoIt's not particularly honest to name a period best known for its lack of historical documentation as an example of... anything.
- mirimir 10y agoIt seems that hunting tech was enough: http://biology.unm.edu/fasmith/Web_Page_PDFs/Lyons_et_al_2004_EER.pdf http://biology.unm.edu/fasmith/Web_Page_PDFs/Lyons_et_al_200...
- upen 10y agoThis is depressing!! These kinda things justify that we are heading towards a mass extinction
- placeybordeaux 10y agoWe are in a mass extinction. It is called the Holocene extinction. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocene_extinction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocene_extinction