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I used to be down with trying to restore things to pre-Caucasians-in-North-America conditions wherever possible. Now upon seeing that that would take constant
by rdiddly 9y ago
I used to be down with trying to restore things to pre-Caucasians-in-North-America conditions wherever possible. Now upon seeing that that would take constant and intensive human intervention, and probably still not succeed, I tend to look more toward post-human conditions as the measuring stick.
If all humans suddenly disappeared or stopped intervening, what would the landscape look like or turn into? Conditions would prevail that were affected by everything humans have done to date, but unaffected by any future human action. So for example, blackberry vines, kudzu, ivy, starlings, rats, and such, would take over, at least in some places, at least for a while. Is that bad? If humans disappeared, who would be around to find it bad or good?
Rather than fight it, I have redefined my ideas of "native" and "natural" to match these conditions. Because that's what "nature" is, right? That which happens without human intervention? Except of course tons of intervention has already happened and can't be changed, so the idea is to think about what would happen if the intervention stopped. Keeping endangered species alive or fighting invasives might be termed unsustainable and artificial under that view. I dunno, interesting thought experiment. To me anyway! LOL
- dwighttk 9y agowhy are humans not part of "nature"?
- B1FF_PSUVM 9y agoShh, don't be difficult. Only stone-age humans are natural. You shall not use bronze, and iron is right out. Fossil fuel is Cthulhu.
- rdiddly 9y agoYeah that part is a shaky construct, I agree. Which is kind of what got me started on this line of thought. The whole idea of 'restoration' that I used to espouse, rests on getting things back to a "natural" state, meaning a state without or before humans. So there's your separation right there. I started thinking like, well too late, humans have been here. But just for fun let's pretend they instantaneously stopped being here; what would the "natural," "human-free" world look like then? It would look like what humans have made it into, plus whatever latent conditions we also caused but might be holding back by e.g. controlling rat populations or whatnot, plus whatever areas/systems/ecologies are and were always outside our influence.
- dwighttk 9y agoby all means continue with your thought experiments, they can be fun and enlightening. I just don't agree with this part: 'Because that's what "nature" is, right? That which happens without human intervention?' Only if humans are supernatural is that what "nature" is.
- InitialLastName 9y agoYou might be interested in this book: http://www.worldwithoutus.com/about_book.html http://www.worldwithoutus.com/about_book.html It uses both pre-human conditions and conditions in places humans have avoided (e.g. Chernobyl) to paint a picture of "What if all the humans disappeared all at once" in both short and long term. One hot nugget: The lower-NYC subways would flood almost immediately, and the streets above them would quickly convert into canals (from saltwater erosion), but the bridges would last longer without maintenance than they would under normal human use (because the biggest damage to the bridges is from road salt).
- rdiddly 9y agoWow, he has really carried the idea through. I'll have to check that out, thanks. Hilariously even the Bill McKibben quote on the cover says "...one of the greatest thought experiments..."
- trhway 9y ago>I used to be down with trying to restore things to pre-Caucasians-in-North-America conditions wherever possible. you'd need at least a 300M bed Mayflower destined for Mars. >If all humans suddenly disappeared or stopped intervening, what would the landscape look like or turn into? Conditions would prevail that were affected by everything humans have done to date, but unaffected by any future human action. So for example, blackberry vines, kudzu, ivy, starlings, rats, and such, would take over, at least in some places, at least for a while. Is that bad? If humans disappeared, who would be around to find it bad or good? Chernobyl area. Flourishing nature preserve. Youtube it.
- undersuit 9y agoI've often wandered about spreading all species as widely as possible. Kudzu can't survive everywhere and maybe the new North American kangaroos and elephants would like it.