5 ms·

So basically the planet is starting to treat us as a kind of a ... weed, in return.

smt88 9y ago
The planet isn't conscious and can't "treat us" as anything. We are doing this to us. We are changing the environment to support short-term wants/needs at the expense of its human habitability in the future.
- terminado 9y ago
  Time to face facts. Some of us are weeds.
- radiorental 9y ago
  Let’s say you were interviewing a butterfly — or a Mayfly. A Mayfly lives for four or five days. Say that Mayfly was standing on the branch of a giant Sequoia tree in California, which lives for thousands of years. If you were to ask that Mayfly, “Do you perceive this branch that you are standing on as being alive?” The Mayfly would say, “Of course not. I’ve been here my entire life, four days, and the branch hasn’t done a doggone thing.” Yet when you look at the tree in our context, it is very much alive. It started with a seed, and it grew. Well, the earth is very much like that tree, and mankind is very much like that Mayfly. If we are lucky, we will live a hundred years. We are standing on a planet that was born four and a half billion years ago. It looked very different when it was born; it evolved and has changed. Africa used to be just outside the window here. Morocco was connected to Cape Cod. Beneath this building are rocks from Africa. It’s hard to imagine that. But if you were to sit on the moon, and look at the earth and blink your eyes once every million years, it would come blossoming to life.
  - monochromatic 9y ago
    Not a great analogy. And even good analogies don't make great arguments.
  - gibberfish 9y ago
    Still doesn't mean this clump of rock has any kind of intentionality.
    - radiorental 9y ago
      ohhh you, and your 'free will'
- naasking 9y ago
  > The planet isn't conscious and can't "treat us" as anything. Well, we don't really know what consciousness really is, so it's hard to say that the Earth isn't conscious. After all, who would have thought a complex network of simple neurons arranged in a particular way would be conscious?
- erikpukinskis 9y ago
  Of course the planet is conscious. The entire consciousness of the human race combined is a lower bound on the consciousness of the planet.
  - monochromatic 9y ago
    By that argument, my house is conscious whenever I'm at home.
    - adamsea 9y ago
      Did your house spontaneously give rise to the lifeforms from which you evolved?
      - monochromatic 9y ago
        What would that have to do with consciousness?
  - alonmower 9y ago
    I guess it depends on what your boundary for the 'earth' is (sure, we're all made up of atoms that existed on the earth before they were us) but if you transported all humans to a different planet they would all be identically conscious and the earth, by your definition, would not. I think if you draw a boundary between human and earth it's hard to make the claim that the earth is conscious
    - log_base_login 9y ago
      Humans would not be identically conscious on a different planet because our consciousness is dependent on the environment in which it exists. Even a cursory definition of consciousness must include the sum total of all of our sensory perception, and without the biome to augment that perception, it is impossible that our consciousness would not shift to accommodate the inclusion and exclusion of whatever difference in our sensory input would give to our experience of being alive. We would all _be_ conscious (presuming relative health), but if we were all on Pluto, for example, the lack of light would change our consciousness, and for each individual this change would happen at a rate determined by their experience. Perhaps this change would happen gradually enough for some that it might be considered an artifact of evolving, but certainly the change would begin the instant we left Earth's influence, and what might be considered our 'normal' state. I realize it's a little (though I detest this term) 'hand wavy' because it's a thought experiment based on zero examples, but we do know that our consciousness is dependent on what we perceive and don't perceive. Hence the question posed by Nagel [1] "what is it like to be a bat?", as bats are cognitively very close to humans (relative to the entire biome), but without eyesight, it is fairly clear that the consciousness of a bat would be different than that of a human. I recognize that this point is not necessarily the one central to your comment, but I do think it's interesting to remember that if we were not here, we would not be as we are. [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_Is_it_Like_to_Be_a_Bat%3F https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_Is_it_Like_to_Be_a_Bat%3F
- kafkaesq 9y ago
  The planet isn't conscious and can't "treat us" as anything. You may want to revisit that assumption. Being as the science on this subject is changing very rapidly, as we speak.
artursapek 9y ago
George Carlin called it.
- kafkaesq 9y ago
  Indeed. Talk about a man ahead of his time.

The planet isn't conscious and can't "treat us" as anything. We are doing this to us. We are changing the environment to support short-term wants/needs at the expense of its human habitability in the future.

terminado 9y ago
Time to face facts. Some of us are weeds.
radiorental 9y ago
Let’s say you were interviewing a butterfly — or a Mayfly. A Mayfly lives for four or five days. Say that Mayfly was standing on the branch of a giant Sequoia tree in California, which lives for thousands of years. If you were to ask that Mayfly, “Do you perceive this branch that you are standing on as being alive?” The Mayfly would say, “Of course not. I’ve been here my entire life, four days, and the branch hasn’t done a doggone thing.” Yet when you look at the tree in our context, it is very much alive. It started with a seed, and it grew. Well, the earth is very much like that tree, and mankind is very much like that Mayfly. If we are lucky, we will live a hundred years. We are standing on a planet that was born four and a half billion years ago. It looked very different when it was born; it evolved and has changed. Africa used to be just outside the window here. Morocco was connected to Cape Cod. Beneath this building are rocks from Africa. It’s hard to imagine that. But if you were to sit on the moon, and look at the earth and blink your eyes once every million years, it would come blossoming to life.
- monochromatic 9y ago
  Not a great analogy. And even good analogies don't make great arguments.
- gibberfish 9y ago
  Still doesn't mean this clump of rock has any kind of intentionality.
  - radiorental 9y ago
    ohhh you, and your 'free will'
naasking 9y ago
> The planet isn't conscious and can't "treat us" as anything. Well, we don't really know what consciousness really is, so it's hard to say that the Earth isn't conscious. After all, who would have thought a complex network of simple neurons arranged in a particular way would be conscious?
erikpukinskis 9y ago
Of course the planet is conscious. The entire consciousness of the human race combined is a lower bound on the consciousness of the planet.
- monochromatic 9y ago
  By that argument, my house is conscious whenever I'm at home.
  - adamsea 9y ago
    Did your house spontaneously give rise to the lifeforms from which you evolved?
    - monochromatic 9y ago
      What would that have to do with consciousness?
- alonmower 9y ago
  I guess it depends on what your boundary for the 'earth' is (sure, we're all made up of atoms that existed on the earth before they were us) but if you transported all humans to a different planet they would all be identically conscious and the earth, by your definition, would not. I think if you draw a boundary between human and earth it's hard to make the claim that the earth is conscious
  - log_base_login 9y ago
    Humans would not be identically conscious on a different planet because our consciousness is dependent on the environment in which it exists. Even a cursory definition of consciousness must include the sum total of all of our sensory perception, and without the biome to augment that perception, it is impossible that our consciousness would not shift to accommodate the inclusion and exclusion of whatever difference in our sensory input would give to our experience of being alive. We would all _be_ conscious (presuming relative health), but if we were all on Pluto, for example, the lack of light would change our consciousness, and for each individual this change would happen at a rate determined by their experience. Perhaps this change would happen gradually enough for some that it might be considered an artifact of evolving, but certainly the change would begin the instant we left Earth's influence, and what might be considered our 'normal' state. I realize it's a little (though I detest this term) 'hand wavy' because it's a thought experiment based on zero examples, but we do know that our consciousness is dependent on what we perceive and don't perceive. Hence the question posed by Nagel [1] "what is it like to be a bat?", as bats are cognitively very close to humans (relative to the entire biome), but without eyesight, it is fairly clear that the consciousness of a bat would be different than that of a human. I recognize that this point is not necessarily the one central to your comment, but I do think it's interesting to remember that if we were not here, we would not be as we are. [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_Is_it_Like_to_Be_a_Bat%3F https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_Is_it_Like_to_Be_a_Bat%3F
kafkaesq 9y ago
The planet isn't conscious and can't "treat us" as anything. You may want to revisit that assumption. Being as the science on this subject is changing very rapidly, as we speak.

artursapek 9y ago

George Carlin called it.

kafkaesq 9y ago
Indeed. Talk about a man ahead of his time.