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“The Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation, a nonprofit group that conducts a yearly census of the western monarch, said the population reached historic

“The Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation, a nonprofit group that conducts a yearly census of the western monarch, said the population reached historic lows in 2018, an estimated 86 percent decline from the previous year. That in itself would be troubling news. But, combined with a 97 percent decline in the total population since the 1980s, this year’s count is ‘potentially catastrophic,’ according to the biologist Emma Pelton.” That’s the hard bit for me. What are we doing to this planet? What will it become? The monarchs are a blessing of a creature. Will we just watch them wither away? Can we escape our petty dramatized politics and think of what we are passing on to future generations? Not just high tech benefits, but mountains of plastics for packaging, toys, and many “novelties” that are useless except for cheap thrills. So while many will say our system has brought great wealth for humans, it’s important to think about which humans have seen wealth and which have seen further destruction. And what species and vistas all of humanity lost to gain our treasures. Those too have a cost, but not much that any of us will have to bear. The cost is paid by someone else we’ve never met or who may never be born yet. But sometimes, stories like this remind us of the great damage we are doing to this Earth.

blitmap 8y ago
Tomorrowland is the Disney movie I have enjoyed most in my life.
- Leader2light 8y ago
  Never saw it, meh reviews online.
ataturk 8y ago
Hey, you're the ones with the open borders and all that SJW shit. We told you not to do it, but Kali did it anyways. Just wait until full-on big "C" Communism hits the US--the commies were and are the WORST when it comes to environmental protection. The Soviets dumped radioactive waste anywhere they pleased. This is what it looks like when regular people have NO CONTROL over anything. It sucks and will continue to suck until the revolution and its natural population control. There is no fixing this short of cutting world population in half at the least.
drugme 8y ago
What are we doing to this planet? What will it become? The monarchs are a blessing of a creature. Will we just watch them wither away? Can we escape our petty dramatized politics and think of what we are passing on to future generations? Not just high tech benefits, but mountains of plastics for packaging, toys, and many “novelties” that are useless except for cheap thrills. But have you seen the latest VR tech? You can just put on a headset and swear your were back at that state park with mom and dad, in front of that old eucalyptus positively twitching with Monarchs.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
irunbackwards 8y ago
Super sad, it's not even something that requires measuring to see. I visited the Monarch sanctuary in Santa Cruz in 2017 and there were thousands of butterflies easily visible. In 2018 it was so hard to spot even groups of tens.
spoiledtechie 8y ago
I suspect the Fires, The Urban Development have greatly affected the pop over the last 2 decades.
njarboe 8y ago
And yet: "Monarchs in the western part of the United States migrate for the winter to California, where they gather mostly among fragrant eucalyptus trees, which provide hospitable living conditions." These eucalyptus trees, many planted in the 1800's and are now quite large and beautiful, are under attack by many environmental groups for being non-native and others for being a fire hazard. Maybe they did not even winter in California until those invasive trees were planted? Life is complicated, but in general humans have been becoming much more respectful of the environment as we become more wealthy. The key to preserving the wonderfully complicated ecosystems on Earth is probably to continue as rapidly as possible with our tech improvements (and get back on pace from where we stopped in the 1970's) and to eventually turn all of Earth into a park, a la Bezo's plan. Don't work to shut down nuclear power tech (we have plenty of coal to burn and that is much worse) but help it improve. Support a safe waste storage solution instead of using that problem to shut down future construction. The other alternative really boils down to a belief that it would be best if humans weren't around. Most humans rightly oppose this view and evolution will tend to support an increase in people with that view in the long run. A religion that has "don't have children" as a belief won't last long.
- RGamma 8y ago
  > Life is complicated, but in general humans have been becoming much more respectful of the environment as we become more wealthy. [...] You can't be serious... https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/max/2000/1*IOUIWy_MZuECIpZRK9hy6Q.jpeg https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/max/2000/1*IOUIWy_MZuECIpZRK... ("The Great Acceleration") Also read The Anthropocene Review whenever you feel too optimistic about the future. In fact now that I read your comment again, there's virtually not a single statement I can agree with. Our current way of "householding" ("economy (from Greek οίκος – "household" and νέμoμαι – "manage")") with this planet is thrashing ecosystems left and right. This is because mankind's economy has long taken on a life of its own, serving itself, without anyone pricing in "negative externalities" (another way of saying we're turning Earth into a Wall-E-esque dystopia, except we're not going to have a big space station to live on).
  - traek 8y ago
foolfoolz 8y ago
this is the age of humans. nature will have to sacrifice to support us
viach 8y ago
>> What are we doing to this planet? What will it become? The tragedy of the commons: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons Technically, the planet is doomed. Practically and pragmatically, everyone who is living here today, has a good chance to enjoy his days, no matter what will happen next. I'm not advocating the way we destroy our planet, just trying to accept facts without emotional barrier. Could be wrong here.
- nipponese 8y ago
  Humanity on Earth is doomed, the planet will be fine.
  - viach 8y ago
    Actually it depends on how far it all gets
    - irrational 8y ago
      What do you mean? If if there was a nuclear war to end all nuclear wars and all humans died and the surface of the earth was irradiated so that most animals died, there would still be life. Slowly the surface would be replaced though tectonic action. New life would flourish and grow without human intervention. In a billion years or so you probably wouldn't even know humans had ever been here. The planet would be just fine.
      - viach 8y ago
        Probably, but you can't really know for sure. Humans is something which never happened to this planet before. I wouldn't bet 10$ on life surviving here in the case things continue to go the way they are going today.
        irrational 8y ago
        Life has been found far far underground, under the greenland and antarctic ice sheets, and in other even more inhospitable places. There is no way humans could eradicate all life before we managed to off ourselves. Only the destruction of the entire planet so that all that is left in the earth's orbit around the sun is a dust cloud could maybe kill all life (and even then I wouldn't bet against it).

blitmap 8y ago

Tomorrowland is the Disney movie I have enjoyed most in my life.

Leader2light 8y ago
Never saw it, meh reviews online.

ataturk 8y ago

Hey, you're the ones with the open borders and all that SJW shit. We told you not to do it, but Kali did it anyways. Just wait until full-on big "C" Communism hits the US--the commies were and are the WORST when it comes to environmental protection. The Soviets dumped radioactive waste anywhere they pleased. This is what it looks like when regular people have NO CONTROL over anything. It sucks and will continue to suck until the revolution and its natural population control. There is no fixing this short of cutting world population in half at the least.

drugme 8y ago

What are we doing to this planet? What will it become? The monarchs are a blessing of a creature. Will we just watch them wither away? Can we escape our petty dramatized politics and think of what we are passing on to future generations? Not just high tech benefits, but mountains of plastics for packaging, toys, and many “novelties” that are useless except for cheap thrills. But have you seen the latest VR tech? You can just put on a headset and swear your were back at that state park with mom and dad, in front of that old eucalyptus positively twitching with Monarchs.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]

irunbackwards 8y ago

Super sad, it's not even something that requires measuring to see. I visited the Monarch sanctuary in Santa Cruz in 2017 and there were thousands of butterflies easily visible. In 2018 it was so hard to spot even groups of tens.

spoiledtechie 8y ago

I suspect the Fires, The Urban Development have greatly affected the pop over the last 2 decades.

njarboe 8y ago

And yet: "Monarchs in the western part of the United States migrate for the winter to California, where they gather mostly among fragrant eucalyptus trees, which provide hospitable living conditions." These eucalyptus trees, many planted in the 1800's and are now quite large and beautiful, are under attack by many environmental groups for being non-native and others for being a fire hazard. Maybe they did not even winter in California until those invasive trees were planted? Life is complicated, but in general humans have been becoming much more respectful of the environment as we become more wealthy. The key to preserving the wonderfully complicated ecosystems on Earth is probably to continue as rapidly as possible with our tech improvements (and get back on pace from where we stopped in the 1970's) and to eventually turn all of Earth into a park, a la Bezo's plan. Don't work to shut down nuclear power tech (we have plenty of coal to burn and that is much worse) but help it improve. Support a safe waste storage solution instead of using that problem to shut down future construction. The other alternative really boils down to a belief that it would be best if humans weren't around. Most humans rightly oppose this view and evolution will tend to support an increase in people with that view in the long run. A religion that has "don't have children" as a belief won't last long.

RGamma 8y ago
> Life is complicated, but in general humans have been becoming much more respectful of the environment as we become more wealthy. [...] You can't be serious... https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/max/2000/1*IOUIWy_MZuECIpZRK9hy6Q.jpeg https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/max/2000/1*IOUIWy_MZuECIpZRK... ("The Great Acceleration") Also read The Anthropocene Review whenever you feel too optimistic about the future. In fact now that I read your comment again, there's virtually not a single statement I can agree with. Our current way of "householding" ("economy (from Greek οίκος – "household" and νέμoμαι – "manage")") with this planet is thrashing ecosystems left and right. This is because mankind's economy has long taken on a life of its own, serving itself, without anyone pricing in "negative externalities" (another way of saying we're turning Earth into a Wall-E-esque dystopia, except we're not going to have a big space station to live on).
- traek 8y ago

foolfoolz 8y ago

this is the age of humans. nature will have to sacrifice to support us

viach 8y ago

>> What are we doing to this planet? What will it become? The tragedy of the commons: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons Technically, the planet is doomed. Practically and pragmatically, everyone who is living here today, has a good chance to enjoy his days, no matter what will happen next. I'm not advocating the way we destroy our planet, just trying to accept facts without emotional barrier. Could be wrong here.

nipponese 8y ago
Humanity on Earth is doomed, the planet will be fine.
- viach 8y ago
  Actually it depends on how far it all gets
  - irrational 8y ago
    What do you mean? If if there was a nuclear war to end all nuclear wars and all humans died and the surface of the earth was irradiated so that most animals died, there would still be life. Slowly the surface would be replaced though tectonic action. New life would flourish and grow without human intervention. In a billion years or so you probably wouldn't even know humans had ever been here. The planet would be just fine.
    - viach 8y ago
      Probably, but you can't really know for sure. Humans is something which never happened to this planet before. I wouldn't bet 10$ on life surviving here in the case things continue to go the way they are going today.
      - irrational 8y ago
        Life has been found far far underground, under the greenland and antarctic ice sheets, and in other even more inhospitable places. There is no way humans could eradicate all life before we managed to off ourselves. Only the destruction of the entire planet so that all that is left in the earth's orbit around the sun is a dust cloud could maybe kill all life (and even then I wouldn't bet against it).