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The only human activity so far on a large enough scale to impact the biosphere as a whole is fossil fuel use. If you want to count that as "terraforming." We c
by jniedrauer 8y ago
The only human activity so far on a large enough scale to impact the biosphere as a whole is fossil fuel use. If you want to count that as "terraforming."
We could add nuclear weapons to that list, if we ever decided to use them.
- kaybe 8y agoNo, the changes in land use had significant and detectable impacts far before that. The albedo change between forest and fields alone is quite large.
- mirimir 8y agoYeah. The North American "indigenous peoples"[0] transformed huge areas of the Midwest from savannah and sparse forest to open prairie. Basically, they burned every spring. It improved habitat for their game of choice, and made hunting them more convenient. 0) Rather, the first known settlers. But then humans have arguably been settlers everywhere, except for particular parts of Africa.
- jniedrauer 8y agoThese are all localized effects. A lot of localized effects can add up to global changes, but they're not the same thing. Terraforming implies global changes.
- arcticfox 8y ago> The only human activity so far on a large enough scale to impact the biosphere as a whole is fossil fuel use. If you want to count that as "terraforming." I must be misunderstanding you; the majority of places in the world today are radically different than they were pre-human. That seems pretty inarguable.
- jniedrauer 8y agoIt's death by a thousand cuts though. A bunch of localized effects that add up. That's not "terraforming." No one thing has impacted the entire planet except for fossil fuels. We dispersed a lot of lead globally in the mid 20th century, but that was also fossil fuel related. Plastic buildup in the ocean is also fossil fuel related. And of course the atmospheric changes.
- mirimir 8y agoThe Romans also did a pretty good job with lead.