Imagine All the People...
While no one was looking the people-o-meter flipped on us. The U.S.A. now has a population of 300 million, making America the 3rd most populous country on the planet, behind China and Indian, and the only so-called 'industrialized nation' whose population is still rising significantly. That's not great news for the world's overall environmental outlook. As the New Scientist notes in the cover story of its latest issue, "Imagine Earth Without People," the average 'eco-footprint' of a U.S. citizen is about 9.7 hectares, or roughly 24 acres. Imagine that.
The world population, by the by, has now surpassed 6.5 billion. In my lifetime (I'm 40), the figure has nearly doubled. It was 3.4 billion in 1966. The U.S. population at that time was about 200 million.
For those who've ever wondered about a people-less planet, the New Scientist article is a good read. The upshot: Should Gaia ever shrug us off, Nature would hardly notice and all traces us of would disappear in about, oh, 100,000 years or so. For evidence to support the contention, consider some of the most dynamic ecosystems in the world; namely, the DMZ dividing the two Koreas, the forest buffer of the Panama Canal Zone (before repatriation), and the woods around Chernobyl.
From the New Scientist piece:
The area around Chernobyl has revealed just how fast nature can bounce back. "I really expected to see a nuclear desert there," says Chesser. "I was quite surprised. When you enter into the exclusion zone, it's a very thriving ecosystem."My question is, does the thought that the planet will abide without humanity bring you comfort or distress?
The first few years after people evacuated the zone, rats and house mice flourished, and packs of feral dogs roamed the area despite efforts to exterminate them. But the heyday of these vermin proved to be short-lived, and already the native fauna has begun to take over. Wild boar are 10 to 15 times as common within the Chernobyl exclusion zone as outside it, and big predators are making a spectacular comeback. "I've never seen a wolf in the Ukraine outside the exclusion zone. I've seen many of them inside," says Chesser.
hat tip: Gristmill
4 Comments:
The thought of a humanless planet brings comfort to me.
Good riddance to the lot of us, that's what I say!
A little of both I guess? The earth was here before we were, there is no chicken and egg about it, no matter what your beliefs on God are. We didn't create the earth and then populate it. (watch some scientist prove me wrong in the year 2152) - However it does make me think of when someone had once said to me "Stop worrying about global warming, God said 'the world will be as it always was'". Which actually got me to thinking, that's right there is nothing on this planet, or better in this universe, that wasn't already here. The foundation for life on earth was set long ago and even after people are gone (hard to imagine all people being gone) that the earth and mother nature will heal itself and it will be like it always was. Even when the Sun sets for the final time it will be as it always was.
I thought Alex Steffen at world changing had some interesting points about this article:
http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/005052.html
"Like so many other ego-apocalyptic fantasies, it plays off two toxic memes: the idea that collapse is a positive force, and the idea that people have no ecologically acceptable place on this planet. Better writers than me have explored why both of these ideas are insane. What isn't explored often enough, though, is the effect these ideas and their like have on our culture: they sap our will to do better."
Thanks for the comment Adrian.
I have to say, however, that I don't really agree with Steffen that the New Scientist article 'saps our will to do better' anymore than the fact that the sun will eventually burn itself out does.
We all know we will die one day. But the realization of our mortality doesn't keep us from trying to live long lives or from enjoying the time we have. We still save for the future, however uncertain it may be. Why should it be any different when considering the survival of humanity as a whole.
Humanity will not endure forever.
Would Steffen say the statement is defeatist?
As to the memes he refers to, well, memes are just persistent ideas. And I'm disinclined to classify ideas as toxic or poisonous. They're just things to be mulled over, considered, perhaps accepted or perhaps rejected. Steffen seems to think it's wrong even to posit the notion that 'people have no ecologically acceptable place on this planet.' I would take issue with the word 'acceptable' -- acceptable to whom? -- but, otherwise, it seems a perfectly fair assertion to consider.
That said, he's right in urging us to envision more hopeful scenarios for human existence on Earth. Too often, however, those visions -- I'm thinking of Ecotopia, for example -- amount to fanciful nonsense.
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