pessimistic about the future biosphere

[mellowtigger]

That landing against the tree seems to require more repair than I had initially figured. I've been very tired and sleepy since then, seeming to rest up so my body can spend its energy on undoing some unseen damage. My lower back still hurts, but it's getting better. I have spackled skin where the tree bark roughed my back, but I see no sign of any serious harm. Still, I've slept 1.5 times as much as usual, and I blame my energy level for today's pessimism.

We're changing the content of our biosphere in so many ways:

• atmosphere (through combustion vehicle exhaust and factory exhaust)
• soil (though mass ranching, and with pesticides through mass farming, maybe even with electricity)
• water (with chemicals carried by rain runoff from our cities, and with pharmaceuticals from our sewers, noise from our sonar)
• biodiversity (simply by carrying macro/micro living organisms across every spot of land on the globe every day, or by mechanizing the destruction of one local ecology to replace it with a new local ecology)

I'm not surprised that a fungal disease is ravaging the world's frog population, or that the north pole may be ice-free this summer for the first time in recorded human history, or that bees (whose species outnumber mammals and birds combined) are suffering colony collapse disorder apparently as a result of a viral infection and their loss will cause even more food shortage for humans.

No, all of that I could believe without getting depressed.

But now even NASA is getting desperate to ring the alarms, primarily as a result of the efforts of Dr. James Hansen, the director of the Goddard Institute of Space Sciences. This man has his own collection of worrying notes, but the pertinent one today is his look back at his last 20 years (pdf) working on just the issue of climate change. Part of me wishes that Homo sapiens would be included in the list of casualties in this now-unfolding 6th occurence of mass extinction in earth's history, as it would seem the only just outcome of our own influence. Or, at the very least, that we evolve into a less-intelligent (and less influential) species, as described by Kurt Vonnegut in his story, Galapagos.

If we ascribe agency to the anthropomorphic Mother Nature... maybe that's what She's preparing for.  One can hope.  (In such a pessimistic mood.)

Comments

[bitterlawngnome.livejournal.com]

My friend rfmcdpei refers to it as the "deterraforming of the Earth".

[mellowtigger]

Hrmm. Polysyllabic, but deliciously ironic. :)

Mother Earth

[little-buddha52.livejournal.com]

Hey Terry I know the feeling. I was thinking alot about the Environment today as well and getting depressed. Have been trying to change my life to reduce my Carbon FootPrint and wondering how can I get people to thinking about taking care of this planet.

http://earthtrends.wri.org/updates/node/111

Re: Mother Earth

[mellowtigger]

An item that frequently shows on these lists that still concerns me is the mention of fluorescent bulbs. It's a good energy trade, but I'm still concerned about the chemical side effect of it as a waste product in a landfill. There are solid state devices entering the market now that seem much more useful even as post-consumer waste. LED white lights, and soon there will be sunlight-spectra plasma devices too.

Re: Mother Earth

[dodecadragon.livejournal.com]

Yes, fluorescents are ancient tech compared to LED's.

Still, there is probably some chemical side effects of making those too.

[scorpioatl.livejournal.com]

Don't forget to add all of the ocean dead zones forming in coastal areas around the world and increasing acidification of the oceans too-- that's a major catastrophe that isn't getting much coverage.

I feel the same way. There's a word for it-- weltschmertz...

[mellowtigger]

detour...

I knew about anomie and hikikomori, but somehow I missed weltschmertz. And what's not to like about a comic book titled, Weltschmertz: Attack of the same-sex sleeper cells? *laugh*