Post
by henry quirk » Sat Mar 17, 2018 6:47 pm
Yeah, I don't think so, but let's just say the science 'is', for the sake of argument, solid.
We can conservatively, based on the conclusions of the science, expect a sea level rise of 200 feet or more, super hurricanes, the west coast made into a desert, etc.
Meh.
We're a clever buncha monkeys: we'll solve the problems or adapt to the problems.
What we won't do, shouldn't do, is hobble our industries (ourselves).
We won't do this, shouldn't do this, cuz, being the predatory cannibal apes we are, we look forward.
We absolutely hate goin' backwards.
We're exploiters, not harmonizers.
We enjoy the shade tree, but -- eventually -- turn it into baseball bats and tables and chairs and pianos.
We're awed by the mountain, but -- eventually -- crack it open for the gold, coal, uranium locked inside.
We're daunted by the ocean, but -- eventually -- set out onto it, dive down deep into it, to find out what's there and take it.
We crouch under the sky and space and feel small, but -- eventually -- we fling ourselves up and use these as well.
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*Our evolution - We evolved and THRIVED on all range of extreme environments all over the Earth, from the infernal heat of Africa where everything is trying to KILL YOU! ALL THE TIME!, to the frigid apocalyptic wastelands of the North and the Ice Age where survival depended on constant invention and ingenuity.
Our history - Humans have been getting better at killing each other basically even before we made stone axes, and our progress in killing continues unceasingly. We also nearly went extinct once, BECAUSE A HUGE VOLCANO EXPLODED, reducing our overall population to about 5000 INDIVIDUALS, and of them ONLY 40 PAIRS were BREEDING ONES. Did that make us quit? NOPE. Only about 70000 years later we had 7,4 BILLION INDIVIDUALS, having 100 TIMES more biomass than any other large animal species in the history of our planet!!! That is a hell of a lot of breeding (which has also made us have a very low genetic variety almost making us inbred but not quite. BUT STILL)!
Our bodies - We're the ultimate Omnivores, we hunt down, kill, burn and eat absolutely anything until totally nothing is left, even more so than so-called "apex" predators like lions, bears, snakes and sharks (in fact, contrary to what Jaws may lead you to believe, we eat sharks so much, we're hunting them down to near extinction. Why? Simply because they make fancy soup). We also drink alcohol, one of the most volatile, flammable, caustic solvents in chemistry that is for all intents and purposes, POISON. It's the same toxic stuff used to exterminate bacteria, fungi and everything else biological, and a VX-like neurotoxin to invertebrates, arthropods and almost every other small animal. Why? Because it's FUN!
Our mind -The most terrifying aspect of us is our brains and technology. Our aggressive instincts combined with our intelligence will never cease to come up with better and deadlier ways to warp reality in our own Image, and to torture and exterminate the enemy, and such is probably seen as incomprehensible Lovecraftian Magic to lower species (we ARE Cthulhu!). We exterminate a lot of species like the Dodo simply by uncaring accident (which is probably why we are thriving 'during' an extinction event [for now at least]). What we can come up with scares the shit out of ourselves even. Think Nuclear Weapons and M.A.D. for example.
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So: human-driven climate change (if it's real): pffftt!
We'll survive it, and we'll survive it goin' forward, not backward; we'll survive by essentially beatin' earth's ass, not catering to it; we'll survive through being competive, surly, mean-spirited dicks, not by way of huggin' nature and each other.
*"Humanity! Fuck Yeah!" edited slighly, by me (cuz, why the fuck not?)