Save the earth, a slightly different take

Streetwiseguy wrote: First off, let me say that I don't like waste, I don't E36 M3 where I eat, and I generally support green ideas. Now: It bugs the heck out of me when greens speak of saving the planet. The planet will survive quite nicely, thank you very much. Humans, not so much.

George Carlin put it quite well: “We’re so self-important. Everybody’s going to save something now. “Save the trees, save the bees, save the whales, save those snails.” And the greatest arrogance of all: save the planet. Save the planet, we don’t even know how to take care of ourselves yet. I’m tired of this E36 M3. I’m tired of f-ing Earth Day. I’m tired of these self-righteous environmentalists, these white, bourgeois liberals who think the only thing wrong with this country is that there aren’t enough bicycle paths. People trying to make the world safe for Volvos. Besides, environmentalists don’t give a E36 M3 about the planet. Not in the abstract they don’t. You know what they’re interested in? A clean place to live. Their own habitat. They’re worried that some day in the future they might be personally inconvenienced. Narrow, unenlightened self-interest doesn’t impress me.

The planet has been through a lot worse than us. Been through earthquakes, volcanoes, plate tectonics, continental drift, solar flares, sun spots, magnetic storms, the magnetic reversal of the poles … hundreds of thousands of years of bombardment by comets and asteroids and meteors, worldwide floods, tidal waves, worldwide fires, erosion, cosmic rays, recurring ice ages … And we think some plastic bags and some aluminum cans are going to make a difference? The planet isn’t going anywhere. WE ARE!

We’re going away. Pack your E36 M3, folks. We’re going away. And we won’t leave much of a trace, either. Maybe a little Styrofoam … The planet’ll be here and we’ll be long gone. Just another failed mutation. Just another closed-end biological mistake. An evolutionary cul-de-sac. The planet’ll shake us off like a bad case of fleas.

The planet will be here for a long, long, LONG time after we’re gone, and it will heal itself, it will cleanse itself, ’cause that’s what it does. It’s a self-correcting system. The air and the water will recover, the earth will be renewed. And if it’s true that plastic is not degradable, well, the planet will simply incorporate plastic into a new paradigm: the earth plus plastic. The earth doesn’t share our prejudice toward plastic. Plastic came out of the earth. The earth probably sees plastic as just another one of its children. Could be the only reason the earth allowed us to be spawned from it in the first place. It wanted plastic for itself. Didn’t know how to make it. Needed us. Could be the answer to our age-old egocentric philosophical question, “Why are we here?”

Plastic…shiny happy person.” ― George Carlin

The perspective no one likes...

As a Christian, I believe we have an obligation to care for the creation. It's why we were put here. Genesis.

The fact that we don't is perfect evidence that we have a proclivity toward sin. What do you know! Just like the Bible says!

We won't be here forever. Revelation.

Scripture does NOT say we are the only life in the universe, so there COULD be other. It DOES, however, say that we are created special and unique. We just don't act that way.

"Mother Earth" is nothing more than a pagan god. Gaia or other. Have fun worshiping THAT one.

Christians generally don't understand some of this because they don't read their own Bibles.

Taiden is a pretty smart dude (well, maybe THAT'S not such an unpopular position!)

George Carlin is a master.

All the planet has to do is yawn, snort and roll over in its long nap and we are goners. It doesn't even have to be the planet itself; anybody remember the 1/4 mile wide asteroid which passed between the Earth and the Moon recently? http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2396086,00.asp Then there was 2012 BX34 in January, only ~35 feet wide, but it passed WAY closer.

In the grand scheme of things, we are no more important than roaches. In fact, the roach is more likely to survive a huge disaster than we are. It's humbling to realize that and a lot of people get really wound up when that is pointed out.

We reproduce like rabbits because that's the survival imperative. Every species is programmed to produce as many offspring as possible because most of them would die off early. That's why ocean species such as anemones release millions of eggs, out of those millions maybe 20 or 30 will make it to the reproductive stage.

As we humans have become more adept at manipulating our environment to suit our needs, the need for huge numbers of offspring to perpetuate the species has declined, at least in the more 'developed' countries. This lessened the pressure to have lots of offspring so that a few might survive. That used to be the case here in the US as late as the 1930's and 1940's, people still had large families but the family size is dropping. For instance, my grandmother (born in 1911) was the youngest of 13 children. My mom (born in 1934) is the middle of 6 kids. She had 3, I was born in 1958. I have 1, born in 1997. Multiply that trend by millions of families and it becomes apparent how the population is stabilizing.

In the Third World, the infant mortality rate is coming down but people still continue to produce as many offspring as possible because they don't really realize the mortality rate is dropping.

That's why the population growth rate of the First World is stagnant or in some places actually dropping even after the post WWII 'baby boom' but the population explosion is in the Third World. Assuming the First World model continues, as the Third World becomes more developed the birth rate will begin to level off.

We need to keep this planet as clean as possible not because a bunch of hackysack hippies are complaining about things but because it is the ONLY place we have to live. If we foul our nest, we can't go anywhere else. There's not much we can do about asteroids, solar flares etc but we CAN control what we do with and to this planet.

BTW: there was a comment earlier about 'irreplaceable forests'. Not so. Nature replaces forests all the time on a continuing basis, what we are seeing is merely a snapshot, a moment frozen in time. All you have to do is ride through the countryside here in the South and everywhere you look there are abandoned houses, barns etc with trees growing up through them. I can take you to a WWII era radar installation that you won't ever see unless you know exactly where and what to look for, and that's what, 70 years?

If we vanished tomorrow within ~200 years the planet will look like we were never here. Well, except for plastic water bottles.

In the old old battle between Man and Nature, Nature will ALWAYS win.

Taiden wrote: George Carlin is a master.

Not the thread for it, but Bill Hicks > George Carlin.

In reply to SVreX:

I'm glad you choose to interpret things in that way.

I once got into an argument with someone who thought:

1. The earth and everything on it was put here for us (humans) to use
2. Our time on earth would be finite; Armageddon would see to that
3. Don't sort plastics, because it displays a lack of faith in God.

All this consumerism, war, taxes, etc, distracts us from what we should be focusing on:

Building starships.

very true.. as a closed system, it is only a matter of time before we completely destroy each other. Look at what happens to mice and rats if you lock them in a container and let them breed uncontrollably

SVreX wrote: ..."Mother Earth" is nothing more than a pagan god. Gaia or other. Have fun worshiping THAT one....

I always find it wildly hypocritical when one religion to criticize another, pretty much by definition of what religion is.

Sorry, don't mean to derail.

Infinite Universe: I am not expert, but I believe the theory is "space" is infinite, but the contents (galaxies etc.) are a finite expanding thing. So you can reach the end of the stars, but not the end of space.

Grizz wrote: Depends on who's in the small groups. I know plenty of people who've got enough stupid to go around.

You rang?

There is a theory that the universe has a set amount of matter, and therefore a finite amount of planets could be created, however, with the destruction of planets over time, some get destroyed while others are being created.

The idea that there is a universe outside of our own universe is a bit creepy, though. Think of our solar system as being a bunch of matter that formed the sun and planets, and the galaxy as a pretty much the same...forming multiple solar systems, and the universe as a larger formation of galaxies...and then...well...you could potentially have more universes.

So, provided that another universe out there is older than our own, with trillions of possibilities for life, then you could speculate that another distant race is able to search for us.

Or, you end up with "Q".

I'll try to stop referencing Star Trek.

aircooled wrote: Infinite Universe: I am not expert, but I believe the theory is "space" is infinite, but the contents (galaxies etc.) are a finite expanding thing. So you can reach the end of the stars, but not the end of space.

Known space (galaxies etc) is currently thought to be finite. However, if all of "space" is infinite, then the odds are good an infinite number of somethings out there.

SVreX wrote: "Mother Earth" is nothing more than a pagan god. Gaia or other. Have fun worshiping THAT one.

While "Mother Earth" is most certainly held as a deity in several non-Christian mythologies (Greek Gaia, Roman Terra), it's most commonly used as a personification of the environment ("Mother Nature"). Similar to "Lady Luck" (or really even the word "fortune").

I don't have much to add other than "Thanks for the new email signature:"

______________________________________________________________________________ Remember the population of the universe is zero. Simple mathematics tells us that the population of the Universe must be zero. Why? Well given that the volume of the universe is infinite there must be an infinite number of worlds. But not all of them are populated; therefore only a finite number are. Any finite number divided by infinity is as close to zero as makes no odds, therefore we can round the average population of the Universe to zero, and so the total population must be zero. Hooray! I don't exist!

Simple mathematics also states that a cone generated by the function y = 1/x rotated about the x-axis has both a finite volume and an infinite surface area. (Gabriel's Horn)

Isaac Asimov wrote an essay on the possibility of life elsewhere (IIRC it was called 'Are We Alone?') and in it he explores the mathematical probability of planets experiencing the collection of random chance cosmic happenstance which could to them supporting life similar to ours. He used only the Milky Way galaxy.

The low end number was something like 36, again IIRC. The high end was in the low millions. The truth is probably somewhere in between. And that's assuming they are water/carbon based only. There are other possibilities, ammonia based comes to mind.

The point is that it's similar to the old saying about an infinite number of monkeys banging on an infinite number of typewriters, at some point there's a good chance they will write the whole of Shakespeare. So there's a real good possibility that there are other civilizations in our cosmic neck of the woods and when you look at the sheer number of galaxies, each with their own possibility of life, then it becomes a mathematical certanity that there's someone else out there.

This seems like a good place to deposit one of my favorite's on the subject:

Carl Sagan's Pale Blue Dot speech

EDIT: Changed to direct youtube link to avoid trojan crap site

Giant Purple Snorklewacker wrote: This seems like a good place to deposit one of my favorite's on the subject: Carl Sagan's Pale Blue Dot speech

Just an FYI, Avast pinged a Trojan off of that page.

Fungus discovered that eats plastic... Not engineered in a lab, but discovered.

Just putting it out there for people who may unquestionably accept the tenants of rampant environmentalism being immutable.

http://www.tgdaily.com/sustainability-features/61260-plastic-eating-fungus-could-help-deal-with-landfill

aircooled wrote:

SVreX wrote: ..."Mother Earth" is nothing more than a pagan god. Gaia or other. Have fun worshiping THAT one....

I always find it wildly hypocritical when one religion to criticize another, pretty much by definition of what religion is. Sorry, don't mean to derail.

I think you DID mean to derail.

I do not find any hypocrisy in having a given set of beliefs and recognizing the differences with other's beliefs. Particularly if one is true.

I do, however, note an enormous amount of hypocrisy from people who hold a particular set of beliefs and claim that other's belief systems are hypocritical but their own are not. There is no legitimate definition of religion that includes the word "hypocrisy".

Hypocrisy does not stop at the door of the church.

SVreX wrote: I think you DID mean to derail.

Hey bubbo! I didn't bring this into a discussion about earth and the environment.

I do not find any hypocrisy in having a given set of beliefs and recognizing the differences with other's beliefs. Particularly if one is true.

Wow, are you kidding? More like "denigrate" then "difference". That's an incredibly arrogant (some might say ignorant) statement BTW.

I do, however, note an enormous amount of hypocrisy from people who hold a particular set of beliefs and claim that other's belief systems are hypocritical but their own are not. There is no legitimate definition of religion that includes the word "hypocrisy". Hypocrisy does not stop at the door of the church.

But you seem fine with a person with one set up beliefs denigrating another persons beliefs?

By "definition" (and I admit I did leave that vague) I did not mean Religion is defined as hypocrisy, I meant by definition Religion is a Faith.

So for one Faith to criticize another Faith when they are both based on Faith by definition, seems pretty hypocritical to me.

aircooled wrote: So for one Faith to criticize another Faith when they are both based on Faith by definition, seems pretty hypocritical to me.

But-but-but-my guy wears a 3 cornered hat and eats cows, abd yours has a top hat and eats fish. You must be wrong about everything, cause a guy with a book said so.

Taiden wrote: Shouldn't our goal as the only intelligent life forms in this giant expanse be to preserve the only example of life in the universe?

If we are the only intelligent forms, then we are so insignificant compared to the giant expanse that we couldn't possibly have any responsibility for preserving anything. That would be like a single atom of carbon in your body feeling responsible for the entire preservation of life on earth.

By the way, the very fact that we (generally) as a human species can't grasp (or don't care to grasp) the true concept of infinity means that we are wholly unqualified to even begin debating about religion, the universe, or quantum physics.

This whole thing is like asking a 3-year-old what they want to be when they grow up. In their minds, "fireman" is the only plausible and acceptable outcome, but the reality is much different.

Our entire human individualism is based on what we KNOW. For some that is letting faith answer all the questions. For some that is a constant struggle for more understanding. For others that is a couch and a video game. As humans we tend to forget that what we DON'T know far exceeds what we DO know. The intelligent human spouts about what he/she knows. The wise human speaks about what we all need to learn.

The bottom line is that we may all know that the answer is always "Miata," but until we are the actual designer of the Miata, we can't say diddley.

SVreX wrote: The perspective no one likes... As a Christian, I believe we have an obligation to care for the creation. It's why we were put here. Genesis. The fact that we don't is perfect evidence that we have a proclivity toward sin. What do you know! Just like the Bible says! We won't be here forever. Revelation. Scripture does NOT say we are the only life in the universe, so there COULD be other. It DOES, however, say that we are created special and unique. We just don't act that way. "Mother Earth" is nothing more than a pagan god. Gaia or other. Have fun worshiping THAT one. Christians generally don't understand some of this because they don't read their own Bibles. Taiden is a pretty smart dude (well, maybe THAT'S not such an unpopular position!)

you can see the earth every day.. you an touch it.. it's real. i've never seen God, never touched him. God is a concept that exists in our imaginations- planet earth is not.