That old environment...

[DakAttack]

Seems like wherever I look I'm staring at something claiming irreperable harm is being done to the environment or an inhabitant thereof. It worries me a lot to see things like oil spills, or the forest fires in Russia covering Moscow with toxic fog. I feel a little hopeless, but with only a single Google search I see dozens of technologies people are developing to combat ongoing risks to our envrionment. I get a boner every time I read about a new piece of green technology.

Is it worth worrying about? I recently read an article about hundreds of thousands of bats dying because of a fungus introduced to their caves by the boots of spelunkers. They suggested building or buying bat houses to offer them a place to live that isn't already exposed to the fungus. Seems like a neat way to help out, and one of the very few options I have.

[Yellow Mage]

Re: That old environment...

I read about the bats, too. To me, at least, it seems very much worth it to at least do as much as you can.

[cidbahamut]

Re: That old environment...

I feel George Carlin expresses my sentiments better than I can.
[nomedia="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EjmtSkl53h4"]YouTube- ‪George Carlin on The Environment (HQ)‬‎[/nomedia]

[MrMageo]

Re: That old environment...

According to Newton, the time of strife is due to occur sometime before 2060. This can include environmental disasters, wars, disease. Newton claimed to have mathematically predicted several events in recent history, from calculating numbers in he bible. So I wouldn't worry to much, anyway look on the bright side the world as we know it ends in another 14 months anyway.

[Yellow Mage]

Re: That old environment...

That's it. I call Poe's law on Mageo.

[Ziero]

Re: That old environment...

Dude, there have been literally thousands of doomsday prophecies, can't take each and everyone seriously though.

As for the environment, once we wipe ourselves out the environment will end up being just fine. I mean in reality we are the ones who will really suffer from screwing things up, the planet and life in generally will get along fine without us. I mean, this ball of dirt didn't have stuff running around on it for millions of years only to have us be what wipes it all out.

The planet will be fine, we're the ones who are boned.

[DakAttack]

Re: That old environment...

The planet will be fine, we're the ones who are boned.

That doesn't bother you?

[cidbahamut]

Re: That old environment...

That doesn't bother you?

Considering that people are scum? No, not in the least.

[DakAttack]

Re: That old environment...

Considering that people are scum? No, not in the least.

You're not worried about what kind of world you'll be raising your kids in?

[cidbahamut]

Re: That old environment...

You're not worried about what kind of world you'll be raising your kids in?

What kids?

[Balfree]

Re: That old environment...

What kids?

When this is what most people say nowadays, then you know the end has already begun, in essence. People start deciding that having kids is way too much of a burden and that is what doom sounds like to me.

[MrMageo]

Re: That old environment...

As for the environment, once we wipe ourselves out the environment will end up being just fine. I mean in reality we are the ones who will really suffer from screwing things up, the planet and life in generally will get along fine without us. I mean, this ball of dirt didn't have stuff running around on it for millions of years only to have us be what wipes it all out.

Ya right man god made the earth for us. It has only been around for several thousand years. There was nothing here for millions of years, because God didn't make it yet. Oh and fossils, those are just gods way of testing our faith.

[DakAttack]

Re: That old environment...

When this is what most people say nowadays, then you know the end has already begun, in essence. People start deciding that having kids is way too much of a burden and that is what doom sounds like to me.

Fortunately, not many people feel that way. But, if you're any kind of smart, it's your duty to make smart babies. There's too many idiots popping kids out by accident.

[Ziero]

Re: That old environment...

That doesn't bother you?

Death is inevitable, whether it be just me personally, or an entire species, when it comes it comes. I mean, when you put it in context, life in and of itself is pretty pointless. When you have creatures on this planet who's life-cycle is literally less then 24 hours, you realize how little it all means. But despite being pretty insignificant specs of dust in the universal sense, at the very least we can enjoy the time we have now. Why worry about things you really can't change(and you really can't change it, the world at large just don't care) when instead you can be enjoying whatever short time we have on this piss-ant dustball we call a planet.

You're not worried about what kind of world you'll be raising your kids in?

Well I doubt my kids will be there for the end of life on earth, and I doubt their kids will be their either. But eventually there will come a time when someone's kids are the last to stick around on this planet. Though humans as a species are a fairly adaptable creature, whatever happens I'm sure some form of man will still be around, just not in the same numbers.

Though we also do muck up things pretty fast, unfortunately it would take a complete global effort for us to "fix" the problems we'll cause. But most of the world don't give a rats ass. As said before, too many stupid people are breeding, but not just in the US, but all over the world. Even if everyone in the US and hell even Canada and Western Europe all banded together to stop screwin over the planet, there's still the vast majority of the world who'd flip you off and keep on cuttin down trees and crappin in your water supply.

If you wanna help "save the planet", go right ahead. It feels good to help, or at least try to help, so don't let anyone stop you. As long as you can enjoy what you got, it was worth it in life.

[Armando]

Re: That old environment...

I mean, this ball of dirt didn't have stuff running around on it for millions of years only to have us be what wipes it all out.

Just because the environment probably will regulate itself once we're gone, it doesn't mean we should take the stuff we're doing to it lightly. Just because over a couple of thousand years it'll eventually heal, it doesn't mean we're not screwing over a lot of species that'll have to deal with our mess after we're gone.

Why worry about things you really can't change(and you really can't change it, the world at large just don't care) when instead you can be enjoying whatever short time we have on this piss-ant dustball we call a planet.

Because this mindset fucks everyone over, and this same mindset applies equally to short-term problems.

Speaking of environmental problems, it turns out that one of the biggest things you can do for the environment is eating less meat. Turns out the livestock industry is one of the biggest contributions to environmental rape in all sorts of ways, from beating all forms of transportation combined in air pollution, to deforestation, to massive energy/land/grain/water consumptions required to produce one pound of meat. In short, meat is very inefficient to produce. This pagehas charts from the book "The Food Revolution: How Your Diet Can Help Save Your Life and Our World" which illustrates the massive inefficiency involved (as well as other information):

Charts

Gallons of water required to produce a pound of:


Calories of fossil fuel required to produce 1 calorie of protein of:


# of people whose caloric needs can be met with 2.5 acres of land devoted to:

Moderating your meat consumption is probably the biggest thing you can do for the environment; consider the amount of water that goes into a pound of meat. If you regularly used 14 gallons of water every time you showered (you probably don't), you'd have to give up showering for a year to save that much.

This is not a hoax. Wikipedia has an article on this: Environmental vegetarianism. The United Nations did a study on this in 2006, which the Wikipedia page uses as a reference: http://www.fao.org/docrep/010/a0701e/a0701e00.HTM

Environmental vegetarianism is based on the concern that the production of meat and animal products for mass consumption, especially through factory farming, is environmentally unsustainable. According to a 2006 United Nations initiative, the livestock industry is one of the largest contributors to environmental degradation worldwide, and modern practices of raising animals for food contributes on a "massive scale" to air and water pollution, land degradation, climate change, and loss of biodiversity. The initiative concluded that "the livestock sector emerges as one of the top two or three most significant contributors to the most serious environmental problems, at every scale from local to global."[154]
...
In addition, animal agriculture is a large source of greenhouse gases and is responsible for 18 percent of the world's greenhouse gas emissions as measured in CO2 equivalents. By comparison, all of the world's transportation (including all cars, trucks, buses, trains, ships, and planes) emits 13.5 percent of the CO2. Animal farming produces 65 percent of human-related nitrous oxide and 37 percent of all human-induced methane. Methane has about 21 times more Global Warming Potential (GWP) than carbon dioxide and nitrous oxide has 296 times the GWP of CO2.[157]

Obviously humanity as a whole doesn't need to drop meat altogether, but we need to drop our consumption to a more reasonable level. I can't remember where but I recall reading that the average American consumes more meat than any other nationality. According to Wikipedia the UN has been trying to convince a couple of nations to encourage their citizens to go meat-free on a specific day of the week. Awareness of this issue is important because as third world countries develop, their meat consumption will increase, potentially screwing things even further if nothing is done.

EDIT: According to the preface of that UN study: "Action is required: if, as predicted, the production of meat will double from now to 2050, we need to halve impacts per unit of output to achieve a mere status quo in overall impact."