Author Topic: Life After People  (Read 11954 times)

Dave

Re: Life After People
« Reply #50 on: 29 May, 2008, 12:51:55 pm »
I think our definition of what constitutes 'natural' is the issue here. 

Just out of interest, what is your definition of 'natural' in this context?

Re: Life After People
« Reply #51 on: 29 May, 2008, 12:57:54 pm »
The program was quite reassuring about the effect humanity is having on the planet - part of me was wondering if it had been funded by oil companies and other global warming naysayers...

andygates

  • Peroxide Viking
Re: Life After People
« Reply #52 on: 29 May, 2008, 01:02:27 pm »
Dunno why, since the big threat of CC is to *us*, not the big ball o'rock.  Barring a clathrate doom, we'll be miserable and the world will carry on.

"Natural" waste is of course to crap in our nearest river and get cholera; if that's a workable definition of natural then abandon fire and tools and go die young on the Salisbury Savannah.  That sort of natural sucks ass.
It takes blood and guts to be this cool but I'm still just a cliché.
OpenStreetMap UK & IRL Streetmap & Topo: ravenfamily.org/andyg/maps updates weekly.

Dave

Re: Life After People
« Reply #53 on: 29 May, 2008, 01:35:37 pm »
The program was quite reassuring about the effect humanity is having on the planet - part of me was wondering if it had been funded by oil companies and other global warming naysayers...

I'm in the same boat as Andy here. In geological terms, we'll have negligible impact on the planet. There'll be periods when average temps and average CO2 levels will be significantly higher than those we can cause (just like there have been in the past). There will probably be other major mass extinctions (just like those that have already happened).

Re: Life After People
« Reply #54 on: 29 May, 2008, 01:45:53 pm »

If you believe that we are not capable of unnatural behaviour at all, then we will have to agree to disagree.  Having sex with a farm animal is unnatural IMO. 


I think we have a confusion between 'unnatural' and socially unacceptable (such as - speaking of sex with animals - the little dog arousing itself frantically against your leg).

Actually we have a little way to go before "pumping oceans full of waste" is really considered unacceptable.

Re: Life After People
« Reply #55 on: 29 May, 2008, 01:51:34 pm »
The program was quite reassuring about the effect humanity is having on the planet - part of me was wondering if it had been funded by oil companies and other global warming naysayers...

I'm in the same boat as Andy here. In geological terms, we'll have negligible impact on the planet. There'll be periods when average temps and average CO2 levels will be significantly higher than those we can cause (just like there have been in the past). There will probably be other major mass extinctions (just like those that have already happened).

Oh, I agree - global warming's a threat to us, and not to the planet.  Across the lifetime of the planet, we're barely a fart in the wind. 

But I thought the program underplayed the effect humanity is having in the short term, i.e. to plant and animal populations or levels of pollution in rivers & oceans.  Is it really as slight as was portrayed in the program?

Really Ancien

Re: Life After People
« Reply #56 on: 29 May, 2008, 02:04:47 pm »

Actually we have a little way to go before "pumping oceans full of waste" is really considered unacceptable.

Good point Ian, my notional little green men may have spotted the North Pacific Trash Vortex by now.
Greenpeace | Pacific trash vortex showing drift of ocean pollution.

Damon.

rogerzilla

  • When n+1 gets out of hand
Re: Life After People
« Reply #57 on: 29 May, 2008, 02:20:43 pm »
We still dump untreated sewage into the sea all round the UK.  OK, it's not as prevalent as it was (most of South West Water's sewage was untreated until the mid-1990s, hence "Surfers Against Sewage"), but it's still happening.

The trouble with humans as opposed to other species is that we've worked out how to make tools, fire, chemicals and split the atom which infinitely multiply our destructive powers.  Our nearest animal cousins have barely started on the first of those.  I remember a story where ants somehow acquired the gift of fire - it's a scary prospect, because even the smallest creature can burn the world.
Hard work sometimes pays off in the end, but laziness ALWAYS pays off NOW.

D0m1n1c Burford

Re: Life After People
« Reply #58 on: 29 May, 2008, 03:02:29 pm »

If you believe that we are not capable of unnatural behaviour at all, then we will have to agree to disagree.  Having sex with a farm animal is unnatural IMO. 

Actually we have a little way to go before "pumping oceans full of waste" is really considered unacceptable.

I think to the majority of people, it is unacceptable.  To the minority who commit such acts, it is justified.

D0m1n1c Burford

Re: Life After People
« Reply #59 on: 29 May, 2008, 03:10:51 pm »
I think our definition of what constitutes 'natural' is the issue here. 

Just out of interest, what is your definition of 'natural' in this context?

Natural refers to being consistent with the laws of nature.  The oceans have been around for millenia before we came along and filled them with our waste and pollution.  In this sense, we are doing something that nature by itself would not do, and therefore is unnatural.

D0m1n1c Burford

Re: Life After People
« Reply #60 on: 29 May, 2008, 03:18:59 pm »
We still dump untreated sewage into the sea all round the UK.  OK, it's not as prevalent as it was (most of South West Water's sewage was untreated until the mid-1990s, hence "Surfers Against Sewage"), but it's still happening.

The trouble with humans as opposed to other species is that we've worked out how to make tools, fire, chemicals and split the atom which infinitely multiply our destructive powers.  Our nearest animal cousins have barely started on the first of those.  I remember a story where ants somehow acquired the gift of fire - it's a scary prospect, because even the smallest creature can burn the world.


This is the key point - we have the intelligence and foresight to know that these actions are destructive, and will be to future generations, but still we continue to perpetuate in such destructive actions. 

Re: Life After People
« Reply #61 on: 29 May, 2008, 03:23:19 pm »
...my notional little green men may have spotted the North Pacific Trash Vortex by now.
Greenpeace | Pacific trash vortex showing drift of ocean pollution.

~50 years to create an oceanic carpet of plastic rubbish the size of Texas  :(

And it's not the only one, and nor is the plastic going away.
Profit or planet?

Jaded

  • The Codfather
  • Formerly known as Jaded
Re: Life After People
« Reply #62 on: 29 May, 2008, 05:12:57 pm »
This is the key point - we have the intelligence and foresight to know that these actions are destructive, and will be to future generations, but still we continue to perpetuate in such destructive actions. 

Do rain-forest-cut-down people know/care?
It is simpler than it looks.

Re: Life After People
« Reply #63 on: 30 May, 2008, 06:06:19 pm »
it's just a shame it was CGI'd to death.  And I found the VO downright irritating.

This could describe virtually every televisition documentary I've seen in the last five years.  :-\

My pet long-term worry is about what happens to all the nuclear power plants and waste dumps in areas that have been subject to glaciation in the past, and probably will be again if the pattern continues.
scottclark.photoshelter.com