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Why doesn’t life on earth collapse and end?


NUance

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I think there's probably a grain of truth in there. Not that the earth needs to do anything. It doesn't notice or care. But many scientists believe we are in the midst of a sixth mass extinction caused by humans, which has resulted in the fastest rate of species extinction in millions of years. Left unabated, humans will almost certainly be a part of the extinction.

 

 

 

 

This is a really fascinating subject when you start thinking about things like Fermi's paradox. The odds that there is life in the universe are, statistically, very very good, but you wonder why we haven't made contact with any intelligent life. Probably because any life intelligent enough to communicate with us, which takes a massive amount of energy, has already destroyed themselves with said energy.

 

 

The more advanced we get technologically, even if 99.99% of the use of that tech is good, the .01% is what destroys everyone.

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Fine...leave deity, religion, X,Y or Z out of it.

 

This world has been "living" for millions of years evolving from molten mush into an amazingly complex system of molecules, cells and energy. The original question was, why doesn't it die off? Well, it appears to me that some people believe that we ARE killing it off and at such an amazingly fast rate that some people produce major movies warning us of ultimate doom and we are the cause of everything that is bad.

 

Well....maybe the answer to the original question is.....it hasn't died off yet simply because humans as a disease on the Earth hadn't advanced far enough yet to do it and that's simply the course this huge chemical reaction is going to take....and....so what?

 

Maybe we are actually a parasite that the Earth needs to exterminate to continue living.

 

I think there's probably a grain of truth in there. Not that the earth needs to do anything. It doesn't notice or care. But many scientists believe we are in the midst of a sixth mass extinction caused by humans, which has resulted in the fastest rate of species extinction in millions of years. Left unabated, humans will almost certainly be a part of the extinction. Not to get too political, but this is one of the reasons I don't understand how Christianity got mixed up with the right wing (although on a positive note, I find Pope Francis very refreshing). I always thought growing up that it was a moral imperative to protect and cherish the environment. Why that isn't a cornerstone of modern Christianity is beyond me: it's maybe the moral imperative, especially when you consider the impact on the poor especially if we fail.

 

If we fail, it won't matter if you are poor or rich, we will be exterminated.

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Fine...leave deity, religion, X,Y or Z out of it.

 

This world has been "living" for millions of years evolving from molten mush into an amazingly complex system of molecules, cells and energy. The original question was, why doesn't it die off? Well, it appears to me that some people believe that we ARE killing it off and at such an amazingly fast rate that some people produce major movies warning us of ultimate doom and we are the cause of everything that is bad.

 

Well....maybe the answer to the original question is.....it hasn't died off yet simply because humans as a disease on the Earth hadn't advanced far enough yet to do it and that's simply the course this huge chemical reaction is going to take....and....so what?

 

Maybe we are actually a parasite that the Earth needs to exterminate to continue living.

 

I think there's probably a grain of truth in there. Not that the earth needs to do anything. It doesn't notice or care. But many scientists believe we are in the midst of a sixth mass extinction caused by humans, which has resulted in the fastest rate of species extinction in millions of years. Left unabated, humans will almost certainly be a part of the extinction. Not to get too political, but this is one of the reasons I don't understand how Christianity got mixed up with the right wing (although on a positive note, I find Pope Francis very refreshing). I always thought growing up that it was a moral imperative to protect and cherish the environment. Why that isn't a cornerstone of modern Christianity is beyond me: it's maybe the moral imperative, especially when you consider the impact on the poor especially if we fail.

 

If we fail, it won't matter if you are poor or rich, we will be exterminated.

 

 

Speaking specifically about climate change, the poor will be the first to experience the pain of droughts, mass migrations, etc.

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If Algore's movie comes true, is it really fearmongering?

 

What about that movie was fearmongering?

I added those words due to the fact it was produced for no other reason than to scare the crap out of people. He wanted an end result and his way of attaining that was to scare the crap out of people. It was so scary he got major awards for it.

 

Let me put it this way.

 

I think we could all agree that ISIS is a major problem in the world and terrorism poses a certain threat to our lives and well being.

 

OK....now....let's say I feel ISIS needs to be stopped and we need to have major political change to make that happen.

 

So, I go out and make a movie (documentary) showing how ISIS is going to take over the world, invade the US, enslave all of us, rape our women and children and behead anyone who stands in their way and I do it in a way it scares the crap out of people.

 

Would my movie be "fear mongering"?

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Fine...leave deity, religion, X,Y or Z out of it.

 

This world has been "living" for millions of years evolving from molten mush into an amazingly complex system of molecules, cells and energy. The original question was, why doesn't it die off? Well, it appears to me that some people believe that we ARE killing it off and at such an amazingly fast rate that some people produce major movies warning us of ultimate doom and we are the cause of everything that is bad.

 

Well....maybe the answer to the original question is.....it hasn't died off yet simply because humans as a disease on the Earth hadn't advanced far enough yet to do it and that's simply the course this huge chemical reaction is going to take....and....so what?

 

Maybe we are actually a parasite that the Earth needs to exterminate to continue living.

 

I think there's probably a grain of truth in there. Not that the earth needs to do anything. It doesn't notice or care. But many scientists believe we are in the midst of a sixth mass extinction caused by humans, which has resulted in the fastest rate of species extinction in millions of years. Left unabated, humans will almost certainly be a part of the extinction. Not to get too political, but this is one of the reasons I don't understand how Christianity got mixed up with the right wing (although on a positive note, I find Pope Francis very refreshing). I always thought growing up that it was a moral imperative to protect and cherish the environment. Why that isn't a cornerstone of modern Christianity is beyond me: it's maybe the moral imperative, especially when you consider the impact on the poor especially if we fail.

 

If we fail, it won't matter if you are poor or rich, we will be exterminated.

 

 

Speaking specifically about climate change, the poor will be the first to experience the pain of droughts, mass migrations, etc.

 

 

Yeah, but maybe not specific to climate change. The poor have always been the canary in the coal mine when it comes to disease, economic turmoil, natural disasters, etc. They--or maybe I should say we--provide a buffer zone for those higher up on the economic food chain.

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Fine...leave deity, religion, X,Y or Z out of it.

 

This world has been "living" for millions of years evolving from molten mush into an amazingly complex system of molecules, cells and energy. The original question was, why doesn't it die off? Well, it appears to me that some people believe that we ARE killing it off and at such an amazingly fast rate that some people produce major movies warning us of ultimate doom and we are the cause of everything that is bad.

 

Well....maybe the answer to the original question is.....it hasn't died off yet simply because humans as a disease on the Earth hadn't advanced far enough yet to do it and that's simply the course this huge chemical reaction is going to take....and....so what?

 

Maybe we are actually a parasite that the Earth needs to exterminate to continue living.

 

I think there's probably a grain of truth in there. Not that the earth needs to do anything. It doesn't notice or care. But many scientists believe we are in the midst of a sixth mass extinction caused by humans, which has resulted in the fastest rate of species extinction in millions of years. Left unabated, humans will almost certainly be a part of the extinction. Not to get too political, but this is one of the reasons I don't understand how Christianity got mixed up with the right wing (although on a positive note, I find Pope Francis very refreshing). I always thought growing up that it was a moral imperative to protect and cherish the environment. Why that isn't a cornerstone of modern Christianity is beyond me: it's maybe the moral imperative, especially when you consider the impact on the poor especially if we fail.

 

If we fail, it won't matter if you are poor or rich, we will be exterminated.

 

 

Speaking specifically about climate change, the poor will be the first to experience the pain of droughts, mass migrations, etc.

 

 

Yeah, but maybe not specific to climate change. The poor have always been the canary in the coal mine when it comes to disease, economic turmoil, natural disasters, etc. They--or maybe I should say we--provide a buffer zone for those higher up on the economic food chain.

 

This is something that will never ever ever ever change. It's been this way since the beginning of time and in every single form of government and economic system the world has known.

 

If I go into McDonalds and order a burger on the $1 meal, that affects someone that makes minimum wage more than me. It's simple economics.

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Hey, that's my Great Granny's Gretel's haus!

 

The query posed by BRB is somewhat akin to, "how many birds are in flight at any one time--globally? answer being, "whoTF knows? Impossible to know.

 

Earf lives, why? Well, some sez is because of "Gawd" that it keeps going, though I sez that "Gawd" has been doing a piss poor job in terms of human intervention for, like, ever. Gawd doesn't seem to protect anybody from anything, whether it's genocidal wars, Christians getting gunned down whilst praying in his own "house" or Syrian children being washed up on the beaches of Italy and what not.

 

Other say it's cuz of "physics", holds it all together, one of the latest theories being that of "strings", invisible "strings". You know, "quantum string thingy's"--I think that's the technical lingo. Some say there's this thing called "gravity" which pulls down or pushes up depending on your point of view.

 

Many romantic types say it's "love" holds it all together. Somewhat a corollary of the "Gawd" theory, it is especially appealing to teenagers and composers of Valentine Day's cards. But is there such a thing as a "loving" volcano, earthquake, hurricane, tsunami, or.....rattlesnake?

 

Thing is, nobody really knows. After all these centuries and tons upon tons of trees murdered for the books written on the subject, in the end, nobody f'ing knows--not even the late Carl Sagan and his "billions and billions" of galaxies knows.

 

It is perhaps, like many things, a subject that is beyond the scope of the human mind to know. The mind can ask, but it is not a powerful enough instrument, is not "wired enough" to know--no matter how much neuroscientific chemical/synaptic crap they bring into the mix After decades of research, they can't even figure out how a dadgum bumblebee works, so you think they're gonna figure out the entire earf or the human mind? They're light years from how we formulate language, like, "see Spot Run, run Spot run", they haven't a clue how that sh*t works--in the brain. They think they are going to create robots and such that attain human like self awareness, consciousness, and creative, lingual thought capacity. No way, Jose'. And some think that's going to happen by 2030 and soon after the robots will go "all Terminator" on us. "We'll make good pets," as they say. I'm here to calm everybody down and submit that that ain't going to happen anytime soon or, probably, ever. You know, humans--especially the scientists-- can be really arrogant and this is a perfect example. I mean, the best they got in Japan right now is a robotic dog and the dang thing shorts out every time it goes to "clean" itself. IBM's "Watson" is a glorified, multibillion dollar calculator that takes a city's worth of electricity to run the dang thing and that's part of the whole insanity of robotics: they're freaking expensive, yo! Humans, much cheaper to create and world's upon world's better than robots can ever "hope" to be.

 

After all these decades of using electricity, they ain't one physicist on the planet can't tell WTF it is. Scientists don't do so well with invisible stuff. What about music? What is music? Where does music come from? More importantly, why is there music? The mind is baffled by such query.

 

So rest easy, Comrades, robots won't be replacing us anytime soon and nobody is going to figure out the Mystery of Life anytime soon. You know, the earf is most likely going to keep on keepin' on with or without us. Which reminds me: how do we know when we're extinct? Anybody? The earf is far more s'ker'd of, say, a comet than, say, us. Overall, the earf's intentions fall somewhere between benign and indifferent.

 

The best you can do is to relax and enjoy the ride, the wonder, and help others as best you can--help relieve, and not add to, suffering on this beautiful planet. And don't expect to get an answer as to why the earf and Life do what they do.

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If Algore's movie comes true, is it really fearmongering?

 

What about that movie was fearmongering?

I added those words due to the fact it was produced for no other reason than to scare the crap out of people. He wanted an end result and his way of attaining that was to scare the crap out of people. It was so scary he got major awards for it.

 

Let me put it this way.

 

I think we could all agree that ISIS is a major problem in the world and terrorism poses a certain threat to our lives and well being.

 

OK....now....let's say I feel ISIS needs to be stopped and we need to have major political change to make that happen.

 

So, I go out and make a movie (documentary) showing how ISIS is going to take over the world, invade the US, enslave all of us, rape our women and children and behead anyone who stands in their way and I do it in a way it scares the crap out of people.

 

Would my movie be "fear mongering"?

 

How was it produced to scare the crap out of people?

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If Algore's movie comes true, is it really fearmongering?

 

What about that movie was fearmongering?

I added those words due to the fact it was produced for no other reason than to scare the crap out of people. He wanted an end result and his way of attaining that was to scare the crap out of people. It was so scary he got major awards for it.

 

Let me put it this way.

 

I think we could all agree that ISIS is a major problem in the world and terrorism poses a certain threat to our lives and well being.

 

OK....now....let's say I feel ISIS needs to be stopped and we need to have major political change to make that happen.

 

So, I go out and make a movie (documentary) showing how ISIS is going to take over the world, invade the US, enslave all of us, rape our women and children and behead anyone who stands in their way and I do it in a way it scares the crap out of people.

 

Would my movie be "fear mongering"?

 

How was it produced to scare the crap out of people?

 

Are you saying it wasn't?

 

The movie took everything to the N'th degree as the absolute worst case scenario. Hey...the special affects were awesome.

 

That was done for one reason, to scare people into believing that is going to happen unless they get behind all the policies he supports.

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I watched probably half to 2/3s back when it came out. I'm not going to go back and watch it again to find specifics for you. If you don't think it was a movie made to scare people into getting behind climate change legislation by showing everything to the extreme then ignore those two words in my post. Not much else to discuss about it.

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If Algore's movie comes true, is it really fearmongering?

 

What about that movie was fearmongering?

 

I added those words due to the fact it was produced for no other reason than to scare the crap out of people. He wanted an end result and his way of attaining that was to scare the crap out of people. It was so scary he got major awards for it.

 

Let me put it this way.

 

I think we could all agree that ISIS is a major problem in the world and terrorism poses a certain threat to our lives and well being.

 

OK....now....let's say I feel ISIS needs to be stopped and we need to have major political change to make that happen.

 

So, I go out and make a movie (documentary) showing how ISIS is going to take over the world, invade the US, enslave all of us, rape our women and children and behead anyone who stands in their way and I do it in a way it scares the crap out of people.

 

Would my movie be "fear mongering"?

No, it would be called the 24 hour news cycle...
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You're saying it was. I'm asking for specifics, not the overly broad "produced for no other reason than to scare the crap out of people."

 

What, specifically, was wrong with how it was presented?

 

Did you watch the movie?

For grins - I googled "was al gore's movie scary' and I got this hit - haven't watched it yet - put thought I'd add it to the

fun.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=_21b7mdJz2M

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