The most successful species that thrived on this earth were dinosaurs, who succeeded in one form or another for 150 million years. We can measure the mass extinction events, but not all the other smaller events that pushed this species forward. I grew up with the theory that a meteor was responsible, a decade ago it became a comet coupled with a super volcano that wiped them out. No paleontologist has been able to answer why they were so big, especially in a higher CO2 environment than now.
People who claim that homo sapiens is the worst and most destructive species to have ever lived are incorrect. We are simply the product of this planet. Survivors of a food chain based evolution. To our knowledge the only species that transformed various environments to our needs. We are neither alphas nor apex predators.
And on a much smaller scale animals have done the same. Elephants in the wild migrate great distances, because they overgraze their local habitats. Lions who fight and win their new pride of females, habitually kill the cubs of predecessors and rivals.
They don't have a choice. We do.
Climate change has always existed. This is a somewhat hostile planet. But unless there is a natural disaster, these changes usually took thousands of years. The anthropocene has seen a significant climate change in just two hundred years. Nature will adapt because it always has. But humans cannot, because we need a Goldilocks zone to exist and cannot inhabit much without technology. That's where our focus needs to be.
Just a brief reminder to please not mention any government individuals by name.
Codex: Thank you. Keeping it simple.
ReplyDeleteYes, Earth will always find a way around us or any other Species. I still think most of our Species Choices haven't been in sync with the Natural Order of things like most other Species tho'... in our arrogance and ignorance we do and continue to do some damaging and stupid shit.
ReplyDeleteCodex: @Bohemian. I agree, and we're not fixing anything at the moment and making it worse. But here we are.
DeleteNo other species has changed the face of this planet like humans have. We turned a massive prairie into a dust bowl, we have built enormous dams changing the flow of rivers creating lakes where none existed, we have hollowed out mountains, cut down entire forests. We have polluted the air, fouled the water, poisoned the land. We kill for the sake of killing. And as you mention accelerated the evolution of climate on this planet from thousands of years to a couple of hundred. I imagine we will be the least successful species this planet ever produced in terms of how long we exist.
ReplyDeleteCodex: Yes, Ellen. We are self destructive. But we have also taken a lot of measures to preserve and rescue. No other 'animal' has done that. Right now we are on the wrong path. But how do you know for sure that Dinos did not do the same? Beavers are much smaller and can fell trees.
DeleteI'm not so sure about the dinosaurs being the most successful species. We have such a limited view on what counts as success, is it to do with intelligence, strength, power? In a pyriamid way of comparison we are think animals/other species to somehow communicate and act somewhere below humans. From the limited reading I have done on planetary intelligence I would want to include ants (as representatives of insects), fungi and certainly cephalopods as success stories. Others may well include viruses and trees.
ReplyDeleteHowever what I am growing increasingly tired of is this argument that we humans are self destructive as a species and thus, doomed. In her newsletter Meditations on an Emergency, the writer Rebecca Solnit recently wrote about the near and distant enemies we are facing:
"We have distant enemies, the enemies of truth, justice, human rights, and environmental protection, and they are easy to recognize and oppose. We also have near enemies, the cynics and defeatists among us who in theory agree with our goals but in practice are forever sabotaging them by insisting that we cannot achieve them and we are naive to try."
I am surrounded by comfortable people, well educated, well read, who in between organising their next holiday or home improvement find the time to express their "climate grief" to me, complete with clever arguments backed by various sources on humanity's shortcomings and ultimate, inevitable demise.
Strange as it is, I have never encountered this line of cynical argument when in contact with people directly affected or threatened by climate change. Could be due to the fact that mostly these people are already organised and involved in mitigation and the spreading on knowledge, who spend time on research and meaningful communication.
I admit there have been days and news that have sent me into a form of despair facing very unpleasant truths. In my view, it's a question of personal maturity whether you can face the fact that there are no simple solutions.
As Homo sapiens, we only have this one home, Earth. And the great strength of Homo sapiens compared to most other animals is our ability to cooperate.
Codex@Sabine
ReplyDeleteSuccess in terms of length of time a genus survives that is reptilian or mammal. The definition as set out by evolutionary biologists like Dawkins et.al who developed Darwins ideas a bit further. Darwin "fittest" was misinterpreted as strongest. He was also talking about the number of progeny that survive. By that definition it would be multi egglayers. I personally don't think there have been any groundbreaking theories since him. This is getting into philosophy of science territory. Every decade new theory. The recent renewed interest in this is due to AI and machine learning.
Codex@Sabine: if interested there's EO Wilson's diversity of life. I've stopped reading evolutionary biologists because they were frequently influenced by superiority theories and much of it was intellectually stimulating but then devolved (ha!) into a debate club for retired old Oxford/ivey men.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you and Solnit. I'm tired of the lack of understanding when people read works from the 60/70s without taking the historiographical context into consideration. I'm sick and tired of the polarization that has gotten us nowhere and this doom and gloom scenario. I don't engage with people who think we're going extinct (utter nonsense). More later or in a post. Thank you for the quote.
I found that Eve by Cat Bohannon (https://www.theguardian.com/books/2023/oct/10/eve-how-female-body-drove-200-million-years-of-human-evolution-by-cat-bohannon-review) shed important new light on human evolution, highly recommended read. Additionally, various publications by Sarah Blaffer Hrdy (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Blaffer_Hrdy), especially Mother Nature (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Blaffer_Hrdy#Mother_Nature).
ReplyDeleteCurrently and especially in view of AI, I am reading James Bridle on the concept of planetary intelligence and his concept of non human centric intelligence (https://jamesbridle.com/books/ways-of-being), quite the mind bomb.
Codex: Thank you for the links. (Truly)
DeleteBridle picks up where the Gaia hypothesis left off and is an adept self promoter. Doesn't he also call himself 'they'? I think he offers an interesting POV on a current trend.
Have you read Gleick's Information?
Didn't he write that book on Richard Feynman? It's on my husband's bookshelf. But no, I haven't read anything by him.
DeleteCodex: Yes. Chaos (still very relevant and recommend). Gleick is a science journalist who really understands the topic he writes about. Wonder what the biologists in your circle think of planetary intelligence.
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