hating human beings IS hating nature. we are part of nature and nature is part of us. a massive plague upon humanity will not fix the problem. reading Robin Wall Kimmerer's book Braiding Sweetgrass changed my view and I hope you'll give it a chance
I don't hate human beings--I'm saying some kind of collapse is inevitable because the way we're living in radically unsustainable, and given the power of corporations and sociopaths, I think a smooth transition, via policy change, to a better, more peaceful, sustainable future without billions of premature human deaths is about as likely as Jesus coming to save us. So if a massive collapse is inevitable, then the least bad scenario is economic unraveling; next least bad is pandemic since likely some humans would survive and most likely it would have little impact on (most) other species. Environmental unraveling would be worst, except for nuclear conflagration which could wipe out all multicellular life and leave the planet radioactive for a long time.
As for Kimmerer's Braiding Sweetgrass, it influenced me too, and I think everyone should read it!
Nature is an interlinked, synergistic system of billions of components / organisms which act together and individually to develop and maintain a sustainable ecology.
Humans don't co-operate in that endeavour but rather, humans destroy sustainable ecologies. We might have been part of nature 20 or 30 thousand years ago, but we are no longer.
it's worth noting here that Neanderthals, with a larger brain than Homo Sapiens Sapiens, survived nearly 200,000 years without destroying the environment that sustained them.
Re: paragraph 3 it’s got nothing to do with our brain size.
Paragraph 3: I think it’s a mistake to lump all actions taken by humans and their institutions into one big verb and label it “humans destroy sustainable ecologies”. Capitalist logic destroys nature, including humans, for profit. The incentive is built into the system. People like us are probably doing all we can to sustain and rejuvenate nature. When you put us all in the same bucket it flattens and obscures the system responsible and the power dynamics that keep it in place. If the goal is to secure a future livable planet we must transition to a political economic system that prioritizes well-being over profit. That’s not capitalism.
I fully realise that some people understand our current situation and are attempting to change it, but when taking the macro view of an entire species as a collective whole, a broad brush is required. To assess the actions every individual member of H. Sapiens Sapiens would require typing 8.2 billion paragraphs, which I can't imagine anybody actually reading.
But modern humans began agriculture 14.5K ybp and in doing so, stepped outside of that synergistic system and began deliberately changing their environment.
As for the Neanderthal brain, there's no way of knowing what particular function that extra brain mass might have performed, but in evolution genetic changes only persist in a species if they are adaptive - that is they improve the chances of the species' survival. The logic of Natural Selection would suggest that, if the larger brain played no part in that survival, and you have to admit 200,000 yrs is a pretty good innings, then that adaptation would not have persisted.
But I definitely agree with you Lizzy that Capitalism, which I hold to be an unfortunate side effect of the agricultural revolution ( collateral damage if you will ) is now the main driver of our stampede towards annihilation.
hating human beings IS hating nature. we are part of nature and nature is part of us. a massive plague upon humanity will not fix the problem. reading Robin Wall Kimmerer's book Braiding Sweetgrass changed my view and I hope you'll give it a chance
I don't hate human beings--I'm saying some kind of collapse is inevitable because the way we're living in radically unsustainable, and given the power of corporations and sociopaths, I think a smooth transition, via policy change, to a better, more peaceful, sustainable future without billions of premature human deaths is about as likely as Jesus coming to save us. So if a massive collapse is inevitable, then the least bad scenario is economic unraveling; next least bad is pandemic since likely some humans would survive and most likely it would have little impact on (most) other species. Environmental unraveling would be worst, except for nuclear conflagration which could wipe out all multicellular life and leave the planet radioactive for a long time.
As for Kimmerer's Braiding Sweetgrass, it influenced me too, and I think everyone should read it!
Nature is an interlinked, synergistic system of billions of components / organisms which act together and individually to develop and maintain a sustainable ecology.
Humans don't co-operate in that endeavour but rather, humans destroy sustainable ecologies. We might have been part of nature 20 or 30 thousand years ago, but we are no longer.
it's worth noting here that Neanderthals, with a larger brain than Homo Sapiens Sapiens, survived nearly 200,000 years without destroying the environment that sustained them.
good description of nature in paragraph 1.
Re: paragraph 3 it’s got nothing to do with our brain size.
Paragraph 3: I think it’s a mistake to lump all actions taken by humans and their institutions into one big verb and label it “humans destroy sustainable ecologies”. Capitalist logic destroys nature, including humans, for profit. The incentive is built into the system. People like us are probably doing all we can to sustain and rejuvenate nature. When you put us all in the same bucket it flattens and obscures the system responsible and the power dynamics that keep it in place. If the goal is to secure a future livable planet we must transition to a political economic system that prioritizes well-being over profit. That’s not capitalism.
I fully realise that some people understand our current situation and are attempting to change it, but when taking the macro view of an entire species as a collective whole, a broad brush is required. To assess the actions every individual member of H. Sapiens Sapiens would require typing 8.2 billion paragraphs, which I can't imagine anybody actually reading.
But modern humans began agriculture 14.5K ybp and in doing so, stepped outside of that synergistic system and began deliberately changing their environment.
As for the Neanderthal brain, there's no way of knowing what particular function that extra brain mass might have performed, but in evolution genetic changes only persist in a species if they are adaptive - that is they improve the chances of the species' survival. The logic of Natural Selection would suggest that, if the larger brain played no part in that survival, and you have to admit 200,000 yrs is a pretty good innings, then that adaptation would not have persisted.
But I definitely agree with you Lizzy that Capitalism, which I hold to be an unfortunate side effect of the agricultural revolution ( collateral damage if you will ) is now the main driver of our stampede towards annihilation.