desire for infinite growth in a finite system - results are obvious. the finite system will crash and burn. we are fucked, nature will recover when we make it not suitable for humans
Strictly speaking, its unknown if we live in a finite system or an infinite one - but it's certain that the local topology isn't infinitely dense.
(We speculate one can technically go infinitely far in any direction of space or indefinitely backward and forward through time; but there's not any infinite amounts of stuff here which is the problem.)
Well yeah, the earth is a fixed size. I think that is their point. Of course the universe could be infinite, but the amount of livable resources we have access to is currently finite.
That’s exactly my point, yep.
My apologies, I'll concede I knew what you meant, but my poor brain tripped on the word 'system'. Your comment was apt on a human-scale system of our planet - we are fucked. But it's way fun and often useful to remember that's not the only lens available.
We are still a product of nature in many ways and all our society could be viewed as nature featuring yet another bloom and collapse - and our blip as a species isn't even special - check out the great oxidation (extinction) event whereby anaerobic organisms created so much waste oxygen that they killed of almost all life on the planet (organisms that live on oxygen and the air cycle we know today were 'born' from this event).
None of that changes the fact that I did deliberately misconstrue your statement; please excuse any offense I may have caused. I meant no harm.
But this is how nature works every day. Humans are just better at pushing the limits and influencing their circumstances to adapt.
Oh, sure, makes total sense. Sure, sure...
Except for the fact that nature has successfully balanced itself out for, well, as long as life has existed on this planet. Including recovery and finding a new balance after extremely drastic shifts in the environment.
Humans managed to remain a part of this for most our existence, too. So the current trends have absolutely nothing to do with our ability to manipulate our environment.
We've allowed an "elite" class of parasitic sociopaths to dictate the direction of modern society, and their influence has spread a corruption to every corner of the modern world. This insatiable greed will be our downfall, and there's nothing natural about it.
Humans have been here for as long as humans have been here, which hasn't been very long in the big picture.
Do you remember your great great great grandma^69420 bacteria?
Nor do I. Sure humans have been around a while, but not all that long in the big picture..
Nature naturally (pun intended) balances itself. If there’s no rabbits, the wolves die out. Allows for the rabbit population to recover. We play Gods with this. We overfarm, overforradge, deforest massive woods, that have existed in peace for eons. We simply don’t let nature recover, because we think we are masters of the universe.
I’m not a hippy - by no means. I consume, I raise children and (although electric) I drive a car. Still, I buy tyres, that are a huge pollutant, I consume electricity to charge it, which is not always renewable, etc etc. It goes on. But this means nothing. I am alone amongst my peers - in my extended circle of friends & colleagues (approx. 400 people), I can only think of 2-3 people that are like me - conscious about what they consume / throw away / reuse / recycle.
Then Jeff Bezos organises his wedding in Venice, and his guests all arrive with their personal plane, while I would not buy and drink coffee if it’s not made (at the very least) with the paper coffee pods…
Do I feel stupid? Sometimes. Am I ridiculed sometimes? Daily. But I stand by my principles.
Some cultures managed to last for tens of thousands of years without destroying the planet. Not all cultures and social structures are the same or have the same impact on their environments.
“Many were increasingly of the opinion that they’d all made a big mistake in coming down from the trees in the first place. And some said that even the trees had been a bad move, and that no one should ever have left the oceans.”
I used to think so as well, but as other posters have pointed out, we actually did manage to live in harmony with nature for tens of thousands of years. Humans aren't the problem per sé, but our systems definitely are.
Fucking pesky humans!
Right on point 👍Nah. This is some eco-fascist/primitivist type shit. Fuck that.
What?
This invokes the overpopulation myth, the reductive belief that the planet would somehow be “better off” without humans (importantly: how would you make that happen?), and perhaps, projecting the environmental sins of one’s own culture onto all of humanity.
I don’t know if these count as actual eco-fascism when the target is the entire human population, but it’s certainly adjacent.
Thank you. The problem is the rich, the problem is capitalism/colonialism, but it's not too many people. Genocide wont solve any problems, overthrowing the billionaire class will.
I’m not saying humans aren’t responsible for the Anthropocene. I’m not saying we don’t have to save out planet. But we shouldn’t idealize nature.
Check out that thread. It’s filled with gems:
The first comment alone misrepresents beavers and elephants as poorly as that one dumbass sunfish comment from the old site that everyone reposted all the time. The widespread eradication of massive beaver populations across North America has caused untold ecological damage that we’ll never fully understand.
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A collection of some classic Lemmy memes for your enjoyment