Comments on: Saving the Planet (aka Plastic, a**holes!)

By: monkeyjen

monkeyjen — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 23:14:00 +0000

I like that tree hugging idea. I’ll have to tell Red. See you tonight, Beth.

By: The Green Cat

The Green Cat — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 05:30:00 +0000

A massage therapist I used to know once old me “Cat, if you ever work on a really sick person, be sure you go out and hug a tree afterward.” She believes that the energy of the illness can transfer from the patient to the practitioner, and that a tree has the power to take that “harmful” energy out of the practitioner and convert it back into something neutral. So, at least in her world, tree hugging IS very beneficial!

By: lauren

lauren — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 02:48:00 +0000

I have been reading “The World Without Us” and the premise is not too far from George’s. Earth will survive.

Humans, on the other hand…

By: ruchi aka arduous

ruchi aka arduous — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 22:28:00 +0000

This post is why I love you Beth. Also because you take me to Rainbow Grocery. :)

By: Joules

Joules — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 21:14:00 +0000

Interesting – I find myself very separated from nature in my daily life and find that people seem to being doing more of this as well. I think quite a bit stems from a fear of ‘unsafe’ conditions. Nature is beautiful and inspiring and all that, but pain is also part of it. Nature is mean – it’s poison and disease and death, too. I think as humans we’ve been able to isolate ourselves from some of that, so we do. It’s for protection as much as anything else, we just seem to be able to take it to the extreme these days. The interesting thing is, the more we seem to stay away from it, the more it kicks us around (e.g. the less you’re exposed to, the weaker your immune system, etc…)

By: SavvyChristine

SavvyChristine — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 18:52:00 +0000

My sister and I had a similar discussion, except we didn't quote from George Carlin. She argued that the planet would be fine without us.

I wish I had told her that I agreed with that idea, but in the meantime, I don't want to be killed off by the planet because of what we've done to it. I also like living here.

By: Clif

Clif — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 16:20:00 +0000

I've no doubt that humans are here to stay. We are just too intelligent and adaptable to disappear even from our own negligence.

If you want a mini-example of what can happen, read The Worst Hard Times about the Dust Bowl of the 1930's. In that case newcomers arrived in a stable environment where grasses held the soil, bison ate the grass and Indians ate the bison. A huge amount of grass, a pretty large number of bison and a small number of humans.

But there was money to be made. The Indians were chased off, the bison were slaughtered, the grassland was ripped up and wheat planted. 5 years later: disaster.

Despite the destruction and devastation - people stayed. A stable environment made over thousands of years was destroyed in a couple of decades and turned into a desert of blowing sand and teeming insects. Folks may have been eating boiled tumbleweed but they stayed.

So not to worry - humans will be here. We are made for struggle, we've proven ourselves triumphant in that regard. But what irony if we send ourselves right back to struggle after escaping it!

Consider the Garden of Eden story a little differently: God stays out of the picture and Adam and Eve are left alone to do as they wish. Given a few thousand years, does it look like the story will have a different ending?

By: Rosa

Rosa — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 15:54:00 +0000

Thank you for this post! Sometimes I think the belief that we're separate from nature is going to be the end of us.

We didn't invent the idea of "nature" vs. "civilization" until pretty late in human history, after we had gotten to the point where we had control over a big chunk of our environment. But it's sure taken over.

The idea of "unsullied nature" wasn't common in European thought until about the 17th century (along with the scientific method and big cities - China had all three about 700 years earlier) and the Romantic ideal of nature was even later.

By: Jenn

Jenn — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 12:51:00 +0000

Great post Beth! I totally agree. Ultimately, the Earth and probably many of its species will survive no matter what we humans do. It just may not be suitable for humans to live here any more, and that would be a shame….I kinda like it here! Thanks for the reminder to get my nose out of the eco-books and get back out into nature.

By: Chiot's Run

Chiot's Run — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 12:35:00 +0000

I love being a part of nature. I garden for this very reason, to get out and get dirt under my fingernails. I love nuturing a plant and having it produce something delicious that I can eat and improving my little part of the earth while I’m at it. I know that when I move or die, my little gardens will be better because I was here (not a thing many people can say – particularly the ones that lived here before us).

I choose to focus on the change that I can make in my little corner of the world, not the cumulative effect of what everyone is doing. In the end I can make a big difference here, I get discouraged if I think about everyone that’s negating my efforts.