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We Destroy Nature; Really.
Topic Started: May 13 2012, 01:33 PM (2,153 Views)
miocenemadness
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Okay, I want to discuss something really important. It is about how we have affected nature. Though some things we do are good for the environment, most things we do just destroy the world. For example, we have already killed many creatures; Ice Age megafauna, dodos, thylacines (the Tasmanian tiger), the aurochs, Caspian tigers, passenger pigeons, and the Baiji River Dolphin. Also, many creatures are now endangered or extinct in the wild because of man; Przewalski's wild horses, Barbary lions, South China tigers, Sumatran tigers, Persian leopards, Siberian tigers, the Javan rhinoceros, orangutans, etc. Now what do you think; will we stop harming nature and peacefully coexist with it, or will the future look like Primeval's Sterile Earth because of man?
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Kamidio
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We know what the hell a thylacine is.

But no. We are not destroying nature. Why?

We are part of nature. No matter how hard we try, as long as we a made of matter, and obey the laws of physics, then we are part of nature.
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miocenemadness
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Then we destroy all nature but ourselves.
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dialforthedevil
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Fakey
May 13 2012, 01:36 PM
We know what the hell a thylacine is.

But no. We are not destroying nature. Why?

We are part of nature. No matter how hard we try, as long as we a made of matter, and obey the laws of physics, then we are part of nature.
Great! Now I can leave my telly on all day and play on my laptop at the same time! Im going to go burn a panda as well, anyone up for it?
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miocenemadness
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lol. But I am being serious, guys.
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Empyreon
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Are you plausible?

It's an interesting thought, and while I agree that there are many things we do that have adverse effects on the planet's ecology, I think it's also important to recognize what Fakey his pointing out: we are a part of the nature that we are destroying. If we look at the Oxygenation of Earth's atmosphere, we see life forms causing massive global change, which was no doubt devastating to life forms that have no protection against the change. In this sense, human civilization has become a potential extinction event, and would lead to a drop in biodiversity at a global scale. I doubt it would render the planet devoid of all life, and would more likely serve as a "reset button" for the evolutionary tree of life. Who knows what life forms may eventually emerge into the world we will have made for them?
Edited by Empyreon, May 13 2012, 01:52 PM.
Take a look at my exobiology subforum of the planet Nereus!

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food for thought
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Kamidio
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Three words.

Complex Multi-cellular anaerobes.
Edited by Kamidio, May 13 2012, 01:57 PM.
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colddigger
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No Dial, that's a waste of resources and very costly for yourself personally.

Like fakey said, we're a part of nature, and like the mighty human in all its glory us ants clear cut large areas and devestate the surrounding wildlife.
It sure is a good thing we're no more than a few cm at the most.
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Russwallac
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We destroy all the nature that doesn't directly benefit us. Which, it turns out, is a lot.
"We've started a cult about a guy's liver, of course we're going to demand that you give us an incredibly scientific zombie apocalypse." -Nanotyranus

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Holben
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All nature is connected, removing one part has ramifications for all the others. If a species didn't fit in, it wouldn't have been around.
Time flows like a river. Which is to say, downhill. We can tell this because everything is going downhill rapidly. It would seem prudent to be somewhere else when we reach the sea.

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colddigger
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We only directly destroy "nature" if it hurts us or is in the way.
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Kamidio
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Like the rainforest.
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colddigger
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Hey Rainforest took the first swing.
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lamna
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No, we're not going to sterilise the earth. We make mistakes, and there are going to be a lot of people to support for the next couple centuries, but we won't destroy everything.

We're not some vindictive force trying to destroy itrself. We're just animals.
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Ànraich
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We are not destroying nature, that is a naive and quite frankly embarrassing idea. As Fakey pointed out, we are part of nature. Animals destroy plants to build nests, does that mean they destroy nature? Of course not. But when humans do the same thing its "OMG QUIT DESTROYING THE PLANET!" We have just as much of a right to do the things we do to survive and improve our lives as other animals do. Sure we killed off the ice age megafauna, but it isn't our fault they died out. We are predators, we did what we had to do in order to survive. The megafauna were incapable of adapting to the introduction of humans into their environment, therefore they went extinct. They were unfit for survival in the rapidly changing world and they paid the price for it. There's no blame to place, it's just what happened.

I am so sick of humans being complete tools and believing fallacies like the one you're trying to get us to discuss. It is absurd, it is asinine, and it is offensive. Sure our industry puts a lot of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, but people fail to realize that, at some point, all that gas was in the atmosphere anyways. And they also fail to realize that without the very industry they are complaining about we would be unable to do all the great things we have done to restore nature. In 2008 Macedonia planted six million trees in a single day. That would be impossible without industrial machinery. Ever try to plant a tree by hand? It takes a whole day just to plant one tree, maybe more than a day (at least it does in Kansas, but our ground is made of sod so it's pretty hard to dig into). Or the fact that we can breed endangered species in captivity in large numbers for the sole purpose of releasing them back into the wild and repopulating the species. For everything damaging we do, we do more than enough to make up for it. That can't happen without technological progression though.

Do you want us to live like tribal savages? Do you know what the average lifespan of neolithic man was? About 25 years, maybe 30. I don't know about you, but I don't plan on being dead in five years. And I'm sure as hell not going to live in a hut made of dung and mud because "it doesn't hurt the planet."
We should all aspire to die surrounded by our dearest friends. Just like Julius Caesar.

"The Lord Universe said: 'The same fate I have given to all things from stones to stars, that one day they shall become naught but memories aloft upon the winds of time. From dust all was born, and to dust all shall return.' He then looked upon His greatest creation, life, and pitied them, for unlike stars and stones they would soon learn of this fate and despair in the futility of their own existence. And so the Lord Universe decided to give life two gifts to save them from this despair. The first of these gifts was the soul, that life might more readily accept their fate, and the second was fear, that they might in time learn to avoid it altogether." - Excerpt from a Chanagwan creation myth, Legends and Folklore of the Planet Ghar, collected and published by Yieju Bai'an, explorer from the Celestial Commonwealth of Qonming

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