By: Michaell Lange,
London, 19/05/19 –
The human arrogance and the race for sustainability: The intelligent survival
For decades we’ve been alerted by scientists over the negative impact of our modern way of life on Earth. Climate change is for many scientists, a result of that. In the middle of this issue, there are those who understand and believe in it, and those who don’t. Regardless of who is right or wrong, it seems unwise to think climate change is not happening at all. It’s also possible that some of the data used to blame mankind for changes on the global climate, could either be wrong, not totally correct, or even misleading. But, we must agree that this planets natural resources are limited, and we are neglecting it big time. We must understand that pollution caused by mankind is responsible for countless death every year, including many children. This alone, should be enough to make everyone to take action.
However, climate change isn’t the focus of this article, but our self-importance in relation to the planet we live in. The first thing we need to understand is the fact that this is not our planet. We don’t own Earth, Earth owns us. One may think that we say “our planet” because we live here, so we belong here. But, there is more to that than you may think. The British Parliament just declared an environment emergency following huge protests that brought over a million people to the streets of London. In fact, this is not a climate emergency, but a human emergency. We got the idea that we are “destroying the planet” or “destroying the environment”, but in reality we can’t destroy the environment or even the planet. We don’t have the power to do that. What we can surely destroy, is our ability to live here. Therefore, it’s not the planet or the environment that is in danger, but us, the human beings. Of course, it’s much easier to say it’s an environment emergency because this terminology, somehow, seems to take a little of the blame from us, and it make us feel good “saving the planet” when in fact, we are only saving ourselves. We are so pretentious!
The truth is, we are not important at all. The Earth will continue to strive without us. A new study believes that a planet the size of Mars collided with Earth, and even that didn’t destroy this planet. In fact, the study concludes that essencial elements for life was delivered by this collision. The dinosaurs were wiped out from the Earth by either a huge volcanic eruption or an asteroid impact. Still, this planet survived. We like to believe we have enough nuclear bombs to destroy this planet many times over. But, even the catastrophic event that finished the dinosaurs, left mammals, birds, crocodiles, turtles, plants and many other species alive. What our nuclear bombs can actually destroy, is humanity, many times over. Earth will survive our stupid little bombs, we won’t.
Some people like to say, humans are a disease that will kill the planet. But, if we were a disease, frankly, we would be at the most, a little cold, that could be dealt with one or two doses of paracetamol. Do you really think we are as important as anything that could destroy this planet? We are so pretentious!
“We are destroying the Environment” says the headlines all over the world. No, we are not! We are destroying ourselves! The environment cannot be destroyed by such an insignificant, imprudent, and arrogant specie like human beings.
Do you really think you can destroy this planet? think about hurricane Katrina, Irma and Maria. Think about Japan and Indonesian Tsunamis. Think about the worst volcanic eruptions and the worst Earthquakes. These catastrophic events in human history is no more significant to Earth than your daily fart. Nevertheless, we like to feel important by showing concern about thousands of species of life that maybe extinct as a result of our egoism and careless with the environment. Sounds contradicting? It is!
When the Earth starts rebalance things, humans will be right on the path of a very fast train, and we won’t stand a chance. Just a little change on one single element such as water or oxygen and that would be it for humans. So, It was never about the end of the world, but the end of us. The world will continue to exist without us. It’s not about the planet or the environment or other species, it’s about us, human beings. It’s about the need to change, to become an important part of the sustainable nature. We can’t live in an unsustainable way forever without killing our own ability to survive. Sustainability means, intelligent survival, and we don’t have that yet. Right now, we are not important to Earth. Earth, would be much better off without us. To change this condition we need to become an intelligent part of nature, and sustainability is the key.
To achieve sustainability, we will have to go through a major change of behaviour. A major reverse on our hunger for things we don’t need. A major reverse on our race to nowhere, and a new race to sustainability. There can be no space for egoism, arrogance and greedy in the future of human beings, or there will be no human beings. We must face ourselves and recognise the fact that this planet doesn’t need us, we need this planet. This planet doesn’t need to be saved. We, need to be saved. We need to stop saying “save the planet” “save the oceans” “save the environment”, and start saying; SAVE HUMANITY! Because humanity is what needs to be saved!
Michaell Lange 