“Save Earth” is one of the prominent slogans nowadays. Environmental groups, industrialists, politicians, technocrats, movie stars, religious leaders, NGOs, media, poets, artists, models, you name it, they all say that “we need to save mother earth”. They organize activities and mega events saying us to protect earth. Talking heads are always advising us to save earth on television while explaining about their sacrifices.
But I am skeptic. Do we really need to protect earth? Let’s have a thought experiment. Tell Earth that we are going to save her.
Human: “Hey, Earth we human are going to save you”.
Earth: “You stupid, worthless creature! How dare you talk to me like that? I am 4.54 billion years old. In that, most of the time I was a red hot planet. 1 billion years ago I gave birth to life. Then millions of life forms had born in me. At last minute you human appeared.
During these times, I also killed 99.9% of the species that lived in me. Your scientists named it as Mass extinction. The changes happening to me and my environment were the reason behind it. There were 5 mass extinction happened. But now the 6th Mass extinction is started. But this time you are triggering it.
The resources in me which belongs to everything is getting exploited by a small 1% of you. You are changing the chemical composition in me very fast.
You idiot, now you are saying you want to protect and save me? Without any of your support I living for 4.54 billion years. Actually protection is required for you and your future generations. If not, be ready for the mass extinction by me.
I will live without you or any other creatures. Nothing will happen to me. Life will regenerate in me. Trees, forest, springs will take rebirth. New creatures will form adapted to the new environment. But you will not be there.”
This is true. We don’t need to protect earth. It will live without that. But the real protection is required for us and our future generations. The celebrities and other people who represent this earth protection ideology are wrong about environmentalism. We have lot of writers, artists, actors who are nostalgic about tree, forests, springs, beautiful villages. People who left home in village and settled in big cities for a living may also share this nostalgia.
But environmentalism is not their romanticism or nostalgia or anti-science/technology rhetoric.
Environmentalism is pure science. For human to live comfortably in earth, the atmospheric CO2 level should be kept below 350 ppm. If the level goes high, then it will form a blanket over earth and cause global warming. Increasing temperature changes weather, more CO2 will dissolve in oceans and make them acidic. Fertilizers used in industrial farming end in oceans changes its chemical composition. That will kill fishes and other higher life forms. But bacteria and jelly fishes will thrive. These all are not romanticism.
But the thought of protect earth is showing only our egoism. Actually that is the root cause of all our problems. We are only one creature who is bonded to live under the laws of nature. Science is revealing these laws time by time. For example, the problems of CO2 were first proposed by mathematician Fourier 200 years ago. During that time scientists thought it will take 10,000s of years to make a significant change in CO2 level comparing the emission rate at that time. But we beat them by burning more fossil fuels. From 1950s scientists tell we must have to reduce the emissions. But we don’t have the political courage and will power to correct our behavior.
The same corporate powers that are using scientific knowledge are the forces making us more egoistic. For selling more and getting more profit they flooding the media, which they control 100%, with egoistic advertisements and movies. They are also making environmentalism as a romantic thought. By making it romantic they achieve one big advantage. Using their media power they can easily portray environmentalism as silly, childish thought with less importance. They say economy is great. In one day they can arrange 700 billion dollars to save the collapsing economy, but can’t do anything to sustainable living.
Actually economy is a subsystem in the finite parent system called earth. No subsystem can grow beyond its parent.
Environmentalism is not romanticism. It is pure science. And we should not save or protect earth. It will live on. Never say save earth. Instead call for saving our future generations.
