IMHO there never has been a need for humans. Perhaps no species are needed. However, some species make an environment that other species can thrive in. Anerobic bacteria that emitted oxygen as a waste product made it possible for oxygen breathing life to evolve even though they limited their own environment since high levels of oxygen are toxic for anerobic bacteria. Lichen which break down rocks help in soil creation which makes life possible for both plants and the animals that feed on them. Humans are the only species that has caused a mass extinction of other species. Cockroaches, rats, sparrows and domestic animals have thrived along with humanity. Most other species have not. The sooner we become extinct the better off most other life forms will be.

Of course I was looking at matters from the viewpoint of non-human species. I like being here. However, no species can increase indefinitely. At some point their numbers exceeds the carrying capacity of the environment. Our species may have already passed that point although it may not become evident for a while.

It may take considerable time for the planet to recover when we become extinct. However, we can delay our extinction and the extinction of other species by taking rational steps to limit our numbers and preserve habitat.

davidf

you and Bob Brown seem of similar alien religion.

david..i find it interesting[curious]..
you began the tale with oxigen

life has its beginings long before that
[think life like them sulfer vents..life forms..under sea's]

and about the high acidity..
sulpher etc that melted rock..broke up dust..so other life forms [moulds etc could 'do their thing'

im presuming you need o..before making co2?

but im fine skipping life true beginnings..[in the deep*]

but yes huhmans are needed
cause machines couldnt re-ply back.. to you

but them again..we wouldnt know it it did
but even if not machines..life needs us..to tell its full story

bacteria only record their bit of it
but we can join the dots

we are that pinacle of life..[trhe ONLY life that can make sense of symbols[writing..plus write back]

this special gift allows us to read the most inner thoughts
those long dead put into word..we will rise abouve the beast[our brother]by serving them...peace/love logic too

what they teach us
about our own creator
is what they give..what of us giving back?

we collectivly are as close to being gods
as beasts are ever likely to get

Ah!...the familiar thud of runner hurling needless abuse.

Fascinating really, an embarrassment to his creed.

Well David F, if you look at the history of earth over the billions
of years, humans have only been here in the relative blink of an
eyelid.

Its really all about being a planet of bacteria and viruses and
they will continue to dominate, with or without mammals.

Long term, biodiversity will dominate, as when one species crowds
together, apart from stretching resources to the limit, the species
barrier is broken, making it so much easier for mutating viruses
to spread.

So if Runner, Cheryl and others are so ignorant as to think that
they are their progeny can ignore nature and crowd together cheek
to cheek with impunity, let them learn the hard way. One mutating
virus will be all that it needs.

Clearly our species has evolved to invent interesting new things,
but those who ignore the laws of nature will sadly most likely
also cause its demise through sheer ignorance. So be it.

yabby has it about right, we are well on the way to testing the matter.
It is a shame about runner, but maybe he is not able to do other.

This is silly.

Needed for what?

Needed by whom?

Is planet Earth "needed?"

For that matter is our entire Milky Way Galaxy "needed."

The only beings that need humans are other humans. But you could say that of most species. The only beings that need dung beetles are other dung beetles. If dung beetles were to vanish from the face of the Earth some other species would evolve to fill that evolutionary niche. A valuable resource like dung would not go untapped forever.

Of course not, but we are much more fun than trees, & we can play hide & seek. Try to get a tree to do that.

David f it seems wants to join the Maurice Strong/Prince Charles/Rothschild eugenics agenda.They want to reduce the world's pop by 4 billion very soon under their New World Order or fascist one world Govt.

Who wants to be first to be culled ? Under Obama's NDAA and the Patriot Act,you will have no rights when fully implemented.All they need is another crisis like 911.Perhaps a nuke in a major city and blame Iran or a biological attack in which the compulsory vaccine will be worse than the disease.

Our total psyche has been geared up for too many of us rats destroying pristine mother Earth so a few elites can have total control.

Yes David f, from an elite view point we are "useless eaters" That is how they refer to us now.Robots will soon replace what we can do so we are no longer useful.

If they can pull of 911 with a multitude of lies and anomalies,illegally invade many countries,strip us of any legal rights,then anything is possible if we don't take a stand.

Dear stevenlmeyer,

Of course no matter, inanimate or animate, is needed. You are correct. Our existence has no purpose unless we define a purpose. Some find it difficult to face that realisation. One reason I posted the original message is to point it out. This string or any other string is not needed either. Neither was your comment, but I appreciate your making it.

Arjay,

Take two aspirin and call me in the morning.

Dear davidf,

Thank you for the thread.

I have had on occasion accused the likes of runner of quite enormous conceit for holding the view that the world, its solar system, its galaxy and indeed the entirety of creation was formed for mankind.

Am I wrong for finding a measure of the same in the words … 'In my humble opinion there has never been a need for humans'. Is this a non-believer adopting the musing of the Gods? Perhaps a flood might be the solution.

Is there not also a deity's sense of husbandry in your words, “The sooner we become extinct the better off most other life forms will be”.

The path of our population numbers is already written, it will peak and then decline even if we do nothing. We can accelerate this only by expending more finite resources or by adopting fiercely draconian measures such as forced sterilisations, and while there may well be good arguments for doing the former the latter should always be off the table.

Ultimately solar physics condemns all life on our planet with a use by date. Humans do have the power through their actions to dictate how life on this planet will fare in the coming years. What is needed are strong messages about the beauty and fragility of the ecosystems around us rather than any Jonestown option.

Perhaps the answer lies in propagating 'a deity's sense of husbandry' in us all.

That's it, I'm off to become a Buddhist.

Just an aside, there is fairly convincing evidence that the destructive feeding habits of the African elephant, which played such a pivotal role in creating the great savannah grasslands, led directly to the extinction of numerous species. They also provided a evolutionary role of pushing our ancestors out of their trees and on to open ground where adaptations allowed us to become a highly mobile species, ultimately reaching and impacting on all parts of the globe.

"One mutating
virus will be all that it needs.
Yabby.......Dont you mean "man made" virus.

Esteele....."That's it, I'm off to become a Buddhist"...Arrrr now you see the light;)......and Hasbeen..lol....thats the most ridiculous thing I've ever read:)

And runner, well......interesting to say the least:)...lol

cc

Dear csteele,

You wrote: Am I wrong for finding a measure of the same in the words … 'In my humble opinion there has never been a need for humans' Is this a non-believer adopting the musing of the Gods?

Maybe you are right. Anyone who considers the fate of humanity or its importance can be accused of adopting the musing of the Gods. It is unlikely to enter the consciousness of other species if we were to disappear.

However, there are other alternatives besides expending more finite resources or by adopting fiercely draconian measures to deal with our population growth. We can provide contraceptives to the general population including school children along with instructions on how to use them. We can see that more girls are educated. That has been shown to reduce the number of births per female. We can promote other expressions of sexuality such as oral techniques. We can accept homosexuality or childlessness among women to a greater extent than we do. Kevin Rudd accused Julia Gillard of being childless. A woman is not less valuable if she doesn’t have children. It has also been shown that in countries where there is a high child mortality people will have more children in hopes that some will survive. We can provide better medical care for mothers, infants and children.

Unfortunately some religions oppose proposed methods of population control. At the Cairo Population Conference Catholic representatives who opposed contraceptives and abortion got together with Muslim representatives who opposed education for women to scuttle recommendations of the conference proposing those initiatives.

Opposing religion where it interferes with population planning was not a key theme at the Global Atheist Convention. I hope there will be another GAC where religious opposition to population control will be considered. I also hope that members of the religious institutions will bring their religions into line. There are encouraging signs that this is happening. The retrogressive attitudes of the Catholic Church in this area are apparently being ignored in both Ireland and Italy which have much lower birth rates than most other countries.

Human beings are no different to any other species. All species form part of the diverse range of life all of which are impacted, subtle or overtly, when changes occur in environments along with impacts on the food chain.

I hope human beings do go on forever but if we don't we won't know anything about it. Nothing is 'necessary' things will be just what they are.

Human beings, being the most versatile and innovative of the species have both the potential to impact the environment for better or for worse and as such have a great responsibility.

Greed is the biggest enemy in that process, particularly where profit driven behaviours often override any other facet of wellbeing, perhaps even survival in the long term.

Human beings are like any other animal or plant, existing at the mercy of not only our own behaviours (within our control) but also to factors out of our control such as meteorites or other disasters or the effects of war, overpopulation - it could be anything.

Who knows about the unknowable, but what we do know is that if human beings continue to pollute and contaminate the very nest they live and rely, the future may not be so pretty.

Hopefully we will be collectively smart enough to realise it before it is too late.

planet 3, like most greenies, there is no fun, & therefor no joy in your soul.

I dare so humans are the only ones immoral enough to kill many of their unborn before birth.

Dear runner,

Here you go mate, from Wikipedia;

"Competitive infanticide in lions, hippopotamuses, and some monkeys, the new male will kill the offspring of the previous alpha male to cause their mothers to become receptive to his sexual advances since they are no longer nursing."

"Harassment to miscarriage amongst wild horses and baboons, the male will "systematically harass" pregnant females until they miscarry."

"Pheromone based spontaneous abortion in some rodents such as mice, a new male with a different scent will cause females who are pregnant to spontaneously fail to implant recently fertilized eggs. This does not require contact; it is mediated by scent alone. It is known as the Bruce-Parkes effect."

Now how about a little hush?

*Yabby.......Dont you mean "man made" virus.*

No I don't, Planet 3. Viruses and bacteria can mutate all by
themselves and they did so a long time before we came along.

Dear davidf,

A God complex is present in most Westerners though few would care to admit it. It comes with the living of extremely privileged lives in comparison to the bulk of humanity, a kind of obesity I suppose. I'm certainly afflicted as are 99% of posters on OLO.

My only saving grace is that I am aware of it, they do say if you know you are insane you really aren't.

You are correct regarding the educating of women as a great driver for limiting family size, but may I politely point out you appear to be failing to connect some dots.

Are they educating themselves so that davidf's world has fewer people in it? Hardly, they are doing it to improve their lot, to have a greater chance at a higher paying job, to then be able to afford the consumables that we are so proliferate with.

It is that the manufacture of these items are using finite resources, poisoning our ecosystems and requiring the clearing of habitat for stock and mono-cultures.

It is a race between raising living standards, therefore lowering birth rates to below replacement, before the depletion of resources causes those standards to dramatically decline.

There is an area near us called the Enfield Forest, a gold mining area previously sporting a couple of schools plus houses for over a thousand people. Every tree was removed to supply the mining industry and timber had to be railed in from the Otways to meet the demand.

There are very few remnants left. You might find the odd base to a chimney and a few old bottles. The trees have all returned and the area is now a State Forest. The healing of the scars happens in the blink of a geological eye. Our little blimp in the species record will hardly be felt although what climate change will bring is an open question.

However the question of what we want for our children and grandchildren is one of the few with universal currency. We need to keep asking it of each other and our leaders.

Dear csteele,

Of course women don’t get educated so my world will have fewer people. However, educated women are less likely to have as many children as their less well educated sisters.

Educated people have more internal resources to fill their lives than less educated people. Aldous Huxley in his book, “Brave New World”, imagined a world with different classes. The most educated were the alphas and the least were the epsilons as I remember. The most educated had fewer desires for material objects and could live life more cheaply since they were more satisfied to read books, make music, enjoy nature and engage in intellectual pursuits which cost much less than the amusements pursued by the epsilons who found greater joy in amassing material objects, gambling, drugs, drinking and in other pursuits that require money. The alphas lived simply with full lives setting the agenda for society while the epsilons were happy with their expensive toys.

My daughter is an example of what I am talking about. She has a number of intellectual accomplishments. She is fluent in several languages, can read medieval French and Italian, is a good musician, gardens, can whip up great meals from cheap ingredients gathered from her garden and is a mother of two children. She turned down jobs in advertising, the diplomatic service and banking to work with culturally deprived children to give them a better start in life. I am especially proud of her. Advertising, the diplomatic service and banking were open to her because of her knowledge of foreign languages, her literary ability and high intelligence. They all involve lying, and I feel good that she is doing what she is doing.

I think many highly educated women have made similar choices.

The same is true for men. Those with greater inner resources aren’t generally as dependent on material goods for their fulfilment.

My daughter’s good life does not depend on having quantities of material goods. Once a person has moved beyond poverty they may have enough if they have inner resources.

Perhaps you haven’t connected the dots.

What a stupid and conceited post.

*Once a person has moved beyond poverty they may have enough if they have inner resources.*

David F, you have to see the big picture. Its not wether your
daughter buys a few extra trinkets, it hardly matters. Fact is
that billions around the globe are moving from the country to the
city, be that in Asia, South America or Africa.

As they do, they want houses, roads, cars, appliances, schools,
hospitals, entertainment, electricity, water and all the rest.

Multiply that out globally, along with another quarter of a million
extra people born a day and its a big issue which is clearly not
sustainable.

Dear Yabby,

You are right. It's not just what an individual wants. The number of individuals is exceeding the carrying capacity of the planet. We can either get down to a sustainable number by rational compassionate methods or the old methods of war, pestilence, famine and death will do it for us. We can still try to leave simpler lives which consume fewer resources.

One approach does not negate the other.

Hasbeen Hi.

planet 3, "like most greenies, there is no fun, & therefor no joy in your soul".....

Iam not going to dignify that with an answer....lol....what ever floats your boat matey:)

cc

Dear davidf,

Very cheeky. I'm having my chain pulled but am happy to play.

Your daughter seems to be a very principled person and if she were mine I would also be proud.

But an Alpha from Brave New World? Really? My good fellow, have we read the same book?

So the men and women who assembled her car, built her home, paved the road out the front, collected her garbage etc are her Deltas and Epsilons? In Huxley's novel and indeed our own society the Alphas could only live the lives they did off the backs of the lowers castes. I'm wondering if you have seen the Hunger Games yet? Donald Sutherland plays an excellent Alpha.

By the way BNW was my introduction to the Greek alphabet (very non-classical education I'm afraid). I had wondered aloud in class why on earth Huxley placed 'Gamma' between Alpha, Beta and Delta , Epsilon. Oops. Why do embarrassing moments remain so vivid?

Let's park a discussion of Fascism for the moment.

By growing her own foodstuffs your daughter certainly would be limiting her energy footprint yet I would venture to guess it would be many times that of the typical African woman for instance.

The defining parameter of wealth in this word is the access to, and affordability of, energy. There is a direct and irrefutable relationship between the two. Most the energy consumed in the Western world comes from non-renewable fossil fuels.

Your lines;

“Educated people have more internal resources to fill their lives than less educated people.”

“Those with greater inner resources aren’t generally as dependent on material goods for their fulfilment.”

Might just as easily read those who are more educated have better jobs and need to spend less time on securing the material goods that we all are dependent on to achieve a certain quality of life.

I'm not sure it is seemly for you or I or indeed our daughters, from our privileged positions, to be ever critical of the striving for that quality of life by those less fortunate than ourselves.

thanks for that correction Csteele. So abortion is people acting like animals. I should really thought of that. Thankfully we have a conscience and know its wrong unlike the animals you mention.

My dear runner,

Lol. So there is no keeping a so called 'Good man' down huh?

It may have escaped you but each example I gave was of the male interfering with the female's reproductive rights. Isn't that exactly what you are doing? By your logic I could regard you and your ilk as animals.

Well certainly those bombing clinics are, the question is are you?

Perhaps that might be explored in a thread about abortion which this clearly is not.

Dear csteele,

I am embarrassed by the post I wrote. Of course my daughter’s carbon footprint is much greater than that of the typical African woman. Part of our large carbon footprint is due to the fact that we live in an energy wasteful society. My daughter would not care to live in the neighbourhood where the culturally deprived children she works with live. Actually she might be willing to if she were single, but she isn’t. She probably has a much smaller energy footprint than most people with her education, but it is certainly much greater than that of a subsistence farmer with no electricity or plumbing.

The energy footprint of a person on welfare in our society is much greater than that of such a subsistence farmer. Much of our carbon footprint is not dependent on our individual actions. In order to cut down on our carbon footprints government and business must make decisions with that goal in view.

Outside of a time living in New York City slums and my time in the army during WW2 I have never lived in any but pleasant conditions. However, I have never been critical of the striving for quality of life by those less fortunate than ourselves.

I still think that those who are educated to take pleasure in less costly pursuits consume less than those with the same income who do not have those inner resources.

Modern industrial agriculture has been described as the process of using land to turn oil into food. The decision makers in our society do not take into account what will happen as oil and other commodities on which we base our standard of living become more and more scarce and expensive. Business is mainly concerned with short term earnings and government is mainly concerned with the next election.

Too many people are struggling for too few resources. Those struggles have already affected the African subsistence farmer in Somalia and similar places, and my descendents will not have the immunity from those struggles I have had during most of my life

*We can still try to leave simpler lives which consume fewer resources.*

We can indeed David f, but we also have to separate what is more
like feelgood from what matters. I've had this debate with Squeers,
a number of times. Squeers goes on about consumption, yet he has
6 children. Now it does not matter how many times Squeers pedals to
work, it is insignificant in comparison to what his 6 children and
their children will consume.

David f please tell me just what you mean by "culturally deprived children". Are you talking about some kid in a New York ghetto, who has the whole world within reach, if they choose, or a kid on a Pacific atoll, with a population of 200, who will rarely if ever see other human beings.

Sounds like a lot of self congratulation, all this talk of do gooding. If it makes you feel good to muck around with a particular type of youth, great, but please, not so much grandstanding with it.

Perhaps if it were not described so grandly it would sound a bit less like pompous BS, just like all this rubbish about carbon foot print. If you stopped giving your self, & your daughter such airs, you might sound less full of your self.

I get so sick of all this self indulgent talk of an individuals carbon footprint. By the time the Prius driver has shouldered his share of the societies use of resources, the difference between it & a nice V8 Cadillac is so small as to be insignificant.

Not that it matters of course. If our society had not developed all of modern medicine, transport, & food production, most would still fail to achieve 35 years of life. Now I think that the improvement in quality of life is a good thing, & carbon foot print be damned.

Dear Hasbeen,

By culturally deprived I mean children who live in a neighborhood where their lives are uncertain, where they may not be in school Monday after a weekend because it is cheaper to move than to pay rent or because one of their parents has moved out or because they may not have adequate clothing and it is winter. There are such neighbourhoods in the US, and my daughter is a school librarian who conducts reading programs in a school in such a neighbourhood.

I hope you are in the minority in your attitude toward the carbon footprint.

david/quote..""By culturally deprived..I mean children
who live in a neighborhood..where their lives are uncertain''

so suggestive
first thought was palistein children in the ghettos
next i thought first people..[culture]

then though its the same same same

if we loose india/china
al wil be wel..if its mainly 'towel heads'...[or arabs..or terropriosts kids....fair game]

will we accept it
if were the ones balloted to die
[of course not]..thus govt plans a nice quick death

for a clue..think rosie ringgs..,sneezing and falling 'down'

its the plan man

they really think to kill one third..two thirds
then going and killing plotting and planning ...no more

sure

Dear Hasbeen,

Davidf is a very rare breed in the rather pompous world of OLO, a member who is able to say they were embarrassed about one of their posts.

I don't think I have ever been that self effacing here, I'm pretty damn sure neither have you and a person like runner would rather rip out their tongue than do the same.

As to the use of the term ’carbon footprint’ try to leave your rejection of human induced climate change aside for a moment and just think of it as a measure of resource consumption. It serves this purpose very well.

Dear davidf,

The use of the word culture was of course provocative and marvelous for sparking spirited responses. My brother-in-law would be hard pressed to have read more than half a dozen books in his life, yet his depth of knowledge in areas like bee keeping, or old rifles, or native and introduced grasses is extensive. To sit outside with him on a summers night and be introduced to the sound of a fox coughing, echolocating as it circled the house is not something to be found in books on medieval Italy.

Your daughter's interests are no less esoteric but who is to say they are provide superior internal resources or are more grand? Not I.

Perhaps there will be an intelligent lass in a few hundred years who will do a dissertation on our current sporting culture, a culture so often dismissed by our ’alphas'. Perhaps she will recognize its value in bringing to us ’masses’ pathos, tragedy, and life affirmation. The names Nikki Windmar, Ben Cousins, Jimmy Stynes all evoke stories that in many ways rival the impact the Shakespearian characters or the Greek tragedies had in their day. Or does something only become culture when experienced from afar?

The great gift your daughter is bestowing is a love of books and reading. This provides tools for following and enhancing ones interests whether they concern older or alien cultures, or our own.

David f,

Your daughter sounds as if she has her head in the right place.

The trouble with the West as it stands at present is that people like Hasbeen are running the show - and people like David f aren't.

All this consumption guilt reminds me of Blazing Saddles.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bcokL59jeqU

To me it all seems a bit silly, as the guilt would seem to stem from an extrapolation involving billions of people suddenly transitioning from Pol Pot's Nirvana to modern civilisation. And were this to suddenly happen, my consumption would be denying others their due. And for this I am to feel guilty?

Am I the only one who finds this extrapolated guilt trip an absurdity?

Sorry Fester,

I think you have been watching too much Blazing Saddles as you seem to be channeling Gabby Johnson.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3hKI3nW5LMA&feature=youtube_gdata_player

Pol Pot? Really?

But even giving you the benefit of the doubt you sound like a NSW irrigator telling a South Australian farmer on the Murray the reason he isn't getting any water is because it is all about protecting farming families but to extrapolate this downstream is absurd.

Well good luck with that.

'I hope you are in the minority in your attitude toward the carbon footprint. '

I doubt Hasbeen would have any chance of matching Tim Flannery, Al Gore or Bob Brown with his carbon footprint no matter how hard he tries. Hypocrisy does often go with religion and gw is no different.

A more accurate analogy would be to argue that the NSW farmers should not be using so much water because the SA farmers might need some in twenty years time.

Absurd isn't it?

matching Tim Flannery, Al Gore or Bob Brown .
runner,
Only the wealthy enough can out-do each other with their Carbon footprints. The simple consumer as polluting as he may be is no match to the Jet-setting crowd or the super rich Arabs with their fleets of aircraft & all sorts of other pollution creating toys. What about car racing then ? If you really want to reduce Carbon emission then you have to target those who pollute but because they're so wealthy or powerful they'll never be pulled up.
Are humans needed ? Yes, but only the thinking ones. Those three aforementioned hypocrites are not of that kind.

It's an interesting, if superficially bizarre question. I have to admit, I was surprised to find that Davidf. Posted it; which I guess highlights the dangers of judging or categorising others.
I believe that just as an individual can have a mission -”if they choose to accept it”- the race as a whole could have a purpose, and could arguably be 'needed' -by Earth Based Life (EBL).
Indeed, I believe we have already proven we are up for the task.
To be 'needed' suggests purpose. I would suggest the only purpose EBL has ever exhibited has been to 'Go Forth, and Multiply'. In this sense, amphibians were 'needed' to colonise the land (not wanting to get into the more intricate 'chicken and egg' discussion of which species was first...)
Over the eons there have been any number of pioneering species, of plants, fungi, insects fish and animals.
But so far, only one species has demonstrated the capacity to continue to Go Forth and Multiply, even after this planet is full.
A number of cosmologists, exobiologists and (a possibly even greater number of) sci-fi writers have suggested the colonisation of other planets will begin as it did on this planet, with -engineered- bacteria and micro fauna and flora.
And Humanity will be 'needed' to perform the deed.
It's quite possible, and not I think unprecedented, that if we do not assume this responsibility we will become extinct, and EBL will languish and die on this one lonely rock.

I see you have not yet tweaked it Grim.

We are actually the cockroach's work force. We build their habitat, provide their means of transport for them to spread world wide, & produce the food for most of them.

Once we have helped with their dominance of earth, they will have little use of us, although they may, hopefully, keep us as pets.

With their size they will require much less use of resources for then to spread out through the galaxies, conquering in the sideways manner they use here, as they go.

Perhaps, with luck, they may actually take some of us with them, if they can't find such useful idiots, else where.

So there you are, we are needed, but only for so long.

Actually Has, I would suggest that grasses are a far more likely candidate as the human dominator.
Consider the millions of hectares of forests we've cut down for our favourite grass; wheat, corn, oats, rye, rice...
Billions of gallons of water conserved, redirected, stored...
For centuries we've favoured grasses over all other species, and that's just the edible varieties.
Consider how much time and effort and money your average suburban householder spends tending his beloved lawn.
Could be a little embarrassing, when the aliens land and ask: “take me to your leader”...

"What a piece of work is man!" exclaims Hamlet in
Shakespeare's play.

"How noble in reason! How infinite in faculty!
In action, how like an angel! In apprehension,
how like a god! The beauty of the world!
The paragon of animals! And yet ...
what is this quintesence of dust?"

And as David F., asks - Are Humans needed?

Good question. The march of industrial
civilisation, which we generally equate with progress
toward a better future, is having a devastating effect
on the other life forms of the planet. In fact, we are
currently witnessing a catastrophic extinction of other
species: not by the dozens, or the hundreds, or even
the thousands - but by the millions.

This quiet apocalypse probably represents the greatest
ecological disaster in the long history of life on earth.
If some different creature were to have the calamitous
effects on other plants and animals that we ourselves do,
we would undoubtedly consider it the most noxious and
virulent pest ever to crawl upon the face of the earth.

The breathtaking diversity of species has evolved in
delicate and precarious balance over many millions of
years. Most of the plants and animals with which we share
the earth have been here a great deal longer than we have.

For a fleeting moment in planetary history, our technology
has given us domain over them. In awe, respect, and humility,
we should just let them be.

Isnt this just interesting and typical....the human race is at 7 billion and not one alarm bell ring anywhere......I would have to agree with hasbeen..."So there you are, we are needed, but only for so long.

So its onward bound we go.....I may as well add..."she'll be right mate"......too.

cc

Dear Grim,

Love the grass speculation. I mean we even call our most prized flowering tree 'grass'. I will certainly use that one in the future, thanks.

Dear Lexi,

I do feel a little like we have the roles of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to davidf's Hamlet.

When trying to answer the question 'Are humans needed?' perhaps we should indeed turn to Hamlet. Though contemptuously delivered by him there is a modicum of truth, in this instance at least, in the admonishment that "there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so".

Dear csteele,

If only we learned to act in accordance with our
thinking. We should all be aware that our planet
has a finite amount of resources and that it can
tolerate only a limited amount of pollution. If
world population continues to grow rapidly, if
industrialisation spreads around the world, and
if pollution and resource depletion continues at
an increasing rate - and all these things happen -
we need to ask - where is human society headed?

The most optimistic answer to these questions would
be that, one way or another, sweeping social changes
await us.

I believe some here are merely dooms day prophets. If China can feed its millions and also export food to Australia; then we do not have a food shortage. We have an education and distribution problem.