"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.