8th Threat: Ecocide

There is a limited amount of air, land, and water to sustain us, not to mention a narrow band of environmental factors such as temperature, climate etc. in which we can prosper. There is no doubt that we’re having a greater and greater impact on all of the above … and our numbers are growing.

If you think that we can’t destroy civilization by ruining our ecosystem, just look to our past. Throughout our history we have overhunted, over farmed, and over consumed whatever. The Mayans and Easter Islanders could attest to disastrous result … if they were still around.

http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/Maya/

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/earth/fate-of-easter-island.html

Now, even though we are playing on a worldwide scale, we have only one planet to work with. We are not only clear cutting nature, we’re putting garbage into the soil, sewage into the water, and since the Industrial Revolution, pumping pollutants into the atmosphere. It’s not just that we are breathing  back in soot and dirt, but that the gases (like CO2) we pump into the air that are harmless at environmental feedback loop levels (plants take in CO2 and exhale Oxygen, animals the reverse), are bad in excess. They change the built-in climate-controls that have evolved over eons. Like the Mayans and Easter Islanders, we are playing with forces beyond our comprehension that will have dire results.

http://climate.nasa.gov/effects/

Next up, the Ninth Threat … one we’re just beginning to understand.