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We have only one Earth to live on

It always makes me shake my head at the profound belief by many that we can eventually master interstellar travel and find new worlds to exploit. Sci-Fi is rampant with that assumption. Its never going to happen. Never. The distance is too great for technology to every compensate for. Screw this planet up to the point its uninhabitable and we're pretty much screwed as a species.
 
We're never going to screw this planet up to the point that it becomes unlivable. Unlivable for humans, maybe, but we aren't capable of eradicating all life everywhere. Still, probably best if we don't make Earth unlivable for humans any time soon; it would put a serious damper on my Superbowl plans.
 
Leyawiin said:
It always makes me shake my head at the profound belief by many that we can eventually master interstellar travel and find new worlds to exploit. Sci-Fi is rampant with that assumption. Its never going to happen. Never. The distance is too great for technology to every compensate for. Screw this planet up to the point its uninhabitable and we're pretty much screwed as a species.
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Never say never 😉

Although yeah the distances involved are immense and its a realistic view that our species may never leave this planet in any meaningful way.
 
sorry logic < money so your pleas will forever go unheard until it's too late.

on the bright side you'll be long dead before that happens.
 
We're due for a large meteor or ice age soon. All signs indicate there'll be a pretty massive scaling back in the human population.
 
We may not destroy the planet for humans anytime soon (although parts of it are pretty fucked up) but, we do have a responsibility to try not to screw it up. Take a look at Poland. They are striving to bootstrap themselves into the 20th century (notice I didn't say 21st) and gambling there will be something left of their country when they do. They've chosen to destroy a number of towns and cities with toxic waste in the pursuit of industrialization. America went through the same growing pains but we are more than 30x larger. You can still see some of the damage in the US. The point is, ignoring the ecology in pursuit of industrialism and little green pieces of paper is hubris at best.
 
I was going to say something smart, but SlitheryDee said exactly what I was going to. I was then going to say something else smart, but poofyhairguy beat me to it. So, I'll just say that this thread has reminded me of what I love about this forum. Where else can I find good intelligent posts and trolling? Most places only have one or the other.

Oh and here's something else to read when you're done with the last wiki link.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prisoner's_dilemma#In_environmental_studies
 
SSSnail said:
I think we're a few billions too many... D:
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Without progress and industrialization we wouldn't be. In fact, we might still break through to a level of technological advancement that allows us to support as many people as we want to without doing undue damage to the environment. In that case, speeding up our advancement by burning through fossil fuels and industrializing at a breakneck pace to get there faster may seem like a good idea in hindsight.

If we don't make it before we run out of gas though... We crash hard, billions die. The generations that follow, greatly reduced in number of course, will remember us as some kind of great lost civilization. Masters of wondrous machines that they no longer have the resources to use. Both scenarios have a weird scifi/fantasy appeal to me.
 
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SlitheryDee said:
Without progress and industrialization we wouldn't be. In fact, we might still break through to a level of technological advancement that allows us to support as many people as we want to without doing undue damage to the environment. In that case, speeding up our advancement to get there by burning through fossil fuels and industrializing at a breakneck pace may seem like a good idea in hindsight.

If we don't make it before we run out of gas though... We crash hard, billions die. The generations that follow, greatly reduced in number of course, will remember us as some kind of great lost civilization. Masters of wondrous machines that they no longer have the resources to use. Both scenarios have a weird scifi/fantasy appeal to me.
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Indeed. Except it's not the lack of gas that will kill billions, it's the lack of plastic.
 
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raildogg said:
I think the planet would thrive without us 🙁

I like Carlin's content. "We haven't learned to care for one another and yet we're gonna save the !@#$#$ planet."
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Ain't that the truth, if you look at the shape the world is and how most humans are.....it's pathetic. And I'm not just talking about poverty, there is plenty of selfishness, greed and arrogance around our ways.
 
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