And in further Global Warming News...

The Whole Story Check it out...this is dire!

Couldn't view the page but it stands to reason any changes in our weather patterens will effect the waters of our world. People need to pay more attention to what we are doing to our world. :wub: I think I've said this before but it is so true. we are the keepers of our world! :P

If we take care of our world, it will take care of us. :)

Well said Tony, but to many people don't even think about taking care of it so we are in a era of globlal warming and terrible stormes, earthquakes, ect. There is still time to correct some of them problems but we can't wait to long or none of us will be able to live on this planet. :o

If I may suggest, the problem is that we tend to think of ourselves as the stewards and masters of the planet--the idea that we are in charge of its upkeep. In fact, the relationship we have with the environment is the same as any other species. We are animals, predatory animals, that seek to eat and procreate, same as any other.

Any predatory species will hunt its prey to extinction if no limits are imposed, which in turn leads to the extinction of the predator. The wolf doesn't think--"Gee, I'd better save at least a couple sheep so that I'll have something to eat next year."

Our relationship with natural resources has been exactly the same; our instinctive behavior is to use all resources heedless of the consequences. We are not the keepers of the planet, just another animal species doing what we're supposed to do.

The only real way to reverse the destructive trends is to create an incentive that will motivate everyone to pursue cleaner, safer energy alternatives. Survival alone isn't enough--it's counterintuitive to tell someone that the only way to keep from starving to death is to leave the cake alone. However, the idea that we are "taking care of the Earth" is a human conceit. The earth doesn't care whether we live or die; it will go on long after we've eaten ourselves out of existence.

Good point! But I like to think that we also have a brain to think with and it is obvious now that we have been thoughtless in our regard towards the planet. We should start thinking ahead now and plan as best we can to protect what's left of our greenspace and the waters of the planet. b:

I disagree, Sean. It's impossible for animals in the wild to eat their prey to extinction. Predator and prey each will equilibrate at or near their carrying capacity. The natural order of things is balance.

Now, if by "extinction" you meant that their numbers will fluctuate above and below that carrying capacity, then yes you are right. I'm not sure what kinds of limits you meant, though.


Humans, on the other hand, have vastly altered (if not eliminated, for now,) their natural carrying capacity through the use of technology. However, it is naive and irrational to believe that we can continue unabaded and that technology will continue to increase our carrying capacity as it has in the past. Just as the predators begin to die off as their prey becomes scarce, so too will we be unable to persist without the resources we so greatly depend on when they are gone. Unlike prey, though, most of our resources do not regenerate by the next spring. :unsure:

I think I followed where you were going with the human conceit and cleaner, safer energy etc. Just wasn't sure I was following your predation analogy.

I have to disagree. We ARE the keepers of the world. We are the ones that have to look out for the future. We are the ones with an intellengence quota that is higher than the lower species. If we don't do something to help our planet who will? Conserve and recycle. Our forrest and oceans need our help. This includes controling the population. We must be responsible for our actions. yike:

Nicely put loren!! That's how I feel. Who or what else has the ability to take care of this planet? We have the highest intellengence. I know we are also destroying the planet now, but we are the only beings that can correct the problem. You don't see the High Dog Council frantically running about the globe having meetings to solve world hunger or global warming. :P I do think we are doing a bad job of taking care of our surroundings though.

It is true that this planet would be able to continue on if the human race were to destroy itself, but I think the point of what I'm saying is that we are the only race/species currently on this planet that has the ability to destroy/repair our planet. I don't mean actually create trees or more oceans, but we are able to cut certain habits that are destroying the earth.

Ah, excellent. Leave it to inflammatory rhetoric to get people talking about an important issue.

Firstly, let me address the "impossibilty" you described. In a real world setting, what you say is true. A predator can never hunt its prey to extinction. However, if you observe the exponential curves from year to year you will always see peaks and valleys which correspond to rising "thrive" periods, followed by the inevitable crash when population exceeds resources. This isn't balance, because equilibrium is never really established. The natural order of things is like a tightrope walker wobbling back and forth between extremes.

In a closed system, extinction of the prey, and then the predator, would occur, and quite often. This has been proven in experimental models. It doesn't happen in our world because there is no such thing as a truly closed system.

But you have correctly recognized what I was trying to say. It is not in our NATURE to conserve.

Now Tony, your comment that we have a brain is interesting. In fact, all animals have brains, so there's no particular superiority there. Everything else we take pride in as setting us apart is completely subjective.

But we have Love, music, art, and philosophy...the animals don't have these things, so we must be superior to them, right?

We're talking apples and oranges here. We don't judge animal species based on examples of individual behavior, but rather the collective. Animals DO show evidence of some higher reasoning ability; but scientific knowledge is based on conclusions drawn from long hours, days, weeks etc of observation. If an alien species were to observe us for a few centuries, what conlcusions would they draw about the human animal.

The idea of "If not us, then who?" is also an interesting one. Again, I say, this is something put forward by well intentioned individuals, appealing to the intangible--morality, beauty, goodness. Those are nice ideals, but it's not enough to change instinctive behavior.

Frankly, I hope I'm wrong. I hope that peace and love will break out all over, and that everyone will go green. For that matter, I hope I win the lottery or get published and make a million bucks. Unfortunaley Hope and Reality live in different zip codes. A lot of happy talk and well wishing is not going to redirect millennia of human instinct.

Thus the nugget of wisdom I seek to impart, and emphasize is this: We (The Human Species) cannot overcome our instincts. Individuals may possess the desire to do so, and may even on an individual basis give evidence that they can rewrite their programming, but the change is not passed along in the genetic code or the ancestral memory. So what can those individuals do: Simply find a new way to feed the beast.

A hundred plus years ago, humanity embraced steam and industry like kids in a candy store, and it changed our world. There are sources of power and economic productivity available right now that could launch the next boom--clean sources that do not deplete Earth's resources or trash the landscape. The only problem is that no one has yet thought to exploit it for their own gain. It may soon happen, but whether or not it does, the key factor that will drive the changeover will not be our passion to protect the earth and its beauty, but rather predators hunger for an endless food supply.

Can't wait to see how this goes over.

Sounds like another disheartened environmentalist subjected to reality (not meant in a mean way, I'm in the same boat!). The human factor is all too present in all of what has been said. Yes animals would not hunt other species to extinction because of checks and balances within their ecosystems, but we humans do for them what they cannot do. The ones that would normally be left behind are hunted/poached tipping the balance for extincton. We can preach about "going green" and "environmentally friendly" until we're blue in the face and unfortunatley it'll never be enough to change everyone's minds. Not to mention that even if everyone altered their behaviour it still wouldn't be enough. Too much damage has been done already. (This is where the disheartened environmentalist comes in...) I've been working for an "environmental" company for some time now (not as long as you might think, not even a year yet) and some of the things we do to "clean up" are atrocious but are within the guidelines set out by the ministry of the environment. For instance, when a site cannot be completely cleaned or this only "minimal" contamination, it can be "stored" beneath the surface. This means that if there is dirty stuff there it can be buried! But buried isn't a nice term for it so they say stored. And I've been cleaning up sites where back in the day the drilling/oil companies would just dump the drilling mud, excess oil, etc into flare pits and sumps (basically holes in the ground that were eventually buried, but most flare pits were just open holes a pipe led into and the pit was set on fire to flare off excess gases/waste) and all we do is get rid of "the really bad stuff" and most of the contamination is left there. You wouldn't believe (or you might) how frustrating it is to do this to the environment. The reason for this...there is no groundwater flowing through (supposedly although some sites I wonder) therefore it won't move, even though we wind up tracing the contamination a fair ways if we ever come back to reclaim the site. Then the reclamation, holy what a joke that is. Reclamation is returning (or reclaiming) a site to its original state. But usually to do that you wind up destroying another area to get clean soil, and little concern is ever given to the flora and fauna species that are there. It is an endless cycle of destruction and half assed work by companies trying to either make a fast buck or hide a mistake. This might change, if the dinosaurs in this industry would stop teaching these "tricks" to the junior technologist and telling them it is accepted. Some are mindless enough to accept it, others realize it is do it or become unemployed. Others (lol like me) ask so many questions that it annoys the hell out of whoever is doing it and eventually gets the brutal truth that this is just how it is done, accept it. I hope that eventually that older generation will be gone and the following ones will begin to change the mistakes of the past, but with few options available for that change it is going to be one brutal path to enlightenment for the environment.

Thanks for clearing that up, Sean. I figured you'd catch on to the key words of "impossible" and "equilibrate" in my post. Your description is spot on. th:

Khimera, you describe much of what went into my decision not to use my environmental science degree in pursuing a career in environmental consulting. I felt trapped into working only with industry and pollution, neither of which held my interest and were a source of frustration during my internship. I find working with college students and helping them figure out their right path to be a much more rewarding experience. To everyone still working in an environmental field, I commend you. You have my prayers, and I truly hope we (the human species) make a breakthrough sometime soon and that there's a liveable earth for our grandchildren.

Trapped is exactly the way to describe it Oswalder. I'm a tree hugger through and through (lol I'll admit it), but I'm also a very anayltical person. I've been trying to find a new outlet for my zeal to perserve and protect the environment, but have come up short thus far. I'm leaning towards working in a lab, since that way I merely produce the results and that's all there is to it, no arguments (well, not as many). What is done with that information from that point on is out of my hands, but the tree hugger in me isn't content with simply doing that for some reason. Being way up here in the north a lot of our sites are out in the bush where very few go and that's why so much of it gets "stored" and hidden away to be forgotten about until someone stumbles upon it. I'm actually looking at joining the military (Air Force in Canada) to pursue a career as a water/environmental tech since I've been told they adhere to strict standards and from the research I've done there is a strong chemistry element to it. One way or another I'm going to clean up, preserve, or protect some portion of the environment!! :)

Nick (Sean) Kismet, I have a question. Instincts?? I'm sorry to bring this into play on this topic but your logic defied the creation of mankind in god's image and the fallen nature thereof. Mankind has only a limited instinct because Man is not an Animal. Man has a Brain. And though we only use about 10 percent of it we do use it. And though I am not a college graduate I love our planet and believe with every fiber of my being that we need to protect what is left of the natural resources of the planet and try to rectify some of the mistakes we have made to the Earth if at all possible. And Nature does take care of itself when it comes to predators/preys. We no longer need to hunt because of big and small farms and manmade foods. Mankind has an omnivorous set of teeth which tells us that our consumption of meat is limited. I love meat but have learned throughout my life that our country needs to change our eating habits. Our meat based economy is in itself a taxation and wastage of natural resources of our planet. It should be said here first as a starting point at least to get people informed on the subject. There are vegetarian and vegan websites available on the internet. I know of one website, it is www.mercyforanimals.com I am not suggesting you change your ways overnight because we have all grown up this way in our country. But it won't hurt to read and inform yourself on the subject. I still eat meat but have cut back some. I eat more vegetables. If you live n a state like Ohio where you can see and notice that the cities are spreading out further, eating up all the farmland, it is a major loss of vital land to grow our foods on. With what we have done in loss of wetlands, farm acreage, loss of sedimentation and the manmade changes to the Mississippi River watershed, it is no wonder that our weather is being affected. Plus it has been nearly 10,000 years since the last Ice Age. I think we are headed for another one sometime in the next 1,000 years or less.

Every one has valid points and I too am not a college graduate or even close I just know what I have to do to help in any small way that I can. I commend all of the people who are working so hard to change things. The younger generation will be the ones to clean things up. I am really sorry we dumped this on them. :(

Hurricane Katrina's victims/corpses still not identified are being held by FEMA and not letting coroners identify them. Money is desperately needed to rebuild the Gulf Coast and the infrastructure of the New Orleans area so that the Mississippi River can create the wetlands and marshlands to absorb future Hurricanes. Warm water woes are creating the bigger and stronger Hurricanes. And the reason is because of our dependence upon Gas and Oil creating the global warming effects. The channelization of the Mississippi River has been disastrous for Louisiana. The state is losing wetlands, barrier islands at such a fast rate it is not a laughing matter. WHAT IS THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES doing???? He has not done anything but spend $14 Billion every six weks on our so called war for for democracy in Iraq. Call your congressman and U.S. Senators and demand to know what is the President doing about Louisiana and the Gulf Coast NOW. This is a SERIOUS matter that needs to be taken care of NOW. I am willing to pay more in GAS money to rebuild Louisiana and the Gulf Coast. Are YOU? Or do you want YOUR GAS Money to line the pockets of those who OWN the GAS and OIL companies??? For more information about Global Warming go to www.katrinanomore.com

Good points Tony, and another big thing on that same note is that US President has made it so that environmental site assessments do NOT need to be performed before a site is drilled for oil and gas. This is HUGE because the ESA's are what keep them from destroying habitats that contain endangered/threatened/vulnerable species of plants and animals. I know if they did that up here (Canada) I wouldn't have any of the good and rewarding environmental work that keeps me in this business! Another great environmental site is www.enn.com, they have great news about what is going on in the environment all over the world.

Unfortunately many ecosystems are being lost every year at a high rate! At least in Canada there's some concern for the environment. That is cool to hear Khimera. w:

We can learn alot from our northern brothers about taking care of our world. It's time to listen and act. :)