Posted on 07/16/2007 6:05:58 AM PDT by ZGuy
The Second Coming may be the most widely anticipated apocalypse ever, but Environmentalists have their own eschatology—a vision of a world not consumed by holy fire but returned to ecological balance by the removal of the most disruptive species in history. That, of course, would be us. There's even a group trying to bring it about, the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement, whose Web site calls on people to stop having children altogether. And now the journalist Alan Weisman has produced "The World Without Us," which conjures up a future something like ... well, like the area around Chernobyl—just forests that have begun reclaiming fields and towns, home to birds, deer, wild boar and moose.
Weisman's intriguing thought experiment is to ask what would happen if the rest of the Earth was similarly evacuated—not by a nuclear holocaust or natural disaster, but by whisking people off in spaceships, or killing them with a virus that spares the rest of the biosphere. In a matter of days or weeks, nuclear power plants around the world would boil off their water and melt into vast radioactive lumps. Electrical power would fail, and with it the pumps keeping New York City's subways from flooding; in a few years Lexington Avenue would collapse and eventually turn into a river. Lightning-caused fires would blow out the windows in skyscrapers.
Much of the world would come to resemble ... well, the Korean demilitarized zone, where no one has set foot for more than half a century, now a mecca for Korean bird watchers.
Sound appealing? Well, it did to Weisman, too, when he began work on the book four years ago. And "four out of five" of the people he's told about it, he estimates, thought the idea sounded wonderful.
(Excerpt) Read more at msnbc.msn.com ...
Without us, kudzu would take over the world and choke it to death.
I invite such people to do us all a favor and kill themselves.
Looking at their website, I’ve seen that big V on the planet before. It involved aliens who wanted to eat us.
These folks are prrof that man is descended from lemmings
( 85% DNA compatability)
When the Sun becomes a Red Giant, The entire Earth and everything on it will become nothing but burned, charred cinder. Everything that ever existed on it live or dead will be gone, and there is absolutely NOTHING that can stop it. Tell that to you enviro-whackos and make their day.
Sounds great!
You go first.
Self-loathing must be some kind of tenet in the environmentalists religion.
I saw this movie, but I didn’t like the ending.
It’s actually a pretty interesting book. Author’s politics aside, the book explores the ways in which humans constantly maintain urban environments. Without humans and our technology New York, for example, would be a radically different place...
Didn't Tom Clancy write a novel based on this? I'd watch these guys. They're wacko enough to try this.
I was wondering when the environmentalists would get to this point. A little sooner than I thought. I agree with earlier posters... You First, Environmentalists.
The senile old fool needs some stabilizing of his own thought processes.
I bet the idiot sits in AC while he writes too. Its not like he’s using his two feet to walk to the store to buy his toilet paper either.
What an idiot.
Rainbow Six.
That’s so “moonraker”...
“Without us, kudzu would take over the world and choke it to death.”
In NH it is BITTERSWEET vine. When I moved in 12 years ago it was all over my property. I cut and spray CHEMICALS every year. ORTHO Brush BE GONE and Triox work best.
According to my 70 year old neighbor, the people across the road had a Christmas wreath they left on the door for 6 months, 30 years ago. The birds ate the berries and spread them throughout the neighborhood. We have been battling it ever since. It climbs up trees, or anything else, and eventually kills the tree.
I heard the book was fascinating and that the book is a straightforward examination of what would happen if all humans disappeared tomorrow. I only buy books once they’ve become available cheap and used online, but when this one does, I’m sufficiently intrigued to check it out.
The left’s obsession with destroying civilized society by stopping people from breeding isn’t anything new, but detailing the science and what would happen to our cities and which buildings would survive, etc, sounds interesting.
I believe it would be more accurate to say, "If humans were extinct, the Earth would flourish." That seems closer to the premise of the book.
Either way, why should I care? As the last line of the article says, "Too bad there's no one there to see it."
Call me a speciesist, if you must. But I believe that the only reason that the Earth is of interest is because mankind lives here. (Moreover, I believe that God created the Earth expressly as a home for mankind.) Without intelligent beings to notice it, the Earth would be just another speck in the void, of no more significance than any other speck.
Can those of us that stay behind to verify the transformation of the entire earth into the Korean Demilitarized zone get Carbon Credits for those that voluntarily extinguish themselves? (:^*)
If they truly believe this, they’d just all go shoot themselves for earth’s benefit.
I don’t think they realize what is going to happen in the next 50-60 years. In about half a century, the world will be at carrying capacity, and population will still be exploding. This is why any dream of “global government” or “worldwide community” is going to collapse by about 2080. Because once you run short of basic items necessary for survival, you see warfare rise.
My thoughts also.
If earth is so bad with humans, let’s start getting rid of them and see how the depopulation plan works.
These guys should be watched
The earth is only “sick” in their heads.
Interesting post, but I would question a couple of your assumptions. First, how do you calculate the "carrying capacity" of the earth? Second, what makes you think that the human population "will still be exploding" in 50 years?
Precisely the point, their world view is flawed. They do not value life because do not believe God.
I think it’s my attitude.
“They do not value life because they do not believe in God.”
Excellently said. Is not God the Font of all life?
lol... there’s kudzu eating a truck by my house.
You’ve won tagline of the day!
It must be, for them to forget that we're as much a part of God's creation as the grass and trees.
Why would he need toilet paper? His sh** smells like roses!
That’s not necessarily true. No matter what happens to the earth bacteria will probably keep on trucking as they always have. They can survive in 120C and in ice on the poles so I doubt even the sun collapsing can get rid of them.
Humans I don’t know. Dinosaurs were one of the longest lived groups in the history of the earth and they only lasted 200 million years. So we’ll probably be long gone before the sun blows up, voluntary extinction or no.
Well Jerry, put your money where your mouth is. (Or in this case, put your gun where your mouth is)
“There are hidden contradictions within the minds of people who “love nature” while deploring the “artificialities” with which “Man has spoiled ‘Nature.’” The obvious contradiction lies in their choice of words, which imply that Man and his artifacts are not part of “Nature”—but beavers and their dams are.
But the contradictions go deeper than this prima-facie absurdity. In declaring his love for a beaver dam (erected by beavers for beaver’s purposes) and his hatred for dams erected by men (for the purpose of men) the “Naturist” reveals his hatred for his own race—i.e., his own self-hatred. In the case of “Naturists” such self—hatred is understandable; they are such a sorry lot. But hatred is too strong an emotion to feel toward them; pity and contempt are the most they rate.
As for me, willy-nilly I am a man, not a beaver, and H. Sapiens is the only race I have or can have. Fortunately for me, I like being part of a race made up of men and women— it strikes me as a fine arrangement and perfectly “natural.” Believe it or not, there were “Naturists” who opposed the first flight to old Earth’s Moon as being “unnatural” and a “despoiling of nature.”
Robert Heinlein
I don’t think they realize what is going to happen in the next 50-60 years. In about half a century, the world will be at carrying capacity, and population will still be exploding. This is why any dream of “global government” or “worldwide community” is going to collapse by about 2080. Because once you run short of basic items necessary for survival, you see warfare rise.You never know. By killing all the whales and pumping the ocean full of sewage we've created a world where squid and clams are quickly taking up the same, if not more biomass than the previous critters. I hope you like Calamari though...
Mother Earth is pregnant for the third time, for y’all have knocked her up.
I like your idea, and I think it would be great on pay per view.
Everybody stops having children at one point or another.
Yup — “Rainbow Six.” Envirowhackos tried to kill off 99% of the pop with a modified ebola.
Well, it’s their idea and the 4 out 5 people they talked to agreed; so why don’t they take themselves off the earth.
Oh, I forgot, they would the caretakers. sarcasm off.
Mercury, Venus, Earth, and possibly Mars will cease to exist. Unless bacteria can survive total immersion into the Sun's corona, I doubt they'll be around........ http://news.softpedia.com/news/What-Will-Happen-When-the-Sun-Will-Die-36181.shtml
"We are the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement Crack Suicide Squad. Suicide Squad, ATTACK!!!"
If humans are gone, why should I care if the earth has thriving plant and animal life? It will be a wasted planet, good for nothing more than biology experiments for Xenu.
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