Hi X,
I also recycle everything I can, and walk instead of drive every chance I get. I hate plastic packaging and avoid it whenever I can. I ask for paper bags instead of plastic at the grocery store, but I'm never quite sure if that is the right choice. I don't buy organic food, but when I lived in Denver and had the room, I had a large garden. I love being out in the country, but I've lived most of my life near large cities for the sake of my work. I've spent a large part of my leisure time though in remote areas, hunting, fishing and photographing nature, and my kids have also enjoyed these activities.
You say we could all do more, and this is where we differ. Things like recycling make sense, in the sense of "waste not, want not". But the simple fact is that this world's human population of several billions has a life of it's own, it will not be denied, and it does and will continue to consume, on a huge scale, the earth's resources. We will drive our cars, power our factories and other machinery with petroleum products, until the oil is gone. We will continue to consume our forests and mineral resources, and grow our food with the most efficient means possible, to feed and shelter ourselves and our children. We will continue to develop our technology, to make our lives easier and longer. The world's population will continue to grow, there is nothing to stop it except the possibility of self destruction. No, we will not reach a stable population level, where everyone has just enough children to replace the elderly, where we replace as much as we use, in some sort of stable, closed loop system. That is not the way of life. Life is expansive, that is it's nature, and human life, acting on the instinct of self-preservation will continue to expand.
No matter how much we may miss the former world, the country that was here for our ancestors, it's gone now, just like them, and it's not coming back. We can't stand against the great tide of human progress, but we don't have to be inundated by it either. All we have to do is ride the wave. Instead of looking back, trying to hang on to what is inevitably transient in nature, we need to look forward. We can enjoy it while we are passing through, but ultimately life carries us forward, and it's gone.
You and I both have kids, and we both think about the world they will live in. My fear is that we will not act soon enough, now when we have the opportunity, and that the resources that are now available to carry our species forward will be squandered, that a population too large for the available resources of the planet will then no longer be able to leave the planet. If that happens, then we will go the way of the dinosaurs. Personally, I can not envision a future for my children that does not include the colonization of space.
Skipper |
