Life on Earth is in unstable equilibrium. The many natural threats did not succeed in destroying
it. Additional threats, brought to the environment by human
technology, are doing the job.
Considerations about the Synergic effect
brought the author to the hypothesis that sometime, during the first half of the XXI century, the environmental
steady-state will suddenly collapse, questioning the survival of Homo
sapiens on Earth.
Other considerations about historical processes and the
behavior of human society brought him to the hypothesis that neither the present generation, nor the next one, will be able to arrest the impending environmental
catastrophe. Our grandchildren will have to work very hard to fix the mess. They will do the job, aided by Controlled Nuclear Fusion and other not-yet-at-hand technologies. Can we make
their task easier? Only if we recognize in time the
essence of the problem.
The
author presents it as a puzzle: the pieces look separate until they are brought
closer, by unconventional comparisons and analogies. The reader is invited to
assemble the puzzle, to look at the whole picture and to take actions for the future good health of
Mother Earth.
SUMMARY
(The
narrow range of Life environment)
(The ecological
steady-state as a wandering boulder)
(The story of a
fat driver and his mother-in law)
(An introduction)
(An
unlikely new mass extinction)
(Holocausts leading to life blooming)
(Dancing with the global weather)
(If we will be so evil to let it break out, the human
species will survive)
(We are piling the most dangerous element, not caring
of the future)
(What do we really know about Aluminum?)
(About
permitted and non permitted food additives)
(We keep it in prison, Nature will set it free)
(What happen when we open the box)
(The real meaning of scientific data)
(The
problem is that we don’t see the difference)
(Everybody needs a little rest, but Earth is doing
overtime work)
(Exhausting the natural reserves while piling polluting substances
instead)
(Mortgaging the
future for present convenience)
(Why
the exploited Undeveloped are exploiting Mother Earth)
(Harnessing
Capitalism to Ecology)
(International
cooperation, a badly needed utopia)
(The
Society’s Managers cannot do it better)
(Reporting a future visit at the Dome of
Remembrance, virtually looking at TIME – Three-dimensional Interactive Model of
Earth)
(The ecological clean Controlled Nuclear Fusion)
(Neither the
hot H-bomb, nor the Cold Fusion utopia)
(A futuristic
undersea Hydroelectric plant)
(About
Ted Turner, Bison steaks and the re-wilding of the Wild West)
(Disposal in
the Ocean bottom inert mud)
(We are the
future Martians)
(Tunneling the
Fly river to Australia)
(Who put the
Nile Perch into Lake Victoria?)
(We need serendipity)
(Encounters of
the third kind and the Drake’s equation)
(A pause for
apologies and introductions)
(Sociology
borrows the Wegener’s Theory)
(About
invasions, colonization and colonialism)
(The meaning of
words, intentions and attitudes)
(Remembering the sixties)
(Explaining
them to the young)
(The son is so
different… like the father!)
(What’s happening to the world population?)
(The developing Nations become developed)
(The happy end)
This
is a serious book, though not too serious. It is the attempt to put together
the pieces of a puzzle: the puzzle of the Survival of
Human Life on Earth. Every one of us asked himself sometime whether the human
species will be destroyed or not in the near future. Nobody can, of course,
give us an answer, but we can look a little deeper around us and try to
understand why we have good reasons to be concerned. I will not write about
some sudden holocaust brought by nuclear
war, nor about a mass extinction caused by a wandering comet, but about how
subtle changes we are making will seriously
endanger life on Earth in a shorter time than we are used to think, perhaps a
few decades the most.
As
I will try to explain, our grandchildren will face a meager reality: an Earth
in so bad health conditions that they will have to work
very hard to cure it, or they will succumb with it.
Since
we are going to leave to our grandchildren a so bad heredity, it is worth to
take a look at them too. Who will
they be? How and where will they live? Are we leaving to them also
something good? How will they accomplish the task of fixing
the mess we are going to make?
To
avoid misunderstanding I wish to clarify in advance that this is not a
Philosophy treatise, nor a Science
Fiction story. It is rather a thought exercise made by a person that likes
to think, for the benefit of other persons like him.
Much
has been said about global
warming, nuclear waste and exploitation of natural resources. I
apologize if I will add a few more drops to the rivers of ink, but I have the
feeling that we all are not seeing the forest, because there are too much trees
around us. I will try to make a short synthesis of some of the issues we all heard
about, and to emphasize how the real danger for us is not this threat or
the other, but rather the “togetherness”
of many small threats. My synthesis will be based mostly on scientific
facts. Each one of them will be presented in no more than a couple of pages,
just to give the idea. I will avoid the use of complex formulas. The reader is
requested to possess certain knowledge in modern science and technology, though
no more than a regular reader of popular science’s publications. I suggest to
those interested to read more about the issues to find references by
themselves, on books or on the web (with the aid of
the hyperlinked references).
The
description of the interactions between the
generations is a personal view, so the description of the grandchildren generation is.
Scholars of History and Ethnology may well argue that this view is not based on
science, and they might be perfectly right. My description is as good as any
other. Does not really matter who is closer to the truth, what is important is
that some future generation will
have to cope with the problems we are creating now.
I
hope that when all the pieces of the puzzle
fit together the reader will see the whole picture: we are well aware of
the fact that we are going to almost destroy
Life on Earth during the next 50 years, but equally aware that we will do nothing to avoid that. Our grandchildren will be those who are
going to fix the mess, with hard work and
energy. The good news: they will have
the meanings to do the job.
Sometimes I will be critic with regard to political leaders, but I am
not taking the side of any political party or movement. As I will explain,
political leaders are just one more little nuisance in the overall problem.
They could help very much, but they will not.
The
book is not for everyone. I urge people who believe in the superiority of one
human race over another to close these pages right now. I suggest also not
proceeding to readers who believe that man is not
an evolution of the ape, or that the universe has been created in seven days
some five thousand years ago. I respect their believes, but we just are not
talking the same language.