this post was submitted on 17 Sep 2025
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They are killing humans. The planet will be fine. The life on it will not be. Long after we are gone a new dominant species will rise. It's silly to think the planet ends with us
This is a common reply I see. I'd argue our impact on the very systems of life is now large enough that there's far from a non-zero risk that we do in fact take the systems that sustain life on the planet with us.
So the planet as rock in space is indeed likely to outlive us but the planet as a host of life is less clear cut.
There has never been a species before that has pulled so heavily on the web of life and that's why its even more important to fight with every last breath to try and fight to protect the only source of life we are aware of in the universe.
I don't think the planet will stop being able to sustain life because of us. Life will look different. But like a particularly sexy chaotician once said "life finds a way"
I think it's arrogant of us to think that the world ends with us. Even if it does. If the the timeline is truly infinite then life will find it's way back
This is not to say I don't support climate science. I still want us to try to fix the harm we have done and limit our future impact
I don't think its arrogance just a reflection of the current level of understanding earth systems. We have grown in capacity and reach to be affecting the fundamental systems of life. Those systems have been self-healing but we are causing unprecedented significant and wide reaching change and there's a non-zero chance we will hit positive feedback loops that completely disrupt the mechanisms of life on this planet.
Its a very minor point of disagreement but its just to acknowledge the scale of impact we are making. We've been fooled by how good earth is maintaining life that its less fragile and precious than it is
While we disagree I respect your thoughtful response
Way more than humans. Heck many species have gone extinct with us and we will keep going with technology when many others die. Given the insects are dying off already we may be dropping it back down to practically unicellular life. At least on land.
I hope the next species that gets a shot at intelligence are ants. They deserve a good run. A close second choice would be moose.
I think it will probably be a new species but now I'm thinking of an ant moose hybrid
The future!