Humans Use 83 Percent of Earth's Surface 719
belloc writes "CNN is reporting on a Wildlife Conservation Society report that states that humans take up 83 percent of the Earth's land surface to live on, farm, mine or fish. The article rerers to a WCS human footprint map, but the WCS site seems to have been CNN'd. Funny: I just got back from a little road trip across the southwest, and from all the nothing you see out there, you would think that 83% is a bit high. I guess Arizona farmlands must look a lot like wild, untouched desert."
what a skewed article (Score:5, Insightful)
isn't that the point..there's a whole continent that's basically uninhabited..but since that would lower their numbers, they threw it out.
Bogus (Score:3, Insightful)
Consider Your Source (Score:3, Insightful)
Incorrect summary (Score:5, Insightful)
This is not a good summary of what the rWCN report states. 83% of the earth's surface is "directly influenced by human agency" (their words). This does not mean humans occupy or farm in 83%; this measure could be anything as simple as "takes water from an aquifer that flows though land x".
To me, the more shocking claim is that humans appropriate directly or indirectly 40% of the NPP of world as a whole. That's a hell of a lot of caloric consumption by any standard.
I Wonder About The Source... (Score:2, Insightful)
I mean, MS-backed studies show all kinds of strange crap. Studies that come out of pro-gun groups show that we should all have guns and crime would go away, and from anti-gun groups we get that we all have to be totally disarmed in order for crime to go down.
I always am pretty skeptical about reports from highly polarized sources.
Re:Interesting (Score:3, Insightful)
Its another environmento-political scare tactic. There are a lot of examples of lands directly used by humans, yet provide a truly excellent habitat for wildlife at the same time.
The thousands of acres of lands used by a military airfield, for one example - wildlife thrives there, and the planes flying around overhead don't seem to bother them. But if you ask these guys, humans are 'affecting' it, therefore it must be completely barren and dead.
About the data (Their words) (Score:3, Insightful)
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About the Data
Last updated 6 September 2002
General issues:
The maps of the human footprint and of the last of the wild should not be read too literally. Although there is no doubt that the human footprint and last of the wild express an important perspective on the world, it is also true that, in its details, these maps contain inaccuracies (acknowledged below) and are mapped at a scale coarser than most conservation efforts
These maps are based on geographic proxies for drivers of human impact: human population density, land cover and land use mapping, lights regularly visible from a satellite at night, locations of roads, rivers and coasts, settlement patterns, etc. However drivers are not inevitably impacts. One of the roles of conservation is to find ways for human beings to lessen their impacts while still making their living.
The input datasets used to map the human footprint are enormously expensive to maintain and update, as a result they tend to lag behind the patterns they depict. All the datasets used here were released in the 1990s, however some are based on much older datasets or datasets which are incomplete. In all cases they do not depict the current 2002 extent of roads, settlement or population density. This problem leads to underestimates of the amount of human influence.
The methods used to produce the input datasets themselves have problems. For example, there are known problems mapping grazing lands, particularly in arid regions. Settlements data and roads are not identified by the type of settlement or road. The lights data sometimes over-estimates the "lit" area for over-bright pixels. The population dataset relies on population estimates made in different countries using different census techniques, which sometimes results in marked changes across national boundaries. These problems probably lead in most instances to underestimates of human influence, but may result in overestimates in some cases.
Our interpretations of the amount of human influence based on the input factors relies on simplified scales from 0 to 10 which do not vary by region, biological or cultural context. The understanding of the human influence on nature is in its infancy, and despite 100 years of ecological science, not known very well; however we do know enough to be concerned. We tried to be conservative and common sensical in our determinations of human influence from the various input factors, using advice from the scientific literature and our colleagues.
We probably overestimate the direct effect of roads in some cases. Direct influence from roads in terms of pollution, soil compaction, modification of stream courses and waterways, introduction of new species, and road kill is known to vary from a few meters to up to several hundred meters from roads. The roads dataset we used maps roads only to an accuracy of 2 km, so we treated all of this 2 km region as influenced by roads. We also treat human access from roads as up to 15 km from roads of all types, though this may be less in some countries and more in others.
The level of access from rivers is probably also incorrectly estimated in some instances. We defined access along all major rivers, where a major river was defined as one depicted as one or more polygons in the input database and connected continuously to the sea. However access along all rivers is probably more likely, since any river large enough to be mapped is probably large enough to support a canoe or other boat. But our rivers dataset does not include the effects of waterfalls or dams, which can impede access up rivers.
The human footprint and the last of the wild do not directly take into account war and conflict between groups of human beings, though these effects may dramatically influence the outcomes of human influence on wildlife and wild places. In some cases, for example, conflicts lead to increases in the levels of hunting because of increased access to weapons, even long after the war has ended (for example, in Cambodia.) In other cases, conflicts result in lower human population densities and less investment in infrastructure (for example, in Angola) with the result that areas become wilder.
The human footprint and the last of the wild are not the complete story of conservation. In fact they do not directly consider conservation targets (animals, plants, air, soil or water processes) at all. Conservation planning requires understanding what is important to conserve in a given area (the conservation targets), how those conservation targets respond to human influence, and the type and degree of that human influence. The last of the wild is not a complete prescription for nature conservation. Even if we saved all of the last-of-the-wild areas, our task would be incomplete.
Specific points:
Brazil - a tile of the roads dataset is missing in central Brazil along the eastern edge of the Amazon rainforest in the region of the Chapadas das Mangabieras.
Democratic Republic of Congo - another tile of roads is missing in the central part of the country.
New Guinea - in Irian Jaya human influence from the Taritatu River is over estimated, because although it is a large river connected to the sea, there is little human movement up the river into the Foja Mountains Reserve, a relatively pristine area that appears heavily influenced on the human footprint map. In general the human footprint map seems to over-estimate influence in many parts of New Guinea and should be used with caution.
Tundra and boreal forest biomes - Access during winter months is not restricted to roads or rivers, but can occur wherever the snow is packed enough to support a motor vehicle.
Note: We welcome specific comments about the human footprint and the last of the wild, especially notations of specific areas where the level of human influence seems to be over- or under-estimated. Send your comments to last-of-the-wild@wcs.org.
Slightly biased perhaps? (Score:4, Insightful)
I think this would fall under the "statistics" portion of "lies, damned lies, and statistics". I'd feel a lot less skeptical if:
A. The report was put out by a more impartial group than the Wildlife Conservation Society (that's like an endangerment study put out by a big-game hunting club),
B. they included their method and analysis, and
C. they did not preface their findings by "Scientists say..." which usually is shorthand for, "You're stupid, they're smart, we're quoting them, so believe whatever we tell you."
Is there any further information? How did they arrive at a figure of 83% and four Earths?
and how did they count this? (Score:3, Insightful)
Does anyone remember equilibrium? (Score:5, Insightful)
I really have a tough time stomaching environmentalist arguments about "overuse" and "overpopulation", because those arguments invariably ignore any idea of equilibrium. There will be an equilibrium to everything humans do. If we eat too much food, one of two things will happen: we figure out how to make more food, or we die. Period.
So I have a serious problem with this being an issue. Also, if you look at the map, a good percentage of the land surface was left out of the equation because of "no data". So what, no data. Just because it's inhospitable doesn't mean you leave it out of your equation. Add Antarctica (artica? arctica? I can never remember...) and I'll bet that number drops a good bit. No one can really live easily in Death Valley or the Sahara, but people still do it.
Hell, looking at the green area of the map really tells me that only about 50% of the land on Earth is really being used or exploited.
This article is just more of the same sensationalist crap that we have come to know and love from our environmentalist whacko friends.
Re:Crap (Score:5, Insightful)
Most of that empty space is BLM land which either is currently or has been historically grazed by cattle and (to a lesser degree nowadays) sheep.
Have you ever wondered why towns like Winnemucca have annual Basque festivals? Basque sheepherders were imported into the northwest corner of the Great Basin to herd vast numbers of sheep.
As I said above, nowadays it's mostly cattle. It requires a large number of acres to support a single cow in the Great Basin. Many of the valleys that are too dry to graze cattle support large herds of feral horses. "feral" means "escaped from captivity". The modern horse is not native to North America and their presence is indeed a human impact.
Does the fact that I know far, far more about the historical and modern use of the land in Nevada make me a whacko? Or does your willingness to spew nonsense make you an ideologue?
You can't irrigate deserts without water, BTW. The Imperial Valley is the largest desert irrigation project in the world. Because of it and various other water demands in many years the mouth of the Colorado is dried up. In other words, the river is overallocated. Where will all the extra water to irrigate those parts of the Mojave desert that aren't currently irrigated come from? Not from the only major river system in that desert
Re:what a skewed article (Score:2, Insightful)
Seriously, though, it does chap my hide when organizations like these use questionable science to further the cause of ecology. It's just idiotic. I consider myself a green (lower-case-g) and the thing is, we who want a sustainable earth will get nowhere blatantly ignoring good science and flubbing things to further our cause.
The ends do not justify the means - how often must people learn this?
Re:what a skewed article (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:what a skewed article (Score:3, Insightful)
Please note where it says "can be farmed" If the land isn't readily farmable, they didn't include it. So basiclly what they are saying, is we are farming on all but 2% of our farm land.
Ummm... No shit.
Re:Do the math (Score:3, Insightful)
Miles of empty space. (Score:2, Insightful)
And all those 'wild' forests? Nah, they are tree farms.
As for fishing on land, read a little about fish farming and it's environmental impacts. Yes, we do fish on land.
But of course, many people who profit from business as usual would have you believe that this is all hooey, and people either have minimal impact on the environment, or some scientific fix will be found for the damage.
Just wait until we sell 1 billion Chinese their own cars and split level ranch houses. There is no way the rest of the world could live like the first world given the world's available resources.
But hey, we've got ours, so why worry? After all, we are (genetically superior/favored by God/better than those other people/take your pick) so it is right and just and good that we get more than them. We are (improving the gene pool/carrying out God's plan/just taking what we are due/take your pick.)
Re:what a skewed article (Score:4, Insightful)
And if you would RTFA a little more carefully, the purpose of the study was to identify areas to prioritize for conservation - in other words the 17% not impacted by humans. Now, the article may've been written in a somewhat sensationalistic manner, but the conservation organization involved makes it clear they're trying to figure out how to best spend their money.
Re:Crap (Score:2, Insightful)
Does the fact that I know far, far more about the historical and modern use of the land in Nevada make me a whacko?
No, but you fall into the same trap of assuming static technology levels.
Where will all the extra water to irrigate those parts of the Mojave desert that aren't currently irrigated come from?
Ever hear of pipes? Build a giant de-sal plant at the ocean and pipe it to Nevada. Or pipe it down from Washington state. If we wanted to turn Nevada into a giant farm, it would be expensive, but doable.
But to state "there are no limits" is to state nonsense.
Sorry, but it's the truth. Every time the gloom and doomers state that the sky is falling, new technology comes along that proves them wrong. And then they say, "well, but what if that solution hadn't come along!!", which of course misses the simple point that necessity breeds invention.
Poppycock! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Humans bad. Animals good. (Score:3, Insightful)
That said, so what? The vast majority of that 83% is agricultural use or just because there happens to be a road in the area. Yeah, we've touched that area but we're using it to GROW crops, which is a good use of land and hardly means we've destroyed it.
If you look at the "About the Data" link on wcs.org, the first sentence reads: "The maps of the human footprint and of the last of the wild should not be read too literally." Wow, at least they open with a surprisingly honest sentence!
They then continue: "These maps are based on geographic proxies for drivers of human impact: human population density, land cover and land use mapping, lights regularly visible from satellite at night, locations of roads, rivers and coasts, settlement patterns, etc. However drivers are not inevitably impacts."
In other words, this shows where we COULD be impacting the environment. This is no indication of whether we actually ARE impacting the environment in these locations, or if the impact might even be good.
Like I said, it's a slow week for environmental news...
Re:Does anyone remember equilibrium? (Score:4, Insightful)
Why not talk about it now so we DON'T starve?
Re:Incorrect summary (Score:3, Insightful)
In fact, the purpose of the exercise is to identify those areas in which *human* conservation efforts can be most effectively applied.
Frequently the cheapest and most effective means of wildlife conservation is to minimize human interference in those areas which are currently least disturbed by human activity.
RTFA rather than rant and rave. If you actually care about conservation. It seems pretty clear that you don't.
Re:Do the math (Score:5, Insightful)
Texas comprises 262,000 square miles. Putting (circa) 6 billion people in that space gives 1184 square feet per person. Not entirely comfortable considering your house would butt up against someone else's on all sides but certainly livable.
Unfortunately, this is just LIVING space. Where are you going to get food? Growing enough crops for one person to sustainably survive requires at between one and six acres of land -- one acre is over 43,000 square feet! Cattle ranching and other "meat farming" requires far more space, because you have to feed the cattle. Then you need a water source. Power generation. Transportation systems. Buildings in which to work/create things. Modern conveniences.
Pretty soon you're up to 20-30 acres per person required in the US to keep things moving. America comprises 2.3 billion acres... do the math and you'll see we don't even have room in the US for the measly 250,000,000 residents we already have, much less the entire world!
Just a thought... it bugs me when people (and I don't blame you) overgeneralize how much space one person REALLY takes up.
Besides, I like to stretch out.
Re:Crap (Score:3, Insightful)
Next time you drive past what you believe to be "unused ranch land," take a close look at the height of the grass outside the fence, and compare it to the height of the grass inside the fence. If you're in Arizona, Nevada, New Mexico, Colorado, or Utah, chances are you'll have to look hard to even see the grass inside the fence -- you'll see a lot of sage, scrub, and juniper, but very little grass. Why? Because ranchers graze there. If cows aren't there currently, it means either/both: 1) the parcel is overgrazed and can no longer support animals; or 2) the rancher has moved his herd to another field with fresh grass. Remember, the point of the report being discussed is not about habitation but about use. There don't have to be cowboys ropin' steers within sight of the road to make it a working ranch.
-schussat
Re:Crap (Score:3, Insightful)
COME ONE GUYS!! Do more than read the
Go ahead, keep repeating your mantra: "there's nothing wrong with the environment". You are harldy rocking the boat with your conventional anti-environmental ideology.
Re:Crap (Score:4, Insightful)
If you drive it, you're missing a lot. Try flying the central corridor as I've done and you'll get a better appreciation for all that "desolation". You'll see widely separated but huge tracts of farmland under cultivation for hay and alfalfa. That hay and alfalfa is used to augment the natural growth in feeding hundreds of thousands of head of open-range cattle that occupy the "empty" between those farms. You'll see thousands of acres of mine tailings, land permanently removed from use because of its toxicity. You'll see on your sectional that there's a huge part of Nevada you can't fly over because it's used for testing aircraft and nuclear weapons. You'll see a watershed that eventually keeps a half million people from dying of thirst. You'll see that almost the entire state is checkerboarded with fences. Those fences are there only because someone is using the land for their purposes and wants to keep all the other uses out.
All those thing sure meet the definition for "appropriated" to me.
Re:Crap (Score:3, Insightful)
Fishermen can hardly make a living in the Pacific Northwest as it is. And of course fish are something we eat, so messing with that ecology trades off one source of food for another.
Would it be a net gain? You have blind faith that it would, but I rather doubt you've run the numbers.
As far as desalinization plants go
Claiming that technology can fix anything is handwaving nonsense. You're being childishly naive.
And, no, I'm not claiming that the sky is falling. Don't fucking put words in my mouth. My guess is my knowledge of technology is as much greater than yours as is my knowledge of software engineering or desert ecology
Now I get it (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Crap (Score:2, Insightful)
I had the pleasure to hear one of the scientists responsible for this report explain what in his words was called the 'ecological footprint'; I guess the version we just read has already been dumbed down.
The ecological footprint is defined as the sum of the earth surface that a human apropriates or, simpler 'uses', in order to live. This includes for everybody a piece of ocean where fish live, a piece of forest where trees breathe out oxygen (AND breathe in co2), a piece of land to grow vegetables, a piece of land to graze cows etc. etc. etc.
So saying the ecological or 'human' footprint is 83% of the planet does not mean we have pushed away all forests, oceans, etc. It means that that's what we NEED at the current consumption rates. You can imagine that this is a daunting task to determine this ecological footprint. It means mapping what we HAVE, an incredibly, monstrously difficult task. This scientist freely acknowledged that. But they've gone OUT OF THEIR WAY to get as accurate a number as they possibly can. The full report contains much much more detailed information and I'm sure if you can get a copy you'd be rather stunned by the detail in there. Try if you can find a copy, I heard the guy talking about it for about an hour and was thoroughly impressed with the scientific backing of this report.
Re:Crap (Score:3, Insightful)
The stat may be wrong in the final number but the US and Europeans for that matter consume an extreme amount of reasources in comparison to its place in terms of population and such to other parts of the world.
However, the US economy which fuels a large hunk of the global economy absolutely feeds off the giant bloated tit of over-consumption. Getting us and even our European friends to turn down the consumption while not destroying the world-wide economy is a major issue. There are only so many resources and not all of it can just be re-produced.
The natural resources of the world are not like the chips commercial where they just promise to make more. Yet, we are not on any ledge of abyss as some alarmists like to say but we are driving up to the edge quick. Moderation in talk and management of resources is the key.
>Sheesh, how about irrigating the desert?
Where the heck are you going to get the fresh water to irrigate a desert? No, I am not a crazed environmentalists about to spout about a fresh water shortage. However, I also understand that there is a finite amount of fresh water available for human use. You can create a huge water shortage (especially in the drought-ridden parts of the US) quick with such a plan.
Technology has been wonderful at destroying natural ecosystems with half-baked perposals from folks like you and half-baked proposals from environmentalists who think a dose of technology can turn back the clock. Both sides are wrong.
>We'll stabilize population way before then, but >this planet could support hundreds of billions >of people.
Man sign me up for that! I want to live an over-crowded hell sprawl with everyone in the world living at population density rates that would drive someone from Tokyo nuts.
If the US can control its consumption and the third-world can control its population expansion then half the environmental problems we see can today can be dealt with in a reasonable fashion.
_______________________________________________
Property ownership is a GOOD THING ! (Score:2, Insightful)
How many public parks and public nature areas do you see needing a continuous clean up effort to keep them free of litter? The reason for this is that the fact that nobody owns them, a good majority of the people that use the areas feel less inclined to keep things properly clean.
All in all this article is journalistic trash.
Eliminating two of the largest unpopulated land masses from the equation is simply ridiculous and illustrates clearly the political aims the article is seeking to achieve.
Re:Crap (Score:3, Insightful)
Have you patented your invention that will enable us to tap into that vast amount of energy contained by the rest of the universe? I'm sure you can make a few bucks once you figure out how to do it.
Theoretical amounts of energy aren't the issue. The amount of energy that is available to us within the framework of today's economy augumented by a realistic figure for its future growth is all that's of interest.
And there's no evidence that this is unlimited.
Re:Statistics (Score:5, Insightful)
Looks like it's that time again.
They're an alarmist group that really doesn't know what they're talking about. Let's take your first paragraph:
The statistics regarding the World Wildlife Fund's footprint are accurate for TODAY the 'ecological footprint' is defined as the 'area of productive land and water that people need to support their consumption and to dispose of waste'. London's footprint is 120 times as big as the land it covers, and as extrapolated by the WWF, Earth's ecological footprint is in danger of growing larger than the entire planet.
Great, that's very informative. The problem is, it's entirely misleading. So, okay. London has a footprint 120 times as big as the land it covers, but so what? The problem lies here: they're assuming that if an acre of land is used to support human (farming/fishing/living/whatever) that it's completely used. As in, that land marked used is somehow fully used.
If it's used for farming, odds are it's not being used to it's full potential. If it's used for trash, you can just keep putting more trash on top of it... or use it to create *more* land. (Tip: It's called landfill.) What the WWF is neglecting is that there's no reason, aside from a preserve, to *not* use land. Just like a house seems to take up the same 'footprint' as an apartment building doesn't mean that if we want to double the number of people, we need two houses.
It's just flawed, lousy logic. But that's okay. They're cruising for donations.
Re:The Club of Rome (Score:5, Insightful)
Since it appears that you didn't RTFA, here's what they say:
"As such they [the relatively unimpacted areas they've identified] provide a promising opportunity to conserve wildlife and wild places while minimizing conflicts with existing human structures and demands."
All they're doing is trying to identify areas in which conservation efforts might have the biggest bang for the bucks. No doomsday, sky-is-falling scenarios. No political manifesto.
As for the Economist, I read it regularly and I'd have to say that "slipshod" applies to a bunch of their efforts to shoehorn the world into their narrowly conservative world view.
Chicken Little, the Boy Who Cried Wolf, & Real (Score:2, Insightful)
Maybe faking your figures is dishonest, and wrong in principle, and maybe even such sacred figures as professional environmentalists should (god forbid) be held to the same standards of integrity as the rest of us.
Maybe every time these people issue a terrifying pronouncement which turns out to be dead wrong, it further diminishes the credibility of environmentalism in general.
These people think of themselves as priests, and they take a similarly dim view of "heretics" who dare disagree with them, but they're more like witch doctors: However often their prophetic dreams and visions fail to pan out, the True Believers still believe.
Meanwhile, we've got damned few credible, responsible organizations actually keeping an honest eye on things and informing the public accurately. Since the oil, as you observe, really will run out one of these years, it would be nice to have access to some reliable information about the matter. Instead, we get circus acts from professional fund raisers.
Book - David Suzuki (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Crap (Score:4, Insightful)
Did you know during the hot summers here that grass needs to be watered on a daily basis just to survive? When the temperature soars over 105, the soil literally bakes the roots of the grass! If you skip watering the lawn for just one day, then the lawn dies! Watering lawns in San Diego is one thing but here and in places like phoenix its insane. Watering grass in the hot desert uses alot more water then you would in a cooler or non desert climate.
American Indians never understood why white men water lawns in the desert. If you want lawns then move out east. I feel like its the equalivant of growing palm trees outdoors in Detroit and having a big 3,000 watt heater and fan blowing on them 24/7 during the winter. Its dumb and pointless and wastes a lot of resources.
Most newer mini-malls now use more desert native palm trees, yucca, and desert bushes which are more native to this environment and require less work to maintain. Finally someone realizes that water is not very plentifully here.
In non desert regions like Chicago and New York, watering lawns and washing cars are restricted if the reservoirs are low. Why not ban them here in the desert which gets like %10 of the rainfall of these big cities?
Re:Statistics (Score:5, Insightful)
Although just estimates, these few statistics are testament to the unprecedented escalations in both human population and consumption during the twentieth century
These are estimated statistics! What we have here is an alarmist group making up statistics and drawing radical conclusions based on them. And what am I supposed to do about it? Oh, I'd guess that they're looking for donations so they can publish more insightful reports just like this, to keep me informed of all of these possible catastrophic consequences that are just around the corner.
psuedoscience and truth (Score:2, Insightful)
The issue, of course, boils down to the fact that the logic methodology used in science pretty much precludes anything from being proven, in the sense that one can prove the pythagorean theory. Therefore, if one starts with truth, there is no hope that the relative facts of physical law will change your view. The current classic example is smoking. Reputable scientists say that the preponderance of evidence says that smoking is very dangerous, and at least significantly contributes to an increase in cancer, where the pseudo-scientist says nothing is proven and based on the research no action can be taken. Once again, all science can do is try find a very likely theory to match physical observable to within an acceptable degree of uncertainty.
The situations gets more complicated when science hits the popular press. Mistakes are made in quotes, ideas, statements of theory, and perhaps even in the original logic. Respectable scientists admit the flaws, and investigate to see if the problems are fundamental enough to damage the theory or just miscommunications. Pseudo-scientist, who already know the truth, grab on to these inconsistent data as proof that not only the researcher, but his family, university, sponsors, and anyone else who might come to his or her support is incompetent and should be flogged.
So not to be offtopic, this report has top level problems. A statistical error is not reported. The exact definitions of terms and methodology is not known. Does it make the research invalid? Is it in fact a 'bullshit report.. that make absolutely no sense and assume a static technology level.' With the infomation availablem, it is hard to say. People also site local examples to refute the paper, but the land area of the earth is over 57 million square miles, while the size of Nevada 100 thousand square mile. One could have 100 completely empty areas the size of Nevada and still not invalidate. And remember, those roads you drive on in Nevada, and the desert you walk on to take a leak, as well as much other 'undeveloped' land is affected by human habitation.
Notice how I refute an argument with observables instead of insults and circular arguments? The fact that a lazy worker want a year to be shorter, or a fascist manager wants a year to be longer, would not mean a whit to the observable that it take right about 365 days for the eartg to orbit the sun.
It's Crazy (Score:1, Insightful)
adds together influences from population density, access from roads and waterways, electrical power infrastructure, and the area used by cities and farms.
An influence of the infastructure is pollution and that touches everywhere.
So the study should show 100% but then everyone would know it's BS without reading it.
I guess we could eliminate mankind and make the world 100% wild lands.
I'd include wildlife but that implies humans
Depends on the meaning of the word: use (Score:3, Insightful)
The the 17% of unused land can be easily taken up by Antarctica and the major deserts. There isn't much farmland or fishing going on in Antarctica.
-Restil
Re:Statistics (Score:2, Insightful)
Bah, but who said it wasn't? (Score:3, Insightful)
Everyone knows that eventually human beings are going to cover as much of the planet as possible. That's just how bacterial multiplication works. You multiply until you've reached the limit of the food source. Nice and simple.
Except there are quite a few people out there that view a few acres of trees to be more important than human life. Even a miserable human life.
I happen to love real conservation. You know, more doing things and less bitching about it. You should check out what Ted Turner is doing. He's been buying up ranch land and returning it to what he calls "pre-anglo" form. All the while trying to figure out how to make it profitable, and therefore, sustainable...and the entire time, 100% touched by human hand.
The southwest US (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Statistics (Score:3, Insightful)
Is it really necessary to just keep adding to landfills? Can we reduce our waste? Can we waste more wisely? On the flip side, but entirely related to waste, can we consume more wisely? If so, why not? What's wrong with wanting to have less of an impact on the environment?
What does it really mean to use land to its full potential? Does that mean raping it? Or having a relationship more like stewardship, so the land continues to be fertile and usable long into the future? Personally, I'm not anti-technology, but I am a little anti-growth, and I don't think "sustainability" is just a new buzz-word... At least, it isn't to me.
Re:I think Carlin has it right. (Score:3, Insightful)
We're just trying to save things for us.
Overpollution, etc., may hasten our departure (or at least make it less pleasant), but the actual planet does not give a fuck. The roaches will gladly take our place. Mankind will be seen as a short term abberation.
Wrong forum for people who care (Score:5, Insightful)
One post stating that environmentalists are "wackos" gets a 5:Insightful, one saying Earth can support "hundreds of billions of people" gets a 4:Interesting, while a carefully written post pointing out grazing patterns and water supply issues is labeled a "Troll". Go figure.
This is a fine forum to talk about tech, but a tough audience to talk about the non-artificial world. I suppose that too many are born, live, and die in cities where a lawn qualifies as "nature". Use /. for its strengths, and don't sweat the rest.
Re:83% (Score:2, Insightful)
This is as silly as saying that 22% of the earth is covered by clouds. You mean right now? What about yesterday? How thick are the clouds? How accuratly are we measuring the irregularities in their shapes?
Re:While flying it seems this is pretty true.. (Score:1, Insightful)
To tell you the truth, i don't see *ANY* land that ISN'T marked by humans.
Where do you fly?
During my private pilot training, I flew with my instructor for Bluefield West Virginia to Dublin Virginia at night and in visual flight conditions. After we got out of Bluefield, there was NOTHING for 27NM. Well, there was one solitary porch light, and we saw some heat lighting in Tennessee (you can see that far at 7500'), but that was it.
If you want open land, go to Alaska. Sure it's cold - but there ain't too many people up there. I almost moved there.. I even got a job offer, but decided to stay with my friends and family down here in Virginia.
Re:Incorrect summary (Score:2, Insightful)
To be more accurate, we are one of the only species that has the ability to make lasting impacts on our environment before we get a clue on what we're doing. Case in point: we domesticated the apple tree, and over time narrowed thousands of varieties (a fraction of which surviving only in dedicated labs and preserves) down to a handful. Today, the apple requires the most amount of pesticides, because they no longer have the genetic diversity to evolve along with their parasites. Oops.
The pesticides we use, in turn, poison other things we didn't intend to, like our own water supply. Oops.
Note that I'm not talking about some metaphorical Mother Earth, just that human actions so frequently backfire even on ourselves that your top-of-the-food-chain arrogance is really quite unwarranted. It's even worse if you do accept a moral responsibility of stewardship for our planet corresponding to our power.
Ignorance of evidence is not evidence of absence (Score:3, Insightful)
- "Ha, this institute is biased because they promote computer security. They'll get more support if everyone is scared."
- "How do you define a network? Maybe they define one unprotected computer on a network as an insecure network!"
- "They didn't have full data on networks in China, so they could be completely wrong everywhere else."
.If you aren't a computer scientist / sysadmin, you can still learn to recognize an insecure system. If you aren't an ecologist, you can still learn to recognize an ecological system which has been significantly changed by human activity. But in both cases it takes some studying. Examples of ecological systems which might look untouched but aren't include:- The golden hills of California- the non-forested areas used to be covered with perennial grasslands- tall (four feet), long lived (200+ years) but slow reproducing (live 200 years- you are a k-selected plant) grasses that could take periodic droughts and wildfires. Less than 1% of these grasslands exist today compared to 400 years ago due to weeds, plowing/ag, viruses and grazing.
- The entire midwest tallgrass prairie- the non-farmland land isn't covered with 8 foot tall mixed grasses and 100 million buffalo.
- Old growth vs second growth forests
- desert land like the Sahel and much of the middle-east. These areas weren't always deserts.
- Parklands which are too small to preserve genetic diversity. Can you tell if a set of parks are connected by a sufficient number of wildlife corridors?
All to say that dismissing results due to one's intuition isn't the best reaction if one's intuition isn't all that informed. Especially as peer-reviewed research on this is as close as a Google search away.Re:The Club of Rome (Score:3, Insightful)
Correction- there are lots of studies that theorize that we may be destroying our environment. There are also lots of studies that disagree with those theories. In fact, the NOAA link that you posted says that all of the climate change that has been observed could just be caused by variations in the sun's intensity or the earth's orbit. Some people theorize that the build-up of "greenhouse gases" like CO2 is not causing a climate change, but rather a symptom of it (like this article [osu.edu] for example).
Either way, none of those links that you gave make the jump that you made that our entire eco system is going to irreversibly collapse.
Your claims that the earth is overpopulated are also crap. Right now, you could fit everybody on the earth into Texas with about the same population density as Paris, France (look here [ncpa.org]). And the global population growth rate has been decreasing for the past 30 years.
Nobody is calling for the blatant misuse of our environment, but I think the earth is a lot more robust that you give it credit for, and I think that humans are not as influential to the environment as you seem to think.