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Our Battered Earth

By Laraine Rose

The earth doctors gather around. Conferences are held, cures are offered, but they can't agree. They argue. "It's not really sick," some say. "It's on its deathbed!" others cry. The rhetoric escalates, the remedies proliferate, the doctors procrastinate, while the patient deteriorates. Nothing is done. They need to make further studies. They write prescriptions that are never filled. Alas, so much of it is just a delaying tactic to allow the polluting to continue and the profits to accumulate. The patient never gets the medicine, his ills increase, the crisis deepens, and the battering of the earth continues.

Now more than anything else the threat to humanity comes from the destruction of the earth's environment. And it needs a movement of planetary dimensions to arrest the holocaust.

After enumerating many problems that the nations must concentrate on solving relative to the environment, Raj Chengappa concludes his editorial with these words: "All this must be done without delay. For the threat is no more to your children's future. It is now. And here."

The earth and the life on it are very complex, intricately interwoven. The millions of interrelated living creatures have been referred to as the web of life. Cut one strand, and the web may start to unravel. Topple one domino, and dozens of others will fall. The cutting down of a tropical rain forest illustrates this.

By photosynthesis the rain forest takes in carbon dioxide from the air and returns oxygen to it. It drinks up huge quantities of rainwater but uses very little in making its food. The great bulk of it is recycled into the atmosphere as water vapor. There it makes new rain clouds for more needed rainfall for the rain forest and the millions of living plants and animals it nourishes beneath its green canopy.

Then the rain forest is cut down. The carbon dioxide remains overhead like a blanket to hold in the sun’s heat. Little oxygen is added to the atmosphere for the benefit of the animals. Little rain is recycled for more rainfall. Instead, any rain that falls rushes off the land into streams, carrying with it the topsoil necessary for the regrowth of plants. Streams and lakes are muddied, fish die. Silt is carried to the oceans and covers tropical reefs, and they die. Millions of plants and animals that once thrived under the green canopy disappear, the heavy rains that once watered the land diminish, and the long slow process of desertification sets in. Remember, the great Sahara Desert of Africa was once green, but now this largest expanse of sand on earth is edging into parts of Europe.

At Earth Summits, the United States and other affluent countries use pressure to try to get Brazil and other developing countries to stop cutting their rain forests. "The United States argues," according to a New York Times dispatch, "that forests, especially tropical forests, are being destroyed at an alarming rate in the developing world and that the planet as a whole will be the loser. Forests, it argues, are a global asset that help regulate the climate by absorbing heat-trapping carbon dioxide and are the repository of a major portion of the world’s living species."

The charge of hypocrisy is quick in coming from the developing nations. According to The New York Times, they "bridle at what they see as an attempt to abridge their sovereignty by countries that long ago cut down their own trees for profit but now want to place the main burden of global forest conservation on countries struggling for economic survival." A Malaysian diplomat put it bluntly: "We are certainly not holding our forests in custody for those who have destroyed their own forests and now try to claim ours as part of the heritage of mankind." In the Pacific Northwest, the United States has only 10 percent of its old-growth rain forests left, and they are still being logged, yet it wants Brazil, which still has 60 percent of its Amazon forests, to stop all logging. You, who take pride in law, 'do you, the one preaching, "Conserve your forests," cut down your own?'

"Brazil is one of the most vulnerable countries to climate changes in the world because of its invaluable biodiversity. If the Amazon loses more than 40% of its forest cover, we will reach a turning point from where we cannot reverse the savannization process of the world's largest forest," said Carlos Nobre, from the Brazilian National Institute for Space Research (INPE) and President of the International Geosphere Biosphere Program (IGBP).

Closely linked to the destruction of forests are the concerns about global warming. The chemical and thermal dynamics are complex, but concern focuses primarily on one chemical in the atmosphere, carbon dioxide. It is a major factor in the heating of the earth. Researchers of the Byrd Polar Research Center reported last year that "all mid- and low-altitude mountain glaciers are now melting and retreating - some of them quite rapidly - and that the ice record contained in these glaciers shows that the last 50 years have been much warmer than any other 50-year period" on record. Too little carbon dioxide could mean colder weather; too much could mean melting polar icecaps and glaciers and flooding of coastal cities.

Concerning carbon dioxide India Today said: "It may constitute just a fraction of the atmospheric gases: 0.03 per cent of the total. But without carbon dioxide, our planet would be as cold as the moon. By trapping the heat radiating from the earth's surface, it regulates global temperatures to a life-sustaining 15 degrees celsius. But if its quantity increases, the earth could turn into one giant sauna bath."

If global weather monitoring stations are anything to go by, the heat is truly on. The '90s saw six of the seven hottest summers since weather began to be recorded about 150 years ago. The apparent culprit: a 26 percent rise of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere over the pre-industrial revolution level.

The source is thought to be the 1.8 billion tons of carbon dioxide spewed out annually by burning fossil fuels. A hoped-for treaty to exercise more control over carbon dioxide emissions was so watered down at a recent Earth Summit that it reportedly "raised the temperatures" of the climatologists there. One of them was so heated up that he said: "We just can't continue business as normal. It is an indisputable fact that the global bank account of gases has lost its equilibrium. Something has to be done or we'll soon have millions of environmental refugees." He was referring to those who would flee from their flooded homelands.

Another burning issue concerns the so-called holes appearing in the ozone layer that protects earth from cancer-causing ultraviolet rays. The chief culprit is the CFC (chlorofluorocarbons). They are used in refrigeration, air-conditioning, and cleaning solvents and as blowing agents in creating plastic foams. In many countries they are still spewed out by aerosol sprays. When they reach the stratosphere, the sun's ultraviolet rays break them down, and free chlorine is released, each atom of which can destroy at least 100,000 ozone molecules. Holes, regions with drastically reduced ozone levels, are left in the ozone layer, both in Antarctica and in Northern latitudes, which means that more ultraviolet rays reach the earth.

These rays kill phytoplankton and krill, which are at the bottom of the ocean's food chain. Mutations are caused in the DNA molecules that contain life's genetic code. Crops are affected. The rays cause eye cataracts and skin cancers in humans. When NASA researchers found high concentrations of chlorine monoxide over northern regions of the United States, Canada, Europe, and Russia, one of the researchers said: "Everybody should be alarmed about this. It’s far worse than we thought." Lester Brown, president of Worldwatch Institute, reported: "Scientists estimate that accelerated depletion of the ozone layer in the northern hemisphere will cause an additional 200,000 deaths in the US alone from skin cancer during the next 50 years. Worldwide, millions of lives are at risk."

Biodiversity, the keeping of as many plants and animals as possible functioning in their natural habitats, is another current concern. Discover magazine published an excerpt from biologist Edward O. Wilson’s book The Diversity of Life, in which he listed the extinction of thousands of species of birds, fish, and insects, as well as species usually dismissed as unimportant: "Many of the vanished species are mycorrhizal fungi, symbiotic forms that enhance the absorption of nutrients by the root systems of plants. Ecologists have long wondered what would happen to land ecosystems if these fungi were removed, and we will soon find out."

In that book Wilson also asked and then answered this question about the importance of saving species: "What difference does it make if some species are extinguished, if even half of all the species on earth disappear? Let me count the ways. New sources of scientific information will be lost. Vast potential biological wealth will be
destroyed. Still undeveloped medicines, crops, pharmaceuticals, timber, fibers, pulp, soil-restoring vegetation, petroleum substitutes, and other products and amenities will never come to light. It is fashionable in some quarters to wave aside the small and obscure, the bugs and weeds, forgetting that an obscure moth from Latin America saved Australia's pastureland from overgrowth by cactus, that the rosy periwinkle provided the cure for Hodgkin's disease and childhood lymphocytic leukemia, that the bark of the Pacific yew offers hope for victims of ovarian and breast cancer, that a chemical from the saliva of leeches dissolves blood clots during surgery, and so on down a roster already grown long and illustrious despite the minimal nature of research addressed to it.

In amnesiac reverie it is also easy to overlook the services that ecosystems provide to humanity. They enrich the soil and create the very air we breathe. Without these amenities the remaining tenure of the human race would be nasty and brief."

Thoughts to ponder:

~The great Sahara Desert of Africa was once green.

~‘Do you, the one preaching, “Conserve your forests,” cut down your own?’

~Too little carbon dioxide—colder weather
Too much of it—melting glaciers

~“What difference does it make if some species are extinguished?”

~Without microorganisms, the tenure of the human race would be short and nasty.

As the saying goes — made trite by repetition only because it is so beautifully fitting — the foregoing is only the tip of the iceberg. When will the battering of the earth end?

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While America tells countries like Brazil to protect their forests, she is still importing (often illegally) millions of cubic feet of tropical hardwoods each year.

I agree. Man’s greed and often ignorance, his shortsightedness and often outright malice, oppose his making headway.

Very well written. This we all know, but we are still importing lumber from other countries where endangered forests are being cut, to provide it. Also, exporting banned herbicides and insecticides to other countries. Then importing their produce, so where does it end? Only the few who cry in the wilderness are concerned and trying to do something about it, but there is too much money to be made, and the same things will continue.

To mention but some of the problems: (1) Deforestation is affecting earth’s ability to absorb carbon dioxide, which, in turn, may contribute to more extreme weather patterns. (2) Excessive pesticide usage is destroying insect populations that perform vital ecological roles, including the pollinating of crops. (3) Overfishing and pollution of seas and rivers are greatly decreasing the fish populations. (4) The greedy use of earth’s natural resources leaves little for future generations and is thought to be hastening global warming. Some environmentalists point to the retreating of glaciers and the calving of icebergs in the Arctic and Antarctic as evidence of global warming.
Man certainly has made a global mess and, you are right, money is the bottom line.

Thanks for the important piece. Greed indeed is the real problem in all of this. When I point out to people that in the early 1970's I go 30 MPG in my car and 40 years later we are not doing much better I'm told that the consumer did not want high mileage cars and we need to leave everything to the free market. How free is a market that costs us the planet?

An aside: Emotion is the only thing that will change things, there is not nearly enough outrage from everyday people.

Thank you for the reference to your car. I have posted here my website "All About Cars" for your pleasure and consideration. Read there about my Grandpa (the inventor) and how his invention was mistreated.
God bless.

Exceptionally well written and very disturbing. I would give more than five stars if I could.

Thank you, June. I know that my voice is just one in billions .. I hope that it helps.

Horrible....an end to mankind....could that be the solution that gaia is looking for?

You could be right!
Ananda Lee Tan, North American Program Coordinator for GAIA (Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives wrote a scathing article to the Editor of NY Times re Incineration. If you haven't already done so you may check it out at http://www.no-burn.org/gaia-raises-serious-concern-on-new-york-times-article-on-inciner...

Hello there Laraine, excellent piece, good on you.
May I place it on my site, with due kudos of course.
With Regard,
Chris

Thank you Chris. You may with my blessing.

Well said, Laraine. We're very good at lecturing other countries on how they should do what we won't.

So true, Larry. It's time we took our own advice.

Very good reading, have tried to post to twitter twice, must be my day as I keep getting this message "TwitterBar can't contact Twitter because Twitter is down"
Most likely will not get back to this intel again, but if I do I will try again.
Have a nice day.
Elsie

Thanks for the try Elsie. I am very Twitter illiterate so if anyone would like to "Twitter" this intel feel free to do so.

My pleasure! Thanks for the visit.
Laraine

Excellent article. It is very worrying that along with man's relentless destruction of the rain forests, we now have natural climate changes to deal with, and no matter what we do we can't prevent global warming from taking place.

Also the recent earthquakes around the world, combined with reports that another Icelandic volcano is about to blow, and the volcanic mass under Yellowstone is bulging too.

Then the mysterious deaths of millions of birds and fish around the world in the last few months. Could life as we know it be due to come to an end? Is the 2012 prophecy real? Scary thoughts...

Poddys Feb 10, 2011 04:25

appreciated

Hi, Poddys,
Like all major species, mankind has come to the end of his days. What possible use can there be for an animal that thinks it is 'neat' to have plastic butterflies made so he can stick them to his wall? Who needs to make mountains of virtually indestructable babies nappies? Why do we create ever more non-essential products? Why do we replace perfectly good equipment? Only mankind is stupid enough to believe that an energy saving fridge saves energy. The profligate consumption of raw materials and energy in the manufacture of the 'energy efficient' product more than cancels out any benefit.
I don't know about 2012 but I really do not see how the Earth can continue to support a rapacious species like man that simply does not know when to stop.

theoldcoot Feb 10, 2011 04:43

appreciated

I don't think that there has been a species before that lives on greed like mankind goes. Our lives center around Money, Power and Material Things, and despite the counteless wars that have taken place, man continues to breed to a point where the limit is being reached. I don't think that has ever happened before, unless it was in our pre-history, before the last ice-age. There are theories that advanced civilizations did exist before, and those who survived the ice-age are the remnants. It's plausible.

The Earth can only support the level of population increase that we are seeing for so long, and it would only take the sea levels to rise a few feet, as I am sure they will, for a good percentage or the best farmland, and the most populated areas as well, to disappear under the oceans. When that happens, which may be combined with other natural disasters (earthquakes, volcanic eruptions etc), the mass panic for survival will bring man to his knees.

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