I despair over “Mother Earth” and everywhere else. My feeling is that the human race is not keeping up with their side of the bargain after being entrusted with the ‘upkeep’ of the earth and the universe.
My main bugbear is garbage. The majority of people do not care about picking up their garbage if there is no profit in it. Look at recycling in general. No one would do it if they can’t make a buck in the process.
We have ruined most of the rivers, oceans and our total environment because we just do not clear up after we have finished what we have been doing.
Discarded net
Where have we left a mess?
Everywhere it would seem, and it may follow that if we develop the technology (i.e. via science, physics, biology, space travel and time travel) to clear up after ourselves, this would propel the human race in all sorts of different directions of endeavor.
Discarded creels
Area one – Our Rivers:
Our rivers boil with every type of poison and chemical known or used by man, just because we are too lazy or cost conscious to find an alternative for dumping the stuff in them. We could perhaps rather use the more costly possibility of chemical conversion. Imagine what wild and wonderful materials we might unearth or create using this method of waste disposal. By mixing one ‘gunk’ with another ‘gunk’ we may land up with a ‘gonk’!
Citizens of Arlington Virginia river warning, thank heavens he is in a boat
The beautifully polluted Kahn River nice shades of white
Area Two – Our Outdoors:
Our outdoors has been sitting there for thousands or maybe millions of years and we, being such an adventuresome race, do not leave one part of it unscathed or undiscovered. My feeling is that if you are traipsing around all over the countryside, who knows whether that boulder or rock or stone that you dislodge may, over another few thousand years, completely alter the soil erosion pattern or re-route river courses or it may cause a mountain to fall or it might even divert a tectonic plate.
Here’s the man, the river and the mountain, the soil erosion could appear later. All we are missing now is the tectonic plates
Ah! there you are some tectonic plates
Area three – Our Oceans:
Our oceans have become the carbon dioxide sink they have absorbed about 50% of the carbon dioxide (CO2) released from the burning of fossil fuels, resulting in chemical reactions that lower ocean pH. This has caused an increase in hydrogen ion (acidity) of about 30% since the start of the industrial age, they have also become the hugest garbage dumps imaginable, with unintentional or intentional disposal of all types of domestic and industrial garbage, oil, grease, sh*t and p*e, poisons, detrimentally affected rivers and millions of tons of discarded fishing gear. And what about all the ships, planes, lost cargo etc.. for goodness sake.
You may just find a plastic bottle or two lying around on the beach
A pristine oil tanker aground
Area four – Our Atmosphere:
Our atmosphere is such a wonder of chemistry and layering there is obviously only one designer that can pull off a feat like this, in one of his quiet patient moments. We are busy messing (I could think up a more appropriate word) it up with our production of the so called “greenhouse gasses” that are actually considered by many to ‘not’ be instrumental in the cause of global warming. One just needs to take a gander at the vast amount of written evidence on this issue to be given a more ‘realistic perspective’.
The table below gives the main combustion sources of the combined greenhouse gasses (courtesy Wikipedia).
| Liquid fuels (e.g., gasoline, fuel oil) | 36% |
| Solid fuels (e.g., coal) | 35% |
| Gaseous fuels (e.g., natural gas) | 20% |
| Cement production | 3 % |
| Flaring gas industrially and at wells | < 1% |
| Non-fuel hydrocarbons | < 1% |
| “International bunker fuels” of transport not included in national inventories |
4 % |
Combustion of fossil fuels and deforestation have caused the atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide alone to increase by about 43% since the beginning of the age of industrialization. This is serious people, please take your heads out of the sand and take note, of the ‘very predictable’ weather patterns that we are experiencing. Tsk tsk flooding in Dubai is very normal, I am sure, or should I rather say that, flooding in Dubai, may become ‘quite normal’ tsk! tsk!
The Earths atmosphere
The top of the atmosphere
Area five – Our Near Space:
Our near space has 5 gazillion orbiting particles ranging in size from microns in diameter to space junk to satellites to rocket bits. Apparently many are destined ultimately to a decaying orbit and frazzling up in our earth atmosphere (if we are lucky). I had an old saying that “one should live for today as one never knows if one will get hit on the head by a brick that has been dropped from an aeroplane”. I think I will alter that saying in future (see, we can’t even leave old sayings alone any more).
Gazillions of objects in orbit. The objects are grossly exaggerated in their size but the positions are fairly accurate
After orbits decay we experience a fiery re-entry and hopefully frazzling up
Area six – Our Moon:
Our Moon is now littered with everlasting footprints, vehicle tracks (if we actually got to the moon) and 189,344 tonnes of various objects such as lunas, rangers, surveyors, and apollos to name but a few, that have landed, have been accidentally crashed or intentionally crashed on the light side of the moon. Goodness knows what we have done on the dark side. If you need a bit of golfing practice head up there as there are even a couple of free golf balls lying around. Thank heavens they are on the light side, could be a bit difficult to find or hit on the dark side.
In the act of leaving everlasting footprints, vehicle tracks and machinery
Moon gizmos in action
Area seven – Our Solar System:
Our solar system is now riddled with (100+ at my last count) pioneers, mariners, veneras and galileos to name but a few again, doing all sorts of exotic things like flying by, orbiting, landing, roving, penetrating, atmosphere probing and sample returning. This means that a great many of these space items will just go hurtling off into the wild black yonder, heading for who knows where or crashing into who knows what. Some of our planets now have orbiting satellites and weather balloons of their very own by courtesy of us beloved humans.
Come Rover, here boy! Come on Rover now that’s a gooood Rover!
The gravitational slingshot maneuver around Venus and beyond (to infinity??)
Area eight – Our Animals:
Many of our animals are endangered bec ..…………………………..Oh cr*p!!! I am not even going to go there (I’ll get back to you on that issue later).
Tuna snared in net
An article about sea turtles stranding in record numbers in the Gulf of Mexico
A toothbrush regurgitated by an albatros in Hawaii (the logo has been altered as there is no free advertising on this site)
In Conclusion:
My sentiments expressed here may appear to be very brazen. I have taken an intentionally tongue-in-cheek, ‘seriously light-hearted’ look at a very serious situation. Maybe after reading this, one or two of us mortals may decide to take a look at how we’re contributing to the status quo. Of those, maybe one or two might even make a small effort to adapt their style of living to help. Here I’ve offered my sentiments as some take-away food for thought. (Digest the food but please be careful how you discard the wrappers and packaging :p).
Sources:- Personal opinion, Images: Wikimedia, References: Wikipedia