Quote from: Edge on June 25, 2014, 10:17:50 AM
You may have a point due to the effects we're having on the environment and other animals. Hurricane's, earthquakes, etc may kill a lot of people, but we may be causing mass extinction. Funnily enough, it's thought that the ancient man with spears and rocks are responsible for the extinction of megafauna.
There will always be earthquakes, hurricanes and other natural disasters. Earthquakes may be changing the areas and frequency just due to the earth's axis changing and the gravitational pull of the moon on the crust. Or it may very well be fracking in areas especially in Oklahoma. Personally I tend to think that some of these areas go for a long time with no activity until it builds to a point and the pressure builds and then it lets loose. The New Madrid Fault line is one that is overdue and that is a bad boy right there. Also we are overdue or coming upon that cycle for the supervolcanoe in Yellowstone. Not to mention Mt Ranier, Mt Hood, Mt Shasta. All of them are coming close to the timeframes of their cycles. Personally that big one in Chile surprized me it didn't set off a chain reaction but it may have something to do with that being in the southern hemisphere. But a chain reaction is sort of what worries me because I think if Yellowstone goes again with the same amount of energy it went last time it will set off all the others and will cause a mass extinction.
When it comes to the envorionment though. I believe that nature can take care of itself a lot better than we can. SE La and the levy systems and now they are complaining about losing marsh. It's not the hurricanes that is destroying the marsh it is the lack of floodwaters overflowing and creating new marsh and then land. Without the levy system the Mississippi River would make more new land per year than what all the senators and politicians could ever possibly think. Yes, there would be floods though so people would have to build accordingly. Forest fires out west. Seeds lay dormant for years until a fire comes along and kicks them off. Gets rid of the old growth and makes room for the new. Same way with CO2 and global warming. Plants thrive off of Carbon Dioxide like we do Oxygen. I read in a science magazine a while back that a lot of CO2 leads to a warmer climate by trapping the heat and keeping it closer to the surface and leads to a wider range of plants from algea to trees. Through photosynthesis these plants put out a lot more oxygen and a tipping scale is reached and oxygen suffocates plants and when there is too much oxygen plants die and the climate gets cooler or colder because Oxygen don't trap the heat and when the plants decompose it will build up more of the greenhouse gasses like methane and CO2 then the climate gets warmer and plants come back and begin to grow and puts out more oxygen. So nature takes very good care of itself even though it may seem
Chaotic. The question is though when is humanity or mankind gonna reach the tipping scale and nature needs to cycle us? A lot of things that are just natural and not just natural disasters. If the Ebola virus ever got out and really took off, in less than a year the planet would probably be devoid of human life. Thing is no one knows where this virus actually originated. I read a book that a cave that was warmer than it should be with an unusually high amount of bat guano could be one source. Or why it will wipe out or used to wipe out whole villages and then dissapear. It is definately not a pretty thing. Pretty much people's insides turn to mush and they beled out from every orafice. If I'm not mistaken and can remember right from the time the virus is contracted to the bleed out is roughly 3 days to a week with a kill rate that is extremely high. But if not Ebola, then it may be even a more deadly virus that may make the Black Plague look like a walk in the park.
OK, enough of the doom and the gloom. Funny Edge, you talk about rambling but look what I just wrote.
Sorry.
