humanity i hate you

Mon cher papa, who is a scientist by training and who shares my tendency to depressive ecological awareness, told me about an alarming TV program he saw recently. Apparently Spring is happening as much as 10 days earlier than it was thirty years ago, as a direct result of global warming. This sounds like a minor point, but it has dire consequences. A change in the familiar pattern of the year could bring the synchronisation of various reproductive cycles out of whack: insects out of kilter with the pollen cycles they need to interact with for fertilization to occur, birds laying too early before there is actually insect life to sustain the hatchlings. Some species are adapting to the new conditions, but thirty years is hardly a reasonable time for a quick spot of micro-evolution. We are apparently likely to lose hundreds of species to this particular problem alone.

Global warming is all very alarming in terms of the effects we are beginning to measure, but it's bloody terrifying to consider the as yet unnoticed trashing of the complex, delicate, essential systems we have cheerfully stuck into the pocket of our pants and then sat down on.

Humanity: voted Species Most Likely To Turn Into A Stupid, Destructive Asshole. This wouldn't happen if the orang-utans ruled.