What are the earth-people up

"Wonder what the earth-people

 are up to today?" said the Martian.

So what do we think of these statements?

1. Climate changes and natural catastrophes have wiped out the dinosaurs and numerous other animal and plant species over time. If history is predictive, homo sapiens will sooner or later arrive at a place where changes or catastrophes make their continued existence impossible, and we might well go the way of the dinosaurs.
2. Climate change and environmental degradation are quite possibly the early stages of changes that will lead to human devolution,* mostly because humans appear incapable of collectively mustering the energy and commitment to do what they must to ensure a future for the species. We seem to be predominantly “eat drink and be merry for tomorrow we die” people, particularly in the over-developed parts of the world.
3. The current, worrisome climate changes have clearly been hastened by CO² emissions resulting from years of burning fossil fuel as our chief energy source.
4. High consumption of energy relates directly to population numbers; if there were only one million people on earth, it’s unlikely that climate change or environmental degradation would ever have become an issue. Population numbers may already have surpassed the earth’s ability to provide a sustainable future for everyone. Or maybe not.
5. Immigration is necessary in the Western world because of low fertility rates. Economic growth as we’ve come to expect it is dependent on a continuing, gradual increase in population. For the irony in this, see # 4.
6. The prevailing wasteful, luxurious Western style of living rests firmly on a constant increase in production/consumption. With the required economic growth that maintains this style of living, the demand on earth’s resources and energy sooner or later must reach irreversible unsustainability. Rapid extinction or a slower devolution are the only possible consequences when the tipping point is passed. You can’t make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear, or if water in a pail isn’t being replenished at a rate equal to what’s being taken out, the pail will sooner or later be empty. This is not sub-atomic science!
7. Given the lightning speed of technological “advancement” in this age, progressive and innovative leadership is sorely wanting. Change often produces fear; rapid change can produce enormous, infectious fear. Waves of civil conflict, terrorism, hate mongering, even the swing to a more belligerent, regressive politic are all symptomatic of the escalating anxiety in populations. An apt metaphor for our age is the cattle stampede, where blind running replaces sound reasoning and informed planning. We are witnessing a fear epidemic, a panic-induced stampede. The style of leadership for which we’re opting is typically verbose, combative and, unfortunately, lacking in the social, cultural, anthropological smarts that are needed to calm our anxieties, get us walking thoughtfully toward a sustainable future.

I sometimes wonder what the prophets Isaiah or Jeremiah or Micah would be railing on about if they were alive today. Take Micah 2:1 & 2:

Woe to those who plan iniquity,
to those who plot evil on their beds!
At morning’s light they carry it out
because it is in their power to do it.
They covet fields and seize them,
and houses, and take them.
They defraud people of their homes,
they rob them of their inheritance . . ..

In his time, Micah’s anger was with the people’s idolatry and the ruthless greed of the rich and ruling classes whose perfidy would, he predicted, ruin the nation. If he were among us today, would his rage focus on climate-change deniers? oil barons? corporate entities that profit enormously while people are starving? Would he heap judgment on the church for its laziness in carrying out its reconciling commission, for its collaboration with structures of power and greed? Would he appear in the body of David Suzuki to condemn the environmental degradation manifest in the oil sands bitumen extraction projects?

And if Micah were to be today’s prophet, would we ignore him like Judah did back then?

* By “devolution,” I mean “evolution’s” opposite. Progress replaced by regress.