[3chelon]

Is it really discredited? What are your sources? I tend to believe (with no actual evidence, since there is none), that the ecosystem will adapt to whatever damage we do to it using the tried-and-tested method of natural selection.

Most mainstream conversations about this are entirely anthropocentric and assume we have to be part of that equation. They always assume we're the top of the food chain. But whereas most of us will never be eaten by a tiger, pretty much all of us will be eaten by bacteria one day. Microbial life has been around for far longer, and is far more abundant than we can ever hope to be. I don't think much we can do will fundamentally alter that balance.

[NoGravitas]

We tend to imagine that the ecosystem that will bounce back is the current one, or something much like the current one.

Of course it's possible that the current ecosystem could be completely destabilized and die off, to be replaced by something radically different. It's happened many times in Earth's history.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extinction_event#List_of_extin...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permian%E2%80%93Triassic_extin...

[Symmetry]

I would generally consider the current ecosphere being replaced by something totally different as a variant of "The ecosphere recovering" as long as the successor has as much complexity as the predecessor - and exactly what the GP is talking about.

But of course there are far worse things than that sort of disaster. Earth turned into a snowball several times but geologic processes producing CO2 managed to fix the problem. The Sun is continuously getting brighter so that wouldn't be a problem nowadays. But eventually, in a billion years, the increasing brightness of the sun will cause the oceans to evaporate and complex life on Earth will probably never recover.

[foota]

It's a hyperbolic example, but I doubt life on Earth would adapt to being engulfed by the sun, for one

[3chelon]

Sure, but that's not the debate.