[mikrl]

The planet will be fine, it survived asteroids and much worse. Even if everyone starts lobbing nuclear weapons at each other, cockroaches and many plants will persevere among the ruins, the untended fields, the forests and hills.

Humanity though? Hoo boy, are we really in for it.

[Aunche]

Humans are the cockroaches of large mammals. We're tropical apes that managed to survive in the some of the coldest places without anything that resembles modern technology.

[avgcorrection]

Are you addressing this comment to the cockroaches? If not then this obtuseness is not particularly witty.

[RobotToaster]

On the internet, nobody knows you're a cockroach.

[pelagicAustral]

I know this is besides the point, but I've always been so happy that there are no cockroaches where I live... In fact so happy that I write comments like this, just so people know.

[mrpopo]

Cockroaches are not a welcome addition into your house's ecosystem, but they are still very useful in the global ecosystem, same as mosquitoes, etc. There are waste products that only cockroaches digest, there are plants that only mosquitoes pollinate, etc.

[Brusco_RF]

Do you live in Antarctica?

[pelagicAustral]

Very close indeed, about an hour away.

[mikrl]

Soon! Soon the twolegs will irradiate everything and our time will come!

chitters maniacally

[bpiche]

Or a dog :)

[mikrl]

The parent was confusing ‘the planet’ with ‘humanity’ which is (IMO) more egregiously obtuse.

[avgcorrection]

No one is confusing the two because “saving the planet” is always meant as in “saving the planet as a hospitable environment for humans and/or animals” (a bit of a mouthful, no?). Literally no one cares about the rock called the Earth for its own sake.

You might as well go and argue that some particular person from Africa can't be called “black” because his skin pigmentation is brown. That's equally productive.

[unshavedyak]

> "saving the planet as a hospitable environment for humans and/or animals"

Well i do think that's partly the point - the animals _will_ be fine. Viewing "the animals" as the set of biodiversity that we currently like and deem correct seems narrowly scoped. Diversity could be set back, but will definitely not go anywhere as long as evolution exists - right?

So what does our interpretation of animals really matter, especially if we're not around to judge it? Which isn't an argument to destroy everything to be clear. But i think "the planet doesn't care" includes life, not just a rock.

Ie, species have been invasively killing and replacing each other for all of time. Every time a closed ecosystem was breached (islands/etc) by some new foreigner it was chaos, expansion, evolution, etc. I don't think we change much in the long run.

But to stress, i am here, and i do enjoy the plants and animals of my habitat so i want to preserve the environment. However that's my selfish desire imo. The "planet and including life within this evolving biosphere" doesn't care.

[eckmLJE]

I disagree. There are plenty of folks who would rather see the natural world preserved for its own sake, even at the expense of human growth and survival. And plenty of folks dismissing environmentalists as treehuggers who love nature more than humanity, who don't get that preserving the natural world is a prerequisite to human survival. I think the distinction is important.

[avgcorrection]

> There are plenty of folks who would rather see the natural world preserved for its own sake, even at the expense of human growth and survival.

Because of what...geology? The Earth itself? (No.)

You might have missed the “and/or animals” part. My comment already addresses those who are more concerned (as in preoccupied) with non-human life.

But I guess I should have mentioned plants as well. Mea fucking culpa.

[lotsofpulp]

> You might as well go and argue that some particular person from Africa can't be called “black” because his skin pigmentation is brown.

What if the person from Africa has brown skin pigmentation and are descendants of people from India? I had a friend in college like that who fit those qualities, but I am pretty sure he would experience backlash if he referred to himself as a black person (in the US).

[avgcorrection]

... You can assume that I meant a native African person. ;)