Has Man Upset the Natural Balance?: In 300 Words or Less
Bill Falzett III
March 13, 2008
If a virus were to make you ill or cause your death, would you declare the virus to be unnatural or evil?
Consider this statement about humanity from Agent Smith in the popular film "The Matrix": "you multiply, and multiply, until every natural resource is consumed. The only way you can survive is to spread to another area. There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern. A virus. Human beings are a disease, a cancer of this planet, you are a plague". With 6.7 billion of us spread across the earth, I tend to agree with Agent Smith, and I worry for our future.
Others worry too, and we commonly hear that mankind has upset the balance of nature, and we are destroying our planet. Businesses, drivers of SUVs and those with a large "carbon footprint" are portrayed as criminal or evil. Portraying humanity in general and America in particular as the bane of planet earth, has become a major plank in Democrat party ideology.
While I worry, I also recognize that like a virus, we are a product of the earth and as much a part of the natural order as the tides, the rising sun, and the common cold. Our genesis, our spread across the planet and our eventual demise are all natural. When we're gone, the natural balance will be affected by other natural factors like volcanic activity, meteor impacts, sunspots, or perhaps even some other prolific species from the animal kingdom. If a virus were to take over your body, you might suffer, get a fever and attempt to eradicate it, but you could not reasonably claim that it is evil or has upset the natural balance. Claiming the activity of mankind has upset the natural balance of the earth is absurd.
Consider this statement about humanity from Agent Smith in the popular film "The Matrix": "you multiply, and multiply, until every natural resource is consumed. The only way you can survive is to spread to another area. There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern. A virus. Human beings are a disease, a cancer of this planet, you are a plague". With 6.7 billion of us spread across the earth, I tend to agree with Agent Smith, and I worry for our future.
Others worry too, and we commonly hear that mankind has upset the balance of nature, and we are destroying our planet. Businesses, drivers of SUVs and those with a large "carbon footprint" are portrayed as criminal or evil. Portraying humanity in general and America in particular as the bane of planet earth, has become a major plank in Democrat party ideology.
While I worry, I also recognize that like a virus, we are a product of the earth and as much a part of the natural order as the tides, the rising sun, and the common cold. Our genesis, our spread across the planet and our eventual demise are all natural. When we're gone, the natural balance will be affected by other natural factors like volcanic activity, meteor impacts, sunspots, or perhaps even some other prolific species from the animal kingdom. If a virus were to take over your body, you might suffer, get a fever and attempt to eradicate it, but you could not reasonably claim that it is evil or has upset the natural balance. Claiming the activity of mankind has upset the natural balance of the earth is absurd.