--- In [EMAIL PROTECTED], Doug Pensinger <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Did they know what they were doing to their island? Did they try to do > anything about it? I can just imagine an Island conference to discuss the > preservation of the trees. Would the attendees have come to the > conclusion that it was not economically feasible to curtail the logging? > Was there a faction of ecologically oriented islanders that fought for > preservation?
The question has been asked "what the islanders think as they were cutting down the last tree?" Of course, we now know that the Easter Islanders need not have cut down the last tree. Once the tree population's genetic diversity was reduced below a certain trheshhold, the remaining trees would have died naturally. > What led them to build the moai? Was their religious fanaticism integral > to their collapse? I can see no obvious correlation between civilizations that collapse and civilizations that are highly religious. One could just as easily ask "Was their Polynesianness integral to their collapse?" (You may be offended, but is it any more offensive than asking if religion was integral to their collapse?) Another, much more logical question, would be: "was memorial building integral to their collapse?" In this case, one might connect America's penchant for Memorial building to the Easter Islanders' proclivity for the same. > Diamond sees the Island as a metaphor for our modern planet and indeed, I > find the metaphor compelling. We know that we are pumping greenhouse > gasses into the atmosphere and that Antarctic ice cores show that they are > at a much higher level now than at any time in the last 420,000 years*, > but we hesitate to act because of the short term economic impact that may > result as a result of our attempts to slow the warming. > > My worry has always been not that the experts on warming are alarmist, but > that they are too conservative in their estimates. If we acted quickly > and an economic disaster followed, the world would be impacted for a > generation or less. If, however, we triggered an ecological disaster, the > repercussions could potentially be far worse. I don't think this is a useful course of thought. You always have to make decisions based upon the best information you have available. First, your theory presumes that manking is capable of having an effect upon the climate. Yet, you also seem to assume that whatever intentional effects we have on the conflict will always benign. There is, of course, the risk that in attempting to tinker with a process we hardly understand that we might end up causing even more damage to our welfare. This would be particularly ironic if we were in fact making serious sacrfices in order to effect these changes. Thus, it is not sufficient to simply say "because the risks are high, we must take action whatever the cost." These risks must always be balanced against other risks. As another example, you seem to indicate that we should be sparing no cost in order to combat global warming. Should we not also be sparing no cost to develop an asteroid detection and deterrance system? Or perhaps sparing no cost to research the development of a shield for gamma ray bursts? And finally, once one decides to spare no cost in an endeavor, one must consider just how palatable those sacrifices really are. There are many causes which seem worthy - for instance medical research, AIDS treatment, preserving wild places, breeding endangered species, disaster relief, etc. The are many other priorities which need to be considered. JDG _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
