The World Without Us

yellowish haze

yellowish haze

Grimscribe
No, this is not about the upcoming political film "The World without US".
It's about:

To view this content we will need your consent to set third party cookies.
For more detailed information, see our cookies page.


the_world_without_us.jpg

​
Yesterday I started reading The World Without Us by Alan Weisman, which describes what would happen with our planet if humans suddenly disappeared.
I thought the subject needs a separate thread.

I just found this documentary "Life After People". I still haven't watched it so I'm not sure if there is much connection between the book and the film (or whether the latter was based on the former), but it looks like it is worth checking out.

Part 1
​
To view this content we will need your consent to set third party cookies.
For more detailed information, see our cookies page.

Part 2
​
To view this content we will need your consent to set third party cookies.
For more detailed information, see our cookies page.

Part 3
​
To view this content we will need your consent to set third party cookies.
For more detailed information, see our cookies page.

Part 4
​
To view this content we will need your consent to set third party cookies.
For more detailed information, see our cookies page.

Part 5
​
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7TP6wo7l7dw"]YouTube - [HS
Part 6
​
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IQ_EiOV2rhE"]YouTube - [HS
Part 7
​
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mw-qANxP7ug"]YouTube - [HS
Part 8
​
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZiBot4B67H4"]YouTube - [HS
Part 9
​
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SbJ2s-FuZp8"]YouTube - [HS
 
Thanks for sharing this! There are many groups now that advocate the extinction of human race (like the Church of Euthanasia - see pic attached!-), their demondtrations are usually pretty striking, but their philosophical basis is weak for me. They're moved by an ecological thought, more than a theoretical one.
I appreciate more Zappfe's position (I guess it is now pretty clear :) ). I share this point of view because it is based on rational thinking and intellectual maturity.
There have also been many thinkers and philosopher who warned about the danger of autodestruction by letal weapons (especially after wwII and cold war)...but still they warned.
I think we have a good number of reasons to support human extinction on a theoretical level.

What does this Weisman book says??Does he give theoretical/existential/ecological reasons?? or any reason at all? :rolleyes:
 

Attachments

  • snuffit1.jpg
    snuffit1.jpg
    66.7 KB · Views: 28
I watched the "Life After People" documentary. Some of what it said was, I thought, wrong. I think, for example, that cats would do less well without humans than the documentary maker thought. The domestic cat has smooth hairs (unlike the European wild cat) which means that their coats aren't weatherproof. They originate (as a species) in the middle east and are not well adapted to living wild in cold and/or wet climates.
 
To view this content we will need your consent to set third party cookies.
For more detailed information, see our cookies page.


To view this content we will need your consent to set third party cookies.
For more detailed information, see our cookies page.
 
What does this Weisman book says??Does he give theoretical/existential/ecological reasons?? or any reason at all? :rolleyes:
Click to expand...
I have now finished the book so that I give you an answer. Weisman is clearly giving ecological reasons, but the book is not concerned with "why should people disappear", but with "what would happened if they did". It's more of a simulation of the post-human world rather than a theoretical work. I think it would be fair to approach it as a apocalyptic speculative fiction - one that is almost non-fiction actually. The author also spends many pages on going through the history of the human species explaining how humans were gradually destroying the nature on different continents, which may make one think he must be one of the Greens.

Nevertheless it's fairly entertaining to read. I think those who like fiction about the end of the world and what comes after might find this interesting .

(btw I wouldn't compare it with that documentary I embedded last time, which is mostly concerned with cheesy CGI;))
 
In a way for me reading such books as "The World without Us" works like a blast from the past... a bit like retreating my steps towards my childhood... and beyond.

This is my street in my childhood (with my house under construction)...
picture.php



This is the same street two days ago (photo taken from the entrance to my house) :
picture.php


Looks as if the cloud hovering above it is a sign that Armageddon is imminent... something will have to contain this virus one day...

EDIT: changed "I hope" for "Looks as if" in the last sentence as the first version sounded a bit too sweeney-toddish. :-)
 
Last edited:
People in UK need to go to a Swiss Clinic in order to end their lives in an assisted way. Even so, it is still legally dubious if anyone who travels there with you is then liable for offences when returning to the UK.
I was wondering, when our own world is ready to die (and some believe this is overdue), perhaps it will need to visit the CERN Hadron Collider that is also in Switzerland!
 
Nemonymous said:
People in UK need to go to a Swiss Clinic in order to end their lives in an assisted way. Even so, it is still legally dubious if anyone who travels there with you is then liable for offences when returning to the UK.
I was wondering, when our own world is ready to die (and some believe this is overdue), perhaps it will need to visit the CERN Hadron Collider that is also in Switzerland!
Click to expand...

The CERN Hadron Collider a Swiss clinic for a whole world that wants to die? :eek: But maybe that's exactly what it is. :(
 
yellowish haze said:
In a way for me reading such books as "The World without Us" works like a blast from the past... a bit like retreating my steps towards my childhood... and beyond.

This is my street in my childhood (with my house under construction)...
picture.php



This is the same street two days ago (photo taken from the entrance to my house) :
picture.php


Looks as if the cloud hovering above it is a sign that Armageddon is imminent... something will have to contain this virus one day...

EDIT: changed "I hope" for "Looks as if" in the last sentence as the first version sounded a bit too sweeney-toddish. :-)
Click to expand...

I know what this is like. When we bought our home over 25 years ago, there were cow pastures not too far from here, and deer and wild turkeys everywhere. Now I have to drive through 4 traffic lights to get 1.3 miles to buy a gallon of milk . . . I miss the GREEN.
 
I've just come from a 'primate sanctuary'. I noticed that just about all the signs on the enclosures listed whatever species was inside as 'endangered'. This reminded me of a conversation I had recently with someone who follows these things quite closely. I asked him about what species were endangered (can't remember the exact question). "Just about everything is endangered now," he said. It's hard, for me at least, not to be depressed at such thoughts. It seems like the inevitable consequence of the natural instinct to breed and prosper, however. It's understandable - and even good - that humans should reflect on what they are and what they have done, and feel remorse. At the same time, if we take this planet as a schoolroom teaching moral lessons, then those lessons would seem nonsensical. (Nonsensical or not, I think they have enough resonance with people that they will recognise them.) To succeed in surviving is bad and must be punished by population-culling disaster. Virtue consists in fading from existence by refusing to breed and compete, but this is also 'against nature' and 'against instinct'. When you think about it, the environment into which humans are born, and the conditions of the game, which start from the horrific fact of having to consume in order to live, are a kind of nightmare. It reminds me of a quote that I came across recently:

In my youth I thought of writing a satire on mankind; but now in my age I think I should write an apology for them. -Horace Walpole, novelist and essayist (1717-1797)

Whether you hate the planet on which we're living or not, it just seems there are too many people at present to be good for anyone's interests, unless those interests are specifically to witness an apocalypse of overpopulation. Anyway, unless you have children, which I don't, there's no point worrying about it as such (well, if your worrying consists in practicalities like stocking a bunker with canned food, I suppose there might be). It's even comforting to think of how insignificant we are, sometimes, though at other times it can be less comforting. Let the Doctor have the last word, at least in this comment box here:

To view this content we will need your consent to set third party cookies.
For more detailed information, see our cookies page.
 
Each of us takes a world with us when we croak. How many since the first humanoid slouched out of Africa? Eighty Billion maybe? We intellectually understand that each of us must die, but many really don't believe it. We can conceive of a planet without us, but we prefer not to and many won't or can't take that to heart either. Even less seem committed to the fundamental fact that the planet itself has its own natural lifespan. It will all end eventually, and even should I live a vampire' lifespan and I wouldn't want to vacate this place for somewhere else anyways. I'm no longer interested in fighting the inevitable. I'm reminded of a line in a poem by Jim Harrison:

After many years of holding the world together
I let it roll down the hill and into the river.

Most people I know are like Roy Batty in Blade Runner: "I want more life, fucker."

No thanks. I look forward to the return to the One.
 
On what I hope is not too much of a tangent, a couple of women delivered a sheet of paper this week headed:

How will you survive the end of the world?

My thought was that, more to the point, is:

Why would you want to survive the end of the world?

:confused:
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top