Doomsday or Chicken Little

Florida Cracker points us to this article about a Univ. of Texas Professor who believes mankind is soon coming to a point where either disease or humanity itself could kill 90% of the earth's population.

Every one of you who gets to survive has to bury nine, Eric Pianka cautioned students and guests at St. Edward's University on Friday. Pianka's words are part of what he calls his 'doomsday talk' a 45-minute presentation outlining humanity's ecological misdeeds and Pianka's predictions about how nature, or perhaps humans themselves, will exterminate all but a fraction of civilization.

Though his statements are admittedly bold, he's not without abundant advocates. But what may set this revered biologist apart from other doomsday soothsayers is this: Humanity’s collapse is a notion he embraces.

Indeed, his words deal, very literally, on a life-and-death scale, yet he smiles and jokes candidly throughout the lecture. Disseminating a message many would call morbid, Pianka's warnings are centered upon awareness rather than fear.

"This is really an exciting time," he said Friday amid warnings of apocalypse, destruction and disease. Only minutes earlier he declared, Death. This is what awaits us all. Death. Reflecting on the so-called Ancient Chinese Curse, "May you live in interesting times," he wore, surprisingly, a smile.

Exciting if what Pinaka is predicting comes true, exciting isn't the word.

So what’s at the heart of Pianka’s claim?

6.5 billion humans is too many.

That's a matter of opinion. There are large swaths of this planet that are sparsely populated.

In his estimation, We've grown fat, apathetic and miserable, all the while leaving the planet parched.

I plead guilty to one of the three. What is parched?

The solution?

A 90 percent reduction.

That's 5.8 billion lives lives he says are turning the planet into fat, human biomass. He points to an 85 percent swell in the population during the last 25 years and insists civilization is on the brink of its downfall likely at the hand of widespread disease.

"Disease will control the scourge of humanity," Pianka said. "We're looking forward to a huge collapse."

Here the professor for once doesn't sound weird or off his meds. A war is going on at the moment, one little talked about. The war against the bug or germs. Man's overuse of antibiotics has created germs immune from anything we can create. There are some scientists and people in the infectious disease field who think man will lose this battle.

"The biggest enemy we face is anthropocentrism," he said, describing the belief system in which humans are the central element of the universe. "This is that common attitude that everything on this Earth was put here for 'human' use."

Man is arrogant, no doubt about it. I always think its interesting that some scientists think man can destroy life on this planet. We can certainly destroy ourselves but this planet is more resilient. Evolution would start all over again, with different results in all probability.

To Pianka, a human life is no more valuable than any other a lizard, a bison, a rhino. And as humans reproduce, the demand for resources like food, water and energy becomes more than the Earth can sustain, he says.

Read Pinaka's obituary(that's not a misprint) the man needs to socialize more.

"But resources aren't the only threat," Pianka says. It's the Ebola virus he deems most capable of wide scale decimation.

"Humans are so dense (in population) that they constitute a perfect substrate for an epidemic," he says.

He contends Ebola is merely an evolutionary step away from escaping the confines of Africa. And should an outbreak occur, Pianka assuredly says humanity will quickly come to a grinding halt.

The professor's not the only one who can articulate this concept.

Maybe not the only one but he's a minority. People who would say the contrary aren't newsworthy. If someone said mankind would last as long as a billion years wouldn't get press. Doomsday sells.

Still there are a few nuggets of wisdom in all of Pinaka's kookiness.

Open Post- Third World County, Jo's Cafe, Right Wing Nation,