When it comes to living in harmony with nature, we humans have repeatedly screwed up, big time. But there’s no instruction manual that explains exactly how we should do things so we don’t harm the earth – yet. 28 scientists have suggested nine key areas including freshwater use and chemical pollutants where governments could define limits to ensure a “safe operating space for humanity”.
From Reuters:
“Today we are clearly driving development in the world blindfolded,” Johan Rockstrom, leader of the study and director of the Stockholm Resilience Center at Stockholm University, told Reuters of a lack of international guidelines.
“We are not considering the risks that there are deep holes we can drive into,” he told Reuters. The call, for setting “planetary boundaries,” was published in Thursday’s edition of the journal Nature.
Rockstrom said there were signs human activities had already pushed the world into the danger zone because of global warming, a high rate of extinctions of animals and plants and pollution caused by nitrogen, mainly used in fertilizers.
Among limits, they suggested capping the percentage of global land area converted to cropland at 15 percent. At the moment, the percentage is 11.7 percent, they said.
Though conservatives are probably shrieking in terror at the idea of global guidelines for a range of human activities, such a ‘user’s guide’ would be extremely helpful in uniting people around the world with a common goal of keeping this planet a safe and healthy place to live. Imagine if world leaders had concocted such a guide back at the beginning of the Industrial Revolution – the world would probably be a much cleaner, healthier place today.
It would definitely have to be a group effort, however, without giving any one person or organization too much say in how the guidelines were developed. Otherwise, we could end up with another Bible on our hands (and Great Flying Spaghetti Monster, we sure as hell don’t need that.)
Link [Reuters]
Photo credit: Alan Dean/Woodley Wonderworks
