Writer's Block: End of the World as We Know It
My, aren't we apocalyptic this week? Besides, we all know the answer is "Jaguars falling from the sky."
I find it interesting the number of answers so far that overlook the obvious counter-question: end for whom? "Us all" implies humanity, but that's not the end of the world, just the end of our species observing it. That's happened a few million times before, and the dirtball keeps right on nonchalantly spinning. A sufficiently large meteorite might, yes, render it a much smaller planet with another moon or two. We are unlikely to have much time to notice if this happens.
Three or four posts down from mine: "liberal democrats." Oh, wouldn't we love for our political affiliations to matter that much in the grand scheme of things? We'll be big enough idiots to wipe ourselves out, or we'll fail to be clever enough to save ourselves this time, or we'll evolve into something with fewer teeth and a high resistance to the chemicals that the current form has been so casual with, but sooner or later something will happen to H. sapiens and there will be no such creature anymore. Ask the crocodiles. They've seen it all before.
RE: Swine flu, and whether I'm worried or not. The short answer is, I've studied microbiology and the history of science quite a lot, so yes, just a bit. Not to the point that I'm out buying a bunch of antibacterial products that eff with the hormones, or that I disinfect my shopping card, or anything like that, just enough that I wasn't comfortable with the level of gas in the car or groceries in the house yesterday. If people get spooked enough, I won't be wanting to go to the store either. I don't want to get stoned for having raging allergies. Misanthropist that I am, I'm far more worried about human stupidity as a contagion than I am about swine/Spanish/Mexican/H1N1 flu.
I find it interesting the number of answers so far that overlook the obvious counter-question: end for whom? "Us all" implies humanity, but that's not the end of the world, just the end of our species observing it. That's happened a few million times before, and the dirtball keeps right on nonchalantly spinning. A sufficiently large meteorite might, yes, render it a much smaller planet with another moon or two. We are unlikely to have much time to notice if this happens.
Three or four posts down from mine: "liberal democrats." Oh, wouldn't we love for our political affiliations to matter that much in the grand scheme of things? We'll be big enough idiots to wipe ourselves out, or we'll fail to be clever enough to save ourselves this time, or we'll evolve into something with fewer teeth and a high resistance to the chemicals that the current form has been so casual with, but sooner or later something will happen to H. sapiens and there will be no such creature anymore. Ask the crocodiles. They've seen it all before.
RE: Swine flu, and whether I'm worried or not. The short answer is, I've studied microbiology and the history of science quite a lot, so yes, just a bit. Not to the point that I'm out buying a bunch of antibacterial products that eff with the hormones, or that I disinfect my shopping card, or anything like that, just enough that I wasn't comfortable with the level of gas in the car or groceries in the house yesterday. If people get spooked enough, I won't be wanting to go to the store either. I don't want to get stoned for having raging allergies. Misanthropist that I am, I'm far more worried about human stupidity as a contagion than I am about swine/Spanish/Mexican/H1N1 flu.