Skip to content

Tag: global warming

Wonderland to wasteland

Wonderland to wasteland

Published October 29, 2020

We’ve seen previously how one of the definitions of Dharma is ‘the stabilization force’ or ‘balancing factor’. This weekend, I watched a documentary featuring none other than Sir David Attenborough, the 93-year-young foremost nature conservancy expert in the world. Freshly released on Netflix, the film is titled A Life on Our Planet. And boy was it an eye opener. The scenes are a mix of joy (unimaginable biodiversity), tragedy (this biodiversity is dying, or rather we humans are killing it), and hope (of restoring this balance).

Here are a few painful and mind numbingly hard-hitting facts recounted in this documentary:

  1. We cut down over 15 billion trees a year.
  2. In all, we have cut 3 trillion trees. This is half of all the trees on the planet.
  3. 90% of all large fish in the sea are gone, due to overfishing.
  4. As a consequence, a significant part of the marine ecosystem is dead.
  5. This has impacted the oceans ability to absorb carbon dioxide, which has led to warmer climates, and erratic seasons.
  6. In each of the past 5 mega extinctions, it took volcanic eruptions 1 million years to increase the temperature. Thanks to our industrialization, we have increased the temperature in under just 200 years.
  7. Of all the mammals on earth, all humans together weigh 56%. The food humans eat (cattle reared for meat etc.) makes up 40%. Just 4% – are all the other mammals put together – from mouse to blue whale.

Mother Earth has given us everything for free. But if we do not know how to receive graciously, She will not hesitate to rebalance the power. We must do our very best – living mindfully, both collectively and individually, in order to save the planet and ourselves. Otherwise, an unmitigated disaster is on hand.

Like it? Please share it!
1 Comment
Warming up

Warming up

Published September 24, 2020

My brother and I had visited Georgia in December last year. This is the country Georgia, not the state Georgia in the US. It is an extremely beautiful country, and during the December winter, some of the places we visited were mostly white, covered in snow. But apparently not as white as it needed to be. We stayed a few nights in a town called Stepantsminda. During that time of the year, the town is supposed to be teeming with people who come for skiing. When we arrived there, it felt more like a ghost town. During a specific hiking trip in the snow that travellers had raved about on online forums, we saw no other people for miles and miles as far as the eye could see. Lots of businesses there had shut shop – because of no visitors – because of not enough snow.

Later, we learned this was on account of global warming and climate change. The winter was quite cold as far as we visitors from the tropics were concerned, but apparently nowhere near necessary for ski resorts to function.

The world is heating up. The ice is melting, and water levels are rising. All those articles and videos we read/see are true. In the last Ice Age, when global temperatures were 4 to 7 degrees cooler than today, the city of Chicago was under 800 meters of ice (like an ice mountain)! We are now racing in the opposite direction – on track to become 3 to 4 degrees warmer than baseline, and already about 1 degree hotter than what is ideal. Every half-a-degree increment from now on could have a devastating impact.

What can we do? We can start small. Each of our actions can be guided by the thought “Do I really need this, or is this just a temporary want? Can I achieve this outcome in a better more sustainable way?” The extra minutes under the shower, the ACs, fans and lights running when not necessary, using too much plastic, driving solo instead of biking/walking/car-pooling among other things all add up. It has to be an individual effort from each one of us, but exercised collectively. The earth is not just a planet, it is our mother that gives us our life. We have only taken, taken and taken more from her since our birth – whether food, or water or oxygen. How can we ever give back to her? And will any amount of giving back ever suffice? Never, and what is done is done, but we can at least reduce the intensity of our taking in the future. Just being mindful of our daily activities is a good starting point.

Like it? Please share it!
2 Comments