[Galbally]

I think that most of these problems come from getting the idea of belief mixed up with just rationality, and the scientific method. People who "believe" in the environment in some mystical way for its own sake are not taking into account that human beings and their ways are also a part of nature, as we of course evolved as we are, we didn't decide to make ourselves intelligent, or creative, or technology creating, its in our "nature" to be this way, in the same way its in a lions "nature" to chase wildebeast. The imperative on the environment is that we fundamentally depend upon a healthy environment for our own existence, without it, we won't prosper as a species, and if we destroy the environment for some short term reason, we will essentially be destroying ourselves, and no one is going to come in and save us if we do.

However, we can no more "return" to some state of innocence, than we can go back in time, (for such a time never existed anyway, man has always had a massive impact on his surroundings, even at the hunter-gatherer stage we were busy wiping out all large mammal opposition, because we could) the only way to deal with the environmental problems we face is to look at them coolly and pragmatically and improve the sustainability of our industries and country's not destroy them, as again, that would result in a disaster at least as bad as the environmental one. Thats not a green light to carry on regardless, we are at a stage where the impact of humanity on our environment is such that we cannot ignore it, but it is also true that a planet with 6 billion humans on it, cannot exist in any other manner than one that is organized and uses technology, any other approach would lead to about 90 percent of humanity starving within 12 months. Not a pleasant prospect.

I think in recent decade there has been a flight from reason and rationality, they have become things that are supposedly sterile and anti-humanist, in fact they are the exact opposites, reason is what makes us human, and also what frees us from the shackles of just a mute existence of eating and procreating, without it we most certainly are lost. Perhaps the tide will turn once again, as there are cycles in human affairs.