Growing human population has forced man to come up with various innovations and civilizations that attempts at making life comfortable. Overpopulation has led to over exhaustion of natural resources and human has been using these civilizations to supplement for such shortages. This overexploitation of earth resources has made geologists to come up with the term Anthropocene, and the Anthropocene debate has been attempting to address the contemporary issues resulting from human activities. Consider the case of deglaciation of ice in the Greenland that causes flooding elsewhere and pollution from China that travels all the through the tropics to cause storms in the United States (Anthropocene Documentary). This paper thus aims to dig into various human activities that threaten our planet and human civilization and possible remedies to these challenges proposed by the Anthropocene debates.
Major Threats to Human
Human civilization is based on both the part of the earth consisting of the crust and outer mantle, and the regions of the surface and atmosphere of the Earth. There are indisputable evidence of human influence on world climate and environment as a result of various activities on either the geosphere or biosphere. Over the recent years just after industrial revolution, human society became faced with unusual larger population which caused overuse of natural resources. Initially when population was not much, nature was able to ‘ingest’ the use and misuse of the resources and also to correct the situation which brought about a balance (Weiler, n.d.). Some of these threats are; deforestation, weather changes, fresh water balance, oceans rise, extinction of some biodiversity, and global warming.
Deforestation
Deforestation is the act of removal of forest cover and the land is then changed to other human activities apart from forest use. Examples of reasons for deforestation include; creation of land for farming, giving room for establishment of homes, and clearing of forest in search for timber. Deforestation has greatly been experienced in the tropical rainforests to meet demands for timber (Chernilo, 2017).
Deforestation has negative effect on the environment and on various species. Forests that act as the habitat for several species of animals and plants are cleared for economic gains. This means that millions of such species are displaced from their natural homes and they may become extinct since they may not adapt to new surroundings they are subjected to (Curry et al. 2003). Humans are also directly affected as loss of trees and vegetation causes favorable conditions for desertification, climate change, flooding, poor agricultural performance, and increase in the level of greenhouse within the atmosphere.
Biodiversity Extinction
Everything that exist are essential for the survival of each other from planktons, bacteria, to marine life and mammal respectively, the quality of soil, wind flow patterns and tropical forests (Weiler, n.d. p.5). From the video clip Anthropocene, killing of large numbers of mammals and vertebrates for their meat, skin, and bones caused the extinction of mammoth. Human encroachment of mammoth’s habitat also contributed to their extinction. Massive pollution from various industrial activities also introduces new conditions that do not favor the survival of some plant and animal species thus causing then to become extinct.
Fresh Water Balance
The world oceans are known as active and efficient global reservation and redistribution agent for most important components of the climate system of the earth such as heat, carbon dioxide, and fresh water (Curry et al. p.826). These components are exchanged through the atmospheric system while salt is retained within the ocean. Curry et al. in 2003 found out that there has been systematic freshening of ocean waters poleward while there is a relatively larger increase in the salinity of upper ocean waters towards equator and lower latitude areas. This shift in ocean water salinity distribution is connected to global warming and changes in the hydrological cycle. As shown in the documentary, the Anthropocene, some places such as the Greenland nowadays have fewer glaciers compared to ice age. This is because Greenland areas have being turned to solid lands for other economic purposes. Glaciers have been smelt to turn parts of Greenland into arable land where extraction of uranium and rare earth materials are carried out.
Greenland and other parts of the Arctic and Antarctic also due to global warming experience increased temperature that promotes snow melting and this reduces salinity around these regions. Global warming in addition to strong solar insolation along around low latitude areas make equatorial areas have higher evaporation rate that causes their ocean waters to have higher salinity. Changes in ocean salinity level introduce new ecological condition that does not favor the ocean creatures (Curry et al. 2003).
Pollution
Pollution is the introduction of a harmful or poisonous substance in the environment. These pollutants can be in gaseous or matter from. Examples of renowned pollutants are energy sources used by man such as fossil fuels and coal. These energy sources emit greenhouse gases that cause global warming. There are also other forms of pollution such as discharge of harmful chemical industries into the water bodies, and burial of harmful waste materials on the grounds that eventually find their way in the rivers and seas. The effect of pollution is that it affects human and other living species in one way or another. For example, pollution causes greenhouse effect that in turn results in increased precipitation that can cause flooding.
What Human Can Do To Avoid These Risks
Human is fully responsible for these threats that are facing nature and it is only a change in human way of life that can help in solving these risks. This will mean that climate change deniers should not trivialize the growing influence of man on earth. Solutions can also be found through biological and technological means.
Creation of Awareness
People of good will and civil society organizations should speak out against the dangers of pollution arising from industrial activities and other processes that introduce chemicals in the atmosphere. Such awareness can however only be effective when various governments implement policies that strengthen policies suggested by such environmental conservancy groups. These policies will control possible irreversible hazards that can face our planet.
Use of Technology to Save the Planet
Technological advancement has been fundamental in changing human way of life and even on how to relate to the external world. Since modern civilization is faced with newer challenges, technology can be effectively be used to play a crucial role in promoting development as well as in reducing environmental degradation. Technology can change how humans can identify, assess, track and value the many natural resources (Lambertini, 2018).
There are some technologies that can be applied in agriculture to change food production such as the use of soil and water sensors, weather tracking, satellite imaging, pervasive automation, minichromosomal technology, and RFID Technology (Lambertini, 2018). From the Anthropocene video, it is shown how sewage plant can be used as a botanical garden where waste water is purified by microorganisms, and also how solar energy can be used to purify salt water which is then used for agriculture within the desert.
Some technologies like remote sensing can also be used in planning and monitoring activities at ground level. Such monitoring technique can be used by governments to monitor and detect deforestation in a particular area. Thermal imaging video cameras can be used by rangers to protect wide range of animal species from poachers. Technology has also been used to preserve a lot of agricultural diversity from becoming extinct by keeping thousands of seed species in a global seed safe in the Norway (Anthropocene Documentary).
There is also installation hardware that can be used to control emission from industries like, claptet. Other technologies that can be used as particulate controls are electrostatic precipitators, mechanical collectors, and fabric filters or wet scrubbers (Bradley and Associates, 2015).
Conclusion
It has been shown how human influence as a result of consuming more than what nature could provide has brought about some activities that have been jeopardizing our planet. Human activity on the planet has actually threatened the continuity of human civilization as it is known today. The dangers include extinction of biodiversity, pollution, and change in global water salinity among others. Solutions to these problems is only through commitment to changing ways that threaten our environment and making use of technological inventions that can solve these risks.
Works Cited
Anthropocene Documentary https://topdocumentaryfilms.com/anthropocene/
Accessed 4 November 2018
Bradley, MJ and Associates, ‘Best Available Technology for Air Pollution Control:Analysis Guidance and Case Studies for North America,’ February 2015, http://www3.cec.org/islandora/en/item/2195-best-available-technology-air-pollution-control-en.pdf
Accessed 9 November 2018
Curry, Ruth, Dickson, Bob " Yashayaev, Igor, ‘Letters to Nature: A change in the freshwater balance of the Atlantic Ocean over the past four decades.’ Nature Publishing Group25 December 2003 Vol. 426 pp.826-829 http://meteo.fisica.edu.uy/Materias/El_Sistema_Climatico/Teorico_El_Sistema_Climatico/curryetal_nature2003-1.pdf
Accessed 9 November 2018
Chernilo, Daniel, ‘The question of the human in the Anthropocene debate’ European Journal of Social Theory 2017, Vol. 20(1) 44–60 DOI: 10.1177/1368431016651874 https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/1368431016651874 Accessed 9 November 2018
Lambertini, Marco, ‘Technology can help us save the planet. But more than anything, we must learn to value nature,’ World Economic Forum 23 August 2018 https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2018/08/here-s-how-technology-can-help-us-save-the-planet/
Accessed 9 November 2018
Weiler, Raoul, ‘Civilization in Danger. Is humanity suicidal?’ n.d, http://www.worldacademy.org/files/Montenegro_Conference/Civilization_in_Danger.Is_Humanity_Sucidal_by_Raoul_Weiler.pdf
Accessed 9 November 2018
