I agree with most of what you say above, but still believe, in spite of our instincts, we should try. Below is a short story written by Peter Straub that I used to close my recent book on our (humans’) continuing degradation of the Earth’s biosphere. In spite of my conclusion, which is the same as yours above, that we are already “over the cliff” on this and will never be able to fix it, there are still some things we should do... Once upon a time, there was an old man who used to go to the ocean to do his writing. He had a habit of walking on the beach every morning before he began his work. Early one morning, he was walking along the shore after a big storm had passed and found the vast beach littered with starfish as far as the eye could see, stretching in both directions. Off in the distance, the old man noticed a small boy approaching. As the boy walked, he paused every so often, and as he drew closer, the man could see him bending down to pick up an object and throw it into the sea. The boy came closer still, and the man called out, “Good morning! May I ask what it is that you are doing?” The young boy paused, looked up, and replied, “Throwing starfish into the ocean. The tide has washed them up onto the beach, and they can’t return to the sea by themselves,” the youth replied. “When the sun gets high, they will die, unless I throw them back into the water.” The old man replied, “But there must be tens of thousands of starfish on this beach. I’m afraid you won’t really be able to make much of a difference.” The boy bent down, picked up yet another starfish, and threw it as far as he could into the ocean. Then he turned, smiled, and said, “It made a difference to that one!” (Peter Straub, 2011)
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