Do you think that human development would’ve made it this far if we didn’t damage the ecosystem? Or did humans do the wrong thing and shouldn’t have harmed the ecosystem in the first place?
As many may have known, the earliest life evolved from the oceans billions of years ago. The ocean is responsible for being the habitat to many of the earliest life on Earth. These species came together to reproduce which leads to a change of the genetic genes and adaptation. The new inherited traits of these species stay within them and are passed to their offspring. The offspring will follow the same procedure and will do the same to pass it down to their future offspring. This will eventually lead to evolution within the species. Evolution changes generation after generation which gave humans its current existence on Earth. So why has “save the oceans” been such a critical topic nowadays. Especially when they’re are the main key for creating and bringing all humans together?
Let’s look back at the early ages
If you travel far, far back into the early 1700’s and 1800’s, humans were just getting used to the early developments of tools. You would’ve noticed that big amounts of newspapers back then wouldn’t be having headlines similar to “Global warming is a threat” or “Reduce your carbon footprint to save this planet”. This is because many people back then didn’t realize what was going on in the world. Instead, more of their focus was on human developments and technology. This act of ignorance and unawareness caused dangerous chemicals to be released into the atmosphere, which eventually lead to big climate change problems in the mid 20th century. It wasn’t until the late 1900’s where environmental movement really came into play. But it’s already too late when we’ve noticed what problems our planet is dealing with. Currently, all the air pollution, greenhouse gas and climate change is still a big factor in causing negative changes to our daily life as well as to the environment around us.
“I believe our biggest issue is the same biggest issue that the whole world is facing, and that’s habitat destruction” – Steve Irwin
In the past few centuries, there has been a large amount of habitat loss of ocean species due to the development of plastic and its fast-growing rate. The graph below represents the amount of plastic there will be floating on the ocean’s surface in 2100. It’s hard to imagine what this planet will be like after 30 or 40 years, perhaps, the blue planet’s existence will be fully wiped out. But on the other hand, human evolution wouldn’t have developed into the world we are currently living in without the sacrifice of our oceans and trees. This is such a controversial topic because humans are developing new technology and systems to increase the quality of life while simultaneously destroying the planet that our lives depend on.
Discovery of new species
Humans have only discovered about 14% of all the species in this world and 5% of our own oceans. This means that humans still have a long way to go before discovering what our planet truly is. Humanity’s main goal is to explore more about the universe and everything connected to it. But climate change, pollution and all these world crises are slowly drifting us further from our goal. Before we can even get to that fur, all the undiscovered species would already be extinct. The undiscovered ocean floors would also be covered up with garbage and plastic which will eventually lead to the extinction of many important organisms.
“If man doesn’t learn to treat the oceans and rainforests with respect, man will become extinct”
– Peter Benchley, Author of “Jaws”
The world is currently realizing that the amount of human industrial development has gone too far and instead of these technologies giving us a better quality of life, the nature we are surrounded by is going to disappear first. If one day, the Earth couldn’t take all the destruction humans made, it will be very easy for a huge hurricane or earthquake to wipe out all existence of humans. We should begin realizing that we can either choose one or the other, the blue planet or human development. But looking at the world crises right now, I think many of us decided to choose nature over technology. Maybe in the future, more ways of “how to increase human development without harming our planet” would come in handy and make our and the ecosystem’s life easier. But currently, our minds should focus on how to reduce damage and negative impacts on our only planet. Our only home.
Here’s a short video: “The ocean and us” made by BBC Earth, United Nations Ocean Conference
Ways to help reduce pollution on the ocean’s surface:
- Reduce wastewater flowing into our oceans
- Reduce waste and RECYCLE!
- Put limitations on energy use
- Respect the ocean species habitat
- Reduce plastic development
There are many, many other good habits we could put into our daily lives to help save our oceans and ecosystem. We as humans should start to realize that Earth is the only planet we have, and we need to put in the effort to keep it safe and healthy. Nature and the ecosystem is what we should treasure the most. As for, once it’s gone, it won’t come back.
Citations:
United Nations. (n.d.). Oceans and the law of the sea. United Nations. Retrieved October 17, 2021, from https://www.un.org/en/global-issues/oceans-and-the-law-of-the-sea
Introduction to human evolution. The Smithsonian Institution’s Human Origins Program. (2020, October 27). Retrieved October 17, 2021, from https://humanorigins.si.edu/education/introduction-human-evolution
unitednations. (2017, June 5). ‘the Ocean and US’ – BBC earth, United Nations Ocean Conference. YouTube. Retrieved October 17, 2021, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2uuWN20Lc4E&t=12s