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[RHex]

I'm kind of thinking, what if Gaia got sick and tired of all these meteorites and what-have-you-nots wiping out the majority of life here on Home ever few million years and decided to create an organism capable of ensuring that as much life as possible gets through these mass-extinction events? If thats the case, and we are those organisms, then we have failed drastically these last 10,000 years. Maybe now's our chance to pay our debts? If each group of rewilders manages to maintain a little haven of life, say in remote valleys and such, applying our intelligence an tools to maintain the maximum possible diversity of life in these arks so that it may spread again when things settle down... I think we might consider us redeemed in the eyes of the Mother. The question is, can we do this?
What do you think?

[kveldulf]

If thats the case, and we are those organisms, then we have failed drastically these last 10,000 years.

More than failed. Civilization is a mass extinction event.

I don't believe in "plans", though. Life is naturally balancing, all things having "grown up" connected, leaning on some, supporting others.
I don't see it as a debt that must be paid. I'm not responsible for the past 10 000 years. I don't seek redemption.


That said, I think it would be amazing to take on that responsibility. People already do, if not always consciously. Anytime people are intimately connected to the land,  they will want that land to remain healthy. The very act of rewilding sort of "forces" this upon us:

"If your experience is that your water comes from a stream, and that your food comes from a land base, you will defend to the death that stream and that land base, because your life depends on it" -Derrick Jensen

[bereal]

I'm kind of thinking, what if Gaia got sick and tired of all these meteorites and what-have-you-nots wiping out the majority of life here on Home ever few million years and decided to create an organism capable of ensuring that as much life as possible gets through these mass-extinction events? If thats the case, and we are those organisms, then we have failed drastically these last 10,000 years.

While I see the first part of what you said as theoretically possible, seeing humans as that organism seems like a HUGE stretch.   Humans actually represent the only species to ever have CAUSED a mass extinction event, equal to a massive meteor impact.  So the evidence would, if anything, point to the exact opposite (although I really don't think Gaia would create a species for the express purpose of causing mass extinctions. )

If each group of rewilders manages to maintain a little haven of life, say in remote valleys and such, applying our intelligence an tools to maintain the maximum possible diversity of life in these arks so that it may spread again when things settle down... I think we might consider us redeemed in the eyes of the Mother.

I like this idea a lot, though.  I see it as a natural expression of rewilding.

[RHex]

 The fact that we are currently causing the worst mass extinction in the history of our planet seems to me a logical extention of our species rebellion against nature. Civilization is a culture of denial and repression, in the psychological sense, and what we deny and repress is the very thing which gave us birth. But what is important here is that this does not disprove the notion that we may be the flow valves of life, it only proves that modern culture is like a four year old trowing a tantrum.

 Yes we are the only species to ever cause a mass extinction event; but at least as far as we know we are also the first species CAPABLE of causing a mass extinction event. We just failed to realise what we were meant to do with this capability.

I do feel a certain need for redemption because I don't see the continuity of human life as certain... I think we may have stirred up forces of the kind we definitly shouldn't have stirred up. We woke the sleeping bear.

The idea of humans as arks is just the kind of story we might need to enact to ensure that:

A. This doesn't happen again.

B. Give us a role in the flow of life.

C. Put the bear to sleep.

[Peter Bauer]

Can you tell me what you mean by Arks?

[RHex]

Arks in reference to Noah and the ark from jewish mythology, arks as in something with the purpose of carrying life through a crisis. Now I'm going into this with the assumption that climate and such will undergo radical changes, leading to the death of countless species in the aftermath of civilization.

 What I'm thinking is groups of rewilders in valley's, islands and generally remote locations who deliberatly build up ecosystems around them to the maximum sustainable population of species, to maximum diversity, not just living there and doing what they need to do in order to eat. For instance introducing species of plants not necessarily native to that exact location, but native to the bioregion. Keeping an eye on each population of plants so imported ones don't outcompete native ones, just generally helping every species get through the changes so they can be reintroduced once things stabilize. Same of course with animals, insects, mushrooms, whatever. Imagine a valley with thousands of species, all tended carefully to maintain harmony. And from these valleys the species can spread to the surrounding land as they see fit. Like in England, there are no large predators left, no wolfes or bears or lynxes. Deer populations and such will explode if a lot of humans disappered.  Guess rewilded dogs could possibly fill that niche though, but would be better in my eyes to reintroduce wolves and bear and lynxes...
 This again would require carefull consideration on the rewilders part, and a finely tuned relationship with the land and it's inhabitants, thus making it a kind of accelerated learning course in the skills needed to survive everywhere else. These groups would also, because of the need to mindfully observe nature, build sustainable cultures and invisible technologies much more rapidly than otherwise. I think it could vastly accelerate the process of returning Earth and humans to something beautiful. Also, I think Gaia likes her genepool;-)

[woozletracker]

Humans actually represent the only species to ever have CAUSED a mass extinction event, equal to a massive meteor impact.  So the evidence would, if anything, point to the exact opposite (although I really don't think Gaia would create a species for the express purpose of causing mass extinctions. )

Ahem (::polite cough:: ) - how 'bout blue-green algae? They were responsible for a little thing that some people call 'The Oxygen Holocaust'. Perhaps their anaerobic cousins cursed them as the malignant cancer of the day, as they choked to death in the ancestral broth?

I think there's a danger in phrases like 'our species rebellion against nature'. Well, just with the word 'nature' itself really. Like Quinn says, it's a word practically guaranteed to turn whatever you're trying to say into complete nonsense. Were the blue-green algae, as mutant sulphur bacteria, rebelling against their nature, or 'Nature' itself? I think they just did what they did best like any other bacterium would, assuming their neighbours would adjust their strategies accordingly.

Having said that I think there's a difference between the two phenomena. The algae caused a dramatic loss in biodiversity (over hundreds of millions of years), but this eventually provided the springboard for a massive explosion of new possibilities, including multi-cellular life as we know it - a Gaian gearshift if you will Perhaps new species will evolve to make the most of the excess CO2 and methane in the atmosphere or the plastic in the oceans, but it seems fairly clear that civilisation is not playing by the same rules and does not have this as part of its 'plan'. It doesn't 'want' new species to evolve; it doesn't 'want' any species to evolve and it's doing its damnedest to assure this outcome. If anything, civilised man's rebellion has been against evolution.

... but I like the ark idea though

[RHex]

Yeah ofc your right, forgot about them:p But pre-oxygen life represented an evolutionary blindgate due to chemistry constraining complexity. So if anything aerobic organisms represent an Gaian mechanism of increasing diversity, just like us in the above hypothesis