Ethics Of Scientific Aquarists

[d3tained]

Just reading this topic have given me a negative feel all over about fish keeping.

IMO animals have been given to humans by the one above to enjoy.This includes eating animals, admiring them in the wild, keeping aquarium in your home to bring nature closer 2 you.

I had a girl comming to visit yesterday and she sat infront of my aqa for 2 hours watching the fish and asking question after question.She enjoyed it so much that she decided she would love to have the same.Explanied to her that its allot of hard work and understanding and you really need to love animals more that yourself.Now is this not proof of it being correct and enjoying it.She left with a big smile and I bet she love animals more than she did.THIS IS PROOF!!

I believe that testing on animals are wrong!!I believe that knowingly doing any animal harm is wrong but doing it by mistake and learning from it is fine.

Any animal should be kept in the correct manner and be treated with respect and as a living organisem that can feel pain, get stressed as us humans.ONLY THEN IT CAN BE JUSTIFIED AS BEING CORRECT!!

 

[Bullrock74]

I agree that captive fish are better off compared to wild fish. I do not feel disheartened by fishkeeping. But I'll try putting it this way. Would you rather: be taken from the danger of outside when you were little, and raised in a small nursery with luxurious pampering, a T.V., and nothing else, and never being able to leave? Or, would you rather exist in the infinite expanse of the wild, being let to roam the unlimited landscape, with no rules, doing whatever you care to do, and never running out of territory to explore, even if it was filled with danger?

I don't think you are truly putting yourself in the fish's place. Imagine you were in the wild with many animals relentlessly trying to eat you and your only defense is to run for your life. How long before you would be DYING to get back in your nursery with a T.V. ?

 

[Lynden]

I agree that captive fish are better off compared to wild fish. I do not feel disheartened by fishkeeping. But I'll try putting it this way. Would you rather: be taken from the danger of outside when you were little, and raised in a small nursery with luxurious pampering, a T.V., and nothing else, and never being able to leave? Or, would you rather exist in the infinite expanse of the wild, being let to roam the unlimited landscape, with no rules, doing whatever you care to do, and never running out of territory to explore, even if it was filled with danger?

I don't think you are truly putting yourself in the fish's place. Imagine you were in the wild with many animals relentlessly trying to eat you and your only defense is to run for your life. How long before you would be DYING to get back in your nursery with a T.V. ?

I would rather live a 30-year exciting, exhilarating, and fullfilling life than a boring 100-year life. And by the way, only few fish can run for their life and nothing else.

 

[Bullrock74]

I would rather live a 30-year exciting, exhilarating, and fullfilling life than a boring 100-year life. And by the way, only few fish can run for their life and nothing else.

Do you think most fish live that long in the wild? The vast majority of fish in the wild die long before they are able to reproduce and of those that don't, most live just long enough to breed and then something kills them...either another animal or a disease/parasite.

What else can fish do to defend themselves but "run" and hide? I know that puffer fish can inflate to keep from being swallowed, but what can other fish do? What can an oscar do to defend itself from a predator?

 

[blue acara]

"there is no fire or explosions in space"

there is no oxygen fires but there are explosions and 'fires' eg all stars including the sun


"Just because I'm a biology nerd, I wanted to point out that the idea of humans evolving too quickly and bypassing wisdom on the way there is kinda silly when you think about how evolution really works"

i know what ure saying-i was just making the point that were cleaver but not cleaver or wise enough to protect the environment we live in-which may eventually be our downfall, and therefore we became too powerful for our own good

 

[Lynden]

I would rather live a 30-year exciting, exhilarating, and fullfilling life than a boring 100-year life. And by the way, only few fish can run for their life and nothing else.

Do you think most fish live that long in the wild? The vast majority of fish in the wild die long before they are able to reproduce and of those that don't, most live just long enough to breed and then something kills them...either another animal or a disease/parasite.

What else can fish do to defend themselves but "run" and hide? I know that puffer fish can inflate to keep from being swallowed, but what can other fish do? What can an oscar do to defend itself from a predator?

Oscars in fact have false eye-spots to defend themselves, as well as their large size. Oscars are a bad example because Oscars are not fast fish, nor are they hiders.

Most small fish (in this case, I refer to small Characins) , that survive past the larval stage, live a life of around 1 year in the wild. Many of these fish will die of old age in 3-4 years, execpt for a few exceptions such as Neon Tetras which can live ten years. I thought that my metaphor was valid, but I know now that there are far too many variables between humans and fish.

there is no oxygen fires but there are explosions and 'fires' eg all stars including the sun

The stars are not space. They are matter. They have their own mass, and their own feul to burn. When they run out, they swell, then shrink, then (in the case of medium-mass stars) explode. They swell because the outward force of iron fusion is far greater than the force of gravity, then they shrink because gravity overcomes fusion. They then explode because there is too much matter in one area, and energy builds up rapidly. Therefore, you are partially right, except that stars are not space, so my statement is still undisproved.



-Lynden

 

[Xebadir]

This all comes down to a lack of understanding and a lack of research into what you are talking about. Some of you I can see have bothered to look at the truth, but unfortunately others are being ignorant.

First of all lets look at the evolution of human kind: Technically this has been occuring since the end of the Mesozoic(65 Mya), however the process has only come to fruition within the last 120-80 thousand years. Homo- Erectus, Neanderthal and several other species merged as one to produce the current 'species'(not the total story as this is far to long to explain). Since this time our ability to think has increased greatly, not to mention our capacity for what we think of as learning. What has not evolved as rapidly as these other capacities is our ability to reason and realise consequence.

Since Roman times, Humans have begun to modify our world: if there was no water, it was channel via an aqueduct, if the ability to travel was needed, a road was built. Thought has moved faster and faster over time because there are more people thinking(contentious, but the difference between 100million in the middle ages and 6+billion today is going to have a great effect). The developments since the renaissance, and the industrial revolution are now looked upon as the glory of human achievement. But are we really achieving?

For every innovation there can be due to people with a lack of reason and consequence a sinister or non intended purpose: One only needs to consider Nobel and the invention of dynamite for mining(and look where that went), or the Manhattan project, which in its infancy was a thought to provide limitless power. It from this we can see, that as technology advances: we can change our world further to suit our desires however this is not all we seem to think it is. A point that lynden made on no fire in space is correct, but her understanding of primary nuclear fission(and fusion) is off the mark: Nuclear energy is heat, fire is a form of heat energy. Heat does not require oxygen: heat travels to the earth from the sun and there is definitely heat in space(its actually in the form of light but these lines are blurred and this is besides the point). Nuclear energy merely require atoms of particular elements to collide(or the various substructures of atoms that we have made up to explain these processes)

The Human race may destroy itself with its own technology, but this is not really the greatest threat. Our lack of ability to control some natural events demonstrates this: take for instance volcanoes, when they erupt we get out of the way, however what about the case of an eruption that is unavoidable? The eruptions that the human race has experienced pale far in the comparison of events of the past: and shall continue to do so to future eruptions. The most powerful volcano expirienced in recent geological time was the Toba supervolcano: this eruption had an effect on the climate, lowering temperatures for a decade at least. This volcano is tiny on comparison to the massive system in the US's backyard: Yellowstone, when this volcano last erupted the eruptive material covered over half of north america, and laid down ash metres thick. This eruption was on a scale 1000s of times more powerful than the eruption of Mt St Helens in 1986. These volcanoes can have such an effect as to change the climate into ice ages: and what can humans do? nothing.

The weather is another example, tornadoes, hurricanes devastate countries regularly: New Orleans is a prime example, humans can do nothing but get out of the way, and still nature manages to kill hundreds. Those of you who believe that we can modify weather, must again think of the enviromental consequences: Without hurricanes, the polar regions and regions further south would become too frigid to inhabit(a hurricane is a heat dissapation engine from solar heating of oceanic bodies). Humans have no control over this.

What about our ways of stopping asteroids: using solar sail or propulsion methods this is a possibility: but what about the fact that life was most likely concieved via these celestial bodies.

Really science does not have all the answers, and we are not becoming more advanced, we are just trying to catch up with our planet.

Now if we look at the humans effects on extinction: Ill agree we have decreased species, however throughout time species evolution has been due to the ability to adapt: if you dont you die out. An example was the Dodoe, It adapted cleverly to its enviroment, however when the changed occured it could not adapt and hence died out. When reptiles dominated during the era of the dinosaurs you might have noticed that they too would have caused extinctions, and did: mammals struggled to survive that age, and many other species also ended. Yes we humans may have an increased effect, but surely you see that nature in general is never changed by a species, it changes the species or it dies out, as we will in time. I doubt that the human race will make it 4 billion years from now when the sun begins to become a red giant however i ask you this: how do we know the sun will take 4 billion years? science; what is science? human reasoning. Looking at it that way, id be careful what you believe.

I support neither the destroy the planet or the save it side, the enviroment will right itself, when the time is right. It has recovered from asteroidal impacts countless times, and mass extinctions to the point of 96% of all species.

Now we come to the so called 'ethics' of fishkeeping.
Moralely all we are doing is preserving part of that which is changing, fish too live by evolution, and will die out sooner or later. Humans have been trying to do that since they realised the wrong of times past(eg the colonisation of Africa and the near extinction of elephants). There is naught wrong with it as it does not really have much of an effect on the enviromental system, and this is certainly neglible to an enviromental change(ecosystems also change due to weather events). Maybe we should stop worrying about what is moraly right or wrong and start looking into further understanding this planet of ours, while we are the dominant species, for sooner or later we will be history.

Ohh and i needed a laugh to get me started:

i know what ure saying-i was just making the point that were cleaver but not cleaver or wise enough to protect the environment we live in-which may eventually be our downfall, and therefore we became too powerful for our own good

Do you really think we are that powerful: we are just a speck in time and a blight that will soon disapear.

 

[Bignose]

Most small fish (in this case, I refer to small Characins) , that survive past the larval stage, live a life of around 1 year in the wild. Many of these fish will die of old age in 3-4 years, execpt for a few exceptions such as Neon Tetras which can live ten years.

Just where in the food chain do you think that 'many' of these tiny fish are? For that matter almost every single fish in our aquariums are pretty low on the food chain.

Do you realize how unlikely it is for almost any fish to live to old age in the wild? To borrow a phrase "There is always a bigger fish," Not to mention bird, or other bigger animal. And, you can go smaller like lice or worms or other parasite. This is purely a guess, but I bet it is fewer than 1 in million neon tetras live 10 years in the wild.

 

[Lynden]

Edit: the quote sign isn't working! I guess I'll bold the quotes...

This all comes down to a lack of understanding and a lack of research into what you are talking about. Some of you I can see have bothered to look at the truth, but unfortunately others are being ignorant.

I don't think the rest of us are the ignorant ones...

First of all lets look at the evolution of human kind: Technically this has been occuring since the end of the Mesozoic(65 Mya), however the process has only come to fruition within the last 120-80 thousand years.

This statement, logically, cannot be right; the first hominids showed up at, I think it was 2 million years ago that I read. But the way you put it, as a technicality, well then technically we have been evolving since the beginning of life.

Homo- Erectus, Neanderthal and several other species merged as one to produce the current 'species'(not the total story as this is far to long to explain).

Now this is just nonsense. From Erectus evolved Neanderthalis and Sapiens, while Neanderthalis' body structure may have been more fit to survive in a harsh world, the industrious and innovative Sapiens outcompeted Neanderthalis to the point of extinction.

(contentious, but the difference between 100million in the middle ages and 6+billion today is going to have a great effect)

We advance faster now because we have a larger basis of knowledge, and previously invented technology, to work with. Considering that most of the worlds population comes from overpopulated 3rd world or communist contries, and that they have little technology compared to the west (excluding most of Europe, Australia and Japan), makes me think that if numbers made any difference at all, than China and India would be on Mars by now.

her understanding of primary nuclear fission(and fusion) is off the mark: Nuclear energy is heat, fire is a form of heat energy.

First of all, I'm a him. But that's not your fault.

Fire is not a form of heat energy, it is the tranformation of chemical enegry to heat energy. And nuclear energy is simply the energy contained in an atom's nucleus, a form of potential energy; but it can transform into other types, including heat.

what can humans do?[/quote]

We can survive, that's what. Humans could survive on Earth even if there were no multicellular animals. It would be boring, but not impossible.

Humans have no control over this

Maybe, but do we need to for our species to survive? No.

but what about the fact that life was most likely concieved via these celestial bodies.

So? Your mother and father conceived you; do they have to kill you now?

An example was the Dodoe

The Dodo fell to humans in the early stages.

nature in general is never changed by a species

Nonsense. Entire ecosystems have been changed or destroyed by humans. Take a look at the Amazon Rainforest.

what is science? human reasoning

Science is our body of knowledge and the act of increasing it. Do we simply "reason" fish to swim?

When reptiles dominated during the era of the dinosaurs you might have noticed that they too would have caused extinctions

Few compared to what humans have caused. Nor was any one species of dinosaur the dominant species.

Do you really think we are that powerful: we are just a speck in time and a blight that will soon disapear

We are that powerful. We are not just a speck in time and we will not dissapear. Nor are we a blight, we are a great power. Don't you get it? We are not like other animals. We are unstoppable to nature. We have the power to create and destroy on a global scale, a power that no other animal has. We are sentient.

Some of you I can see have bothered to look at the truth

You are not one of them.

-Lynden

 

[Boids-n-more]

Man afyter reading this whole post i'm all screwed up on our evoulution lol . Of course theres the biblicly correct form and the scientific form. I perfer the scientific form i like physical proof not a word in a book buts thats me. HAHAHAHA . Now for fish keeping whitch is what this forum is about , if you truley feel bad that a animal was taken out of the wild and started a fish breeding farm or ended up in some ones tank , then sell all your animals and there goods. This type of thread is the last thing anybody with a pet needs to see. When you make threads like this you don't just effect people with fish but everyone that keeps dogs,cats,reptiles,birds and fish. I can name more animals but hopefully you get the point. Also theres a thing called CITES , whitch means if an animal is endangered it can't be brought into the country to be sold publicly. Now i deal with those nutt hugging treebark sob's all the time cause "hence my name" i mainly deal with reptiles for my pets so i'm sorry if i offended anyone here , but these post really tick me off.

 

[Lynden]

Man afyter reading this whole post i'm all screwed up on our evoulution lol . Of course theres the biblicly correct form and the scientific form. I perfer the scientific form i like physical proof not a word in a book buts thats me. HAHAHAHA . Now for fish keeping whitch is what this forum is about , if you truley feel bad that a animal was taken out of the wild and started a fish breeding farm or ended up in some ones tank , then sell all your animals and there goods. This type of thread is the last thing anybody with a pet needs to see. When you make threads like this you don't just effect people with fish but everyone that keeps dogs,cats,reptiles,birds and fish. I can name more animals but hopefully you get the point. Also theres a thing called CITES , whitch means if an animal is endangered it can't be brought into the country to be sold publicly. Now i deal with those nutt hugging treebark sob's all the time cause "hence my name" i mainly deal with reptiles for my pets so i'm sorry if i offended anyone here , but these post really tick me off.

Well I kindof changed my opinion... domestic animals cannot be released into the wild again (excluding pigs, dogs, ect.) and need us to survive. The Farmed fish are the same deal, and they do not know what they are missing, as do not the wild fish that are that are collected as babies. And I guess my metaphores where wrong too... fish are just too different from humans. I'm kinda glad I started this thread... it changed my views for the good. But I was never no tree-hugging veggie-loving hippie... just so that's clear.



-Lynden

 

[Riley]

Whats wrong with Hippies



-Riley

 

[Lynden]

Whats wrong with Hippies



-Riley

He must be one of those guys that CFC was talking about; posing as a fishkeeper but really a hippie!

-Lynden

 

[Xebadir]

So you decided to bite : sorry to rain on your parade(bad joke for a meteorologist isnt it) but really if you wish to see referencing that can be arranged. Now:

This all comes down to a lack of understanding and a lack of research into what you are talking about. Some of you I can see have bothered to look at the truth, but unfortunately others are being ignorant.

I don't think the rest of us are the ignorant ones...

I rather think this flame is misplaced, I rather outlined in simplified terms many of the strange things in this debate.

First of all lets look at the evolution of human kind: Technically this has been occuring since the end of the Mesozoic(65 Mya), however the process has only come to fruition within the last 120-80 thousand years.

This statement, logically, cannot be right; the first hominids showed up at, I think it was 2 million years ago that I read. But the way you put it, as a technicality, well then technically we have been evolving since the beginning of life.

Sorry, logically i did not explain this enough for nit picking of this nature: I refer to the commencement of Mammalian dominance after the Mesozoic. I do not argue with the estimated first hominids 2mya approx, however, the evolutionary process(or rather the more evident fossil record) along with carbon dating methods is available for the last 120-80 thousand years. However we must remember that all dates outside of carbon dating are approximates from radioactive half-life dating in most cases.

Homo- Erectus, Neanderthal and several other species merged as one to produce the current 'species'(not the total story as this is far to long to explain).

Now this is just nonsense. From Erectus evolved Neanderthalis and Sapiens, while Neanderthalis' body structure may have been more fit to survive in a harsh world, the industrious and innovative Sapiens outcompeted Neanderthalis to the point of extinction.

My apologies on this point, It seems I did not again explain this enough for my learned Lynden. You might recall there has been significant scientific debate at the exact trends of evolution within hominid species. IN fact there have been significant claims that the body structure of sapiens appears to be a hybrid of Neanderthalis and the Sapiens species, Ill agree that neanderthalis was removed from the picture, but It may be not only competition but rather interbreeding between species(quite possible if you think of it, look at fish species). Again this point follows the older scientific beliefs.

(contentious, but the difference between 100million in the middle ages and 6+billion today is going to have a great effect)

We advance faster now because we have a larger basis of knowledge, and previously invented technology, to work with. Considering that most of the worlds population comes from overpopulated 3rd world or communist contries, and that they have little technology compared to the west (excluding most of Europe, Australia and Japan), makes me think that if numbers made any difference at all, than China and India would be on Mars by now.

Undoubtedly the larger basis of knowledge and previous invention has an effect, but population can also play a role. Just because a country is a 3rd world one doesnt mean that they dont have their intelligent and gifted people, and statistically greater numbers of population mean that greater numbers of intellectually gifted people exist within that location, remember that intelligence doesnt increase just because you come from North America. Many of the worlds greatest scientists and intellectuals have come from the third world, and the larger population undoubtedly increases the number of these people. China you might remember from history invented the concept of rocketry? and until the 1600's was the most advanced civilisation on the planet. It also had a larger population that most of the then western world. Maybe part of the problem in China's case is communism and the purges that occured due to free thought. However it is sound thought that higher population=higher rate of gifted intellectual individuals, as you yourself might know, if a gifted individual is 1 in 1000 people, then if there are 1million people there are less gifted individuals than in a population of 10million.

her understanding of primary nuclear fission(and fusion) is off the mark: Nuclear energy is heat, fire is a form of heat energy.

First of all, I'm a him. But that's not your fault.

Fire is not a form of heat energy, it is the tranformation of chemical enegry to heat energy. And nuclear energy is simply the energy contained in an atom's nucleus, a form of potential energy; but it can transform into other types, including heat.

My Apologies on that, really should have put him/her (sorry). Again I didnt write this correctly, Fire produces heat energy, any chemist will tell you that(and this reminds me to read my writing). Again I did not bother to explain the Nuclear concept further because it seemed unecessary however to enlighten those of you who do not have any idea of what we are talking about: An atom consists (suposedly we are talking to small to be visible) of protons and neutrons in a nucleus, surrounded by an electron 'cloud'(actually a set of supposed orbitals) In general elements are in a non charged state: ie no. of protons = no. of neutrons, Now elements can have various numbers of neutrons within the nucleus for example atomic weight 235, 238 Uranium. Now this number of neutrons can lead to instability within the nucleus resulting in radioactive decay(several forms, the one in this case is neutron emission). Now by increasing the number of neutrons in the nucleus suddenly(say by firing a neutron at our uranium 235), the atom is rapidly destabilised and splits, resulting in two new elements with a proton and electron number equal to the original atom(in the idealised case) However some of the neutrons are not part of either new atom, and if they collide with other uranium atoms repeat the process, what follows is a runaway chain reaction resulting in huge amounts of energy in the form of heat and light being released.

what can humans do?

We can survive, that's what. Humans could survive on Earth even if there were no multicellular animals. It would be boring, but not impossible.

Humans have no control over this

Maybe, but do we need to for our species to survive? No.

but what about the fact that life was most likely concieved via these celestial bodies.

So? Your mother and father conceived you; do they have to kill you now?

The first point: for a Biologist id expect your to better understand the paeleontological evidence that tells us that species rise and fall, and comparatively we are only a young species: remember we have "ruled" the earth for only a tiny period(hominid time 2mill, multicell life on earth 560mill years approx). Also if mutlicelluar animals are removed from the enviroment generally the ecosystem is found to collaspe, nature is complex.
Onwards, Maybe you dont understand the implications of a supervolcano eruption. Most plant life dies if not from lack of sunlight then from the acid rain and cooling global conditions, the food chain collapses as the earth falls towards another ice age. The implications are the similar to the asteroid theory. Can you imagine an area of 1x10^8 or more kilometres cubed? There has been an eruption in Siberia of this magnitude. the granite is still there. Now imagine the ash cloud associated with such an eruption, not to mention the volcanic outgassing. I can guarantee that an ice age will have far more wide reaching effects than the crap that was the Day after Tommorow, and though humans will survive it most likely the population will die off rapidly, leaving the species weak to other factors. Also if we are being so natural and trying not to hurt the planet then the asteroid must be allowed to allow human civilisation to disapear and nature to continue. Also your laser mentioning was rather amusing, although a great idea, far too small scale for a significant body: more clever ideas revolve around solar sails(as used in long rang probes) or sun magnfication and focusing to destroy comets.

An example was the Dodoe

The Dodo fell to humans in the early stages.

nature in general is never changed by a species

Nonsense. Entire ecosystems have been changed or destroyed by humans. Take a look at the Amazon Rainforest.

Fair point, however out of context: as a biologist you know as well as i do that the most adaptable species survive: Survival of the fittest. This is why bacterial life forms have existed since near the infancy of life. The moment a species evolves to dominant a niche enviroment leaves it ripe to extincition when that niche disapears. An example are the Brachiopods, and the dating that they allow us: shallow tropical enviroments disapeared leaving the population destroyed. Ill agree that humans are sentient and most likely more adaptable, but the risk is still there. The second point I cant deny, however ecosystems are difficult to completely destroy, and with the removal of the pressure they begin to reemerge: look at the empire of the Mayan civilisation.

what is science? human reasoning

Science is our body of knowledge and the act of increasing it. Do we simply "reason" fish to swim?

Whoops for calling me "not one of those people" this is a bit of a mistake on your part: Science is our attempts via reason to explain the natural world. Simple example: Newton: Hmmm things fall towards earth, well to explain this i shall invent a concept called gravity. These attempts to explain form our body of knowledge.

When reptiles dominated during the era of the dinosaurs you might have noticed that they too would have caused extinctions

Few compared to what humans have caused. Nor was any one species of dinosaur the dominant species.

Well this again is a fair point, but what about the mass extinctions(75% of all species) that are believed to be caused by a virus? Again we are not the only species to cause extinctions, so what if we have cause more than other species, nature has proven it can right itself: we will not last forever.

Do you really think we are that powerful: we are just a speck in time and a blight that will soon disapear

We are that powerful. We are not just a speck in time and we will not dissapear. Nor are we a blight, we are a great power. Don't you get it? We are not like other animals. We are unstoppable to nature. We have the power to create and destroy on a global scale, a power that no other animal has. We are sentient.

We are powerful in comparison to prior species: and we are in some ways unlike other animals: But what are we creating? arent we truly just altering our enviroment(think about concrete for example). We are actually quite stoppable to nature: maybe not to other creatures, but still floods can disrupt our "power", as can heatwaves, which kill thousands each year. Thunderstorms and their progeny, Hurricanes(typhoons etc), earthquakes, volcanic events, drought, can pull civilisation to a halt, killing humans annually on a large scale. We have no control over any of these events. Ill be the first to agree that the nuclear destruction is an unbelievable power, however notice how during the cold war, had one country sneezed or a radical fired a single missile and all out nuclear holocaust would have resulted: and that I can assure you would have wiped out most of the human population(not to mention the enviroment), however with time the enviroment would resolve itself, and no trace of our passing would be evident except for a fossilised and stratified ash layer. We may be sentient, but sentient for what? As put by some rather amused astronomers we have reached the point that we can be sentient for our own destruction.

Oh and just to note, I was not refering to you except for the nuclear fission bit, so that flaming was really quite harsh.

Some of you I can see have bothered to look at the truth

You are not one of them.

-Lynden

Unlike you good self I do not seek to flame or defame any member of the scientific fraternity, rather to inform on the basis of fact from cumulative knowledge. You have my respect for the way you outline your ideas, and you scientific knowledge, however you attitude has a long way to come.

Maybe before jumping all over me you should read "A Short History of Planet Earth" by Ian Plimer, you might find it of interest.

 

[QuotheRaven]

The only way for humans to live on after 4-5 billion years is to move planets or to be able to live in space I think as I heard somewhere the Earth will break apart after 4-5 billion years

I could be wrong and most likely am