HIPPO

I called the second essay in the Appendix of my book, To My Countrymen, "Gaian Issues" (Gaia is the ancient Greek goddess of the Earth). The essay laments the fact that Americans place Gaian (environmental) issues at the bottom of the heap of political issues that are important to them. And it lists the ten most significant Gaian issues (Global Warming / Climate Change is only one of them). Here is the list: 

• Global Warming
• Peak Oil
• Rain Forests & Coral Reefs
• Deforestation
• Endangered Species – the Sixth Extinction – the Loss of Biodiversity
• Over-fishing, over-hunting
• GMO
• Waste
• Water
• Human Population Growth

Edward O. (sometimes E.O.) Wilson is with little doubt the most famous and respected living naturalist and biologist in the world today. He may be the third most famous scientist in America, after Neil deGrasse Tyson and Bill Nye, but he has better pedigree than both (he is older and has more published works). His most recent (10-20 years, at least a half-dozen popular books) passion has been the loss of biodiversity (the loss of species) at humankind’s hands. He wants us to be more careful stewards of life on Earth, better stewards of the incredible biodiversity that we are blessed with and that we daily threaten. Here is a section of his book, Half-Earth, pp.57-58. 

Conservation scientists often use the acronym HIPPO for a quick recall of the most ruinous of our activities, in order of importance: 

Habitat destruction. This includes that caused by climate change. 

Invasive species. This includes plants and animals that crowd out native species and attack crops and native vegetation, as well as microbes causing disease in humans and other species. 

Pollution. The effluents from human activity are killers of life, especially in rivers and other freshwater ecosystems, the most vulnerable of Earth’s habitats. 

Population growth. Although it is still widely unpopular to say so, we must really slow down. Reproduction is obviously necessary, but it is a bad idea, as Pope Francis I has pointed out, to continue multiplying like rabbits. Demographic projections suggest that the human population will rise to about eleven billion or slightly more before the end of the century, thereafter peak, and begin to subside. Unfortunately for the sustainability of the biosphere, per capita consumption is also destined to rise, and perhaps even more steeply than human numbers. Unless the right technology is brought to bear that greatly improves efficiency and productivity per unit area, there will be a continued increase in humanity’s ecological footprint, defined as the area of Earth’s surface each person on average needs. The footprint is not just local area, but space scattered across land and sea, in pieces for habitation, food, transportation, governance, and all other services down to and including recreation. 

Overhunting. Fishing and hunting can be pressed until the target species is driven to extinction or on the way, making the last surviving populations subject to final erasure by disease, competition, changes in weather, and other stresses survived by larger and more far-ranging populations of the same species.

I have nothing brilliant to add; I just wanted to bring this brief passage to your attention.  Most of us don't think about these threats to animal life on Earth, and ultimately human life on Earth, because they have no short-term consequences.  But they are deadly important.  Read Wilson's words again, use the HIPPO acronym to help you imprint these ideas into your soul.  They may make you a better citizen of the Earth and its infinite and fragile biodiversity.  What more could anyone ask of you?

For those few and blessed of you, click the half-earth project logo above and get involved.  You have a planet to win, if not for yourself, then for your grand-children.  Tell them Ben Paine sent you!  😃