Every Breath We Take

We take for granted. But perhaps we shouldn’t.

I’m not usually given to irrational concerns, but there is one concern I have which might be described as such.

But even a simple education in science will equip every person undertaking it with the straightforward knowledge of how much on a knife edge, is the fact that we live on a planet that has an oxygenated atmosphere, and perhaps more important, is able to retain it.

The sun we rightly consider to be the reason why we are all here, and in the latitude where I live, in the United Kingdom, I am able to benefit from temperate seasonal variations, neither too hot in summer, not too cold in winter.

If we did not have the protection of our magnetic poles, that same life giving Sun would quickly strip what atmosphere we have from our planet.

And soon to follow would be any trace of water in the oceans, which modern science tends to agree, has been the source of life itself.

And of course is the means by which water is recycled through weather systems so that in most parts of the world, sufficient fresh water falls so that it ultimately can become a source of life giving sustenance, for both plants and animals.

But much is wrong with those systems that sustain life on this planet.

And I would do not seem too cranky if I were to express concern at the rate at which vast forests are being destroyed, on a daily basis.

Quite simply, though it may have taken millions of years for these systems to have been generated, it is far too easy to imagine that we may be close to a tipping point, when sufficient has been broken of what is required for all of these interconnected things to begin not to work sufficiently.

It does not take someone with a Hollywood imagination to consider what outcomes might be likely.

It is all too straightforward to imagine the kinds of disasters that might come to pass before all of life became impossible as these systems begin not to work.

As I begin to write this blog, I make no apologies for sounding perhaps like some doomsday predictor, but as I outline these things, I begin to wonder if my fears are not as irrational as I might have imagined.

Perhaps we should all take some responsibility for not simply taking every breath for granted, and though it might seem unpalatable for the air that we breathe to become a taxable commodity, perhaps we might more seriously consider ways in which we can achieve some sense of stability in the manner with which we take advantage of this planet.

The alternative, quite simply, is unimaginable.