Planet Needs, Gets New Name: Eaarth

April 24th, 2010 by Susan Kraemer

It seems like science fiction. It seems impossible that we would destroy our planet and our future, but, we did. We have no idea how bad the effects of our brief exploitation of fossil fuel will be, over the next centuries and millennia.

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Since it is going to be a completely different planet, it needs a new name. The UK Guardian reveals why Bill McKibben suggests we begin to call it “Eaarth”.

“There’s a slightly science fiction look to it; that’s appropriate in the sense it’s a little like a science fiction story: we wake up one day and the planet we have been used to for 10,000 years has 5% more moisture in the atmosphere, the sea is turning more acid. The only trouble is it’s not fiction.”

The 10,000 years helps us understand this. When I was a kid, we worried about the terrible problem of radioactive nuclear waste that would still be here in 10,000 years. Gradually, our perception of time horizons have closed in on us since then. Now we dare only look 50 or 100 years into the future, and no further.

We have stopped talking about 10,000 years ahead.

Cities like New York City have to plan for the beginning, of course. Scientists have to guess how bad the effects might be by 2100, our immediate future.

But sea levels won’t magically stop rising in 2100. Icecaps and glaciers won’t magically stop melting in 2100. The dust from drying continents won’t stop blowing away in 2100. Species won’t stop going extinct in 2100.

We’ve come 10,000 years as a group of civilizations. But to imagine as far ahead as we have been civilized is no longer an option. We no longer look as far forward as we can look back.

Now it seems almost quaint to care about radiation for those people 10,000 years into the future, as we know that much worse will befall them far, far sooner than that, thanks to our brief fling with fossil fuel. We bequeath Eaarth to them. Who knows what it will be, or how long humans can even survive on it?

After the Permian extinction 250 million years ago, this pig-sized creature almost had the planet to itself for 30 million years. The Permian extinction took about 5 million years to eradicate 95% of life on earth, leaving behind just a few species like the Lystrosaurus to dominate the planet.

Who knows what species will survive what we did to Eaarth? My guess? A jellyfish. They are already expanding in our new acidic ocean.

Images: FanPop and the Natural History Museum

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Tags: $10, 000 years, Bill McKibben, Eaarth, Name, Needs, New, Planet

About the Author

Susan Kraemer writes at CleanTechnica, CSP-Today, PV-Insider , SmartGridUpdate, and GreenProphet. She has also been published at Ecoseed, NRDC OnEarth, MatterNetwork, Celsius, EnergyNow, and Scientific American. As a former serial entrepreneur in product design, Susan brings an innovator's perspective on inventing a carbon-constrained civilization: If necessity is the mother of invention, solving climate change is the mother of all necessities! As a lover of history and sci-fi, she enjoys chronicling the strange future we are creating in these interesting times. Follow Susan on Twitter @dotcommodity.

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Mary Genoud

Great article.

Time for everyone on this planet Erth-Eaarth to focus on building a sustainable near future.
Frank Hanlan

My first thought is that we should change the name to Erth because obviously we are leaving less behind that we found when we were born. Alternatively we are leaving more of the bad and less of the good behind.
Dorian

My first impression of Bill’s suggestion that our Planet Earth be re-named “Eaarth” is not without a twinge of dire humor. I am reminded at once of Stewart Brand’s 10,000 Year Clock idea. But I get it. What humanity has managed to willfully neglect over the past century of squandering planetary resources is the ability to any longer seriously consider the conditional fate of our World. Perhaps we already sense our outcome but we just aren’t brave enough to confront the hard decision-making that needs to be done on a collective level. Based upon the inculcated desires foistered upon us by savvy advertisers and cynical marketeers that we should seize the moment and fulfill our short-range needs and cravings for immediate gratification, we can no longer fathom what we should want to look like in the next 100 years.
http://sfworld.info JP

This was a fascinating article! I would have thought it was science fiction if the source wasn’t the Natural History Museum. Thanks for posting!