Before we evolved from apes into the current form of human less than a million years ago, the earth had existed billions of years. The earth will continue to exist billions and trillions of years long after we are all gone. The planet earth does not need us, we need it. We are the ones who need clean environment. The earth does not need what we need. We are the ones turning the earth inhabitable by making air and water toxic. We may even kill ourselves by fighting each other. Existing nuclear weapons alone can blow up the earth a few times over. We are the one in need of help to get out of our own suicidal stupidity. We, the homo sapience, have been on this earth less than one million years, but cockroaches have existed 300 hundred million years. Even dinosaurs came into being after cockroaches. They will likely continue to thrive after we are long gone because they consume only what they need, know how to escape from danger. I ask myself who is more intelligent.

We think humans have better quality of life, are happier, and live longer thanks to our scientific achievements. We think we made great progress in food production, eliminated many deadly diseases, and created comfortable life. Some changes we made might have been harmful. I am beginning to wonder if a lot of our health problems might be the result of ignoring the fact that we have not yet fully evolved out of hunter/gatherers’ physical disposition.

Past is not always regressive. A professor of communication theory at the New York University, Neil Postman, begins his 1992 book “Technopoly” with the story told by Greek philosopher Socrates: Before humans came up with the idea of writing spoken word, the inventor Theuth proudly presented his new idea of what we call today as “letters” to the King Thames. “Written letters preserve spoken words without memorizing them.” The king was not impressed. He said, “They will lose ability to remember. Where there is no memories of spoken words, no wisdom emerge.” Thames was right. It’s why we are turning the earth inhabitable. Postman’s point is this: We should be aware that every progress has a negative consequence.