Yesterday, Time magazine had a little item tucked into its pages saying Stephen Hawking believes we have about 100 years to find a new planet to call home before global warming makes Earth uninhabitable. Such a little piece, such a big story. Well, unless you don’t believe in global warming. (I do.) Or you don’t believe in science. (I do.) Or you don’t think Stephen Hawking is all that smart. (He’s a genius, one of a handful of the most brilliant minds in the world.)
This little fact about global warming chills me. 100 years isn’t that long. And our new president doesn’t believe in global warming or spending money or resources on trying to stop rapid climate change. He’s already overturned, or is in the process of overturning, just about all the safeguards Obama put in place to clean up Earth and reverse climate change.
100 years. I have a new grand baby coming next month. She’ll be my third, the first girl in our family in generations. My mom was the only girl, I was her only girl, and I had two sons, no girls. Then my sons (or rather their wives!) each had babies, both boys. So we’ve been waiting awhile for this little lady. In her lifetime, with all the health and medical advances, she may expect to live to age 100 and beyond. But will she be able to afford the ticket to Mars or wherever humanity will go once our own planet is uninhabitable? I’m thinking of my grandsons, too. They’re still toddlers. Will they be the last generation of children born on Earth?
This world can be a terrible place to live. Famine, genocide, war. But it is also beautiful: meadows, sea, sky. Skyscrapers, medical miracles, love. You. Me. Everybody else. And obviously it’s the only planet we’ve got. For about a hundred years, if Hawking got the science right. I have great faith in science and scientific genius, so I feel that the chances are good when Hawking says 100 years, he’s not kidding.
I’m disturbed and upset, but part of me wonders if his warning will change anything. Is there hope for us if we start to clean up our act right now? Because as far as I know, nobody’s really looking seriously at moving the entire population of this planet to Mars. And I’m betting if we do find somewhere to go, the price of a ticket will be beyond the means of most people. I see the rich people packing their diamonds and furs, but what about everybody else?
Cynthia Harrison 
Scary stuff indeed!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Time magazine didn’t get into everything Hawking said…I did more research and found there will be a television special on finding a new planet for Earth’s population due to any number of causes like nuclear war, a rapid-spread virus, or global warming. He recently changed 1000 years to 100 years, too. So, maybe doomsday is not necessarily at hand. Still, scary stuff. I’m not telling my kids.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Reblogged this on Anita Dawes & Jaye Marie.
LikeLiked by 1 person
A hundred years on the dot, or will we be suffering long before then? In a way, I’m glad I won’t be around, but surely the scientists/politicians will have to do something?
LikeLiked by 1 person
Jaye I am looking at N. Korea right now…nobody seems to be able to do anything. I think there’s a lot of scary stuff we the general public don’t even know about. I heard about the cyber strike in hospitals in the U.K. over the weekend. Seems the world is a dangerous place, even now.
LikeLiked by 1 person
You try not to think about what could happen, but you get nervous anyway…
LikeLike
There’s a huge aliance forming. It will be ok.
LikeLike
It is such a scary thought. It makes me glad I will be dead long before this happens – but like you it won’t help my grandchildren and great grandchildren. Most people I talk to about global warming prefer to think it is some kind of abstract thought and if it happens someone will figure out how to save us. Then they go on to live lives that benefit no one but themselves. But still I push on to educate people about issues that affect us all and where ignorance is not bliss. I don’t know how do anything else.
LikeLike
Sonni, I’ve read more on this since I wrote and a great book called Enlightenment Now by Steven Pinker that has a chapter on climate change that goes into great detail about how we can reverse global warning, and many smart scientists are working on it every day. It’s what the Paris Accord is about and the world agrees we need to take steps. It’s not to late to hope for our kids and grandkids. I know what you mean about people just being about themselves and not really caring. That can be frustrating when it’s somebody you really like. Keep being you!!
LikeLike