Humanity on Earth: Bending the curves
I just watched a TED talk by Johan Rockström that nicely sums up the current situation of our species on our planet.
I really recommend watching the video in full, but since I know that some of you will hesitate to do this, here is a brief travel guide through the video (times in min): The Earth is a complex system (7:15), and it faces multiple pressures (3:46) that are driving it away from its current equilibrium state. Such complex systems have multiple states of equilibrium, and the transitions between them may be sudden (5:36-5:38). The human contributions are nicely symbolized at 4:02 and detailed between 4:35 and 4:55.
This leaves humanity with the conclusion (5:07) "that we may have come to the point where we have to bend the curves, that we may have entered the most challenging and most exciting decade in the history of humanity on the planet, the decade when we have to bend the curves."
How do we bend the curves? 12:30: "We have to invest in persistence, in the ability of social systems and ecological systems to withstand shocks and still remain in that desired cup" (by which he means the potential well illustrated at 7:15).
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