Nature’s Leviathan

Crushing human pride for millennia

On the one hand, the world changes due to man’s genius and perfidy. One the other it changes by nature’s hand, changes that are far more powerful, sudden and unpredictable. The Leviathan then makes a new social contract without reference to the earlier one. When a meteor or two wiped the dinosaurs out, the slate was wiped clean and the world started again in a new paradigm.

To put our ‘greatness’ in perspective, if you convert the 4.5 billion years earth’s history into one day, Homo sapiens have existed for only 1 minute and 17 seconds – (Bill Bryson: a short history of nearly everything). All other species have lasted longer – so far. If you go by the yardstick of longevity they are not failures but successes, even the cockroach and crocodile. Humility, my fellow bipeds some humility please when you try and play god.

Here’s one of nature’s many ‘conspiracies’ against the great and the good. “It appears a 55 million ton asteroid may soon be approaching Earth and soon getting closer than the distance between the Earth and the moon. But how close will the object get? And how did it manage to stay out of the headlines in the midst of the chaos of our current year? And if this sounds like just another asteroid passing by, it’s not. It is actually the largest to ever to get this close.

“The asteroid, also known as YU55 which is a little over 1,300 feet in diameter will be passing by the planet at an estimated distance of just over 200,000 miles as it reaches its nearest point on November 8th. It is currently the largest asteroid to ever reach this distance with a size easily capable of causing a major catastrophe if it did indeed impact the planet’s surface.

“How concerned should we be? As a matter of likelihood, scientists are saying the asteroid will not likely reach the planet’s surface or come any closer than the 200,000 as it passes by. But skeptics of NASA’s ability to make calculations such as this say it’s only a matter of time before a miscalculation is made and one of these massive objects not only passes by the planet, but passes right into it.

An asteroid composed primarily of rock hitting Earth at a 90 degree angle of this size traveling 25 miles per second would be equivalent to a 19,149 million tons of TNT detonated on the ground. It would create a crater just over ten miles in diameter and almost 3,600 feet deep. It’s estimated that an asteroid of this class hits the Earth once every 16,000 years. It would be more than enough to devastate a city and could have far reaching consequences elsewhere in the Earth depending on where it hit.

“Of course NASA scientists are confident we have nothing to fear from this rock as it sails through the sky. And it’s not even the largest object that will be approaching Earth in the near future. In 2028, the Asteroid Apophis is expected to approach the Earth and just barely miss it. Apophis raised fears in 2004 when scientists expected an unprecedented high probability for impact based on initial calculations. As time went on, however, it was discovered that the asteroid would likely not hit in 2028 or when it returned in 2036.

The object is approximately 835 feet in diameter and could cause significantly more damage than YU55 if it impacted with Earth – something scientists admit is far more likely than an impact with YU55 – although still not terribly likely. And while Apophis, named after the Ancient Egyptian demon of chaos, may not be causing too much sleep lost at NASA at the moment, scientists are hoping to recalculate the trajectory in the near future to see how the change has been affected by gravity from nearby objects – including other asteroids.”

A super quake of more than Richter 11 would not only cause total devastation in its zone, there would be a tidal wave so huge that Noah would be remembered. Geography would change. There could even be a polar switch, the North Pole becoming the South Pole and vice versa.

Climate change is upon us. It will lead to all kinds of changes – agricultural, demographic and industrial, all of which will lead to culture change. Eating and living habits will change, as will styles and fashions. The next Ice Age could be upon us sooner than we think – perhaps in 20 years. The recent Japan quake shifted the Earth from its axis. Places that were nearer the sun have got further; places that were further from the sun have got nearer. Places will get hotter or colder than before. This will affect cropping patterns with harvests and sowing coming earlier or later. It would change society.

The polar ice caps are melting. The ice cap around the North Pole is discharging cold water into the sea, causing the Gulf Stream to cool down. It flows elliptically in the Atlantic along the east coast of the Americas. If its cooling goes beyond a point, it will stop entirely. That will bring the ice age to North America and Europe with a vengeance.

London and New York would be under tons of ice and snow. Wolves would be shopping in Oxford Street looking for Little Red Riding Hood who will have escaped to Morocco and bears going for walks in Central Park searching for Goldilocks who would have run to Mexico. Huge population shifts will perforce take place, from north to south, from cold to warm, causing a massive change in global demographics. This could happen sooner than expected or predicted, in our lifetimes perhaps. It could lead to wars over territory. Is our species prepared for this? Of course not! Whenever bad news stares us in the face, it is human nature to pretend that, “This can’t happen to me.”

The human race has to decide how it will weather this storm of change. Every week there are earthquakes, tsunamis, volcanoes, blinding dust storms, hurricanes and tornadoes in every corner of the globe. Wisdom lies in being flexible like the willow, not unbending like the mighty oak, but that’s easier said than done in this age of lunacy, wishful thinking, make-believe and constantly blaming others for faults that lie within us. If you think that another has taken advantage of you, it begs the question: “Why did you let them? Had common sense deserted you?” Answer it and you will find salvation.

The writer is a political analyst. He can be contacted at [email protected]