Earth Day

Guruko and her platypus companion were once again looking, through their magical mirror, at what was happening on a mysterious planet from another universe than their own.

This planet was covered with water, which gave it its blue color when seen from space.

And today, its inhabitants had decided that it was Earth Day, the name they had given to their planet.

Why such a day?

Because since its inhabitants, called humans, had managed to use the fossil resources of their planet, they had at the same time begun to impact the global climate of the Earth.

The use of these resources had brought them an abundance and wealth at a level never known before, allowing their population to grow to levels never seen before, and their economy to expand, now based on an ever-increasing use of machines powered by energy.

But if the picture seemed perfect at first glance, looking at it from a more thoughtful and global perspective had been showing for years that this was not the case at all. Besides the increasingly significant inequalities that this wealth had created for humanity, humanity is not the only one to exist on this planet, and biodiversity, forests, and oceans have been heavily impacted.

The planet will survive, of course.

Humanity too, probably; humans develop extraordinary resilience when they are backed into a corner.

The questions may be more tragic:

Who will survive, in what numbers, and under what conditions?


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