Daily Times

Consciousness and discontentment are the prominent attributes that distinguish humans from their fellow living beings. Embedded in human nature, the existence of these traits has always spurred humans to whet for the things not available to them. Given that such unique behavioral virtues exhibited by the human race stimulate humanity to strive for more progress and development however it also results in a trade-off. It increased human appetite to hoard more resources.

Consequently the nature and its miserable inhabitants by and large fall prey to satisfy human’s endless needs and have to bear the entire brunt of the ensuing quagmire.

As compare to other creatures, Humans are more adaptive and appear more resilient. They have since their primordial existence endeavored hard to catch up with the changing circumstances or if their mental capacities permit have left no stone unturned to mould the environment to their advantage. Driven by adaptive and pragmatic tendencies, they became more conscious of their surroundings and of the underlying opportunities and challenges posed by it.

Acquiring an ability to harness nature and its associated resources to their benefit was the consequence of their enhanced awareness of nature which subsequently set the stage for human evolution. Their foremost need: the unrelenting pursuit of survival in the face of biotic and abiotic distractions spurred them to learn and seek, create and develop things crucial to their survival. The need to keep themselves warm in cold weather led them to ignite the fire and form a variety of cloth. Similarly, the fear of death arising out of hunger, enemy attack and fatal diseases resulted in the development of farming and hunting practices, tools and weapons, cures and treatments.

While one can hardly doubt the mainstay role of necessity behind these fascinated developments, there also involves its flipside. It abruptly increased human appetite and greed rendering him dissatisfied again with what he has so far achieved. As a result, they started to yearn for more, this time with the spiteful motive of dominance and supremacy. The quest for survival eventually morphed into a struggle for power and hegemony. To this end energies were invested; capacities were built to create weapons of mass destruction. An arms race was initiated to outclass one another. Massive and varied stripe of missiles, bombs, aircraft, weapons and tanks were engineered.

A final blow to humanity appeared when an apocalyptic nuclear bomb was created and subsequently incorporated into conventional military arsenals. Since their incorporation, the horrific devastation inflicted by these lethal weapons of indiscriminate destruction has endured by the successive generations of mankind on several occasions. The not-so-old Second World War serves as the one such glaring reflection of it. The invasive humanitarian crisis subsequently unleashed supply ample evidence to the notion that an undue obsession with need culminated in the deprivation of the entire human breed.

It was not until the far and wide of enlightenment and civic values that human life was given precedence over any other consideration and the collective willingness was shown by the then rulers to prioritize human welfare and social wellbeing over and above anything. This paradigm shift epitomized a great landmark in the history of mankind which ushered in opening new vistas of progressive advancement. Humanity’s arduous journey from a semi-nomadic and rural existence to an industrialized and urbanized society marked great stride humanity has ever achieved in its evolutionary history.

Industrialization, mechanization and a never-ending glut of Inventions created financial opportunities for masses to realize their goal of adequate food, shelter and dignified living, however abuse of these novel developments has left adrift humanity in a sea of multifarious problems. Whereas the origin of machines, computers and scientific discoveries have helped enable masses to enhance their standard of life and overall productivity thereby bringing comfort, solace and sustenance in their life- which however was not available to majority of them in the past-, it has stoked materialistic tendencies among people and has made them indolent, selfish and excessively self-centered. Unhealthy and mutually destructive competition among different races of mankind and different classes of people both at the individual and collective levels is the attendant consequence of the ensued exploitation.

Ironically discontentment and marginalized sentiments among people increased leading to the outbreak of various psychological diseases such as anxiety, depression and cynicism. Moreover, an abrupt rise in inequality between the affluent and impoverished class lends credence to the fact that the popular notion of more-have, no matter how impressive it appears, ultimately ends up in the ruining of masses.

There is no denial to the skeptics claim that highly civilized and modern society was founded on the wreckage of nature. Huge settlements, aplenty roads, giant infrastructures and an ever-expanding network of rail and bridges were laid down through the entire globe on the wreckage of nature. Enthralled by such fascinated transformation, perhaps there were hardly left anyone who might have suspected the heavy price that would be required to endure by the people of the successive generation.

Nevertheless, the present world is said to have almost arrived at its apogee of cultural and infrastructural development, this was achieved at the dire expense of comprising nature and its life-sustaining features. Nature is not only deprived of its self-sustaining resources but also made to have lost its biodiversity. A glut and flood of humans and industries to support cultural and infrastructural progression has not only shrunk space but also has deteriorated their remaining habitats of other co-habitants.

Motivated by the brewing storm of competition against the backdrop of the paucity of resources and a soaring bulge of humans, distraught mankind found recourse to pursue development in a more aggressive and vehement fashion an only cheap option. Turning a deaf eye to its long term countervailing effects consequently stranded humanity in the throes of the tragedy of the commons. Satisfaction of need at whatsoever case and unsustainable and insensible pursuit of giant developmental greed triggered environmental catastrophes and climatic changes of massive proportions.

Unaffected and unconstrained to any limit of social, economic and political dimension-delineated by mankind to segregate and rank one another-, climatic events began to threatened all and teetered the entire mankind on the brink of major environmental apocalypse. Recurring droughts and famines, heavy stormy rain and flooding, more often than natural glacial melt and forest fires, increased sea levels and frequent hurricanes experiencing the world overexpose the Damocles sword mankind has hung over itself out of its reckless needs and burgeoning greed.

The writer is a practicing Lawyer and a Teacher.