Humanity is NOT a Virus

We're actually much more like a cancer.

This happy realization came to me while listening to James Lovelock on NPR the other morning. He's a right chipper English bloke, member of the Royal Society of Fellows, and proponent of the Gaia Theory. This theory holds that the Earth is a living organism made up of subsystems... that various species of flora and fauna operate the way different organs work in a human body. They all work in concert to achieve a self-regulating stability. The human race can be compared to the central nervous system or "brain" of this earth-organism. As Lovelock points out, the earth can now actually defend itself from a potential asteroid collision thanks to the miraculous efforts of it's brain organ. Hurray for growing brains. Hurray for Gaia's evolution. Hurray for humanity.

However...

We're also growing at a completely unsustainable pace. We're savaging many of the other "organs" in order to feed our own advancement. As Al Gore and any other environmentalist will tell you: when we cut down rain forests to build cattle ranches or burn fossil fuels for energy, we're causing a breakdown in the delicate balance that sustains Gaia, and soon the planet will become a lot less inhabitable. But I no longer see us as a parasitic virus... feasting on the husk of a depleted planet. Instead, I see us like a cancerous tumor... multiplying in size despite the adverse consequences to our own species and to all of our neighboring species. The good news is that there is nothing inherently wrong with humanity... no more than there is something inherently wrong with evolving a brain. We just happen to represent a nasty case of cancer to our mother Gaia at the moment. I'm hoping we don't have to resort to radiation treatment.