Okay, okay, I'm sorry, I'll make it more obvious that I care about global warming, since I know that's what we're all supposed to be passionately invested in at the moment. And I truly am concerned about global warming, deeply concerned. It's just that I'm not deluded about it.

We are, without question, changing earth's climate. Some places are about to get pretty toasty while others confuse those on the knowledge periphery by actually getting a heck of a lot colder. Ocean ice is melting en masse, which will result in rising sea levels - a major issue for a species that has, throughout history, done it's best to build all major settlements right around sea level (that'd be us). But see, there's the issue. I am concerned about global warming, but my concern contains not a single grain of world-saving complex. Yes, we do need to do our best to mitigate the already alarming impact we have had on the environment, but not because this indifferent planet really gives a shit.

Ultimately, my environmentalism is a direct result of my humanism. What I care about is not hoisting needless suffering upon my fellow man, and thus I seek to minimize my footprint, to live lightly on this earth. If there's one thing I don't doubt, it's that global warming could lead to incredible human suffering as we drown, starve, freeze, and suffer all kinds of worse fates we haven't even imagined yet. The earth, on the other hand, will be fine. That's what mechanisms like global warming are for - causing a massive global shift so that any established damaging patterns (or really particularly nasty one-offs) are disrupted and the planet can slowly creep back towards equilibrium. If we humans push things too far, this little blue marble will pretty much rub us off its skin and go on. Once most of us are wiped out by flooding and associated catastrophes and the few who remain have no choice but to devote their every waking minute to subsistence, humans will essentially stop being a threat and the earth will do just as it has after countless ice ages, warming periods, meteor impacts, eruptions, and nameless other massive disruptions: slowly return to normal.

In short, I say f*ck this world saving crap. The world isn't particularly interested in being saved by the likes of us - a mere species - anyways. Our job, our most important and noble job, is as it has always been: to save ourselves. Let us re instill with honour the notion of saving ourselves and our fellows. As a species, that ought to be our most consuming concern, what we strive to do with each waking hour. Save the humans, and toil not in the service of this indifferent little earth, for surely it will shake us off like so many water droplets from a wet hound should the need arise. If you ask me, environmentalism is the ultimate humanitarian project, as it strives to prevent great calamities from befalling this peculiar species of squishy hairless apes. And the calamities brought on by global warming my be the greatest challenge to human survival yet.

Okay, now you can start disagreeing.