world without humans

May not seem like a cf but one of the comments got me,

Good reason NOT to have kids. Do you want your great great grandchildren to live in the last few moments of hell? Spend what you have in this marvelous time. We are living in the golden age folks. Mark, Michigan, USA

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Revealed: what the world will look like when we've gone
By NIGEL BLUNDELL - More by this author »

Last updated at 20:48pm on 14th March 2008

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=534190&in_page_id=1770

Welcome to Planet Earth: Population 0.


This is what our world would look like without people.


The images were created to illustrate what would happen if human life ceased tomorrow, if, for whatever reason, mankind was obliterated.


The question it raises is: how long would the remnants of our civilisation remain?

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Washed away: Harrods, London's premier department store, rots among derelict double-decker buses in flood waters caused by the bursting of the Thames barrier


Crown and out: Buckingham Palace sinks into decay


How much would we leave behind? What would an alien visitor learn about us upon landing on our planet a century or more after we had disappeared from it?


The answer, astonishingly, is: almost nothing.

Within a hundred years most traces of our modern-day lives would be so destroyed by weather, corrosion, earth tremors, surviving animals, insects and bacteria that the monuments and hieroglyphics of ancient civilisations would be better preserved than our buildings and our billions of books and electronic records.

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Tower Bridge is falling down: A London landmark crumbles



An alien visiting Earth might well believe that the last civilisation on the planet were ancient Egyptians.


The prophetic forecast for the longevity of our 21st-century civilisation is contained in research for a TV documentary, Life After People.


And it's not guesswork. The two-hour special uses scientific expertise and understanding of history in order to predict the future.


Principal advisor on the TV programme is a 53-year-old Scot, Gordon Masterton, former president of the Royal Institution of Civil Engineers.

He says: "The lights will start going out around the world almost immediately. The last power will be produced by wind turbines but, after a few weeks, the planet will be plunged into a deep darkness it has not experienced since primitive Man huddled around camp fires."

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Rust in peace: Made of steel, the Eiffel Tower, France's monument to the industrial age, teeters


After only six months, urban areas will begin to be repopulated - by animals, including former domestic pets.



Bear on the subway: Wild animals would roam the streets of New York


Within 20 years wolves and bears will be the master species, roaming the streets. Any buildings made of wood will start to crumble, especially where termites flourish. But concrete and steel structures will also begin to be affected.


Looking 40 and 50 years into the future, the corrosion of steel, incursion of vegetation roots and effects of the weather mean that modern buildings will start collapsing.

Within a century nearly all automobiles will have rusted away.


Eventually glass buildings will topple, stone buildings crumble; successive freezing and thawing would turn streets to rubble, ground water will rise, underground railways flood, sewers crack and lightning will ignite overgrown grasses, engulfing cities in flames.


Central London, of course, will be largely under water. Without power, the Thames Barrier will leave the city defenceless.


Some myths are exposed. For instance, with no heating in buildings, the "invincible" cockroach would succumb to the cold; and rats would starve or become lunch for hawks and falcons.

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New York: Once magnificent skyscrapers would rot away


Ultimately, the larger animals would take over again: within 100 years, the half-a-million surviving African elephants would have multiplied to their pre-colonial population of ten million or so.

Livestock such as cows and sheep will be killed off by more aggressive predators.


Meanwhile, the most precious records of our history and culture which are stored in archives that are temperature and humidity controlled, will also vanish.


The Dead Sea Scrolls, for instance, remained intact for 2,000 years in desert caves.


"Rescued" and placed in a modern environment - but without the power to protect them - they wouldn't last 100.

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Last civilisation: The ancient Sphinx and Great Pyramid of Gaza would remain, while modern buildings would crumble


Almost all of the records of our human experience - books, photographs, electronic data - will fade away, leaving little evidence that we ever existed.


This apocalyptic forecast is justified in Life After People by astrophysicist and author David Brinn, who says: "Every civilisation has its tales of Armageddon or apocalypse, but we are the first generation that could, by deliberate action, cause its own doom


Brilliant stuff, at last the animal kingdom will dominate again with out the interference of the stupid human being, who has wrought so much destruction on this planet. A fitting finale for humanity perhaps for several thousand million years.

- Keith, Shropshire

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I just post the stories, for interest.. for everyone

Lord, what fools these mortals be!
- A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act III, Scene ii

Voltaire said: "Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities."

H.L.Mencken wrote:"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.”

Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former. Albert Einstein

Too depressing to read even further even though the world would be much better off without selfish, polluting humans.^^;

to me i find it a comfort, knowing that without humanity the world will carry on as normal even get better for all life. elephants back to pre colonial days.

*********************************************************************************************************************************
I just post the stories, for interest.. for everyone

Lord, what fools these mortals be!
- A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act III, Scene ii

Voltaire said: "Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities."

H.L.Mencken wrote:"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.”

Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former. Albert Einstein

Better off without us? Many would think so.. However, as someone else here pointed out, a lot of what is lovely, beautiful, will also pass. Of course, what would emerge would also be beautiful in time..
But no one to appreciate it. (Here's a thought, enjoy what we have.. life is short)
Sad thing is, we are so busy destroying that it will only be missed when it is gone.