Did you know that Yellowstone – the park, not the Paramount+ series set there – is a giant volcano? Geologists* think that if it were to erupt it would cause a VEI level 8 catastrophe. To put that in perspective, the most severe eruptions that the planet has ever experienced during its existence has been an 8, which caused worldwide environmental destruction and mass extinctions. While Yellowstone is seeing some ‘normal’ activity, there is no indication at present of any major eruption any time soon – it last provided one 64,000 years ago – but with volcanoes you can never say never.
Did you know there have been there have been almost 40,000 earthquakes in the last thirty days? Most have been under 3.5 on the Richter scale, some were not. The Richter scale is a logarithmic scale. An eruption that registers as a 4 on the scale is not just a little greater than a 3. It is 32 times greater. An 8 is 32x32x32x32x32x32 times greater than a 3. Most earthquakes are caused by the movement of the Earth’s tectonic plates. The plates move an average of 2-10cm a year and grind up against, under and over each other. Their movement means there will inevitably be many more quakes greater than the moderate 3.5. These quakes will hit the news, just like the level 5 quake in Venezuela in June this year (6,700 deaths, 226,700 injuries, tens of thousands still missing).
Apart from predicting them, we can do nothing about earthquakes – and the resulting tsunamis when they occur under the sea – except attempt to build quake resistant buildings to minimise their effect. We could also avoid living on the borders of tectonic plates, but invariably we don’t.
Did you know, we are still within an Ice Age? We are entering an interglacial period towards the end of that Ice Age. This is leading to there being less ice on the planet and a warmer climate. While human activity is almost certainly accelerating this warming, it is happening because of the cyclical nature of glacial and interglacial periods. For the same reason, a future glacial period, with much more ice and much colder temperatures is inevitable, though probably not for a few thousand years.
I mention all of this because of the notion that the Earth is fine-tuned for our existence. In fact our presence is precarious here. We are like ants on an ever-shifting surface that at any time can move violently, destroying a great many of us. The fissures in the Earth’s surface and under its oceans can erupt unexpectedly, creating massive devastation, tsunamis and the destruction not just of human life but of animals and entire environments. The climate changes constantly, warming and cooling for reasons we don’t yet fully understand, driving hardship and extinction for life forms on the planet.
This Earth, like the universe itself, is completely indifferent not only to our well being but our very existence. It does not care whether we, and the animal life on the planet, survive, thrive, live or die. It has not been fine-tuned to nurture us. Homo Sapiens has existed for only 0.007% of the time the Earth has existed. By comparison, the great lizards were here for 3.5% of that time. While it is true that organic life has adapted to being here, it is the surviving life forms, including homo sapiens, that have been fine-tuned to the planet’s changing conditions, not the other way round. This fine-tuning is of course narural selection and pitiless, indifferent evolution. 99% of all the species that have ever lived are now extinct; the vast majority because they could not adapt to the planet’s constant changes (and yes, the arrival of a giant meteorite).
This is the world, the universe we live in, and we do so at our peril. There’s no fine-tuning creator behind it all who has our best interests at heart. Very far from it.
*The details in the first two paragraphs of this post are taken from a series of talks by the geologist Dr Natasha Stephen, which I was lucky enough to attend recently. I’ve checked those details (and also those of the later paragraphs), not because Dr Stephen could have been be wrong but because I might have misheard or misremembered things she said. Please feel free to check further and correct me if need be.
