La vie Après les Gens

Welcome to Planet Earth, Population: 0. I'd been waiting quite a while for the colossal documentary "Life After People" to air on The History Channel and last night was the night. Over two hours long, this ultra-detailed "what if" scenario poses the question, "what would happen if for some reason man vanished from the Earth and everything else stayed?" The details of why this would happen are not explored, and thank goodness, because frankly I can't stand details that are based on curiosity rather than need.

So, slowly we envision the first days, weeks and months of the Earth, sans people. What would happen to domestic pets, to zoo and wild animals, what's going to happen to buildings, homes and landmarks when there is no one there for maintenance and upkeep. The results of which, in the first few months to a year are for the most part that of a natural disaster in many cases.

The really interesting part was when we started getting into 20, 50, 100 years into the eco-system without man. The collapse of giant monuments, bridges and things that as of now seem like they'd last pretty much forever, but we learn that if not for the engineers and workers striving to maintain these things, they wouldn't, in the grand scheme, last all that long.

Animals and their adaptation are touched on, but not really explored all that much. They did spend some time of the loss of records of the existence of man to anything that might come along after us. Let's face it, without us around to keep the records from vanishing, they will be lost, returning to dust and lost forever and ever.

Once they start getting into the thousands of years after us, the Earth is pretty much back to normal, safe and sound and doing well...does Mother Earth give a rip about some Styrofoam here and there? Nope, she cleanses herself of all that we've done to her...because let's face it, we're far worse than the cups, diapers and plain garbage we leave behind...there would be no damage were we not around. Without a pencil, there really is no need for an eraser.
Life After People
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