A Future History of the Planet Earth

A few people really liked my quick science talk on the last post, so I thought I would post a few science based articles that could help inspire some stories for the anthology.

The story of our planet, is the story of change. In fact, any story worth telling has to do with the fundamental law of change; "what happens." We go through our days wondering "what if...?".
What if I decided not to go to work today?
What if our country goes to war with [any country you can think of right about now]?
What if we ran out of oil?
What if bees or bats went extinct?

Most disaster movies go that route:
What if Earth were hit by an asteroid?
What if global warming forces the climate out of control?
What if the rabies virus mutated out of control?
What if another advanced civilization found us?

In our world, major changes happen along with minor changes. Usually they are the same thing. Changes have a rippling effect. The extinction of one minute species may cause the extinction of ten larger ones. Changes are what cause adaptation. What are we as a species if not an adaptation to the planet? Originally humans evolved into a subtropical climate, but as we have grown, we have found ourselves able to adapt to any climate in the world. It is the nature of our world that forces change out of us. All species of life on earth are the result of their environment's requirements.

That is not to say that animals will easily change to meet their environment, it is that only the animals that can survive (and thrive) in an environment will. It is only by chance that our planet contains the exact diversity that it does. If things had gone slightly different in our past, it may have been our species that went extinct instead of others. But it is all of these slight chances that form the tight machinery of our planet's ecosystem. And it is minute, but constant change that will determine the infinitum of possibilities of our future.

Here are a few things that will perhaps spark your interest and curiosity as you ponder the possibilities:

The World Without Us by Alan Weisman
The Time Machine by H.G. Wells
Phoenix by Osamu Tezuka
Astronomy 161 Podcast by Richard Pogge
Will We Soon Be Extinct article by Josh Clark
Nova PBS ulti-site
After Man: a zoology of the future by Dougal Dixon
Radiolab by Jad Abumrad and Rober Krulwich

thes are a few sources I use to inspire me (at various times) or just generally some of my favorite things.