Ellis:
I too have long and often asked myself that same question; why do people not see what is going on in terms of pollution, mostly, despoiling the biosphere? And the only answer that I can come up with is apathy. "It's not happening in my back yard, right at this moment, why should I care?", The "So What? Syndrome".
I remember those bush fires outside of Adelaide a few years back. I recall wondering if the vineyards of the Barossa Valley were destroyed. Excellent Wine, BTW.
Most people never venture very far from where they were raised. I think that "narrow scope" has something to do with why we are apathetic as a Species. We simply don't relate to people starving in Africa, dying of Aids in Haiti, being forced to leave their homes in Vanuatu. It's on TV, it's not real. "Honey, switch to American Idol, will ya?"
I feel no sympathy whatsoever for us. We all learned in Primary School that if a species could not adapt, it was doomed to extinction.
