In 1973 a reportedly drunk driver flattened a tree in the middle of the Sahara, which sounds unremarkable until you learn it was the only tree for 250 miles around, a 300-year-old acacia so isolated it was marked on maps covering half a continent. https://share.google/ePM21R48Aq0VRqTUb
This was a cool and sad read. The end of an era thanks to human stupidity. Id like to have known how long the tree could’ve lived naturally before finally succumbing to old age.
Humans struggle with accepting that as we are now we’re more or less a virus killing a host.
We aren’t killing the host. The host will go on, we’re just destroying the growth medium for ourselves and other creatures.
Something will go one even after we manage to wipe ourselves out.
Every day we stray closer to The Matrix
Not with the demise of public phone booths.
Matrix will be a subscription service that many people willingly pay for.
How the hell do you manage to run into the only tree for 250 miles!!
On accident? Seems unlikely.
Someone should replant it. Surely we have the technology.
New trees haven’t been able to grow there for centuries. You’d have to spend a century giving the new tree progressively deeper irrigation until the roots reach the current water table, 40+m deep.
Yeah I realize it would require irrigation but that’s very doable with modern technology.
We could fundraise an electric truck to bring the water or something.
Would need a pretty good fence around it. Sounds like unaware and drunk drivers are great at hitting the only thing around for miles.
