All animals in their nature exploit the resources they have access to in order to survive/multiply.
Humans however seem to have a trend of exploiting things to the max, even to our own detriment when we completely obliterate the land we’re using. Despite having the knowledge to thrive without destroying the planet, we still do it.
Is this human nature at this point, or something else? Interested to see what the science community thinks about how we go to this weird place in our species’ evolution
At this point it looks like it’s human nature to deal poorly with extremely gradual problems that aren’t easily fixed (like the ozone hole crisis was). Emissions could be peaking as we speak, but only because changing technology bailed us out. 2100 is just too far away and abstract for people to really care about when they have needs and wants today.
It’s not just us, either. The main thing that stops other animals from overexploiting is not being able to. If you have a pet, you might have noticed they struggle with things requiring prolonged attention over far less than decades.
There is some psychology around this. In nature things are random and impermanent, and it’s not necessarily a great move to assume you can work on a thing forever and you won’t be interrupted by inclement weather or a visit from a rival. Far better to assume a constant probability of everything going away, and that means living in the moment more.