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Anti-evolution? The VHEMT movement.

VHEMT

Voluntary Human Extinction MovemenT

"May we live long and die out"

"Phasing out the human race by voluntarily ceasing to breed will allow the Earth's biosphere to return to good health".

While surfing the web the other day, I ran across VHEMT. Never heard of it, so of course I looked. Imagine my surprise. They are advocating the complete extinction of the human race, done through no procreation. Plenty of sex, just no more pregnancies. I mean as an atheist, I believe not only in evolution, but in our place in nature. We are a part of nature, one end product (as of now) of evolution. The urge for procreation is a biological imperative, but we also have a mind, which can make us go beyond our biological programming and act altruistically, as it were. Since most species on the planet have become extinct (as high as 98% in some studies I have read, of all species ever to exist on the planet), our turn is coming. Whether selected by nature, or at our own hand. So should we let "nature take its course", or help it along by voluntarily exterminating ourselves?

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Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Mark Scacco on April 10, 2012 at 11:19pm

Reminds me of the feelings I had when reading "World Without Us" by Alan Weisman (http://www.worldwithoutus.com/) I couldn't help simultaneous feelings of "god have we #$@%^ up this planet" and "as the dominant biological life form, what else was expected?"

Your last question is kind of circular... since we evolved, we are the work of nature, in essence we _are_ nature. Whether we help or not, nature will take care of us in due time.

Permalink Reply by Tony Carroll on April 10, 2012 at 11:31pm

Hello Mark. Sorry if it sounded circular. My bad if I didn't explain it better. I did say we were the end product of evolution. And part of nature. After reading their site, just made me woner, how people felt, as in us helping it along (our extinction) or just go along as we are. Hope that makes it clearer for you. Any confusion is mine. Thanks alot for responding. Be well.

Permalink Reply by Mark Scacco on April 10, 2012 at 11:36pm

Hi Tony,

Absolutely no need for an apology or clarification. I was just being difficult. :D I think Weisman mentions the group in his book; probably another reason the book leaped to mind. To give a direct response to your question, VHEMT's goal is clearly impossible, so nature will have to do away with us without our help (unless "help" includes us making the planet uninhabitable!"

Permalink Reply by Tony Carroll on April 10, 2012 at 11:57pm

Which is a real possibility (us making it uninhabitable). Thanks again, my friend. Peace. And be well.

Permalink Reply by Richard ∑wald on April 11, 2012 at 5:05am

"I did say we were the end product of evolution."

Well, …all forms are transitional, …may be a better way to look at this.

As for this group suicide bunch, I don't often use the term "retarded", but it's appropriate here. It makes me think of cutting off one's head to spite one's nose.

Permalink Reply by Grinning Cat on April 11, 2012 at 12:14am

I also read The World Without Us (actually, listened to the audiobook in the car). A dramatic exploration of how permanent and impermanent our different artifacts and other effects on the planet are!

Perhaps it's my biological programming, but my altruism focuses much more easily on (hypothetical) future humans (or perhaps on some broader concept of "people" that I could identify with?) than on voluntarily extinction for the sake of the rest of the Earth's biosphere.

This also reminds me of an SF short story (I don't recall the title and author) where humans, now living on planets in many star systems, chose to restore Earth as much as possible, removing the remains and pollution of human civilizations, and then to leave the cherished ancestral planet alone, in a "natural" state.

Permalink Reply by Tony Carroll on April 11, 2012 at 12:21am

I'm with you. My altruism won't let me make a leap of that magnitude. We are a part of nature. Since people won't stop having babies, best to do what is possible to help out future generations, and also the planet.

Wish you could remember that story. Would be nice to read. Ah, the mind. I lose mine everyday. LOL. Peaced and be well my friend.

Permalink Reply by Steph S. on April 11, 2012 at 12:22am

Learned something new. I had not heard of this group before.

Permalink Reply by Tony Carroll on April 11, 2012 at 12:38am

Yeah, it brought me up short. Made me think of Rod Serling saying 'picture if you will'. Some wild stuff.

Permalink Reply by Joseph P on April 11, 2012 at 4:35am

One of the big things they're not thinking about is life beyond this planet. At some point in the future, our species may get off of this rock. At that point, we'll be bringing a good percentage of our ecology with us, for the purpose of making our new home more like our old one.

We're talking biological reproduction on a planetary scale. Will the ants do that? You need a tool-using species to accomplish that. Any tool-using species is going to be a bit destructive. It's just one of those things you have to accept, in the life-cycle of a biosphere.

Short-sighted of them, really.

Permalink Reply by Marc Draco on April 11, 2012 at 7:25am

May get off this rock - that's a stretch Joseph - at the rate the rednecks/chavs/white trash/republicans... call them what you will are breeding, there won't be enough technologically adept people to develop the resources necessary.

We may already have reached our pinnacle - the world we're leaving our kids is on a downward spiral and there's nothing I can see that we can effectively do about it.

The trouble is there are always more stupid people than smart ones - and thanks to democracy they can (and often do) elevate their own into positions of power.

Permalink Reply by Stuart Jeremy Oxley on April 11, 2012 at 5:57am

Okay, so I'm ashamed to be human and I dislike my species as a whole, however, we are among the most amazing (and stupid) creatures on earth and our total extinction would be a shame. These are the things that need to happen, putting aside illogical and misplaced morals (the religous and/or excessive human rights activists).
A reduction in the population either by law or migration to other planets.

Having children should be a privalage and not a right and a licence should be obtained after a successful parenting course.

Parents teaching their children that science is wrong and their religion is factual should be prosicuted for child abuse and misleading a minor.

Aggresive and or violent people should be castrated/spayed.

Dangerous genes that cause illness should be bred out in as humane a way as is possible.

It needs to be understood here that I am not a nazi sympathizer and do not advocate any form of ethnic cleansing. Infact, under these rules I would not be able to have children, I suffer from depression, non-24 hr sleepwake syndrome and am almost on the autistic spectrum, all genetic in my case. I am not going to be having further children as a result of these things and the fore mentioned over population. I have one son for the record, who probably has aspergers syndrome, he is 5 and is being tested at the moment.