Earth Without People

  This article called Earth Without People is mainly talking about what would happen on the earth without people and what the earth would look like after that. Alan Weisman predicted the human disappeared as a breakthrough point to examine our earth. Through observe the world without people; we can see how the world will develop in the future in a unique perspective.

  Firstly, he gave an example about North Korea. There has a 155-mile-long, 2.5-mile-wide mountainous Demilitarized Zone and no one could pass that area since 1953. He said "Today those paddies have become barely discernible, transformed into pockets of marsh, and the new occupants of these lands arrive as dazzling white squadrons of red-crowned cranes that glide over the bulrushes in perfect formation, touching down so lightly that they detonate no land mines." The author described a marsh with red-crowned cranes and white bulrushes. We can see a large and desolate area with no people. But according to the last sentence, it also showed us how dangerous of this area

  Secondly, he talked about the groundwater that were may rise up and flood the street. He mentioned that "That would exacerbate a problem that already plagues New York—rising groundwater. There's little soil to absorb it or vegetation to transpire it and buildings block the sunlight that could evaporate it. With the power off, pumps that keep subways from flooding would be stilled. As water sluiced away soil beneath pavement, streets would crater." According to his described, we can see the groundwater flood the subway station because the pump would not work. After the water flood the street, it may become back the stream or river.

  Last example is after a few hundred years, many creatures would flourish. He described that "America would have three times as many species of animals over 1,000 pounds as Africa does today," he says. An amazing megafaunal menagerie roamed the region: Giant Armadillos resembling armor-plated autos; bears twice the size of grizzlies; the hoofed, herbivorous toxodon, big as a rhinoceros; and saber-toothed tigers. A dozen species of horses were here, as well as the camel-like litoptern, giant beavers, giant peccaries, woolly rhinos, mammoths, and mastodons." He gave us lots of examples about what kind of new animal would appear and named their species. It makes us feel like we can really see those animals. 

 

  I chose three examples of the vision. It is the most direct way to feel the changes of the Earth with no people. It could leave a deep impression that what he wrote to us and we also could feel what his feeling was when he wrote this article.