It seems to be a common lead in of late, “worst in 40 years” or “worst in known history”. Now 2011 is upon us and in past weeks rising water was too, not specifically the slower global warming-related rising water, the inland flash flooding kind. I, myself was fortunate, however our neighbours were not so. Belongings, livelihoods, lives, lined the muddied streets and as natural disasters usually go there is an apparent natural selection whereby a whole street is destroyed and one house is left completely untouched. As thousands of people, both directly and indirectly affected, take action to recover from the devastation of these recent floods it appears two tropical cyclone systems are threatening a sequel. Tropical Cyclone Yasi, the most threatening of the two, looks to reach a category five as it approaches the North Queensland coast.

This frequency of events, not only in the Asia-Pacific regions but across the globe, reminded me of comments made by Chris Stringer of the Natural History Museum in the documentary Museum of Life.

According to Stringer we are to expect more climate change in the next 100 years than we’ve seen in the last 10,000 years and in that time the tropics and sub-tropics will become uninhabitable for human beings and the marginal survivors will inhabit the north and south poles. If this is true then the frequency of devastation and natural selection will make recovery efforts near impossible as the events are compounded.

“There is a view… that our culture protects us from the effects of natural selection, but I don’t agree with that, I think that we’re under selection as much as we ever were. Billions of people globally are still suffering from insufficient food, insufficient water, insufficient medical care — those people are still strongly under the effects of selection. We get people who are obese, there is exposure to alcohol, to drugs, all of these things are selective forces. So, I think evolution is carrying on but it’s difficult to project where we will go.” — Chris Stringer (Natural History Museum) Museum of Life

Gloominess aside, on a positive note – as a result of global warming, earth cycles and/or a natural disaster I now know my neighbours, and they in turn know other people in the street, and we say “Hello” in passing and at minimum we exchange a smile and a nod.