Good morning John, you may have heard that we are in the middle of something of an environmental crisis? Climate change, Oil spills, Dead zones, Garbage patches, Meltdowns, Mass extinctions. The root of all these problems is people. Us. You and me and Jacques Chirac and everyone watching this video and everybody they know and everybody who's ever made a movie with Kevin Bacon.

The environmental crisis that we currently inhabit, was created to satisfy the needs, or at least the whims, of humans. So the question becomes given the marvelous beauty and tremendous value of these biological systems that, as far as we know, are unique in the universe, are we worth it? Would the world be better off without us? Is humanity and our culture, our civilization, our technology just an asteroid bearing down on the planet destroying everything in its path? Basically 'Should I feel bad for existing?' is what I'm asking.

My suspicion is that most people don't spend a lot of time worrying about this, but I do and I've come to the conclusion, after years of thinking about this, that we're worth it. I might be biased towards humans, being one of them and all. But in the same way that the complexity of the natural world is beautiful and marvelous and as far as we know unique so is the technological world and the psychological world and the sociological world. There's something really marvelous about humanity that is really easy not to notice when you're inside of it all the time.

I've heard people say 'Yeah, sure humanity is the smartest, but cheetahs are the fastest, blue whales are the biggest and barnacles have the longest penises. It's all completely subjective, it's about what trait you choose to put value on.' But I don't buy that. I think those people probably know that there is something different, something special, about people.

The scale on which our brains have allowed us to create. Everything from tiny little ideas to the Burj Khalifa. We create! We've created cultures and atomic theory and  Bridget Jones's Diary and Star Trek and Honky Tonk Music. All of these tiny units of seemingly ceaseless complexity and order, it's extremely valuable and unique.

We are not an asteroid, even if in the end and I hope we don't, we have the same effect on the biodiversity of the planet. Witnessing the scale humanity's achievement and our creation and the interaction of that with the natural world and the way that it allows us to understand the natural world, that's the closest I get to spiritual. It fills me with awe and joy and wonder and pride. Yeah, we have done things for which I will never forgive us, but we create more than we destroy. 

That's gotta be the goal, to destroy less, and to create more. To increase awesome and decrease suck, that's- that's what I believe in. That is what I believe, and that, I think, humans ultimately are pretty good at. And are getting better at. John, I'll see you on Tuesday. 

Endscreen! Few things going on. One: CrashCourse Psychology starring me, has just launched on youtube.com/crashcourse, if you wanna check it out, we're going to be using our minds, to explore our minds. 

Two: I promise this time I'm coming back to hankgames, cause it's been johngames for a long time. Multiple videos per week, including Pikmin 3 and hank and Katherine play super Mario brothers U. 

Three: If you haven't heard already, DFTBA Records, our merch company, needs a bigger warehouse. So we're leaving our old warehouse and moving to a new one, and we would rather not take all of our old shirts with us. So we're selling them for ten dollars apiece, which is about half of what they usually cost. A bunch of them have sold out but there are many more that are not sold out. 

There's a link in the description to all of the things that are on sale, or just go to dftba.com. If you've been holding back, this is the time. Okay! Thanks for listening to me rationalize why humans should exist. Okay! That's it, for real this time.