Veteran climate campaigner calls for renaming of planet Earth

Author and activist Bill McKibben says planet should be renamed ‘Eaarth’ to reflect environmental changes caused by humans

Humans have changed the planet so drastically that it needs a new name, claims one of the first environmental campaigners to warn the public about climate change.

“Eaarth” is the name being suggested by author and activist Bill McKibben, and is the title of his latest book. The new name is changed just a little because the world looks like the familiar planet Earth, but is different in fundamental ways, McKibben told the Guardian.

“It’s a conceit: the notion that we’re living on a planet a lot like our own, the one we were born on, but different enough to need a new name,” said McKibben, who thinks the new name should sound like Arnold Schwarzenegger would pronounce it in his deep Austrian-American drawl.

McKibben describes how he played with the spelling of Earth, adding different letters, and chose his new name because he liked the look of it best: “There’s a slightly science fiction look to it; that’s appropriate in the sense it’s a little like a science fiction story: we wake up one day and the planet we have been used to for 10,000 years has 5% more moisture in the atmosphere, the sea is turning more acid. The only trouble is it’s not fiction.”

Lees hele artikel -> www.guardian.co.uk/environment