Comment to thread at AlterNet: Did God Send the Hurricane?

This is a comment to a discussion about Hurricane Katrina that might be of interest:

It is interesting in times like this that we humans fall back on superstition; especially superstition that puts our own importance at center: 'it must be God's big punishment for our big sins,' or 'it is the world striking back for our greed and big mistakes.' Well. . .the fact is, we're not so big. Oh, yes, we, with our vast numbers and our 'too-clever-for-our-own-good' machinations can make things here on Earth very unpleasant for ourselves and other living things – in the geologic short-term. But, after we're gone, the Earth will repair itself, some other life-form (hopefully wiser) will ascend, and our puny attempts to transform the planet to our immature wants will be forgotten. Keep in mind that the dinosaurs, the most successful large life-form in history, ruled the Earth for 250 MILLION years – and they're gone. We've only been here for less than 4 million years – only about 20 thousand as organized societies – and already we've fouled our nest.

No, our foolishness may have exacerbated the conditions that caused Hurricane Katrina, but in terms of the planet, that storm was just a small eddy in the flow of atmosphere. It only seemed so large to us, because we are actually so small.

I hope that someday we all (I include myself) can take more of a Zen perspective on our place in life, and put our egos where they will do less harm.