One of your best, Umair. Yes, all beings have consciousness - it seems trees do as well as spiders and I'm just waiting for the announcement that bacteria are conscious too.

Why has the Earth tolerated our arrogance and destructiveness for so long? I believe it's so that we can go into space, taking Her with us, and leave the planet fallow to recover.

We are her reproductive tissue - because there's a lot of hard vacuum and ionising radiation between the Earth and anywhere else She could grow. We're here to take Her to the other planets, maybe even the stars.

If we don't do it, She will wipe us out easily and start again with rats or raccoons.

I'm betting on the rats.