An Inconvenient Truth: Survival

There are a number of upcoming difficulties that will pose challenges to our survival as a race: reliance on non-renewable resources, the disturbing potential of existing nuclear arms, the world's supply of clean water, and (why not?) the Sun exploding. What bothers me about this is that our generation may not necessarily be the one that actually has to deal with these problems. The plastic bag that I throw away today may be part of the gargantuan mass of garbage that will be screwing over the future Earth that my great-granddaughter will live in. The inhabitants of Earth at this very second may never have to face the consequences of human environmental exploitation and manipulation, yet a number of them have created consequences for future generations already. I realize that there are plenty of efforts being made to address almost all of the issues that will and already do plague us, however I also realize that a perfect world will never be achieved. A number of problems will always remain, a heavy burden passed down to the future carriers of our genetic line. Lamenting this is almost completely futile and almost certainly useless, yet thinking about it still bugs me. The saying is right: we don't inherit the land from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children. But how do you hold someone accountable for damaging something they borrowed if they're dead already? There's only one option when it comes to our planet: Fix it or die trying.