Seriously - this doesn't count as a stick - this is a close approximation of a stick in that it has many similar properties but it is far from it. Watch how in a few hours it dissolves on the ground (or inside?).
However it does beautifully capture the novelty-based appreciation of sticks. There's something to this, for sure...
I just realized there is an entire continent where there are no trees, and thus no sticks.
And it isnt a small continent either. it is larger than all of Europe and also larger than Australia. We arent talking about an island or archipelago or even some random landlocked desert. It is a continent.
the fact that there are no sticks that naturally occur there at all... it confuses and concerns me.
It makes sense why there are no sticks. But I agree, the thought of a lack of sticks seems to be unsettling, not a lack of trees or bushes.
Are we that naturally attracted to sticks because of primate evolution? I wonder if the earliest human ancestors developed this awareness of sticks as it is a primitive tool used to survive.
So i did a little research. The sad/fun part about my realization is... if you go back far enough in time, before the ice and nothingness, archeologists have pointed out that Antarctica was once a massive forest continent.
Millions of years ago, it had trees, and thus, sticks for days and days.
Once again we are living in the wrong time. Too late to explore all continents having sticks. But also too early to live where all continents have sticks. In the grand scheme of things, we exist in the uneven ground.
"...there are no sticks here. Nothing grows..." so far...
[...] we demonstrate a clear but nonlinear trend towards a greater area of vegetation cover across the [Antarctic Peninsula] in recent decades [...] Crucially, the rate of change in vegetation cover has increased considerably in recent years
[...]
Regardless of the complexities discussed in the preceding, the overall statistically significant trajectory of APwide greening from 1986 to 2021 [...] provides strong evidence of rapid and ongoing response of AP vegetation to climate change, and presents a compelling case for future widespread changes in the AP’s terrestrial ecosystems.
That doesn't make sense, if that were the case it wouldn't be relevant anymore as humans simply walking on the continent would introduce incredible amounts of bacterias and viruses.
Even with the sterile processing of Moon and Mars rovers have observed this. It's impossible to prevent, only reduce.