TBT here: We are a small planet in a huge place. But it is the only place we know of where we can live. Let's try not to mess it up.
If we make things bad enough, we will go extinct. Species do that when things change enough. Some life will continue, but it won't be "us".
No matter how badly we treat our world, "some somethings" will survive. And maybe even evolve. But it won't be "us". Random Natural Selection would never create "us" again, exactly. Maybe not even primates.
Maybe not even a thinking species. Predators and prey, probably. But a World of cats and mice, wolves and deer is not really worth noticing. That might happen elsewhere often.
Intelligence might not be very common. We have it. We can explore ideas. We can imagine seeking among the planets and stars. That might be very rare.
We are here.
We are fortunate to be in the Galaxy not too far out and not too far in. We have an advantage of place.
Let's not destroy the possibilities of our future for short-term gain in the present. It may be that we are the only intelligent species in the Galaxy. Or not. We can't find out yet.
If we don't try, though, we will never know. And to know, we have to survive. I don't mean surviving "alien invasions" or comet strikes. Just not killing ourselves off.
Earth is one small spot in the universe.
All of the history of intelligent life, so far as we know, has existed on this one single planet. On this "Pale Blue Dot" (thank you, Carl Sagan) in the entire Universe.
Maybe the Universe is teeming with many intelligent species. And if we kill ourselves off, it wouldn't matter much. But I don't want to bet there are others.
Let's try to not ruin the one place we know it exists...