With the development of science and technology, as humans it’s easy to feel like we’re capable of anything. But sometimes we need reminders that nature is in fact more powerful than us, no matter how much money we funnel into a project.

Such is the case in Dubai, where one of the world’s most ambitious building projects, a series of islands in the Arabian Gulf shaped like a map of the Earth, is currently under serious threat. Instead of a collection of luxurious country-shaped islands, The World has turned into the world’s most expensive shipping hazard, an ocean wasteland with half finished piles of rocks and sand surrounded by breakwaters.

“The World has been cancelled. It doesn’t even look like the world. Basically there is one island that is maintained that is said to be owned by the Sheikh [Dubai’s ruler] and the rest looks like a pile of muck,” said one local property agent, as quoted by the Times Online.

Rich investors may not have the vacation homes on private islands like they hoped, but the greater impact here is of course how with time The World will alter the local water ecosystem.

[Photo: Pete the painter, Flickr]