The great pacific garbage patch is rather overhyped. From what you hear and the way some people describe it you'd think it would be like a sargasso sea of garbage, but it's actually just an increased concentration of small bits of plastic just under the surface of the ocean. If you were looking right at the water in the densest part of the garbage patch you probably wouldn't even be able to tell that the water was unusual.

For example, here's a typical picture illustrating the garbage patch: http://myecoaction.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/great-paci... However, it's a fraud, it's actually a picture from Manila harbor. The fact that this isn't the deep ocean should be blatantly obvious by the fact that there is a person in a canoe in it, and canoes are not well known trans-pacific transportation vessels.

I'm not saying that the various oceanic gyre garbage patches aren't a problem, but they certainly will not form a legacy for humanity, as they are pretty much invisible.

The plastic NEVER goes away and is always increasing, not decreasing

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/10/science/10patch.html

I've heard the analogy that capitalism is just a clever method of converting the natural world in to garbage.

I wouldn't go that far, nor is capitalism alone responsible. I think a great deal of blame lies in the methods we've developed to keep the garbage out of site. Our manufacturing pollution is outsourced to the other side of the globe, we put our trash in black bags and have someone else bury it far away from where we live.

In space you can't hide. And that makes the problem, and the consequences, very evident.

Ever see the film Wall-E? Cause that's where we are headed.