It was already. We've been a rolling ecological disaster way before we figured out writing. We just went from place to place, leaving burned forests and extinct species behind.

Grokking physics definitely accelerated this, but we have an opportunity ahead of us to stabilize. Not sure we'll be able to take it, though. Not with the systems of incentives that we have now.

At that scale it's not much more than other species can do. I remember an article of the effects of less wolves on the eco system (yellowstone?). The whole area became a swamp. What changed since is the scale at which human societies impacted the ecosystem.