Gone in 100 years

[Poo Bear]

Apparently we will 'probably' all be extinct in 100 years according to Professor Frank Fenner (one of the scientists who helped eradicate smallpox).


'homo sapiens will not be able to survive the population explosion and associated unbridled consumption...

6.8 billion people

We’ll undergo the same fate as the people on Easter Island

there will be a lot more wars over food'


http://www.physorg.com/news196489543.html

[Slyh]

We will all be extinct? Every single one of us? The whole race?
Never effing ever!

Well, maybe if a nuclear war starts, a really deadly virus emerges, a meteor hits the earth or there is some other major change in climate that will also kill all or most of earth's inhabitants.

I even doubt that there will be wars for food. Have we ever had one of those? Currently we only have wars for oil or over stupid **** like religion.
Apart from that, there is no longer an exponential growth in world population, see for example: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:World_population_increase_history.svg

[Slyh]

Maybe I should have clicked the link before posting... :)

[Poo Bear]

I read something about the last ice age being precipitated by a mega-volcano going off and there were only about 1,000 human breeding pairs left on the planet! That was our closest extinction event I believe.

So it's a massive gamble, does climate change + consumerism + overpopulation equal a mega volcano? How much would our technology help us? Will the astronauts on the international space station be the only ones left? Is it 'all good'?

Seems like most of the world (especially the rich) are saying - 'we can't really be sure, so let's just wait and see. Woo!'

doh!

[Johnh]

I don't know, 100 years sounds too implausible. The only way for humans to starve themselves out entirely would be for them to drive all life to extinction. Possible, I suppose, with the help of our friend Mr. Hydrogen Bomb. But I doubt that there are honestly any countries out there who would start throwing nukes around willy-nilly. Even if WWIII, I have a strong suspicion that there wouldn't be a lot of nukes thrown at third world countries in Africa.

Next, climate change isn't going to wipe out all life. The issue with climate change is weather patterns - some areas will experience drought, some areas will experience floods. There will be more severe weather, as the ocean has an enormous capacity to store energy. But will this be enough to reduce the human population below the minimum viable population (around 5000)? I don't think so. Humans are crafty people. Island nations have been able to weather hurricanes and horrible natural disasters without the aid of technology. It should be even more possible to do so with the aid of technology, especially since there are areas on Earth which are protected from severe weather due to geography.

I don't think so. First of all, overpopulation isn't gonna cause us to run out of food. Our ability to produce food will continually decline as we run out of fertilizer (a petroleum product). Actually, this isn't quite true. There are other ways to produce fertilizer, it's just more expensive and less efficient (synthesizing it from renewable resources which don't have the energy density of petroleum)

Megavolcanos: Well, the largest one I know of is Yellowstone. That one will wipe out the US, or at least the western half of it. But definitely not the entire world. Even if the ash creates a miniature ice age, it still won't wipe out our sources of food. Somehow, all life managed to survive the last time it erupted 600,000 years ago.

[Poo Bear]

I think if things change slowly enough then humans will always find a way, the worry is if things accelerate faster than our ability to cope. Which is unlikely, but still...

I just don't see any real movement to do anything serious about climate change or poverty or excessive consumerism. Too many vested interests. I think it will take a HUGE disaster to motivate world governments.

The population explosion is interesting, that is one thing that must definitely reach some kind of tipping point and be addressed properly. Can't just keep going up and up surely.