It would have to be a lot more than what is pictured to wipe out the human race
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· 6 years ago
We're like cockroaches. We've survived the Black Death, a population bottleneck that lowered our entire global population to around 10000 individuals, the damn near breakout of all out nuclear war. I think we'll do just fine.
Well, the problem is that only a small portion of the population will do just fine, and most of humanity still lives under the impression that "the majority" will do well. As resources start dwindling and as humans overpopulate, we'll have resource wars (food, potable water, energy).
They said bees would go extinct too. The marvelous thing about humanity- the thing that gives us computers and space travel and higher math? We solve problems: we also are very good at adapting, so if chocolate does go extinct, we will find a way. As for wars- we haven't really been at a shortage of those for... all of known history. Hell, they found a caveman that was killed by tools. As far as the majority goes, for most of history the majority hasn't done very well. We tend to do well compared to periods before or after our time, or well compared to each other, but not compared to those at the top. Most of human civilization has a few requiring many to do worse so they can have more. Pretty much all of it. So the "majority" may be smaller- but when we say someone has it rough we are comparing it to our frame of reference, the majority in the depression were worse off than those of the late 1800s and better off than those of of the 1700s. It's relative.
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· 6 years ago
And who knows what the future holds for us. Could be nuclear war. Could be aliens making first contact. No one knows.
Mirroring @grimreaper I'd say that humans are much harder to kill than all that. Civilization as we know it may well end and be transformed into something we would likely not find very pleasant, but humanity will likely endure for quite some time. So long as there are plants and insects, and the temperature doesn't go much above or below the harshest human inhabited areas, human beings have a good shot at surviving.
It’s bad, but not as bad as you think. It isn’t going to get worse though. Tbh be more worried about the super volcano underneath Yellowstone rn than anything else
Why be scared? Humans are a pestilence on this planet. We inherently destroy everything around us. The planet will flourish with life after we're gone.
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· 6 years ago
Yeah but it’s a bit shit for us if we’re not there to enjoy it
I don't understand this train of thought. Why consider ourselves bad ? Sure we change our environment, a LOT. But that isn't necessarily a bad thing. It's what makes us the dominant species.
Progress and technology aren't 'unnatural', not more than a wasp nest is unnatural. It wouldn't happen if it weren't for a particular animal, but its natural for the animal. We destroy a lot around us, to makes things better for us. And that allows our species to prosper.
It's because we have the potential to wipe out nearly all the life on this planet if we aren't careful. A 5 degree Celsius shift in temperature over 100 years would kill damn near everything because ecosystems would flat-out collapse. The question is if we are capable of stopping ourselves. I don't think we are. I don't think we will go extinct, even in those conditions, but we are going to hit a bottle-neck again at some point.
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· 6 years ago
I think we can.
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· 6 years ago
Though it’s certainly been made more difficult by a certain president backing out of climate agreements
Don't fall victim to availability bias. Terrible things have always been happening, we are just more aware of them now. In addition, media outlets hype up the severity of any potential incident, so everything seems to be doom and gloom. Anyone remember Y2K? The world was supposed to implode in the year 2000...
While I agree in that people love a good hype band wagon- I also think it's important to stress that just because a fallacy is at play doesn't mean restraint or caution shouldn't be explored. It reminds me of those anti drug campaigns where "little sally" kills her family and then herself because she touched "a marijuana." Its easier to her people to act by telling them there's immediate and terrible danger, but if observation contradicts that in their mind they instead will often dismiss what would be a valid concern as hyperbolic BS or propaganda. It's a good idea to be concerned with the environment and to do more with less, but selling it against an abstract concept of destruction that relies on a person even caring about what happens after they die or in their future is a better way to alienate most than convert them.
Progress and technology aren't 'unnatural', not more than a wasp nest is unnatural. It wouldn't happen if it weren't for a particular animal, but its natural for the animal. We destroy a lot around us, to makes things better for us. And that allows our species to prosper.