# How will our world end?



## WJoseph (Dec 27, 2008)

I know people have opinions on this, and I hope they share them! 

I believe that given the satellite systems in the sky and the ever-evolving capabilities- one day soon (if not already), the satellites will be capable of destroying the world's population, while leaving all structures intact. A modern day neutron bomb effect, but from the sky. No long-term environmental or radioactivity issues and a clean sweep. It would happen almost instantaneously, within a couple of minutes, given the number of satellites.


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## Jimmy Magnusson (Dec 28, 2008)

Do you mean the end of our planet? When teh sun burns it to ash.

End of humanity? I predict either evolution or natural disaster/climate change (and I'm NOT talking about today's climate change scare, but about real heavy-duty ice ages and such).


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## Omphalos (Dec 28, 2008)

What the heck are you talking about?


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## dask (Dec 28, 2008)

What about the year 2012? Isn't some big catastrophe coming our way around then?


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## tangaloomababe (Dec 28, 2008)

If you mean the "end of the world" I thinkwe will just wear it out and make it a totally unlivible place. We will use up all our resources, exhaust the minerals, wage wars for those left, break down any resemblance to humanity.  We will go out with a wimper and not a big bang!


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## kythe (Dec 28, 2008)

I agree with tangaloomababe.  As much as we sci-fi lovers enjoy dramatic stories and heroic endings, I don't think our world will end with any real meaning at all.  We will waste away slowly, and most likely due to our own overuse of resources and overpopulation.  

The course of evolution will eventually lead to our demise, as with the dinosaurs.  I don't think our race is so special that we will live forever.  Maybe other life will appear in our place, but eventually our planet itself will grow old and our sun will become larger until in time all semblance and memory of life on earth is completely obliterated.


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## Quokka (Dec 28, 2008)

If I had to place a bet I'd agree about the Earth but hope that maybe life will have spread out by then, surely if we can avoid extinction for another few centuries maybe a millenium that will be enough time to be living in self sustaining environments somewhere else in the Solar system. 

That's got to increases our odds against the one off catastrophe and then it's just a question of if we can create something really different to get out further, faster than light travel, generational ships whatever. No idea what, a bit like what Clarke says that's going to be a fantasy world if you could see it from back here. 

Societies and cultures may crumble but I think we're slowly crawling closer to the point where some form of human life will continue to exist for a long, long time.


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## Interference (Jan 5, 2009)

Human life will become extinct well within the next million or so years, either by our own idiocy or the action of external agencies, such as asteroid impact or surprise ice-age.

The next civilisation to rise might not be for several hundreds of millions of years after that and will probably be either mammalian or insect in nature.  Reptillian life had about 200 million years before we got here and did didley-squat in social-evolutionary terms, so it's probable that, on earth at least, mammals are more capable of developing intelligence and imagination.

I'm not sure about insects.  However, they are far better suited to space travel (if only due to their size) so if they do evolve, they might have quite an impressive space exploration programme.

That civilisation will in turn be wiped out within a hundred million more years.

The big question is whether humanity will spread out to the stars and begin colonisation.  It's possible.  But we may not be intelligent enough to achieve it in reality.  Humans are only now becoming interested in saving themselves from the ravages of climate shift, whatever its cause turns out to be.  Even now, this may be too late, but it will almost certainly restrict funding for anything other than re-housing/re-location projects on our own planet.  The least expensive SF-related solution would be to build under the sea.  This would also seem to make sense since it'll be the sea that covers most of our descendants' homes, anyway.

But if an inexpensive means of terraforming does become available, and if re-location off-planet becomes viable (ignoring for the moment that it'll probably only be available for the rich and influential, anyway), then in a few billion years our distant descendants might actually encounter the then-encumbant dominant species of their erstwhile home.  And that would be an encounter I'd like to see.

But I won't.

I'll be dead.

So will you


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## Scifi fan (Jan 5, 2009)

Interference,

You've made a good sub thread - if humanity were wiped out, who will take our place? I'd have to say insects, because anything that can wipe us out will also wipe out the larger mammals and reptiles, leaving only the smaller creatures to evolve. 

Of course, if this planet were cracked into several pieces, there wouldn't be much evolution on it.


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## tangaloomababe (Jan 6, 2009)

Quokka I think you are probably right we should have bele to branch out by the time the Earth's eventual demise comes, bet the dinasours wish they could have built space ships and moved on to............................

Now that would be a sad end Sci Fi Fan but I guess it is possible, we could just break up into little pieces or maybe one of those metorites they keep taking about will finally hit us one day.


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## chrispenycate (Jan 7, 2009)

Definition, please, of "world". For you it's presumably obvious, but the word is used with a variety of different significances.

For actual destruction of the planet, I think we've established that the easiest response is sitting back for a few billion years until the sun does the job. But "the world I live in" can be the biosphere, much easier to damage, and almost certainly within human capabilities to destroy. Or even more limited, human society; that we could definitely destrox, and might yet.

But my world can be used even more limited, in the "my world died with the passing of steam" poetical sense, in which case it is eternally ending, and eternally being recreated, every change destroying someone's perception of continuity.

But "world" can also be bigger than the planet, incorporating a fair slice of the cosmos (the word exists from longer ago than anyone could conceive of the size we now believe the universe to be) and could thus be placed even further into the future.

Various religious beliefs contain detailed recipes for world ending; and, of course, my world will come to an end fairly soon when I leave it, but this should have negligible effect on anyone else's unless (breaks into song)

We will all go together when we go
All suffused with an incandescent glow
When the air becomes uraneous
We will all go simultaneous
Yes we'll all go together when we go.


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## Parson (Jan 7, 2009)

When the air becomes uraneous  --- Sounds smelly to me --- That must mean we end with a whimper and not a bang.


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## SNG (Jan 7, 2009)

Run out of trees => run out of toilet paper => run out of oxygen => die a violent stinky death

Just joking. Perhaps when the Sun grows larger and heats up the Earth too much. Mars on the other hand will be nice and warm... for a while


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## Connavar (Jan 7, 2009)

Personally i hope the earth survives us humans and keep evolving or just stays alive as it is.

Im not talking about in a few billion years or whenever the sun goes out but before that.

Earth has many millions years to live without us,with hopefully other types life surviving us.

So i dont think or hope for dramatic end that destroys the earth too.  Human "world", life they deserve whatever happens.


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## Parson (Jan 8, 2009)

Connavar said:


> Personally i hope the earth survives us humans and keep evolving or just stays alive as it is.
> 
> Im not talking about in a few billion years or whenever the sun goes out but before that.
> 
> ...



Seems to me the *they* in the last sentence should be a *we. *Christianity has been teaching from the very beginning that we reap what we sow unless God's grace is shown. Our harvest looks gloomy in deed.


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## Interference (Jan 8, 2009)

Parson said:


> Seems to me the *they* in the last sentence should be a *we.*


*

I'm not sure I agree, Parson.  I take from Connavar's comments something that I also feel, which is that human existence is only important to humans.  We are currently bent of converting the biosphere we live on into something incapable of supporting human life, and if this continues unchecked we will all be gone much sooner than some of us are expecting.

But whether we are now sowing the seeds of our own demise or not, the planet will outlive us and other life forms will emerge capable of surviving whatever mess it inherits from us, some to become dominant, some to become fodder, for billions of years before the solar system changes into whatever it changes into.  During that interval, after humanity has vanished without shadow or trace and before the sun dies, life will find a way.  Not our life, but in a broader, cosmic, Universal sense, Life.

Many religions suggest that our souls will live on, anyway, regardless of our corporeal shells' mortality, and perhaps that's true.  That's up to God.  Which means, of course, that there has to be a God in the first place.  And if there is, then I imagine (in my paltry, human way) that He has a Plan.  I just doubt that it includes keeping humankind around for (literally) an eternity.

I don't know this for a fact, of course.  Perhaps, if anyone knows, a parson knows.*


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## Interference (Jan 8, 2009)

Sorry, it looks like I have to do this in two stages ....



dask said:


> What about the year 2012? Isn't some big catastrophe coming our way around then?




This increasingly prevalent belief comes from an interpretation of a thousands-of-years-old Mayan calendar, which measured cycles of civilisation with no more accuracy or credibility than any almanac or horoscope.  Calculating from this calendar, measurement of time comes to a halt around December (21st, I think) 2012.  Think Millennium Virus and you'll get a better idea of what this actually means.  Just because the clocks were thought to have been incapable of coping with the rolling digit and its floating integer did not, in fact, mean that planes crashed and money-markets crumbled.

Finally, even if the prediction is accurate, it only actually suggests a change or "upheaval", which could mean anything from the development of harmless renewable fuel and energy to a new international political approach.

Though, if the world collapses around us on 21st December 2012, I'll PM you with an apology.


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## dask (Jan 9, 2009)

Interference said:


> Sorry, it looks like I have to do this in two stages ....
> 
> 
> 
> ...


 
Thanks for the info. Sounds like it might put a damper on Christmas.


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## Parson (Jan 9, 2009)

Interference said:


> I'm not sure I agree, Parson.  I take from Connavar's comments something that I also feel, which is that human existence is only important to humans.  We are currently bent of converting the biosphere we live on into something incapable of supporting human life, and if this continues unchecked we will all be gone much sooner than some of us are expecting.
> 
> But whether we are now sowing the seeds of our own demise or not, the planet will outlive us and other life forms will emerge capable of surviving whatever mess it inherits from us, some to become dominant, some to become fodder, for billions of years before the solar system changes into whatever it changes into.  During that interval, after humanity has vanished without shadow or trace and before the sun dies, life will find a way.  Not our life, but in a broader, cosmic, Universal sense, Life.
> 
> ...



Interference, I am having a little trouble following the thought in your post. Perhaps it's the interference? 

Anyway, I understand you to be saying that you heard that "human life" was not all that important in the grand scheme of things. I agree. My point in my post to Connavar was that it sounded like he believed himself to be something other than part of the human race that is likely sowing the seeds for our own (not their own) destruction. If he is other, we have our first verifiable alien contact.

When I said destruction I was talking about our mortal life on this planet. Unless the end is cataclysmic, like a major solar event, if evolution has any truth to it at all it would seem that life in the widest sense would remain. 

As to the religious ramifications of the soul. I do indeed believe that God has a plan. I believe what the Christian faith teaches that those who are in Christ in life, will be in Christ after death as well. (We all wish that the Bible were more specific in this case, but most of what is normally taught is conjecture.) However, the Christian hope goes radically beyond this. (Taught clearly in the Bible, but not often from the pulpits.) The Bible says that we will be resurrected bodily and live with our God in a new heaven and a new earth. So the Christian faith is not one that teaches that the soul goes along into eternity in some other state, but that our everlasting life will in the end be a bodily one, a resurrection body, like Christ had, but a very much still a body.

You are right to assume that I am a Parson but as to knowing this for a fact. No! I believe the Bible. I have faith in Jesus to be my savior, but these are not scientifically provable. The proof in this life is our closeness to the savior. The true proof comes at the end of time.


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## Connavar (Jan 10, 2009)

Parson said:


> Seems to me the *they* in the last sentence should be a *we. *Christianity has been teaching from the very beginning that we reap what we sow unless God's grace is shown. Our harvest looks gloomy in deed.



Yeah but i and all my blood will be gone in million years.

The future world will not be our problem.

I believe realisticly in the selfishness of people of not caring what happens to other people in the future.  

Plus i dont really care nearly as much for future humans as i do for poor earth and animals,species that are dying out forever.   I read science mags and see frogs,species that will be gone in ten years and for all time.

Those times i think *we* and *they* in the future deserve everything that happens to our human world.  As long as Earth survives in some ways im glad.


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## Parson (Jan 11, 2009)

Connavar, your altruism exceeds my understanding. As far as I am concerned without human beings, life on this planet is simple biological functioning, nice, but doesn't make an iota of difference in the grand scheme of things.


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## Connavar (Jan 11, 2009)

Parson said:


> Connavar, your altruism exceeds my understanding. As far as I am concerned without human beings, life on this planet is simple biological functioning, nice, but doesn't make an iota of difference in the grand scheme of things.



Cause of religious reasons you dont think highly of author life on this planet?

I was taught to think highly of other types of life even something as small as a bug.
Doesnt christianity teach to care other forms of life ?

Personally i see the miracle of god in all the complex different types life forms.


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## Jimmy Magnusson (Jan 11, 2009)

Talk about different ends of the spectrum! I'm a man of science above all else, and I've never seen any reason to believe in mythical beings. And why is it that religion X is the correct one, and the other 60-90% are wrong?

Anyway. Yes there is a quality in life of any kind, and I wouldn't want the planet to go under completely (which I don't believe will happen). As long as there's intelligent life I think I would be happy. Not that it matters a great deal for *me*, as I'll be dead by the time this would become an issue.


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## Interference (Jan 11, 2009)

Connavar said:


> I was taught to think highly of other types of life even something as small as a bug.
> Doesnt christianity teach to care other forms of life ?



Sadly I've encountered the Christian argument for eating meat, which I won't do.  It starts with the quote that says God gave us the creatures of the Earth to, pretty much, do with as we please, with some few exceptions.  Other religions have a higher regard for life (not just human or intelligent life) than this, but not all, some of which will even teach that other faiths are fair game, too.

Although I'll be first to say let's not have yet another religion thread, I'll just say again that it is my view that human life is just a blink in eternity.  Other lives, other intelligent lives do and will exist (probably) and we will have played our part in the history of the planet by preparing the way for the next unique civilisation, but beyond that, we are none of us any more important than any other creature in the richly diverse eco-sphere that we call home.

So, be kind you yourself, to each other and to all life you encounter, not because you should or must or the fires of Hell await you if you don't, but because you can.


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## WJoseph (Jan 11, 2009)

Without wanting to delve into the religious angle too much here, I would only say that how religion is practiced (not whether you individually believe in a God or how you believe) has certainly at times in history been problematic, and deadly, for the human race. Nonetheless, that doesn't mean there is no God, only that too much destruction has occurred in His name by people purporting to be taking actions for His purpose (in their eyes). When talking about preservation of 'life' one would assume ALL life, but only humans are capable of creating weaponry that could destroy the whole world 100 times over (or more). Therefore, there is certainly a distinction between what malice can come from the hands of humans versus all other life (although given the tools to do it, who says an outraged Zebra wouldn't destroy all of the world if they could do it?). What other form of life in nature would ever even consider intentionally destroying the entire world? Our higher (?) brain function is such a double-edged sword.


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## Parson (Jan 12, 2009)

Connavar said:


> Cause of religious reasons you dont think highly of author life on this planet?
> 
> I was taught to think highly of other types of life even something as small as a bug.
> 
> Doesnt christianity teach to care other forms of life?



I do think highly of the author of life on this planet. Christianity does indeed teach us to care for other forms of life. But other life on this planet never rises to the importance of a human life. I would kill a whale or even a dozen of them if it meant saving one human life. I wouldn't be thrilled by it. I would look for some other way, but if killing whales were the only way, I would do it. I believe that we humans are made in the image of God, not the rest of life on this planet. Every human life is sacred, and needs to be protected.

One of the greatest miscarriages of justice in the USA is that there are stringent penalties for breaking American eagle eggs, and none for ending the life a baby in the womb. Both should carry stringent penalties. But the second should be greater than the first.



> Personally i see the miracle of god in all the complex different types life forms.


 Yes!


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## matt-browne-sfw (Jan 17, 2009)

A passing black hole?


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## WJoseph (Jan 17, 2009)

I guess if we were to be sucked up by a black hole, it would just happen and we wouldn't even know it. Like the ... snap of a finger. 

OK, I'm still here...

I still see destruction at the hand of man happening before any such event (although who really knows!). And I think destruction will come from satellites in the sky, not from nuclear or other such explosive weapons. Not from lasers alone, but in combination with other weaponry (which may or may not already be discovered or exist) and coming from the sky. The world will not end with a bang, nor a whisper, but with a flash of light as our eyes turn towards the sky...


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## Interference (Jan 19, 2009)

Renegade scientist with delusional ideas making a terrible error during a time travel experiment.


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## Moonbat (Jan 19, 2009)

> But other life on this planet never rises to the importance of a human life.


 
I think this is a very arrogant statement, you are no more important in the grand scheme of things that an ant. It is the fault of religion to raise man above the other animals so that he can have control over them, even if a book written years ago says that god said we have control over the beasts it doesn't make it right, and it is that sort of attitude 





> I would kill a whale or even a dozen of them if it meant saving one human life.


 that makes the world a bad place.

So Parson, if Adolf Hitler, or lets say Ian Huntley was drowning in a large pool becuase 12 whales were also living in this pool, you would kill all of them to save his life? Where is the logic in that?

And I think the world will end when the cows have amassed enough power to take over and farm humans!


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## SNG (Jan 19, 2009)

Parson said:


> ...But other life on this planet never rises to the importance of a human life. I would kill a whale or even a dozen of them if it meant saving one human life...


Don't want to divert this thread off the topic but I think this is a very harsh statement. Even in religious terms I believe God gave us a duty to look after and protect animals, because they are so much dependant on us since it's us who change and shape the world. I think animal life is precious as well. Unlike humans, who are potentially sinful creatures and are capable of doing horrible things, animals just live their natural life (as God intended it, some might say) and have no control over this world.

Who is to say a whale's life is less important, less sacred, less significant than human just because we have intellect? Do you know what being a whale is like?


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## Interference (Jan 19, 2009)

Your points are in line with some of my own thoughts, SNG, but I realise that there is a school of religious thought that will never agree with either of us.  Human life is, as someone has said, a virus on the face of this planet; multiplying and spreading to each corner as a cancer might do until the host planet is destroyed.

The only comfort many of us can derive comes from what Richard Dawkins refers to as their "imaginary friend", while for others it comes from knowing that we cannot (probably) destroy the planet without leaving somewhere for the next dominant life to evolve after us.

In the end, it is pointless trying to increase people's awareness beyond what they are capable of.  My own awareness is, of course, just as limited.  But faith needs no proof and I have utter faith in my own cosmic inconsequence.

And so, I will continue to rate animal life equal, and in some obvious cases superior, to my own.  I don't ask anyone do agree with me, just to accept that other points of view exist.

And I would save a dozen whales rather than let one more (in)human cruelty lead to their extinction.


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## Parson (Jan 19, 2009)

SNG said:


> Don't want to divert this thread off the topic but I think this is a very harsh statement. Even in religious terms I believe God gave us a duty to look after and protect animals, because they are so much dependant on us since it's us who change and shape the world. I think animal life is precious as well. Unlike humans, who are potentially sinful creatures and are capable of doing horrible things, animals just live their natural life (as God intended it, some might say) and have no control over this world.
> 
> Who is to say a whale's life is less important, less sacred, less significant than human just because we have intellect? Do you know what being a whale is like?



I guess we will follow this thread off topic a bit. 

Yes, my statement was very harsh. I would like to put some context on it and say further, that if someone wanted to risk their own life to save whales, I would consider that noble. Humans, I believe, were given free choice and we can and do mess that up often and horribly. This is sin. Our only salvation is in God's grace alone.

The answer to "Who is to say..." is God. I believe in the Bible, and it teaches us that human beings are the point and purpose of creation. We are to be stewards of creation. This is not the same as plundering, but it of necessity points out that other life, animal or vegetable does not rise to the importance of human life. The text does not give nature rights, but it does give humanity responsibilities to care for it. Clearly we cannot but take life to sustain our own, (vegetable or animal) But the point of our life is to do what God created us for to bring him glory. To pointlessly take life, human, animal, or vegetable is forbidden, but when choices must be made human life is to be given preeminence.


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## Interference (Jan 19, 2009)

This is one of the reasons I find the God of Judaeism and Christianity, as described in the scriptures, to be so disagreeable.  When Jesus all-but demolished the ten commandments to replace it with the one (love thy neighbour as thyself), he opened up the possibility of other races, apart from Israelites, being important to God's plan.  No longer was it enough to "honour thy father and thy mother" (your anscestors) "that thy days may be long in the land" (for the survival of your race), now we are asked to "love your enemies as yourself" because we're all in this together.

Had he been born two thousand years later, I have no doubt he would have included a clause about respecting the planet and all the life that dwells on it, because we all depend on each other, as we are only now beginning to realise.

Human life to me has no pre-eminence, which is not to say that I don't respect human life.  Just that it is no more important to me than the lives of the animals of the jungles whose contribution to the eco-system ensures the balance of nature.  We murder them at our peril because without them we will surely perish, as we are also beginning to realise.


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## SNG (Jan 20, 2009)

*@Parson*
When I was a kid I used to believe in the Bible too but that has changed. You don't need the Bible to be able to separate right from wrong: you have your own mind with which to think, your own eyes with which you can see and your own life experience that you can lean on. Regardless, with or without the Bible, some people still do bad things and some do good.

The whole topic of religion always makes me wonder as to how much of it is actually true, largely because there are so many different mainstream religions now (and there always were so many before: the ancient Egyptians, Greeks and Romans believed in many Gods) which one is true? And is there one?

But I see your point and I am not disagreeing with it. We all have our own opinion and arguing about this sort of thing is never good.


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## Parson (Jan 20, 2009)

Interference said:


> This is one of the reasons I find the God of Judaeism and Christianity, as described in the scriptures, to be so disagreeable.  When Jesus all-but demolished the ten commandments to replace it with the one (love thy neighbour as thyself), he opened up the possibility of other races, apart from Israelites, being important to God's plan.  No longer was it enough to "honour thy father and thy mother" (your anscestors) "that thy days may be long in the land" (for the survival of your race), now we are asked to "love your enemies as yourself" because we're all in this together.
> 
> Had he been born two thousand years later, I have no doubt he would have included a clause about respecting the planet and all the life that dwells on it, because we all depend on each other, as we are only now beginning to realise.
> 
> Human life to me has no pre-eminence, which is not to say that I don't respect human life.  Just that it is no more important to me than the lives of the animals of the jungles whose contribution to the eco-system ensures the balance of nature.  We murder them at our peril because without them we will surely perish, as we are also beginning to realise.



I'm confused. Your first two paragraphs seem to say that you've had enough of this "love your neighbor as yourself" stuff, and then your last paragraph seems to say you agree with it in an extreme form.


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## Parson (Jan 20, 2009)

SNG said:


> *@Parson*
> When I was a kid I used to believe in the Bible too but that has changed. You don't need the Bible to be able to separate right from wrong: you have your own mind with which to think, your own eyes with which you can see and your own life experience that you can lean on. Regardless, with or without the Bible, some people still do bad things and some do good.


 
I believe that I need the Bible to discern right from wrong. And I believe that everyone needs some centering point. Otherwise the only right is what is good for me, and the only wrong is what is not good for me. This in the end, ends in anarchy and puts an end to whatever safety we may have, and likely ends nearly all advancement of humanity as a race.



> The whole topic of religion always makes me wonder as to how much of it is actually true, largely because there are so many different mainstream religions now (and there always were so many before: the ancient Egyptians, Greeks and Romans believed in many Gods) which one is true? And is there one?
> 
> But I see your point and I am not disagreeing with it. We all have our own opinion and arguing about this sort of thing is never good.



The Christian religion can only be accepted by faith. There is no proof that could be considered scientific of its validity. But this does not make it untrue, it is unprovable at this time. I believe that its claims will be proven at death and at the end of time.

I dislike arguing as well. I do not mind open discussion. An open discussion treats each person with respect and does not denigrate the person, but gives the freedom to confront the other's viewpoint with your own.


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## Interference (Jan 21, 2009)

Parson said:


> I'm confused. Your first two paragraphs seem to say that you've had enough of this "love your neighbor as yourself" stuff, and then your last paragraph seems to say you agree with it in an extreme form.



The Old Testament says very little about loving your neighbour.  Jesus is the first to mention it in this form.  This is one of the first discernable discrepencies between the descriptions of God in the two testaments.  My phrasing was poor.  It frequently is.  But I agree with the philosophy of respecting the lives of other humans.  The Old Testament God was heavily biased towards the Israelites and against most other tribes and often endorsed genocide.  This seems an unlikely stance for God the Creator to take.

Christians will avail of the freedom to quote from any part of the bible, not just the new testament, but Christ himself rejected much of what was taught before him.  I feel that there are thoughts and concepts that could never have occurred to Jesus that we are now capable of being aware of and adopting, and among these is respect for animal life and for the planet we all share to, potentially, our mutual benefit.

This is in keeping with my belief that there is nothing particularly special about human life.  We are here, we will live out our days, and eventually we will, as a race, die.  Then some other life form will rule the planet we once called our own.

Our world will end, another will begin - presumably with its own Gods and philosophies.


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## Parson (Jan 21, 2009)

Interference said:


> The Old Testament says very little about loving your neighbour.  Jesus is the first to mention it in this form.  This is one of the first discernable discrepencies between the descriptions of God in the two testaments.  My phrasing was poor.  It frequently is.  But I agree with the philosophy of respecting the lives of other humans.  The Old Testament God was heavily biased towards the Israelites and against most other tribes and often endorsed genocide.  This seems an unlikely stance for God the Creator to take.



The Old Testament does command love for neighbor. "Do not seek revenge or bear a grudge against one of your people, but love your neighbor as yourself. I am the LORD." Leviticus 19:18. Jesus expanded the definition of neighbor to include anyone in need. Not so much in his commandment, but rather in his teaching. The parable of the Good Samaritan being the best example. 

The Old Testament does contain endorsed genocide and other issues my Western World mind set finds very difficult to accept. But I also believe that God knows better, and I am willing to trust God. The Old Testament however speaks a lot about good treatment of the foreigner living inside Israel, so the roots were there for Jesus' expansion on the command.




> Christians will avail of the freedom to quote from any part of the bible, not just the new testament, but Christ himself rejected much of what was taught before him.  I feel that there are thoughts and concepts that could never have occurred to Jesus that we are now capable of being aware of and adopting, and among these is respect for animal life and for the planet we all share to, potentially, our mutual benefit.



Near the beginning of the best recorded sermon of Jesus we find these words in Matthew 5:17. 
"MT 5:17 "Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. 18 I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished. 19 Anyone who breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. 20 For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven." 

Jesus at least, did not believe that he was rejecting the moral law of the Old Covenant. He saw his teaching and living as fulfillment of it. Later in the gospels we will learn how he superseded the food laws and the worship laws of the Jewish religion, but never the moral basis of it.




> This is in keeping with my belief that there is nothing particularly special about human life.  We are here, we will live out our days, and eventually we will, as a race, die.  Then some other life form will rule the planet we once called our own.
> 
> Our world will end, another will begin - presumably with its own Gods and philosophies.



I believe that the very fact that we are asking these questions and positing answers begins to prove that there is something very special about the human race. Whether our time will end and another race will take our place, -- Only God knows.


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## Aeris (Jan 21, 2009)

dask said:


> What about the year 2012? Isn't some big catastrophe coming our way around then?


 
Ummm...back to the end of the world and all that...sorry if I'm interrupting your trains of thought, I just wanted to put my two cents in...

I've read a lot about December 21, 2012, and though I believe it MAY be a significant day, I can't imagine that will be the day everything suddenly changes. True, the Mayan calendar has pointed to this date for whatever reason, but that's not the only reason it will be significant. Apparently, on that particular morning, the sun will "appear to rise directly in the center of the Milkyway Galaxy", which only happens every 26,000 years or something...and every time it has done that in recorded history (from what I've understood), something "big" happens.

Another reason so much speculation surrounds this day is that on or around this time, the poles of the Earth are supposed to shift. That makes people nervous, because there is a very delicate balance maintained between these two poles (north and south), and when they shift it COULD cause the electromagnetism (I'm not really sure of the correct term, I'm just spewing what I remember) to become weaker, thus exposing us more nakedly to the radioactivity of the sun. This would have devastating consequences...it would be a nuclear holocaust without any bombs ever having been dropped.

Anyone seen *Children of Men*? Yeah. Scary stuff.

Again, it's all purely speculation. Nobody KNOWS the earth is supposed to end at that particular time, but Nostradamus and the Mayans, among others, have predicted this to be a very significant time. I vote that it will just be a time of change.

That's all.


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## Aeris (Jan 21, 2009)

And, as Orson Scott Card puts it, the human race has evolved to survive. One person among the species may be selfless and willing to give up their lives for the good of all, but the only reason we have survived thus far is that we are ruthless. 

While I agree that the human species won't last forever, I think we'll put up a real fight for survival.


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## j d worthington (Jan 21, 2009)

Parson said:


> I believe that I need the Bible to discern right from wrong. And I believe that everyone needs some centering point. Otherwise the only right is what is good for me, and the only wrong is what is not good for me. This in the end, ends in anarchy and puts an end to whatever safety we may have, and likely ends nearly all advancement of humanity as a race.


 
Correct me if I'm misreading the second sentence on as applying generally rather than personally, but I find this:



> Otherwise the only right is what is good for me, and the only wrong is what is not good for me


 
to be both naïve and misanthropic. Common observation, unhampered with opposing preconceptions, tends to indicate this is simply not true. We, as with many other species, are social beings by nature. Therefore we almost all crave affection, approval, and acceptance. (I would say _all_, but there are likely to be a very tiny portion which are exceptions). As a result, we _do_ look to a broader "good" or "bad". This may extend only to immediate family members, the local community, the entire human race, or the planet and its species as a whole. By "looking out for each other" we in turn look out for ourselves and those people (and things) we care about.

While in a sense this would support a more subtilized form of what you are saying, in truth it refutes the spirit of the statement. I freely grant all the barbarities which have been performed by humanity throughout its history; but at the same time it is difficult to argue with the idea that, by the reasoning of your statement above, humanity never would have survived to evolve complex forms of worship, let alone founded complex, dynamic, and creative societies such as we have seen.

I am much more inclined to give humanity due credit for its inherently "good" traits, both narrow and wide in scope, as well as for its "bad". For all our faults, our missteps, and our stupidities, we have continued to learn and grow, and the quality (as well as duration) of life is considerably higher for a larger number of people now than has been the case at any time in history. This in itself argues our ability to cooperate regardless of religious, political, philosophical, and other differences much more generally than the opposite. As I've said before, it is simply that that opposite is, in contrast to the positives (which we tend to take for granted as "the norm", even if only subconsciously), all the more glaring, and therefore what we tend to remember most in our thinking.


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## Interference (Jan 22, 2009)

Parson said:


> The Old Testament does command love for neighbor. "Do not seek revenge or bear a grudge against one of your people, but love your neighbor as yourself. I am the LORD." Leviticus 19:18.



I stand ever-so corrected.  But I'm happy you've seen the point I was making.  From the self-interest of the tribe in the OT we come to the embrace of all humanity in the NT, a progression that took only three thousand years.  I reckon we're about due to start taking the rest of the planet's fauna and one or two alien races into consideration, as well, before the millennium's out.



Parson said:


> Jesus expanded the definition of neighbor to include anyone in need. Not so much in his commandment, but rather in his teaching.



During his teachings, Jesus said, "You have heard that it was said, 'Love your neighbour and hate your enemy.' But I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you." (Matthew 5:43)

Later when the Pharisees were quizzing him, they asked which he thought was the greatest _commandment_: "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbour as yourself.' All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments."  (Matthew 22:36-40)

It seems clear to me that in this he is recommending a new, previously unseeded (it isn't on the tablets) _second-most important _commandment.  Jesus, as we know, was an apt student of the bible and his understanding must have been great.  He may have encountered the quotation in Leviticus and decided it didn't go far enough.

Now, some of us are looking at that and thinking even _it_ doesn't go far enough; that our respect should extend to all life.  One day we will encounter alien life.  When that day arrives, I hope we are not still so backward as to consider it a subordinate life form whose only function is to promote our sense of self-importance in the universe.

We honestly aren't that important, except as a coexistent variety of planetary fauna.  We can make choices, other animals can't.  It's our responsibility to start making some right ones.


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## Parson (Jan 22, 2009)

j. d. worthington said:


> Correct me if I'm misreading the second sentence on as applying generally rather than personally, but I find this:
> 
> 
> 
> ...



JD, 

Nice to have you back. We haven't communicated in a while now. Hope the job is still going well!

As always your posts make me go "Hmmm, he has a point." On some further reflection I remain where I was. Your insights into human nature are astute. We do crave affection, approval, and acceptance, and this does lead to a view of "greater good" at least on the family or tribal level. But I would maintain that unless these greater goods or evils are codified the eventual outcome is still anarchy, but on a somewhat larger basis.

I cannot recall any large society which was able to maintain itself with a codified law, or a law giver. If we take ancient civilizations for examples we often see a law giver, who is in time restrained by the written or oral laws which have come to be seen as having significance even over the law giver. Being a person of balance and moderation are not necessary traits when it comes to rising to the top of an hierarchy, therefore a centering set of principles is necessary for a continued forward movement of the race.

Work is yelling at me to get going so no more on this today.


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## Parson (Jan 22, 2009)

Interference said:


> I reckon we're about due to start taking the rest of the planet's fauna and one or two alien races into consideration, as well, before the millennium's out.


 
I would hope that there are alien races, but so far no evidence. I believe an alien race could be incorporated into the Scripture by asking questions like "What makes a human?" and "Who is our neighbor?"




> During his teachings, Jesus said, "You have heard that it was said, 'Love your neighbour and hate your enemy.' But I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you." (Matthew 5:43)
> 
> Later when the Pharisees were quizzing him, they asked which he thought was the greatest _commandment_: "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbour as yourself.' All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments."  (Matthew 22:36-40)
> 
> It seems clear to me that in this he is recommending a new, previously unseeded (it isn't on the tablets) _second-most important _commandment.  Jesus, as we know, was an apt student of the bible and his understanding must have been great.  He may have encountered the quotation in Leviticus and decided it didn't go far enough.


There were rabbis of Jesus day who said basically the same thing for good reason. If you were to look at the "Ten" you would note that the first four (divided as Protestants do) deal with our relationship to God, and the last six deal with our relationship with fellow humans. So if you were to summarize the law you would be hard put to do it anymore correctly or succinctly than Jesus did. --- Luke has some support for this. In these verses Jesus is discussing with a Jewish religious leader and says:

LK 10:26 "What is written in the Law?" he replied. "How do you read it?"

    LK 10:27 He answered: " `Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind' ; and, `Love your neighbor as yourself.' "

    LK 10:28 "You have answered correctly," Jesus replied. "Do this and you will live."

    LK 10:29 But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, "And who is my neighbor?"




> Now, some of us are looking at that and thinking even _it_ doesn't go far enough; that our respect should extend to all life.  One day we will encounter alien life.  When that day arrives, I hope we are not still so backward as to consider it a subordinate life form whose only function is to promote our sense of self-importance in the universe.
> 
> We honestly aren't that important, except as a coexistent variety of planetary fauna.  We can make choices, other animals can't.  It's our responsibility to start making some right ones.


I agree with all my heart with sentences 2 and 3 of your last paragraph, and I believe they negate sentence 1 of it.


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## Interference (Jan 22, 2009)

Parson said:


> I would hope that there are alien races, but so far no evidence. I believe an alien race could be incorporated into the Scripture by asking questions like "What makes a human?" and "Who is our neighbor?"
> 
> 
> There were rabbis of Jesus day who said basically the same thing for good reason. If you were to look at the "Ten" you would note that the first four (divided as Protestants do) deal with our relationship to God, and the last six deal with our relationship with fellow humans. So if you were to summarize the law you would be hard put to do it anymore correctly or succinctly than Jesus did. --- Luke has some support for this. In these verses Jesus is discussing with a Jewish religious leader and says:
> ...



In essence, I don't see anything on which we _do_ disagree, except our conclusions.  At one time, I may have agreed with you even on that, but my thinking over the last ten-to-twelve years has led me down paths which you will probably never need to travel.  Your journey ends with wonder and eternal bliss, mine with "Meh".


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## j d worthington (Jan 22, 2009)

Parson said:


> JD,
> 
> Nice to have you back.


 
Thank ye kindly....



> But I would maintain that unless these greater goods or evils are codified the eventual outcome is still anarchy, but on a somewhat larger basis.
> 
> I cannot recall any large society which was able to maintain itself with a codified law, or a law giver. If we take ancient civilizations for examples we often see a law giver, who is in time restrained by the written or oral laws which have come to be seen as having significance even over the law giver. Being a person of balance and moderation are not necessary traits when it comes to rising to the top of an hierarchy, therefore a centering set of principles is necessary for a continued forward movement of the race.


 
I would agree that eventual codification of these things is necessary or at least very useful for a society, but there is a difference between that and the idea of a center expressed in your earlier post. In this one, I see you've broadened that to be "a centering set of principles" for a society or "race" (species?) -- or at least made that broader application more apparent. It is here that I would tend to differ with you to some degree. 

For one thing, I don't think a society, species, or race (whichever term you prefer) _needs_ such a "center", though again it may be helpful or harmful, depending on said center. It is more likely to be useful for an individual, but even there I question your use of the term because of implications of other statements surrounding that use. While you may not have intended it to be such, there is a strong implication of some sort of religious or at least semi-mystical basis for said center, and this I take strong exception to. I would argue that there are many other reasons for development of a strong system of ethics or morals based on simple observation of the fact that we are an interdependent species; no one stands (or _can_ stand) entirely alone. (Even Lovecraft remarks on this in his first mature story, "The Tomb", albeit in his protagonist's case it is the fact of the company he keeps which contributes to his downfall: "I have said that I dwelt apart from the visible world, but I have not said that I dwelt alone. This no human creature may do; for lacking the fellowship of the living, he inevitably draws upon the companionship of things that are not, or are no longer, living.") Reciprocity is the keynote of human interaction, in this case, _just as it is for many other species_.

Which, at base, is what happens when that "law-giver" becomes constrained by the very things he or she originated. It becomes more of a construct of the community, refined over time based on the observation of what benefits that society and what doesn't -- in other words, what has reciprocal benefits (albeit it balanced by necessary punishments in some cases) for the parties (i.e., the members of that society) involved.

These things do sometimes get out of balance, and you end up with cancers which are either locally contained or widespread (such as Nazism, genocide, pogroms, and the like), but these -- like a cancer -- by their very nature are unsustainable over the long run; they either are removed or they kill the host and therefore themselves.

However, my point of difference with you lies primarily in the fact that the statement made above implies that, without an authoritarian, paternalistic force at work, human beings will inevitably sink into a particularly vicious form of barbarism very close to the "tooth-and-claw" model, and this is simply not the case. I'd argue that this does not give the human race its due, and is prone to see us as "irretrievably fallen" save by "grace", rather than a species which refines and hones its ethical patterns as it develops along its evolutionary way; something which by its nature prevents overarching "center" (and certainly anything of the sort which remains stable), yet which evidently reinforces the need to increase what we call our more "noble" qualities as they increase our chances for survival....


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## Parson (Jan 23, 2009)

j. d. worthington said:


> I would agree that eventual codification of these things is necessary or at least very useful for a society, but there is a difference between that and the idea of a center expressed in your earlier post. In this one, I see you've broadened that to be "a centering set of principles" for a society or "race" (species?) -- or at least made that broader application more apparent. It is here that I would tend to differ with you to some degree.


 It seems we are going to struggle over terms here. If I was not consistent before, I'll try to be now. I am speaking of societies. I don't believe race is a useful term as applied to humans. There is only one race, unless and until a true alien race appears. I am trying to speak in the broadest human terms available, but drawing illustration from societies. 



> For one thing, I don't think a society, species, or race (whichever term you prefer) _needs_ such a "center", though again it may be helpful or harmful, depending on said center. It is more likely to be useful for an individual, but even there I question your use of the term because of implications of other statements surrounding that use. While you may not have intended it to be such, there is a strong implication of some sort of religious or at least semi-mystical basis for said center, and this I take strong exception to. I would argue that there are many other reasons for development of a strong system of ethics or morals based on simple observation of the fact that we are an interdependent species; no one stands (or _can_ stand) entirely alone. (Even Lovecraft remarks on this in his first mature story, "The Tomb", albeit in his protagonist's case it is the fact of the company he keeps which contributes to his downfall: "I have said that I dwelt apart from the visible world, but I have not said that I dwelt alone. This no human creature may do; for lacking the fellowship of the living, he inevitably draws upon the companionship of things that are not, or are no longer, living.") Reciprocity is the keynote of human interaction, in this case, _just as it is for many other species_.



I am not making religious or semi-mystical statements here, (You know I am not averse to them, I am Christian to my core, but I am trying to speak in the language of a sociologist.) I agree that there are many reasons for a strong system of ethics or morals. You quote Lovelace, I'll quote the Bible: "It is not good for man to live alone."



> Which, at base, is what happens when that "law-giver" becomes constrained by the very things he or she originated. It becomes more of a construct of the community, refined over time based on the observation of what benefits that society and what doesn't -- in other words, what has reciprocal benefits (albeit it balanced by necessary punishments in some cases) for the parties (i.e., the members of that society) involved.
> 
> These things do sometimes get out of balance, and you end up with cancers which are either locally contained or widespread (such as Nazism, genocide, pogroms, and the like), but these -- like a cancer -- by their very nature are unsustainable over the long run; they either are removed or they kill the host and therefore themselves.



Agree completely



> However, my point of difference with you lies primarily in the fact that the statement made above implies that, without an authoritarian, paternalistic force at work, human beings will inevitably sink into a particularly vicious form of barbarism very close to the "tooth-and-claw" model, and this is simply not the case. I'd argue that this does not give the human race its due, and is prone to see us as "irretrievably fallen" save by "grace", rather than a species which refines and hones its ethical patterns as it develops along its evolutionary way; something which by its nature prevents overarching "center" (and certainly anything of the sort which remains stable), yet which evidently reinforces the need to increase what we call our more "noble" qualities as they increase our chances for survival....



JD, we have come to the point, probably the non-negotiable one, in record time for one of our discussions.  I do believe that without an authoritative guide (I take exception to the modifier paternalistic) humans will inevitability fall backward, until such a time when there is an authoritative guide which is widely followed, again. 

I would also argue that you last statement about "as it develops along its evolutionary way..." has raised evolution to something like at least a demi-god. It seems to be implying that there is some overriding predisposition toward life and after that, toward a better life for the group. I don't believe that there is any proof for a group evolutionary process, and noble qualities often have deadly consequences for the one being selfless.


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## Saeltari (Jan 23, 2009)

I was wondering about this thread as I kept seeing it pop up.

(the below is solely my opinion and not a reflection on anyone or any specific religion)

First, let me get it out and please keep in mind no disrepect intended to anyone but ... Religion -> Blech! 

Having said that it can be highly useful, but it is a double edged sword; easy to cut with and easy to get cut by, but comforting in the hand.

I think I politely disagree with the bible being needed as a center, there are too many places and peoples that do not use it and still have a sense of morality, ethics and right vs. wrong. They may not be my ethics or your ethics but they still have them. 

While I may not agree with the words used to describe a guide or that a guide is even needed there is one thing that seems to have been proven and continues to act as it has for many, many years. The drive or guiding desire of biological life to survive and perpetuate itself continues.

And to answer the question that started the thread; things don't end, they change. Therefore, it will not.


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## Interference (Jan 23, 2009)

Have to say, that sounds like a near-perfect answer to me, Sael.


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## j d worthington (Jan 23, 2009)

Parson said:


> You quote Lovelace....


 
Um, that was H. P. Love_craft_, actually... known more for his horror tales, but there's a lot of food for thought behind them....



> (I take exception to the modifier paternalistic)


 
In this case, I mean the term in the broader sense, as in a government which has a "paternal" attitude toward its people, or the sort of "paternalistic" attitude even many abolitionists adopted toward black slaves.



> I would also argue that you last statement about "as it develops along its evolutionary way..." has raised evolution to something like at least a demi-god. It seems to be implying that there is some overriding predisposition toward life and after that, toward a better life for the group. I don't believe that there is any proof for a group evolutionary process, and noble qualities often have deadly consequences for the one being selfless.


 
I can see where you are getting that reading, though it wasn't intended. I use the term here simply to designate the particular road we have traveled up to now; this is, of course, subject to unforeseen change. And evolution itself also has the possibility of extinction of a species, including humanity. There was no teleological aspect intended. I see evolution as a process which, while not subject to "blind chance", follows physical laws we are still coming to understand, and which can be influenced by an almost incalculable number of variables. However, the evidence of our past evolution points to our being increasingly prone to cooperative effort in general rather than the opposite (hence the building of cultural bridges, including trade and political affiliations), as such benefit the various parties concerned. It isn't a straightforward progress, and there are steps backward and the like; but overall this does seem to be the trend we have followed _so far_. My argument is that, given the increasingly complex problems we face, it is likely to remain the most beneficial approach for the forseeable future as well.

As for noble traits: again, this can prove to be the case on a physical level, yes; but it promotes and reinforces such behavior in groups as a whole, as it promotes survival of the larger group; hence is evolutionarily a positive rather than a negative. In addition, often by continuing such a path, a person is surviving in the way most important to them: by following through with a code which is so intensely intermingled with their own sense of ego (self or consciousness) that it becomes more important than their physical continuance. This is as often true of individualists and non-believers as of the reverse, though nearly all sides can exhibit (and have exhibited) it at various times.

As for "group" here -- again, I think it applies more to the overall "group", the species, as a beneficial form of learned behavior, and therefore becomes a part of _social_, rather than _biological_, evolution.

At any rate, a good debate. I still disagree with you on the subject of authoritarian approaches (though I will agree that there are times when they have proved useful (and will continue to do so); but they aren't necessary, at least, not across the board. I think I've just learned to have a good deal more faith in humanity -- though, oddly, most of my life I think I might well have argued otherwise, as I tended to be more cynical, or even pessimistic, until a few things I ran across caused me to do some heavy scrutinizing of my reasons for such opinions, and to compare them to a broader view of reality.

As for the original query of the thread: depends on what you mean, I suppose. If you mean "our (human) world", then there are any number of possibilities, both natural (non-human in origin) and otherwise. If you mean "our world (the planet)", then again there are a number of possibilities, though not necessarily the same ones.

I _do_ think, however, that the likeliest thing is that we will eventually be replaced by a form of insect life; not exactly a new thought, but considering their advantages when it comes to survival -- even, in many cases, when exposed to massive doses of radiation -- it is quite a strong possibility.


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## Parson (Jan 23, 2009)

JD,

(If I Lovelace, might not I also Lovecraft?)

What kind of evidence do you have for "social evolution?" Is this a strictly human trait? I was thinking of prairie dogs as an example of an instinct which makes sense for the group but not for the individual -- "being on lookout and making yourself a target for the nearest hawk by standing up." 

But humanity has to raise the idea of social evolution several orders of magnitude. Here is where the idea of a centering code or norm from which ethics and morals are derived becomes the tool from which what looks like evolution develops. Without a set of agreed on principles progress in a society is more than slow. It is bound to slide backwards.  Yes, I do believe that humanity is fatally flawed, able to accomplish great things and lose them all to selfishness and greed.

(btw -- I am not arguing religion here for those who think I am. And I never spoke about the Bible as the only centering truth.)


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## Saeltari (Jan 24, 2009)

Parson said:


> ... (btw -- I am not arguing religion here for those who think I am. And I never spoke about the Bible as the only centering truth.)


 
Good to hear, although there is nothing wrong if you were . I was just going off of my impression of what had been written, which is really all I can go off of since I already went off my rocker a long time ago. 

I am interested in your last sentence prior to the parenthesis, are you saying only that the flaw exists or that it is a state we are prediposed to gravitate to?

And to J.D.,

Insects and viruses, both last and adapt... and humans have been called a virus .


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## Parson (Jan 24, 2009)

Saeltari said:


> Good to hear, although there is nothing wrong if you were . I was just going off of my impression of what had been written, which is really all I can go off of since I already went off my rocker a long time ago.
> 
> I am interested in your last sentence prior to the parenthesis, are you saying only that the flaw exists or that it is a state we are prediposed to gravitate to?
> 
> ...



I would like to answer your question but I'm having a hard time discerning the difference between a flaw that exists, and a state to which we are predisposed. Aren't they essentially the same thing? Certainly I would think that the results would look the same. *IF *the difference is that a flaw is universal, and predisposition is not, then I would say that a flaw exists. But one which can be battled and successfully for a while in some people. 

In evolutionary language the ability to adapt is one of the key ingredients to long term survival of a species. --- But we are talking in geological terms here, and the necessity to adapt can be moderated by how benign the environment is.


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## WJoseph (Jan 24, 2009)

Wow. Some spirited and intelligent banter (for a change- based on some websites I have been on!). I have come to appreciate the mutiple interpretations of "How will our world end?" 

"Our world" to me really meant- the society in which we live and the world as we know it (and the human race as we know it). I think every individual, and even every group, always has a center of some kind. A religion (including the Bible), a set of rules, a set of standards, a way of life, a goal, a purpose, etc. Many different centers, but all with the perpetual quest for their own version of utopia.

I also think that, barring some colossal event involving the planet, humans and many forms of life will always survive. The question is, who will survive, in what number and what will they look like? I have grown up believing that the world could be destroyed any minute, and honestly, it could! Even as a young man, growing up during the cold war, it was always about war and complete world destruction (then it was the U.S.A. vs. the Soviet Union). I explain how that is what inspired me to write a story, with that mindset as a basis, in the section of my website, A World Without Divide, under 'The Story Behind' tab. 

Our fate lies in some shaky hands at times (around the entire planet) and I still fear that the end of our world and society as we know it, will come at the hand of man- and not too far into the future.


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## Saeltari (Jan 26, 2009)

Parson,

 Actually, if I understand what you are asking, it never ocurred to me that ,if a flaw exists, it is the state that people are predisposed to. 

I do agree with the moderation of adaption by environment as that is often the only reason for adaption of one degree or another.


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## WJoseph (Feb 8, 2009)

Parson, do you think humanity is fatally flawed, or that we have the capacity to be so flawed (which I think is different, fatally flawed would indicate that that is the default)? It seems that all of the motivations (generally speaking) to do harm are man-made (power, money, religion, etc). Were it not for our 'higher level brain capacity,' we would be happy to be fed, warm, safe, stimulated to some degree, and our needs would be met. Occasionally there would be naturally territorial confrontations (hey, get away from my girl, or that food is mine, etc) but never something that would rise to a cataclysmic level. That I believe is the state that we are predisposed to, but social conditioning has made us believe that we need more and the human conscience and consciousness provides a horrible worth-meter that motivates us to do things we really don't need to do. We are only flawed because our 'worth' and value is socially conditioned. If only we all believed that being fed, warm and safe was enough, we would be fine as a species (and survival from a cataclysym from the hand of man would not be an issue).


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## Parson (Feb 9, 2009)

As far as I can tell, I would say that we are fatally flawed. It might be that the flaw goes along with what you call "our higher level brain capacity." Many of us would call someone who only wanted to be "fed, warm, and safe" as lazy. I think the flaw exists even in nature. Even the biggest and the baddest have enemies that can defeat them upon occasion. Life is a struggle. I think the natural predisposition of both man and animal is not live and let live, but rather "I want more." I'm not botanist, but my limited observation would indicate that most animals try to protect and defend the biggest territory they can manage. Chimps have been known to conduct what can only be called war against rival clans. 

Our brains have let us become the ultimate competitors in this eco-system. But when we let our higher instincts for religion and social order come to the fore, we begin to think in terms of peace, harmony, cooperation, and the like, over a species wide, and now beginning an eco-system wide continuum. 

The flaw can be overcome, however to this point, and I fear for eternity, it can not be defeated.


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## GeoffNelder (Feb 20, 2009)

Like some others here, I believe our idiocy will see the end of our species, maybe all species. Out of control GM crops, virus (I know we now have a glut of end-of-humans virus stories,  butbutbut)  and misuse of radioactive weapons  seem more likely to me than running out  of resources triggering catostrophic wars. Yes, there are no new  copper mines, and the only untapped oil fields will be expensive to exploit - eg the huge one in deep shelf to the  SW of Ireland. However, although our species is idiot writ large,  we are good at changing resource use and being adaptable.

The sad thing for me is that I'd always thought our art would survive us. However, it seems less than likely. Ironically written words have survived millennia on stone and papyrus while recording tapes barely last a few decades. We  used to think CDs were indestructable but not so,  especially as  they become obsolete. Memory cards, bubble organic memory devices? No one is sure. The problem with clever tech storage is that we don't know what devices will be around in the future to play them. Perhaps we should be writing our  novels in stone, but they will erode, oxidize, etc over millions of years too. The future is sans humans,  and sans evidence of humans. 

Unless...

Geoff


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## WJoseph (Feb 22, 2009)

Well, I would just say that humans have developed weaponry that can destroy the world. The buttons to be pushed to effectuate such destruction, are also in the hands of humans. Certain humans with their hands on the buttons could cause incredible destruction. Are there enough checks and balances to prevent this? One would hope. Whenever I try to minimize the potential for catastrophic damage, my one friend casually reminds me that Hitler started with a group of less than 10 people, and he came within a few strategic moves of controlling the entire world. Think about that!


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## Simple Simon (Feb 23, 2009)

[FONT=&quot]Parson I'm curious about exactly what you mean by "fatally flawed". A flaw is a defect in something that hinders its purpose and as such I could understand your perspective if you believe humans are meant to be moral creatures and that we should oppose the more base/evil actions we have the capacity to commit. 
Since you take a religious perspective and as such believe we are the construction of God does that mean we were created flawed? In my understanding of Christianity humans are given free will and this in turn allows for both good and bad deeds but this instills no flaw in us.

In my opinion our wide moral spectrum allows us to choose our own purpose and therefore create and overcome our own individual flaws. The very fact that these flaws so often involve greed and lust and a plethora of other of our less desirable attributes shows that these are not things that define us or that we choose to embody.
[/FONT]


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## WJoseph (Feb 24, 2009)

Uh-oh. You mean lust is a less desirable attribute?


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## Parson (Feb 24, 2009)

Simple Simon said:


> [FONT=&quot]Parson I'm curious about exactly what you mean by "fatally flawed". A flaw is a defect in something that hinders its purpose and as such I could understand your perspective if you believe humans are meant to be moral creatures and that we should oppose the more base/evil actions we have the capacity to commit.
> Since you take a religious perspective and as such believe we are the construction of God does that mean we were created flawed? In my understanding of Christianity humans are given free will and this in turn allows for both good and bad deeds but this instills no flaw in us.
> 
> In my opinion our wide moral spectrum allows us to choose our own purpose and therefore create and overcome our own individual flaws. The very fact that these flaws so often involve greed and lust and a plethora of other of our less desirable attributes shows that these are not things that define us or that we choose to embody.
> [/FONT]



Good question! and deep thinking. I believe that we humans are flawed. I believe that we are a construction of God, not in the "God created fully formed and functioning humans" form of that, but rather in the role of oversight of evolution. For me the main point of the Genesis account is that God was behind all that we see and experience, and that it was all good. But humanity, out of all the creation we know, was the only part of it which was given the freedom to choose. We have all chosen to be less than what we can be personally and corporately. So in the sense that God allowed us to develop free choice it is a flaw, but it is also our strength. We can choose something different by God's grace. (This largely lines up with what you are saying.)

But this is where the work of Jesus comes in. He restores to us the freedom to choose the right. As a part of corporate humanity we all share in humanity's flaw even before we make our own choices. But for those who trust Jesus the possibility exists to choose right and to be forgiven for those times we miss God's mark for us. And so we work against the flaw waiting for the time when the fullness of God's work is complete and our flaw has flown further than the East is from the West.


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## LJonesy (Mar 15, 2009)

Parson said:


> Good question! and deep thinking. I believe that we humans are flawed. I believe that we are a construction of God, not in the "God created fully formed and functioning humans" form of that, but rather in the role of oversight of evolution. For me the main point of the Genesis account is that God was behind all that we see and experience, and that it was all good. But humanity, out of all the creation we know, was the only part of it which was given the freedom to choose. We have all chosen to be less than what we can be personally and corporately. So in the sense that God allowed us to develop free choice it is a flaw, but it is also our strength. We can choose something different by God's grace. (This largely lines up with what you are saying.)
> 
> But this is where the work of Jesus comes in. He restores to us the freedom to choose the right. As a part of corporate humanity we all share in humanity's flaw even before we make our own choices. But for those who trust Jesus the possibility exists to choose right and to be forgiven for those times we miss God's mark for us. And so we work against the flaw waiting for the time when the fullness of God's work is complete and our flaw has flown further than the East is from the West.



I'm inclined to agree with you being a Christian as well...

But i don't know, something about the whole Eden thing still bugs me. Questions of humanity's flaws, strictly in Christian terms, boil down to the questions of "In what state were we made? Complete or Incomplete?" and "What did we actually 'gain' by taking the fruit from the tree?" Was it that by doing what Eve did we forfeited our connection with God? Or was it that we grew a level of consciousness which made us a third entity, in terms of there being God, Satan, then us? Because before that if you were to distinguish "sides" it would be something along the lines of "God vs. Satan" just for arguments sake. But then does our taking that fruit from the tree make us a third party in this whole thing?

Questions questions... I'm just discussing here...


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## Parson (Mar 17, 2009)

LJonesy said:


> I'm inclined to agree with you being a Christian as well...
> 
> But i don't know, something about the whole Eden thing still bugs me. Questions of humanity's flaws, strictly in Christian terms, boil down to the questions of "In what state were we made? Complete or Incomplete?" and "What did we actually 'gain' by taking the fruit from the tree?" Was it that by doing what Eve did we forfeited our connection with God? Or was it that we grew a level of consciousness which made us a third entity, in terms of there being God, Satan, then us? Because before that if you were to distinguish "sides" it would be something along the lines of "God vs. Satan" just for arguments sake. But then does our taking that fruit from the tree make us a third party in this whole thing?
> 
> Questions questions... I'm just discussing here...



You are right, "Questions, questions." 

I believe that the story of Adam and Eve and the Garden of Eden tells us a deep truth about humanity. From the first humans onward we have chosen to rebel. We have not been satisfied letting God be God, but we have wanted to be God ourselves. In a sense you could say God is to blame, because God created us with the ability to choose. But it is that ability to choose that allows us to love purely. If I have no choice but to love, can that really be love? Is it not compulsion? So God's creation was perfect but we have chosen not to let the perfection be the last answer. But God too has chosen not to let our "No!" to his perfection be the last answer either. He sent Jesus into the world so that the possibility of a "yes" to God's perfect plan is again possible.


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## LJonesy (Mar 17, 2009)

Parson said:


> You are right, "Questions, questions."
> 
> I believe that the story of Adam and Eve and the Garden of Eden tells us a deep truth about humanity. From the first humans onward we have chosen to rebel. We have not been satisfied letting God be God, but we have wanted to be God ourselves. In a sense you could say God is to blame, because God created us with the ability to choose. But it is that ability to choose that allows us to love purely. If I have no choice but to love, can that really be love? Is it not compulsion? So God's creation was perfect but we have chosen not to let the perfection be the last answer. But God too has chosen not to let our "No!" to his perfection be the last answer either. He sent Jesus into the world so that the possibility of a "yes" to God's perfect plan is again possible.



But your entire premise works under the assumption we simply did not change when Eve took that fruit. Genesis 3:5 kind of supports this notion that something was gained by eating the fruit;_ For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil. _Additionally, Genesis3:6-7 also backs up my premise; _When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom,... Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realised that they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves._

The entire notion that "Their eyes were opened" indicates change. What did they lack beforehand? Is it that we've become aware of the Good and Evil (Genesis 3:3) Or have we understood that there was more to life than what was once first thought, and as you said, vouched for autonomy. 

My point is, is that something _changed_ in that event in Eden, Adam and Eve _gained_ something which changed the circumstances and thus separated them from God. When you say _From the first humans onward we have chosen to rebel. We have not been satisfied letting God be God, but we have wanted to be God ourselves. _You imply a level of consciousness on Adam and Eve's part which is simply not evident in the text. If we were aware of the circumstances, if we were truly aware that death, satan and sin were beyond the choice to eat the fruit, would we _really_ have taken it? I think Eve would have been scared shitless if she truly knew. That is why people say that she was _decieved_. Your statements imply Adam and Eve's mind was as capable as ours currently is. But i feel they honestly didn't know any better. I am not saying it was Ultimately Satan's fault, for the choice was Eve's. 

There is just more behind this than the simple notion that "We were rebelling against God" Saying that comes with certain implications which simply aren't there. Eve wasn't aware of her actions, and after she took the fruit, became aware of them. Something _changed_...


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## TheEndIsNigh (Mar 17, 2009)

Sadly I have only just discovered this thread thanks to LJ - Ta


In answer to the original question

SOON.

Now getting down to the deep and dirty parts of the argument Herein, my six penneth.

Taking the Adam and Eve story first (since it's still fresh in our minds)

If we accept the premise that there is any grain of truth in the tale then surely what it shows us is one or all of the following (just as a start)

1. God is a weak creature that is unable to impose his will on even the most timid of creatures (here we have a lot to thank Eve and womankind for) Given the state of play, who among us would have defied the creator of all things when he said do not eat of the tree etc. Furthermore having been defied does he wipe the slate clean and start again with a new batch. No he allows us to use the knowledge we have gained and hasn't got the backbone to punish us, other than to take it out on poor Eve who's only fault was that she had not been given the ability to resist temptation. 

2. God is a devious creature that deliberately placed the tree there knowing (as he would) what would happen and that Eve wouldn't be unable to resist the wiles of the snake. Yet he placed the tree there presumably so he could have the fun of casting us out. Seems a bit contrived to me.

3. God wanted us to eat of the tree. I can understand this. It must have been pretty boring back then in the garden. What was required was a new stimulus. Something random (oh wait, how can anything be random if there exist a creature that can know every outcome - damn - oh well sketching over that one). Something that would amuse and entertain. After all why create a universe if you can't have some fun with it.

4. God was a poor designer ( a given) since, if it was supposed to be the tree of all knowledge then it seems he left great chunks of information out. which would have been very handy to know especially at times like these. But no, did Adam and eve immediately invent the computer or develop industrial farming or space flight or the transmutation of matter. No - some tree.

As for the alien life question :-

Let us speculate that life exists out there and it has or will visit us it raises all sorts of imponderable questions for the religious (belief in god) among us.

Since they are more advanced than us, presumably, they are the more favoured by god since he has given them more knowledge and taken more care of their development and maybe we are intended just to be the just another creature that god has given dominion over to these new guys - In which case we are in for it, given what we do to what we have been given (Soylent Green springs to mind - Food for though).


If we visit them then again this poses a problem since it would appear that as they came second they must have been created after us, (and they are better and we are just prototypes with all those flaws) implying that god thought he had failed and has started a new batch and just abandoned us to our fate.


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## bluerayarchangel (Mar 17, 2009)

*Does it really matter???   There is no point being afraid of something out of your control. *

*"If you can change the sitution why worry, (just change it) if you can not change the sitution whats the use of worrying" ( it only make you ill so don't add to your problems.)*

*Take life as it comes, and when it ends *


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## Parson (Mar 18, 2009)

LJonesy said:


> But your entire premise works under the assumption we simply did not change when Eve took that fruit. Genesis 3:5 kind of supports this notion that something was gained by eating the fruit;_ For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil. _Additionally, Genesis3:6-7 also backs up my premise; _When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom,... Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realised that they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves._
> 
> The entire notion that "Their eyes were opened" indicates change. What did they lack beforehand? Is it that we've become aware of the Good and Evil (Genesis 3:3) Or have we understood that there was more to life than what was once first thought, and as you said, vouched for autonomy.
> 
> ...



Indeed there was a change when we chose to break relationship with God. Our eyes were opened to the meaning and true results of sin. We now "knew good and evil." The words of the temptation were true, and in some sense we did become like God, but in a much more important way we lost the perfection of our birth right. We lost the freedom to choose which was also our birth right, we were eternally separated from the intimate fellowship of God. 

But God was not willing to let our rebellion be the final answer, and so in Jesus of Nazareth, the second person of the Trinity, the penalty of sin was paid, and all who accept the gift are restored to the birth right of choice to be in relationship with God, or outside of it. But there is an important difference. Now the default position is outside of relationship, not inside.

(This is getting to be deep theology. A pleasure to communicate!)


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## ManTimeForgot (Mar 22, 2009)

No thread about destroying the world is complete without at least a shout out to "How to destroy earth"  How to destroy the Earth @ Things Of Interest  I've sent in a few suggestions to the place and gotten some feedback and am quite familiar with the ideas there.  Simply put ending the earth is _really_ difficult.  The sun's end may not even do the job.  Earth may very well get pushed out to a "safe" orbit by heightened solar wind (red giants are not entirely stable and thus throw out quite a bit of mass).

As far as the biblical/God situation goes: there is another option to consider.

God is like a gardener who cares about seeds/like a painter who cares about canvas.  God contrived a situation wherein the seeds once sprouted/canvas once painted upon were weened from God's influence and allowed to act in accordance to their own dictates (free will).  Consider for a moment if you will: If everything that anything did was only in accordance with God's will, then why should anyone sin?  Assuming that God was both omniscient and omnipotent the only real option remaining is that God has willingly limited "his" own influence upon creation (something that only an omnipotent being could do).



And as far as how humanity and/or the current culture will end: that is going to depend on quite a few things.


First allow me to dispel many of the myths proposed in this thread by listing what will _NOT_ end us.  *Caveat* Individually none of these have a chance at doing the job, but in combination these could drop the human population below the termination point for reproductive viability

1)Nuclear war.  Nuclear war and subsequent winter may end the current incarnation of our world/country's culture, but will not end humanity.

2)Bio-chemical warfare.  Bio warfare is too random and resistances too wide-spread.  Chemical warfare is too limited in scope (hard to produce enough quantity and hard to distribute effectively).

3)Satellites (??)  I don't even know how to respond to this.  An upper atmospheric event propagates EMP down to us via Compton scattering and upscattering, but this by itself won't kill us.  It will only interfere with society.  Neutrons "kill" by knocking hydrogens out of water (which is 70% of us).  However, the atmosphere is also quite water rich and as such neutron bomb effectiveness is *seriously* diminished by large volumes of atmosphere buffering against the bomb's effects.  It's entirely possible to knock out every satellite we have with certain weapons and it is entirely possible to scorch an area the size of Maine, but it is not even remotely plausible to knock out us.

4)Degenerative cultural/economic spiral.  Humans are resilient little buggers.  Someone somewhere will isolate themselves and form a remote community.  And this is not an isolated phenomena.  It will happen in quite a few places.  Once the "crisis" is over humanity will re-establish contact and start anew (as a dark age it might set us back a thousand years, but it won't do us in... no chance).

5) Global Warming/ Next Ice Age.  Global Warming won't even come close.  And by the time the next Ice Age rolls around I will eat my laptop if we aren't easily able to hold out in space or other planets (possibly artificial ones) and wait it out.  Heck we may even have the tech to avert the Ice Age by the time the next one hits.

*Note* Humanity's threshold for survival is something on the order of 50,000 people.  With advancements in genetic engineering this number only drops as genetic diversity can be artificially introduced.  We can build structures able to survive in shallow water (Water is a very good radiation soak, retains heat much better than air, and allows for making use of tidal forces for energy production).  We can build green/hot houses that will allow for crop harvests in just about any climate imagineable and indefinitely sustainable artificial sunlight.  Earth is a very good radiation soak (every 3 feet of earth reduces radiation by 1/10).  So people who build themselves underground shelters will be almost like cockroaches in the degree of difficulty it takes to get rid of them.  Hydroponic and fungus farming in combination with aforementioned greenhouses would make underground survival nearly indefinite. 


Now for things that could actually work:

1)Humanity could get wiped out by a truly astoundingingly unlucky astronomic event of enormous proportions: stray fast moving black hole, extra-solar fast moving heavy object (something the size of mars going at a significant fraction of C), etc.

2A)Genetic engineering: with sufficiently advanced scientific knowledge and technical application we could change ourselves beyond the point of reproducibility with a "modern" human.  At which point we cease to be homosapien sapien.

2B)Cybernetics/Organic-Chemistry: similar to above... sufficiently advanced scientific knowledge and technical ability we could create "perpetually regenerating" bodies that are mostly synthetic/semi-organic technology and cease to be human.

3)Aliens/God: Yeah.  So what?  God isn't happening.  If reality was going to alter itself to get rid of us we either wouldn't have ever existed or it would have happened a long time ago.  And as far as aliens with phenomenal cosmic powers...  Why would they care?  Anything that has been around and evolving (socially, biologically, mentally, academically, scientifically, technologically, politically, etc) for millions of years before us is so different from us as to harken to the difference between us and ants.  (Remember body of knowledge doubles every 10 years.  A few million years is a *VERY* large number: 2 ^ 100,000)

4)Humanity erases itself from spacetime...  Timespace manipulation at high levels could potentially do a number on earth, humanity, even our solar system depending on what's going on.  Time-travel could wreck humanity's historical progression.  Opening up a new universe (something we may very well do some day as our current one cools down) and having it go awry (if you banish earth to a universe with weaker nuclear forces we would all very quickly decay into base particles and energy).


So in sum: its easy to disrupt society and end what is our current society.  But ending humanity: that takes serious effort.  It will either happen in a spectacular cosmic event/accident or, on our terms, as we advance ourselves beyond our current forms.  And as far as earth goes: Earth is in it for the long-haul.  She will almost certainly still be here even after humanity has left this corner of the universe for greener pastures.

MTF


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## Parson (Mar 24, 2009)

MTF

Well thought out. A needed dose of realism in an overly pessimistic age.


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## Moonbat (Mar 27, 2009)

> 1)Nuclear war. Nuclear war and subsequent winter may end the current incarnation of our world/country's culture, but will not end humanity.
> 
> 2)Bio-chemical warfare. Bio warfare is too random and resistances too wide-spread. Chemical warfare is too limited in scope (hard to produce enough quantity and hard to distribute effectively).


 
MTF, how can you say that Nuclear war wont end humanity, if the war was big enough and widespread enough, then all densely populated areas could be targeted and hit, the resulting nuclear winter would make survival for any remaining people (not in a densely populated area) very difficult, difficult to the point where they do die. You must admit it is possible. I agree that Osama Bin Laden in his lead lined cave might survive the initial blast, but when most of the animals and plants die from lack of sunlight what will he live on?

How can you say that Bio-Chemical warfare wont destroy humanity, I'm not sure where you got your info on the diificulties of spreading chemicals, or even the wide spread resistance, but it wouldn't take too big a leap in imagination to see that an air-born bio-chemical could wipe out all of humanity.

As for God, well.....

Please explain,


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## ManTimeForgot (Mar 28, 2009)

I got my information from weapons designers and from the Air Force.  My dad is a nuclear weapon's designer and works with a fair number of individuals responsible for the United State's attack response and strategic planning, whom I have spoken with on occasion.



It doesn't take much of a leap of imagination because most people don't have the first clue just what nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons are capable of.  I'm not even going to bother invoking deterrence, since obviously the whole assumption of total war rather invalidates anyone holding back, but even if all the densely populated areas on earth were targeted and struck using every nuclear weapon currently on earth the chances of humanity going extinct are virtually nill.

For starters the types of weapons dropped are generally not made ideal with a ground burst and even presuming that blast focused weapons were used by the majority of nations nuclear blasts are more destructive as air bursts.  Global, protracted nuclear winter is a fantasy constructed by doomsday fanatics and eco-sensitive extremists.  Even if all the blasts were ground bursts you still won't get decades of nuclear winter; you get heavy fallout inside of a 20-30 miles radius depending on prevailing winds of the blast site.  But heavy fallout doesn't necessitate disaster either.  After six months your ground activation and most of the fallout will have settled and been rendered inert enough that outside will not be immediately lethal (as in if you send somebody out to scout or scavenge and they only spend 20 minutes inside of a radiated zone they aren't coming back dead man walking).   After 2 years or so long distance travel will be available (fixing the electronics after the EMP pulse will take time, but will be doable by this point).  Underground shelters, coastal areas (prevailing winds blow inward from the ocean/sea), and most large-scale farmlands will be almost completely untouched (shelters are basically immune to anything short of a direct hit), coastal areas will ensure that fallout will be landing elsewhere (thus short of being in the blast zone this will be fine), and most farmlands are so far from anything even resembling a target that somewhere large swaths of farmland will still be usable.  If total war this is, then all the electronic information not hardened and shielded from EMP and radiation will be wiped out, but a dark age is _not_ the same as human extinction.  And killing humanity down below 50,000 people out of 6 billion is rather quite difficult when the above locations are all going to be relatively untouched.  It may very well set humanity back 1,000 years, but we won't be down for the count.


Bio-weapons are more doomsday whack-job mythology that has permeated the American (and I assume many other first world countries) consciousness on account of games and movies like Dawn of the Dead and Resident Evil.  The simple fact is that no natural born pathogen we are aware manages above a 50% kill ratio (HIV doesn't exactly count here, since as far as weaponization goes its about the opposite of what you want; you can't guarantee spread and it kills decades down the road).  Designer pathogens might manage 90%, but the simple fact is that human immune systems are varied and genetics are widely disparate (some people will simply lack the receptor sites that your pathogen uses to attack the human body).  A 90% lethality rate is certainly impressive and would set humanity back a hundred years or so while we rebuilt the world population, but 10% of 6 billion is 600 million at that is _well above_ the threshold for human survival.  The major problem with biological attack is that it is really only useful as a weapon of terror.  Military installations and personnel all have decon procedures and equipment which will prevent infection.  If you don't kill/neutralize a nations military with your pathogen, then a nuclear response is imminent.  The fact that you screwed over the whole world with your designer pathogen means that nuclear annihilation for your country is probably imminent.  Additionally, any biologicals with a useful rate of spread and vector of contamination will almost certainly come back and infect your own population.  Biologicals are the weapon of choice of the suicidal and the desperate (and even then your desperation is usually a sign of your imminent downfall, not the windfalls of victory).


And as far as chemical attacks are concerned consider if you will the necessity of chemical exposure.  You actually have to come into contact with the chemical in order to be affected.  Winds, humidity, rain, and human demographics all interfere with the effectiveness of chemical attacks.  Lets say that your chemical requires one gram of substance in order to be lethal to a human.  That's 6 billion humans.  So the best possible rate of destruction would require 6 billion grams of chemical.  But winds, humidity, and rain will disperse and decrease the effectiveness/saturation of your chemical and thus require you to use more.  Additionally with human populations spread out over large swaths of land you have to cover every bit of land with the lethal concentration in order to be sure.  In the final analysis you need probably 10,000 (or more) times that "ideal" amount in order to guarantee human annihilation.  And as I'm sure you are aware 60 billion kilograms of chemical is more than any agency or government on earth can produce let alone distribute in manner that would be effective.  But the major problem with chemical weapons is that they too are a weapon of terror, not military action.  Chemical weapons have greatly reduced effectiveness against modern militaries (there are still somewhat effective, but as I said greatly reduced) due to preventative measures and installation hardening.  Any kind of major chemical attack provokes far greater nuclear/conventional responses and those _will_ be effective against your military forces.



And as far as God is concerned: speculating on God's destroying humanity is an exercise in futility.  If it's going to happen, then nothing we can do will stop it.  Moreover if reality was supposed to be hostile to human existence, then why would a God create humans in the first place?  Spontaneous reality alteration to end humanity is not something we should even concern ourselves with because it makes no sense.  If we were to waste our time creating contingency measures for all the possible imaginary ways that our world could end or reality could change to make things hostile, then we would never be able to deal with all the every day problems that we encounter because all our resources are tied up in preventative measures again moon men, space slime, giant spaghetti monsters, extra-dimensional tentacles, spontaneous combustion, etc...

MTF


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## Interference (Mar 28, 2009)

Even so, nulcear war is baaad.


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## TheEndIsNigh (Mar 28, 2009)

> MTF:
> 
> And as far as God is concerned: speculating on God's destroying humanity is an exercise in futility. If it's going to happen, then nothing we can do will stop it. Moreover if reality was supposed to be hostile to human existence, then why would a God create humans in the first place? Spontaneous reality alteration to end humanity is not something we should even concern ourselves with because it makes no sense. If we were to waste our time creating contingency measures for all the possible imaginary ways that our world could end or reality could change to make things hostile, then we would never be able to deal with all the every day problems that we encounter because all our resources are tied up in preventative measures again moon men, space slime, giant spaghetti monsters, extra-dimensional tentacles, spontaneous combustion, etc...


 
On the contrary MTF there's plenty we can do about it. We could all fall to our knees and beg forgiveness and pray that he will not bring the flood the fire or the brimstone down on our heads. 

As for why would he :- did you never build sand castles and play with them only to smash them down at the end of the holiday.

Also, it's all very well suggesting that prevention measures against the giant trans-dimentional spaghetti monsters should be dropped but I for one would prefer to spend a few trillion dollars on this than find myself, during the short time we all have left, being probed by one of their tentacles.


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## matt-browne-sfw (Mar 31, 2009)

Supervolcanoes are often overlooked. I think homo sapiens would survive this, but lose all of its technology. The world could also end because of a virulent genetically engineered virus.


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## ManTimeForgot (Mar 31, 2009)

The only super volcano that seems like it is still functional is the one under yellowstone and its magma pocket is slowly being shifted under the rocky mountains.  The history of its effects has slowly gone down through time and that is because as more and more of it slides under the rockies, the less magma will actually reach the surface (and apparently the magma pocket is shrinking just a little bit each time).  Super Volcanos are overlooked because they are not a world ending disaster.


And no, a virulent genetically virus will not end all of humanity.  As I said before a small enough percentage of the population will be missing the receptor site, have a damaged one, or have an innate resistance to your disease.  Even if 99.9% of humanity were wiped out (no disease we are capable of making nor one in the near foreseeable future can obtain any where near this level of lethality) it _still_ would not take humanity below the roughly 50,000 person termination threshold for species survivability.  That is also _completely_ ignoring efforts to combat the disease and quarantine human beings away from its effects.

No, a disease could do a real number on human society (possibly starting a millennia long dark age), but it will not by itself end the human species.


Before anyone else posts here please go back and read my list of things that will not end humanity on the previous page.

MTF


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## Interference (Mar 31, 2009)

A giant space donkey called Geoff.  Don't ask me how I know -- I just _know_.


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## Ursa major (Mar 31, 2009)

Parson said:


> That must mean we end with a whimper and not a bang.


 


ManTimeForgot said:


> 1)Nuclear war. Nuclear war and subsequent winter may end the current incarnation of our world/country's culture, but will not end humanity.


 
Those were the days: when all we had to worry about was nuclear war and "Going out with a Bang, _then_ a Winter".



By the way, Interference, make an ass of yourself by all means, but leave the rest of us out of it.


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## TheEndIsNigh (Mar 31, 2009)

Oh no, not the giant space donkey again. 

I thought we had put that one to bed long ago.

Trust me I now this isn't the way cos I've got a stick and a carrot and I'm not afraid to use them.


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## Interference (Mar 31, 2009)

Sorry, did I say "A giant space donkey"?  I meant _monkey_ of course.


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## TheEndIsNigh (Mar 31, 2009)

Ah, If you'd read my thread on the size of books you would know that all monkeys work for me. Though they are fast becoming an autonomous enterprise now, what with the elixir of life, together with the world poverty and peace program. 

They are doing well though I can't seem to find a publisher for their complete works of Shakeapointystick which they rattled of in a couple of months. I suspect the problem is that it's so close to the original that the printers don't see why anyone would buy it.

Still a giant monkey is bound to be up for a little foreigner helping the cause - we have plenty pf plantains.


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## ManTimeForgot (Apr 1, 2009)

Everyone knows that random terrorist activities of Space Cows are the bane of civilized existence throughout our galaxy.  I can't count the number of people killed at random by Space Cows in just 6 months.  Sudden meteoric re-entry and the only warning you receive is a soft resonating "_mooooooooooooooo_" before you die irrevocably by an emplosion (implosion explosion at the same time).

MTF


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## TheEndIsNigh (Apr 1, 2009)

I have heard tell of the space cow problem.

I hadn't realised they induced irrevocable death mind.

Crikey, that must be terrible compared your average stop breathing, heart stops pumping, brain ceases to function, get him in the ground standard death.


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## Interference (Apr 1, 2009)

The space cow was a myth, or so I thought.  Though there are records of a giant whale appearing out of the sky and causing a fifty-seven mile diameter crater, the only verifiable space cow incident I'm aware of involved Britney Spears and a wardrobe disaster.  No British tourists were involved.

Still, new data is always coming in ...


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## Ursa major (Apr 2, 2009)

Space Cows used to be a lot safer: in times past they had a better audible warning than the moo: they had horns. But then some bright spark had to know what the space cows felt about this issue, and rather than ask them all in a vote (which would have cost too much, given the distances involved), he polled them, with the inevitable result.


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## TheEndIsNigh (Apr 2, 2009)

Yep, and there's nothing makes a space cow more angry than a good polling.

IT reminds them too much of all those spit roasts their ancesters had to suffer at the hands of the space cowpokes


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## Ursa major (Apr 2, 2009)

They had a good beef about that, if I recall....


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## Parson (Apr 2, 2009)

Groan! Groan! Groan! -- The Parson attempts to laugh and can only Groan!


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## Team 2012 (Apr 8, 2009)

We have some pretty involved and specific ideas about the end of the world, actually.

The bad news is, you have to read the RSS-fed novel until December to get the gist of it.

Actually, though, that's the good news.

Eschathons can be fun if handled with good taste.

mayancalendergirls.com    The blog-based, drive-by, serial RSS novel.


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## Grimward (Apr 9, 2009)

Nah! I expect Harry Turtledove will chronicle the end to occur, retroactive to the signing of the Treaty of Appomattox, where Lee surrendered the Army of Northern Virginia to Grant and the Army of the Potomac. Nice, Revelation-like possibilities there, as today (April 9 here in the States, for you Chronners in other, far-flung time zones) is the 144th Anniversary of that treaty....

A little bit of history, a little bit of Biblical AND SciFi Literature, and a lot of far-fetched speculation; truly, I am a full-service Grimward!


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## bloggeratf (May 7, 2009)

End of our planet = solar flare... duh.

End of humanity option A: We make it to the stars and survive for a very long time.

End of humanity option B: We never make it off earth and run out of stuff/destroy the ecosystem/revert to barbarism and survival of the fittest.


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## ManTimeForgot (May 11, 2009)

Our planet will either be ripped apart, consumed by the black hole at the center of some galaxy before it is crunched into the center of a collapsing universe, or decayed to pieces as its existence fails after a number of years that it takes scientific notation to properly express.


Our society will end after either great catastrophe or after we change it into something else so different as to be fundamentally incompatible with what we were before.

MTF


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## Porridge Beast (May 11, 2009)

I'll eat you all. No questions asked.


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## laestadius (May 15, 2009)

The death of humanity will either come about through self destruction or a plague (hopefully the swine flu thing wont mutate into something deadly, it more than likely wont but it's still a chance). I'm going to try and get myself a mountain retreat before that happens. Read up on anything by Ragnar Benson.

I see some people here talking about astronomical mishaps with the sun, asteroids, or gamma-rays, but we'll kill ourselves long before anything like that happens. Even if we don't nuke ourselves or die of a plague there will be over-population and mass-starvation to worry about. The global population is growing exponentially. It's shot up what, 1 billion, 2 billion in just the past 100 years?


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## dustinzgirl (May 15, 2009)

laestadius said:


> I see some people here talking about astronomical mishaps with the sun, asteroids, or gamma-rays, but we'll kill ourselves long before anything like that happens. Even if we don't nuke ourselves or die of a plague there will be over-population and mass-starvation to worry about. The global population is growing exponentially. It's shot up what, 1 billion, 2 billion in just the past 100 years?



Don't be so sure about that. In 2030 there's an asteroid coming around that may hit us.


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## laestadius (May 15, 2009)

dustinzgirl said:


> Don't be so sure about that. In 2030 there's an asteroid coming around that may hit us.



We may kill ourselves by then, but you're right there is a chance.


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## ManTimeForgot (May 15, 2009)

Laestadius:  I'm sorry but you really don't know what you are talking about.  Over-population is not something that can kill off humanity entirely (you get a malthusian correction at some point, and we go back to a sustainable number of people).  The so-called "world hunger" issue nor plague is capable of ending humanity entirely either.  I suggest going back a few pages and reading the list of things I posted that will _not_ do humanity in.  They might alter society in such a way as to be completely unrecognizable to us currently, but humanity will go on.

And humanity won't die off by 2030 either.  Not by a long shot.  And that asteroid is going to come close, but if it looks like it is going to be too close all we need to do is several years before hand push it 2cm with a nuke and suddenly it misses us by thousands of miles by the time that the event would have taken place.


A gamma ray burst would do it, but there really aren't any stellar candidates within 50 light years that are large enough to do it, and there aren't any nova candidates within 5-10 light years that are large enough to do us in either.  So natural stellar events aren't really an issue either.  (An artificial stellar event could still do it; if ET gets pissed at us and teleports a white dwarf into the center of our sun, then we are totally screwed).


So on the list of events I posted before of the astronomical variety stars aren't really on the list, but an extra-solar object of the meteoric variety or brown dwarf caliber would certainly do us in given the correct trajectory and velocity.

MTF


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## laestadius (May 15, 2009)

ManTimeForgot said:


> Laestadius:  I'm sorry but you really don't know what you are talking about.  Over-population is not something that can kill off humanity entirely (you get a malthusian correction at some point, and we go back to a sustainable number of people).  The so-called "world hunger" issue nor plague is capable of ending humanity entirely either.  I suggest going back a few pages and reading the list of things I posted that will _not_ do humanity in.  They might alter society in such a way as to be completely unrecognizable to us currently, but humanity will go on.



It wont destroy humanity by itself, it would make the world uninhabitable which would eventually kill us off. We're already eating up our natural resources at an incredibly unhealthy rate. And I am well aware of our astronomical surroundings, I simply said we would be dead long before anything like that could happen.

As anybody even touched on global warming yet? When do they expect that to be irreversible?


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## Hedge (May 15, 2009)

Sorry to be pesemistic but the world will probably end with a great deal of suffering if the world as we know it today is anything to go by.


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## Urien (May 15, 2009)

Hi Hedge,

Depends what you mean by suffering, and of course relative to what. Three hundred years ago the entire world lived under what we might today term 3rd world conditions. Lives were hard and on average short, infant mortality was very high, many would have carried around the lingering effects of disease.

Today that kind of suffering still exists, but it is no longer universal. Most people in many countries (principally OECD nations and similar) do not suffer as their ancestors would have done. 

Hopefully we can eventually extend the living conditions of say Singapore and France to the whole world. But the situation today is probably the best the world has ever seen.

Hence if trends continue then suffering will continue to decrease.

I think it's easy to forget that the past was generally a worse place to live.


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## Hilarious Joke (May 16, 2009)

Nice post, Urien.


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## ManTimeForgot (May 16, 2009)

laestadius said:


> It wont destroy humanity by itself, it would make the world uninhabitable which would eventually kill us off. We're already eating up our natural resources at an incredibly unhealthy rate. And I am well aware of our astronomical surroundings, I simply said we would be dead long before anything like that could happen.
> 
> As anybody even touched on global warming yet? When do they expect that to be irreversible?



You should probably have read the list I suggested because you are simply rehashing arguments that have already been quashed.

No because those that survive will be genetically quite resilient to whatever plague there is and will pass on those genetics.  There are people who will lack receptor sites, have damaged ones, possess altered receptor sites, etc and those people will survive.  We do not possess anywhere near the necessary know-how to be able to create a bug capable of rendering earth uninhabitable to anything, let alone humanity that possesses cunning and science with which it will defend itself.  We can't manage a 90% lethality rate yet, and it takes far more than that to be able to push humanity to the edge of extinction.  That's _completely_ ignoring humanity's inevitable response to be pushing to the edge.


No one has really touched on global warming because I nipped that in the bud quite a while back.  Climate change is inevitable.  Global warming is not.  Even if the globe is warming (which is under serious contention), runaway global warming is complete bunk according to the standards of our best science.  Irreversible doomsday is a complete myth.

*But* even if it were true the rate of change is so slow that humanity could and would respond with some sort of drastic measure in order to avoid extinction.  Such a response might usher in a dark age and/or kill billions, but it suffice it to say it will work.  So global warming is NOT going to end humanity.

MTF


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## WJoseph (May 19, 2009)

I still believe we are our own worst enemy. I think it will be weaponry, but not nukes. It will be from a satellite weapon system that was originally meant to defend against airborne nukes, but for which an offensive option has been developed. Once that power evolves completely, and can be administered from satelittes, we are in big trouble. All it takes is the greed, power-madness and delusions of the right handful of people, and we are doomed. 

Sorry for the shameless self-promotion (well, I am a little ashamed), but that is the basis of the apocalypse in my first novel, A World Without Divide (www.awwd.us.com). It is just a matter of time before that type of weaponry is unveiled (I am sure it has been in the works for years, even before the USA Star Wars Program became known).


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## Interference (May 19, 2009)

If we accept the OP's premise that all human life will one day cease to infest the Earth, then let's hypothesise on how that might come about for a minute or two.

Complete extinction of a species may occur as a result of genetic disorder, possibly provoked by viral or other infection.

It might also result from mutual annihilation by use of some terrible weapon we can't imagine yet.

Alien invasion and subsequent genocide might do the trick.

Terrible, pervasive mutation (like zombies or vampirism) would render recognisable human existence a mere memory for any creature, earthbound or otherwise, who cared to recall us.

Eventually, humanity will cease to exist, even if we colonise other worlds, because essentially the Universe is all about change.


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## Nesacat (May 19, 2009)

I'd like to think it may be like this, although it's not at all scientific ...

Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I've tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.

Robert Frost


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## Hedge (May 20, 2009)

Urien said:


> Hi Hedge,
> 
> Depends what you mean by suffering, and of course relative to what. Three hundred years ago the entire world lived under what we might today term 3rd world conditions. Lives were hard and on average short, infant mortality was very high, many would have carried around the lingering effects of disease.
> 
> ...


 
Hi Urien,
 You are right the world has come a long way in 3 hundred years with advancement in medicine and knowledge of suffering around the globe.
Good people are making a difference to a great deal of lives out there,
but there is a lot of greed in the world as we know it today which prolongs
the suffering for many people in many parts of the world.


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## AE35Unit (May 20, 2009)

How will the world end? Badly and at our hands!


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## Hedge (May 20, 2009)

AE35Unit said:


> How will the world end? Badly and at our hands!


 
Totally agree AE35Unit we (here and now) are gaurdian,s of this planet.It will end badly,but not maybe in our hands. We will transfer our guilt to the next generation.


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## chrispenycate (May 20, 2009)

> You are right the world has come a long way in 3 hundred years with advancement in medicine and knowledge of suffering around the globe.
> Good people are making a difference to a great deal of lives out there,
> but there is a lot of greed in the world as we know it today which prolongs
> the suffering for many people in many parts of the world.



The trouble is, it is frequently the best intentions that do the most damage. The biggest problem at the present is an ever-growing excess of human beings, and that is due to not enough babies dying.

Don't look at me like that – of course I'm not in favour of children dying. I don't like governments interfering in people's private lives, either. But those selfless medical specialists reduced infant mortality too fast for social values to keep up. Politicians got scared of population ageing, religions worried there might not be enough new souls to be saved, and wives go on getting pregnant at the same rate as when only one of three children survived it's first year. There is a lot more food produced now, but as many people starving to death as a couple of centuries ago. And even in the rich countries maintain the misery far longer than absolutely necessary, driven by a morality that requires re-examining in light of technological advances (not "rejecting and being replaced", note; just given a careful analysis.


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