The biggest threat to humanity.
Poll: The biggest threat to humanity.
Total Members Polled: 459
Discussion
We’re constantly being bombarded by possible existential threats to humanity in tv film and the news.
Do we just like to have something to worry about and the media are entertaining us with disaster stories for mind control, tax, getting viewers, whatever?
When I was little it was nuclear war with films like threads and when the wind blows to scare us, then there was AIDS, later we had a spate of films suggesting it would be asteroids or volcanoes blocking light and then there was pandemic viruses like chicken flu. Now we’re into weather and the environment and population disasters.
Before that we had things like the Cuban missile crisis and maybe things like the devil or sin or falling off the end of the earth or the sky falling on our heads.
What do posters think is actually the biggest risk to humanity?
Do we just like to have something to worry about and the media are entertaining us with disaster stories for mind control, tax, getting viewers, whatever?
When I was little it was nuclear war with films like threads and when the wind blows to scare us, then there was AIDS, later we had a spate of films suggesting it would be asteroids or volcanoes blocking light and then there was pandemic viruses like chicken flu. Now we’re into weather and the environment and population disasters.
Before that we had things like the Cuban missile crisis and maybe things like the devil or sin or falling off the end of the earth or the sky falling on our heads.
What do posters think is actually the biggest risk to humanity?
I don't think there is a risk to humanity as a whole. Human beings will probably continue to survive for many many thousands of years to come. I think we're at the very beginnings of civilsation.
We all like to think we're important somehow but we're just a speck on the surface of the planet.
We all like to think we're important somehow but we're just a speck on the surface of the planet.
Many of those are not a threat per se, but could lead to a series of events which would lead to a threat. Overpopulation in itself is not a huge problem, but overpopulation will lead to greater competition for resources, armed conflict and eventually nuclear war, which should then sort out the issue of overpopulation.
Also do you mean threat to our current ways of life and western decadence, or threat as in every last one of us wiped out and humanity gone forever? Even the most pessimistic of scenarios are unlikely to result in a zero percent chance of survival for humanity as a whole.
I voted nuclear war BTW, as it is essentially inevitable.
Also do you mean threat to our current ways of life and western decadence, or threat as in every last one of us wiped out and humanity gone forever? Even the most pessimistic of scenarios are unlikely to result in a zero percent chance of survival for humanity as a whole.
I voted nuclear war BTW, as it is essentially inevitable.
JPJPJP said:
I think a disease of some sort could thin out our numbers very significantly - it wouldn't surprise me if 30% of the population was quickly lost to a disease of some sort at some point in the next 100 years, but I think humans as a species will be here for a while yet.
A temporary fix at best. What happens after that disease is that birth rates skyrocket and we're back at square one before a generation has passed. Birth rates tend to go up when more resources are available and after a natural disaster, a disease that wipes out 30% of humanity ticks both boxes.
As was eloquently put in the 2nd post, the problem is
Monkeylegend said:
Human beings.
Henners said:
Humans.
Humans in general for short term ruining of the world.
Humans with a religious bent for the general grind of war / intolerance / dithering etc.
Right, but how will humans cause human extinction? What will humans do or what event might result from our behaviour that might lead to our demise?Humans in general for short term ruining of the world.
Humans with a religious bent for the general grind of war / intolerance / dithering etc.
El stovey said:
What do posters think is actually the biggest risk to humanity?
I think you need to qualify whether the risk is catastrophic or existential i.e. a catastrophic event that would see the human population and civilisation significantly reduced vs one that would completely wipe out the human species.In human history we experienced - to a greater or lesser degree - all of your options apart from Aliens and Armageddon, and whilst some of them have proved catastrophic - the Black Death for example - none so far have proved to be existential to humanity.
We do, however, have evidence that meteor impacts wiped out whole classes of species in the past, and hence there is a precedent (and strictly speaking the impactor need not be an asteroid - you'd be hard pressed to tell the difference if a large enough comet hit you, and comets tend to have a higher relative velocity than asteroids).
So I'd go for a planetary impact being the thing that would most likely finish humanity as a whole.
LimaDelta said:
Many of those are not a threat per se, but could lead to a series of events which would lead to a threat. Overpopulation in itself is not a huge problem, but overpopulation will lead to greater competition for resources, armed conflict and eventually nuclear war, which should then sort out the issue of overpopulation.
Also do you mean threat to our current ways of life and western decadence, or threat as in every last one of us wiped out and humanity gone forever? Even the most pessimistic of scenarios are unlikely to result in a zero percent chance of survival for humanity as a whole.
I voted nuclear war BTW, as it is essentially inevitable.
I agreed with you, right up until your vote. An asteroid strike is inevitable, it's just a mater of when. Global nuclear war leading to extinction is not. Tech is unlikely to save us from the asteroid strike, unless the political will builds to create an absolute solution in advance of any threat becoming critical. And I don't see that happening.Also do you mean threat to our current ways of life and western decadence, or threat as in every last one of us wiped out and humanity gone forever? Even the most pessimistic of scenarios are unlikely to result in a zero percent chance of survival for humanity as a whole.
I voted nuclear war BTW, as it is essentially inevitable.
Poof. Asteroid will get us.
eharding said:
In human history we experienced - to a greater or lesser degree - all of your options apart from Aliens and Armageddon, and whilst some of them have proved catastrophic - the Black Death for example - none so far have proved to be existential to humanity.
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Pandemics though might be worse due to travel or terrorist boffins engineering something nasty or getting hold of something engineered? .
Asteroids might be larger or would one that killed the dinosaurs be enough to do us all in?
Nuclear war would be much worse than any previous conflict.
Robots and artificial intelligence is only starting. Perhaps because of how many PHers work in IT they know how ropey their code is and aren’t worried or are more worried about terminator like scenarios?
Population rising is constantly on going. Might it eventually result in a lack of biodiversity and famine or war or something else that could end humanity or by then will humanity have gone to another planet to start there?
Once we’ve left the planet the chances of survival as a species are obviously improved.
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