Top 10 Ways Human Civilization Could End
Specifically, this came about because of Eyjafjallajokull (which is, incidentally, my middle name). I started to think about volcanoes - big ones. Ones that make Eyjafjallajokull look like a pimple on the face of a 13yr old girl. Volcanoes like the Lake Toba eruption which likely lead to the emergence of modern man. And then I though - gee - what else could do this... and here we are.
Most of these will not end life on earth. Life on earth is a hell of a lot hardier than the dominant species. So even if mankind goes the way of the Whatthefuckasaurus, life will probably stick around. Turns out that crows are nearly as intelligent as humans (more on that later) - so I am betting on them to take over after we are gone.
-They decided to adopt some of our human sports
The chances of each of these happening is very very small. But together, the chance of human civilization ending is... still basically 0% if you were paying attention to all that significant digit crap, man I always hated that.
So, starting off:
10) Astrophysics decides to kill us
Astrophysics is a decidedly nasty field of science. We dont really know how a lot of it works, but we know a lot of it could kill us. In this case - I am talking about two possibilities: 1) that the laws of science do something funky and we all end up dead, or 2) Humans do something funky to figure out the laws of science, and we all end up dead.
In the first category, there is about a 1% chance, that Mercury's orbit could be made unstable by Jupiter, sometime during the lifespan of the sun. Simulations suggest a collision with Earth as one of four possible outcomes (the others being colliding with the Sun, colliding with Venus, or being ejected from the solar system altogether). If this were to happen, all life on earth would obliterated. Seriously, all of it, even the crows.
There is also the possibility of a Vacuum metastability event. Which means this: "The possibility that we are living in a false vacuum has been considered. If a bubble of lower energy vacuum were nucleated, it would approach at nearly the speed of light and destroy the Earth instantaneously, without any forewarning." There are actually a lot of variations on this one, all based around the idea of that we are not living in a four dimensional world, but rather something a lot more exotic, and exciting. As we all know, "exotic and exciting" can also leave you broke and nursing a hangover from too many sugary drinks, or in this case lead to the collapse of the universe. One of the ways this could happen is if the fine people building particle accelerators do something to puncture this quite nice vacuum/brine/hologram/fisher price view master we are all living in.
Other options in this category include, but are not limited to:
- Our galaxy or solar system getting too close to a black hole and deciding that it was just going to dip its toe in, just to see what it feels like, only then realizing seconds too late it is caught in a multi-million year agonizing inescapable spiral of death
- Radiation: "A gamma ray burst or other devastating blast of cosmic radiation. One especially deadly hypothesized source is a hypernova, produced when a hypergiant star explodes and then collapses, sending vast amounts of radiation sweeping across hundreds or even thousands of lightyears of space. Hypernovas have never been observed; however, a hypernova may have been the cause of the Ordovician-Silurian extinction events. The nearest hypergiant is thought to be Eta Carinae, approximately 8,000 light-years distant." In other words, the Earth has probably been inter-stellar microwaved before, and it could be again.
- A drastic and unusual decrease or increase in Sun's power output; alternately a solar superstorm leading to partial/complete electrical/technological death of human civilization. Too much = bad. Too little = bad. The human race is pretty much Goldilocks.
- Abrupt geomagnetic reversal and/or drastic decrease of magnetic field of the planet Earth. Consequences can be the same as in the cases of cosmic radiation or solar radiation blasts. Why that is, I have no damn idea. But supposedly this could wipe us out, rather than just make it a nuisance to navigate by a compass.. "Goddamn it, we hit Antarctica again."
- The solar system passing through a cosmic dust cloud, leading to a severe global climate change. Sort of like biblical blocking out the sun, just less pro-Jewish.
9)An exceptionally devastating hypercane (hypercane is to hurricane as Chuck Norris is to Joe Lieberman) probably combined with global dust storm, taking up to the atmosphere enormous quantities of dust. This leads to the same doom and gloom the dinos went through. Waking up each morning and finding out that not only do you have just the crumbs left in the bottom of the box of Rasin Bran, but also that the Earth is getting about 50% less sunlight than it needs to survive. In this scenario it is essentially guaranteed that crows take over the earth.
8) Severe climate change, due to pretty much anything. Solar shifts, changing ocean currents, humanity destroying what it touches, etc etc. Generally, this could lead to all sorts of bad things which I recommend you ask your local hippie about (they can be frequently found at thrift stores, Whole Foods, and community organized events. They can also been seen driving small, older yet reliable and generally fuel efficient cars. Avoid people in Priuses - this means they have lots of money, large houses, and believe being green means great looking bamboo floors shipped from China).
7)A cybernetic revolt. Think iRobot, then take away Will Smith. Or Terminator, but take away the Connors, and Arnold after he turns to the good side. Its like that. Or basically - in the long run it is the Matrix, which turned into the worst sequels of all time because in the end, the fucking robots basically win. WTF. But yeah...
In the not too distant future we will reach the singularity, and will create a computer which is more intelligent than man. Though really - I think this has a fair way to go, it is still a distinct possibility. Assuming we then give that computer, or network, access to and control over sufficient resources in order to take us on - for "our own good" or otherwise - human society then gets taken over by our creation. Caveat Deum.
6) Polarity shift
An abrupt repositioning of Earth rotation axis. It could be caused by extremely powerful internal geological or/and external cosmic factors. If it happens abruptly (and not slowly within a very prolongated interval of time) it will generate enormous multiple earthquakes, multiple volcano eruptions, a hypercane or multiple megacyclones, giant tidal waves and megatsunamis all around the globe. In other words - giant surfboard city ships at the ready, this one is going to be fun .
5) Armageddon. As in the movie. But without space cowboys and a lot more like the BP rig fail that is actually going on right now. From wikipedia: "An impact event causing a collision (or extremely close passage) of a large meteorite, asteroid or comet. A common theory postulates that the extinction of the dinosaurs occurred approximately 65 million years ago as a result of the Cretaceous-Tertiary extinction event when a large asteroid struck the earth, producing atmospheric dust which blocked solar energy and caused a significant lowering of temperatures worldwide("nuclear winter"). Evidence for this theory includes a sedimentary layer of iridium in the geological record and a large crater in the area of Chicxulub, Mexico. The Tunguska event (1908) was on a much smaller scale. In the case of a close passage of an object(a large asteroid, comet or planet) with a significant gravitational impact on Earth, the consequences could be the same as in the case of an abrupt repositioning of Earth rotation axis. And such a repositioning of the axis would not necessarily have to take place for the earth to see the same global effects."
Long story short - it does not even need to hit us in order to completely destroy human society.
4) Supervolcanoes
A "supervolcano" refers to any volcano capable of throwing out at least 300 cubic kilometres of magma during an eruption, sort of like Long Island getting blown up. At least one of these beasts explodes every 100,000 years or so, the geological record suggests.... and... the last one blew up 74,000 years ago... hmmmm... aww crap. That was the Toba eruption, which pretty much lead to the development of man as we know it - because it greatly reduced the amount of light available etc, the theory is that man had to work together as a social animal to survive, and do think like talk to each other.
A medium-sized super-eruption, releasing 1000 cubic kilometres of magma, would wreak the same devastation as a 1-kilometre-wide asteroid smashing into the Earth. The bad news is that such a super-eruption is five to 10 times more likely than an asteroid strike, according to a 2005 report by the Geological Society of London.
Previous super-eruptions have been linked to mass extinction events, such as the Permian mass extinction 250 million years ago, which wiped out more than 90 per cent of marine species and was associated with an eruption at the Siberian Traps. The eruption of the Deccan Traps in India, together with a meteorite impact, might even have finished off the dinosaurs.
There is no doubt that Earth will experience more super-eruptions. "It is not a question of 'if' - it is a question of 'when'," says Bill McGuire, director of the Aon Benfield Hazard Research Centre at University College London.
Possible contenders for the next eruption include Yellowstone volcano in Wyoming, the Phlegrean fields volcano west of Naples, Italy, and Lake Taupo in New Zealand. However, there are many other areas where a supervolcano could one day pop up, including Indonesia, the Philippines, several Central American countries, Japan, the Kamchatka peninsula in eastern Russia, and even Europe (the area around Kos and Nisyros in the Aegean Sea might be a supervolcano).
As the recent research into the impact of the Toba eruption reveals, super-eruptions may not necessarily be as catastrophic as we fear. That said, a super-eruption would almost certainly devastate our civilisation. Unlike the humans living when Toba erupted, we depend on globalised trade and food production, with much reliance on air travel and space-borne communications, all of which would be severely knocked by a super-eruption.
Using similar considerations as they did for the Toba model, Hans Graf and his team at the University of Cambridge predict a Yellowstone super-eruption would cause the global temperature to drop by at least 1 °C. Several centimetres of ash would blanket all of North America. Oceans would become even more acidified and plant growth across the globe would be disrupted for several years.
The Geological Society of London's working group went one step further in 2005 when they described the impact of a generic super-eruption. "An area the size of North America or Europe could be devastated, and pronounced deterioration of global climate would be expected for a few years following the eruption. Such events could result in the ruin of world agriculture, severe disruption of food supplies, and mass starvation. The effects could be sufficiently severe to threaten the fabric of civilisation," they conclude.
So yeah - we dont want that to happen. The good news is that it would probably not wipe out all of human civilization. So, even though it is pretty likely, mankind would stick around, leaving this at number four on my list.
3) Ecology
An ecological disaster, such as world crop failure and collapse of ecosystem services, could be induced by the present trends of overpopulation, economic development, and non-sustainable agriculture. Most of these scenarios involve one or more of the following: Holocene extinction event, scarcity of water that could lead to approximately one half of the Earth's population being without safe drinking water, pollinator decline, overfishing, massive deforestation, desertification, climate change, or massive water pollution episodes.
A very recent threat in this direction is colony collapse disorder, a phenomenon that might foreshadow the imminent extinction of the Western honeybee. As the bee plays a vital role in pollination, its extinction would severely disrupt the food chain. Not to mention would be a cryin' shame, because honey is so damn delicious. But seriously, in China there are regions where they hand-pollinate fruit trees, so this specific threat is bad, but no the end of the world. On the other hand, I am a pretty firm believer that we are royally screwing up Earth's ecology, and give us a few hundred more years on the same course (before we learn to be completely sustainable) and the devastation could come back to bite us in the ass.
2) Pandemic
A less predictable scenario is a global pandemic. For example, if HIV were to mutate and become as transmissible as the common cold, the consequences would be disastrous. As in we all die disastrous. Either that - or we all become Mormon, which is pretty much just as bad.
It has been hypothesised that such an extremely virulent pathogen might not evolve, because, well, it is extremely virulent. A pathogen that quickly kills its hosts might not have enough time to spread to new ones, while one that kills its hosts more slowly or not at all will allow carriers more time to spread the infection, and thus likely out-compete a more lethal species or strain. We hope. This simple model predicts that if virulence and transmission are not linked in any way, pathogens will evolve towards low virulence and rapid transmission. However, this assumption is not always valid and in more complex models, where the level of virulence and the rate of transmission are related, high levels of virulence can evolve. The level of virulence that is possible is instead limited by the existence of complex populations of hosts, with different susceptibilities to infection, or by some hosts being geographically-isolated. The size of the host population and competition between different strains of pathogens can also alter virulence. Interestingly, a pathogen that only infects humans as a secondary host and usually infects another species (a zoonosis) may have little constraint on its virulence in people, since infection here is an accidental event and its evolution is driven by events in another species.
In other words, the most likely way we are going to all die from a pathogen is when it is transmitted by a species other than us. Prime contenders? Mosquitoes, rats, and of course, crows.
1) Nuclear war
We have enough nuclear fissile material to end human live as we know it many times over. But we don't even need that much. An air-burst nuke set up to be an EMP (electromagnetic pulse) would destroy everything electronic... which would have pretty much the same effect. Option three is wrapping a nuke in cobalt to make a so called "salted" nuclear device, which creates a giant radiation cloud. Granted it would take 530 tons of cobalt and an equivalent size thermonuclear device to wipe out life on earth, but even a 2 ton bomb could render an entire region (US East Coast, Beirut etc) uninhabitable. The Israelis have supposedly designed and built just such a bomb.
Of course, in my mind the reason this is number one is because all it relies on is humans wanting to do it. All the other possibilities are either unintended consequences or events unrelated to mankind in any way. Nuclear winter could be caused by Putin getting road-rage over where the Chinese embassy decided to park their limo.
The upshot is that I think it is unlikely to completely wipe out human civilization. The downside is that I think it is pretty damn likely that nuclear devices will again be used in anger or conflict in the future.
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