Can the human race survive the next 100 years?

Once they saw what a mess we've made of the prison planet, why should they care? ...mamby-pamby, liberal doo-gooders or not.

If you don't know what a "mamby-pamby, liberal doo-gooder" is, then it's best that you never find out.

Baron Max

 

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Oh, I know what they are. Maybe it is a social comment that they weren't in the spell check dictionary. They are now 'cause I added them.

QW

 

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I don't disagree with this, but barring any "need" to flee (and I agree we have the technology now, but not the desire), the reality is, few species, if any, would chose to build such a ship until it became not just technologically capable, but outright easy (in relative terms). There will--hopefully--be a day when we do the same (and I don't buy into the antagonistic alien shtick) when we'll just prance about out of curiosity. Again, any species capable of undertaking the same, wouldn't need to eliminate entire worlds just to "restock" the ship. They'd come around out of curiosity more than anything, so on this we agree, but I just don't think that they (or us for that matter) will resemble their earlier intelligent ancestors. The technology is just too tempting and the "abilities" and "tools" gained through such changes are too wild to ignore.

~String

 

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What about radical environmentalists? I've seen more than one person on this very board postulate that the earth would be better off without the human race. Put that feeling together with a knowledge of genetic engineering and/or virology and it could spell big trouble. The movie 12 Monkeys portrayed a future in which 99% of the human race had been wiped out by just such an idiot.

That's one possiblity. Another is, as Fraggle suggested, that the generation ship was launched at a time when the species was not that much more advanced than us. And, in subsequent years, hasn't advanced much more owing to the small population aboard the ship.

Another possibility is that, for whatever reason, the aliens (or some subset of them, like the Amish) prefer their original form. Maybe they like fucking. Maybe it's religious. Consider this: If you, personally, were given the choice of living forever in your body maintained at its peak via nanotechnology; or as a disembodied spirit: What would you choose? I'd stay with the body. I like eating and fucking and breathing and, well, living.

 

Of course we do. We are only human after all. However, is that disembodied spirit option actually available, ... just asking

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. At some point the joy of sex and eating and all becomes diminished.

 

Oh, my god! Absolutely not! The Earth would definitely be better without humans, but I damned sure don't want to send the same fucked up plaque out into space to fuck up the whole universe!

Geez, Fraggle, would you send a pestilence out into space? That's what man is on Earth ....a destructive pest!

Baron Max

 

The ties that bind?

The strange and tenuous connections of life: You echo a sentiment that has been diversely expressed by such a range as Dr. Leonard Jeffries and Frank & Ernest.

 

I have no idea what you've just said because I don't know Dr. Jeffries or Fank and Ernest.

However, know you, I'm going to assume that it's some kind of personal insult directed toward me.

So, I ask you, Tiassa, .....Do you think man has been good for the planet Earth?

Baron Max

 

I've never seen that in the newspaper in my whole life. However, I did see a little "cartoon" booklet like that once at a bookstore.

H. L. Mencken??? Nope, never heard of him either.

No, I don't live in Latvia. But I do live in a cave in Texas.

Baron Max

 

Who cares? The earth isn't a sentient being, it doesn't care what we do. Whether the dominent species is dinosaurs, humans, or sea turtles; the earth will just keep spinning around the sun.

And I, for one, would love to see humanity spread around the universe. Raising hell where ever we go. Doing things both great and mundane, but happy most of the time either way.

 

Not surprising

Frank & Ernest, as Fraggle noted, is a widely-distributed daily comic strip. I recall in my childhood a frame that depicted the Earth talking to Saturn, discussing the former's bad case of people.

Dr. Leonard Jeffries is a controversial scholar with whom you're probably more familiar than you realize. Ever hear the argument that a black man can't be racist? While it make sense in a certain context, and at a certain point in American history, the idea was never really sold on those terms. At any rate, Jeffries is one of the proponents of that idea. I'm not sure it originates with him, but he's certainly gained some notoriety by the statement.

It may even have come into play when he successfully sued his employer, City University of New York, after they fired him once upon a time for making some mind-boggling statements. Among those was that the space shuttle Challenger disaster should be hailed as a good thing, since it stopped white people from spreading their filth across the Universe.

The idea that humanity does not deserve to continue in its endeavors is fairly widespread, and even found itself at the center of a second-generation Twilight Zone episode ("A Small Talent for War", 1986) when the UN scrambles to prove humanity's worth to its alien creators, only to find out too late that peace and civilization were not our task. Damn UN, always getting humanity wiped out.

And there is even a religion that believes peace and justice won't come until the end of the world, when only a fragment of humanity—the deserving, as such—are transformed into something greater than humanity; in other words, the capacity for genuine justice is not within human capability, hence we need divine intervention to save us from our inherent corruption.

Sure, Max. If you say so.

Depends on what you mean. From a human perspective, no. From the perspective, as such, of nature and the Universe? There is no good or bad about it. If we actually cause the planet to explode, for instance, it's just nature doing what nature does.

 

The next 100 Years

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The life continius the next 100 years, no problem.

 

No, I live next to Los Alamos... we are going to be toast soon.. so borrow as much money as you can and spend the hell out of it

 

nuclear war: 50% probability
Global Warming : 15 %
Racism: 5%
Over Population: 30%
Natural Disaster: 30%
Medical Epidemic: 5%
Possible Alien Attack: 0 % (IMPOSSIBLE)

the Human´s living for the next 100 years o more.
"Don´t worry be HappY"

 

Probability these figures are accurate (+/-10%): 7%

 

peak oil and other disappearing energy resources weren't mentioned, although they will play (well, their lack of) a huge part in the next 100 years.

This is kind of faulty logic. It is like saying this dam what we have a house below looks safe enough even though it has a few cracks in it (nuclear proliferation). But it has been holding back a huge water reservoir for 60 years, so statistically we are safe.

If a worldwide (not localized) nuclear war breaks out (let's say for the disappearing resources) it will have the same effect as a dam breaking. It doesn't matter that nukes caused very few deaths in 6 decades they could whipe out a large % of humankind....

 

Well, no problemo if your relatives are part of the surviving 100 million...

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