(October 10, 2019 at 7:21 pm)Macoleco Wrote:(October 10, 2019 at 9:26 am)Mister Agenda Wrote: I think the odds are against us, but there's some hope. I would certainly love to have a way to see how it all turns out.Why do you think there is hope?
There's always hope, Macoleco. If we're still around in a million years, we won't be the same species, but at least we'll still have surviving descendants. Our record has been muddling through the middle between best and worst case scenarios. We're going to have to weather some very tough times due to climate change (aware of pun but it's not the point) that we have failed to take sufficient action on in time, but it's not an extinction event for humans, nor will it end scientific and technological progress, and that could kill us all off, or it could save us. Hundreds of millions, even billions of us could die and our species would still be going strong.
The main source of resistance to climate change action is cost, and as it gets worse, we'll have no choice but to start paying those costs. It will be way more expensive than if we had acted sooner, but even the USA will do the right thing after it's tried everything else. I think our biggest near-term existential risk is an attempt at climate change mitigation gone wrong. But we could lose 99% of our population and still bounce back.
Our species will be the last large mammals to go in the last big extinction. Hopefully this one isn't it and we'll be around for the big asteroid hit or whatever is coming. I've been hearing our doom is just around the corner my whole life, I'm not giving up hope now.
But it doesn't look good.
I'm not anti-Christian. I'm anti-stupid.
