Global warming: Are we doomed? A poll.

[Anomalocaris]

The main point is climate change is a humanitarian and economic threat, but not in itself an existential threat, unless our reaction to its impacts including adoption of diplomatic and political stances that leads to break down in global cooperation and nuclear war.

[Jehanne]

Time will tell. In my opinion, anthropogenic global warming is a dire existential threat to the existence of Homo sapiens sapiens. The only question is if the threat is imminent, and if not, is there still time to mitigate it?

If my camp is correct, perhaps such explains the Fermi paradox?

[Oldandeasilyconfused]

Time will tell.  In my opinion, anthropogenic global warming is a dire existential threat to the existence of Homo sapiens sapiens.  The only question is if the threat is imminent, and if not, is there still time to mitigate it?

If my camp is correct, perhaps such explains the Fermi paradox?

 Not quite sure what you mean.

My take is that I'm not convinced that the claims about alien life 'probably existing' are correct.  The main argument as I see it is that the universe is so vast that other sentient life cannot not exist.  I've always suspected there's a logical flaw in that argument. For all I know, we are alone in the universe. That I don't like that idea is irrelevant.

Scientists claim there are probably vast numbers of 'Goldilocks planets' in the universe. So far that claim is unfalsifiable.    Could it be that the Fermi paradox is based on wishful thinking?

I'm no scientist, so my view may simply be that of a scientific illiterate. Consequently, I welcome correction on logical or factual errors.

[Jehanne]

Time will tell.  In my opinion, anthropogenic global warming is a dire existential threat to the existence of Homo sapiens sapiens.  The only question is if the threat is imminent, and if not, is there still time to mitigate it?

If my camp is correct, perhaps such explains the Fermi paradox?

 Not quite sure what you mean.

My take is that I'm not convinced that the claims about alien life 'probably existing' are correct.  The main argument as I see it is that the universe is so vast that other sentient life cannot not exist.  I've always suspected there's a logical flaw in that argument. For all I know, we are alone in the universe. That I don't like that idea is irrelevant.

Scientists claim there are probably vast numbers of 'Goldilocks planets' in the universe. So far that claim is unfalsifiable.    Could it be that the Fermi paradox is based on wishful thinking?

I'm no scientist, so my view may simply be that of a scientific illiterate. Consequently, I welcome correction on logical or factual errors.

The idea is that as soon as evolution develops intelligent life on distant worlds (if it does), then that life develops civilization, goes through an industrial revolution, exceeds the carrying capacity of its environment and ends up destroying itself, all within the span of a few centuries of first developing radio technology. Per this idea, this is why SETI has been a failure.

In terms of our situation, one could look at the predictions from the AR6 IPCC report, available online.

[Anomalocaris]

 Not quite sure what you mean.

My take is that I'm not convinced that the claims about alien life 'probably existing' are correct.  The main argument as I see it is that the universe is so vast that other sentient life cannot not exist.  I've always suspected there's a logical flaw in that argument. For all I know, we are alone in the universe. That I don't like that idea is irrelevant.

Scientists claim there are probably vast numbers of 'Goldilocks planets' in the universe. So far that claim is unfalsifiable.    Could it be that the Fermi paradox is based on wishful thinking?

I'm no scientist, so my view may simply be that of a scientific illiterate. Consequently, I welcome correction on logical or factual errors.

The idea is that as soon as evolution develops intelligent life on distant worlds (if it does), then that life develops civilization, goes through an industrial revolution, exceeds the carrying capacity of its environment and ends up destroying itself, all within the span of a few centuries of first developing radio technology.  Per this idea, this is why SETI has been a failure.

In terms of our situation, one could look at the predictions from the AR6 IPCC report, available online.

I think Fermi paradox is more easily explained by the supposition that in the course of the development of technology by most extra-terrestrial technic civilizations,  the nature of externally detectable signature of technology will evolve quickly and radically on time scale very short compared to the average life span of such civilization.     So only during a tiny fraction of life span of any technological civilization would it give off signatures of technology that we currently both have the technology to detect over interstellar distances or the scientific comprehension to recognize as signatures of technology.  

I suspect if human civilization has an exact twin 20 light years from earth, identical to us in all ways but for being 2000 years ahead of us in technological development, we currently would be hard pressed to detect it, or recognize a visitation from it if it saw no reason to specifically contact us.   And if it finds a reason to contact us, it probably wants something from us, and given that they are just like us, we are doomed.

[Nay_Sayer]

0% to worry about.

Covid is taking us out first.

It was a fun ride folks. Adios

[vulcanlogician]

I think Fermi paradox is more easily explained by the supposition that in the course of the development of technology by most extra-terrestrial technic civilizations,  the nature of externally detectable signature of technology will evolve quickly and radically on time scale very short compared to the average life span of such civilization.     So only during a tiny fraction of life span of any technological civilization would it give off signatures of technology that we currently both have the technology to detect over interstellar distances or the scientific comprehension to recognize as signatures of technology.  

I suspect if human civilization has an exact twin 20 light years from earth, identical to us in all ways but for being 2000 years ahead of us in technological development, we currently would be hard pressed to detect it, or recognize a visitation from it if it saw no reason to specifically contact us.   And if it finds a reason to contact us, it probably wants something from us, and given that they are just like us, we are doomed.

Agreed.

I've always thought the Fermi paradox was plagued by assumptions. The Milky Way is awfully large. I don't think we can safely conclude anything when we don't even know what we're looking for.