Future History?

[Giff]

Who created the series? Hope it isn't JJ Abrams!!!

[Oldandeasilyconfused]

Have we the right to destroy other species?

I reject the notion of innate rights to any kind. I won't even go into the implication that it's immoral to destroy another species per se.


We behave towards other species as any predatory species does..We exploit them to survive and improve our own lives. We're too short sighted, greedy, indifferent and stupid to seriously consider any long term damage we may be doing. Few animals shit in their own nest to the extent of humans.


A major difference between us and other animals is our propensity for navel gazing and the ability to feel guilt and shame, or at least pretend we do.

[g-mark]

An eye for an eye. What ever happens too us is our own fault.

[Oldandeasilyconfused]

An eye for an eye. What ever happens too us is our own fault.

I didn't say that or mean to imply it.

My position is the rejection of absolute moral imperatives and of a transcendant moral authority.

My position is that all morality is either a social construct based on pragmatism and self interest or a biological urge (EG protecting the young,cooperating with and helping other members your group.) Morality always has a survival value,if only as an agent of group inclusion.

Human beings may on some occasions act in ways which do not APPEAR to be self interested,but we are not consistently altruistic as a species.

"Eye for an eye (revenge) is a common human position.Strangely,this rule is earlier than Jewish law,coming from Hammurabi,in Babylon (1760BCE) and is as much about compensation as revenge. A person can still escape the death penalty for murder in some parts of the Middle East by paying blood money*

000000000000000000000000------------------------------------0000000000000000000000000





From the code of Hammurabi (wiki)

Examples

These are seven (7) example laws, in their entirety, of the Code of Hammurabi, translated into English:

1. If any one ensnares another, putting a ban upon him, but he can not prove it, then he that ensnared him shall be put to death.

2. If any one brings an accusation against a man, and the accused goes to the river and leaps into the river, if he sinks in the river his accuser shall take possession of his house. But if the river proves that the accused is not guilty, and he escapes unhurt, then he who had brought the accusation shall be put to death, while he who leaped into the river shall take possession of the house that had belonged to his accuser.

3. If any one brings an accusation of any crime before the elders, and does not prove what he has charged, he shall, if a capital offense is charged, be put to death.

4. If a Builder build a house for someone, and does not construct it properly, and the house which he built fall in and kill its owner, then that builder shall be put to death.

5. If a man give his child to a nurse and the child die in her hands, but the nurse unbeknown to the father and mother nurse another child, then they shall convict her of having nursed another child without the knowledge of the father and mother and her breasts shall be cut off.

6. If any one steals the minor son of another, he shall be put to death.

7. If a man takes a woman to wife, but have no intercourse with her, this woman is no wife to him

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hammurabi_Code


9999999999999999999999999---------------------------------999999999999999999999999999

Blood Money (wiki)

Blood money is money or some sort of compensation paid by an offender (usually a murderer) or his family group to the family or kin group of the victim.[1]

Other uses

Blood money is, colloquially, the reward for bringing a criminal to justice.[2] A common meaning in other contexts is the money-penalty paid by a murderer to the kinsfolk of the victim. These fines completely protect the offender (or the kinsfolk thereof) from the vengeance of the injured family. The system was common among the Scandinavian and Teutonic peoples previous to the introduction of Christianity, and a scale of payments, graduated according to the heinousness of the crime, was fixed by laws, which further settled who could exact the blood-money, and who were entitled to share it.[2] Homicide was not the only crime thus expiable: blood-money could be exacted for all crimes of violence. Some acts, such as killing someone in a church or while asleep, or within the precincts of the royal palace, were "bot-less"; and the death penalty was inflicted.[2] Such a criminal was outlawed, and could be killed on sight.[2]

[josef rosenkranz]

[

quote='leo-rcc' pid='14597' dateline='1240389825']
I hope History Channel in Europe will transmit this series soon.

[/quote]

I saw at the History channel some times ago a similar film which showed how Nature restores the Earth to the pre-human state.
I thought about some questions which arise from a biological point of view.
Let's presume that the phenomenon is limited to the disappearance of the human race while other animals continue to live.
What could be the conditions to it:
1)A meteorite hits the earth in the same way as we presume that happened in the time of the
dynosaurus and destroys the minimal conditions needed for subsistance of humans.
In this case if small mamals ,like the strong resilient rats we know to day,continue to live, then in
the next 150-200 milions of years a new human race similar to us has good chance to reappear.
2)A pandemic bacterial desease exterminates all humans but spares animals.The future could be the
same as above.
3) The life supporting conditions for the whole fauna disappear but bacteria succeed to adapt
themselves to the new conditions.If the flora continues to subsist then the bacteria could enter an
evolutionary chain and revive the human race after some billions of years .

There could be also another succession of events if the flora disappears before the fauna ,a phenomenon which we partly see under our very eyes.
In this case a supplementary major cathastrophy hiting the remaining fauna has the chance to bring the earth to the state which it appears on other solar planetes.

These are all mental games but I wonder if the biologists of our forum coud find any interest in developing debates related to Darwinism, concerning this topic.

[LEDO]

Future history?

As the sun cools down it expands. Eventually the diameter of the sun will be out to Mar's orbit. Do the math.

[Kyuuketsuki]

As the sun cools down it expands. Eventually the diameter of the sun will be out to Mar's orbit. Do the math.

That's not history though is it (certainly not the history that this series refers to) ... it's quite specifically talking about near not far future events.

Kyu

[Darwinian]

I think that as long as we can survive the next few hundred years, the future of humanity will be secure.

Once we have permanent bases on the moon, Mars etc. that are completely self-sufficient then if some catastrophe does impact the Earth, we can always back populate.

[Kyuuketsuki]

Once we have permanent bases on the moon, Mars etc. that are completely self-sufficient then if some catastrophe does impact the Earth, we can always back populate.

Agreed though I personally think we have to look to the stars to assure our future.

Kyu