Zooming out - will humans go extinct or what?

[johnny]

I think it is enough when we ACT like animals are conscious beings and we should alwayas aim to minimize their suffering.

And personally, I always do. Those who do not aren't going to take any notice of a philosopher going on about "speciesism".

Well, good to see you are a doer rather than a trier and hoper and wishing others well to do the right thing type. We all know what happens when most of the world are sending thoughts and prayers though, rather than acting as though they care. Good to hear you aren't one of them types. Now if you can just convince the other 8 billion.

Small change in wording and look at that....in one case we care, and the other it is okay to pretend we care.

You do not need the word "speciesism" to care about non-human animals.

I use the word speciesism to characterize the behavior of folks who seem concerned about doom, collapse, whatever, and cast it as a "whoa to us humans" context.

There is no point in imposing an ethical requirement on humans to prevent a mass extinction which can no longer be prevented. I don't personally even believe there is an ethical requirement to save 8 billion humans, and for exactly the same reason: it's impossible.

There are no facts in the future. You can no more be sure of a mass extinction than peak oilers could be of 20th century peak oils in the same decade it was being claimed, and we've all seen how religiously that belief was defended. Right up until it couldn't be. Apocalypticism has been around for a millennia for a reason, because people have believed what you apparently do. That they knew the future. It just seems so logical in the moment.

So life has been getting harder for awhile now. Probably shouldn't be confused with doom, as some are wont to do. Is it even a reasonable expectation to think that isn't the natural order of things, or is this some vestige of a leftover dream we inherited from our parents and grandparents coming out of WWII?

I don't understand your question, because it has too many negatives in it.

Is it a reasonable expectation to think that life getting harder now isn't the natural order of things?

Atlas Shrugged...and welcome to the consequences of humans doing human. And most of us suffering from speciesism, as we think we matter, and those other species? Well..some of them taste good at a barbeque....is about as far as that goes.

Everybody here seems to agree we won't go extinct, so the choice is between figuring out how to live on this planet in balance with everything else, or allowing natural selection to re-program us. Looks to me like we will choose the latter, which is bad news for most of the other animals on this planet.

Humans as an apex predator have certainly been bad news for most other species on the planet. The meek inheriting the earth and all that I guess. But us meek humans do enjoy those other species at a barbeque.

[johnny]

At the moment they have enough to eat

Well, they would if they could it afford it. Not much use there being food in the shops if you cannot afford to buy it.

The poorest 10-20% of the UK population is already skipping meals to save money.

Any chance that Brexit has created some of the most recent economic dislocation?

[UndercoverElephant]

At the moment they have enough to eat

Well, they would if they could it afford it. Not much use there being food in the shops if you cannot afford to buy it.

The poorest 10-20% of the UK population is already skipping meals to save money.

Any chance that Brexit has created some of the most recent economic dislocation?

The problem is mostly global. Brexit hasn't helped, economically.

[UndercoverElephant]

I use the word speciesism to characterize the behavior of folks who seem concerned about doom, collapse, whatever, and cast it as a "whoa to us humans" context.

That is the only way anything is really going to change. So long as the majority think that what is going to happen is not going to affect them, nothing significant changes.

There is no point in imposing an ethical requirement on humans to prevent a mass extinction which can no longer be prevented. I don't personally even believe there is an ethical requirement to save 8 billion humans, and for exactly the same reason: it's impossible.

There are no facts in the future.

There are conditional facts. Either humans go extinct or humans end up back in balance with the global ecosystem, presumably after both have changed. Also: economic growth will eventually end. This is inevitable, so it is a fact about the future.

You can no more be sure of a mass extinction than peak oilers could be of 20th century peak oils in the same decade it was being claimed, and we've all seen how religiously that belief was defended.

OK, now I am wondering what your agenda is. We can be sure of a mass extinction because it is already well underway.

Is it a reasonable expectation to think that life getting harder now isn't the natural order of things?

It is the natural order. Nothing supernatural required.

Humans as an apex predator have certainly been bad news for most other species on the planet. The meek inheriting the earth and all that I guess. But us meek humans do enjoy those other species at a barbeque.

Vegetarianism will not solve humanity's problems.

[johnny]

There are no facts in the future.

There are conditional facts.

Oh, you are going to need to elaborate on that one. Assuming we both accept that a fact is a mutually agreeable thing, historical event, definition, equation, whatever, then a fact is a fact, and conditional on nothing other than it being known and agreed to.

And you, being no more precognitive on a grand scale then I am, can ONLY do what everyone else can, which is couch things in terms of probabilities. Any probability distribution of future events must also include that incoming GRB sterilizing the planet. And something other than what any of us can even imagine perhaps. The Vulcans show up and congratulate us on surviving our civilizations infancy and help us out with our fusion issue perhaps.

Either humans go extinct or humans end up back in balance with the global ecosystem, presumably after both have changed. Also: economic growth will eventually end. This is inevitable, so it is a fact about the future.

I do not agree with your either/or supposition, therefore it, and neither of the scenarios, are facts, conditional or otherwise. Let's hear it for Dyson Spheres!!! Catton outlined the other 6-7-8 times your conditional perspective might have looked reasonable to the species. Like peak oil...it looks reasonable...right up until it doesn't.

You can no more be sure of a mass extinction than peak oilers could be of 20th century peak oilsin the same decade it was being claimed, and we've all seen how religiously that belief was defended.

OK, now I am wondering what your agenda is. We can be sure of a mass extinction because it is already well underway.

Agenda? I love gabbing, and most people don't gab about even limited future scenarios, but doomers doing it seem quite common, so I hang out around doomer folks. It isn't as though BAU folks are thinking outside of any box, and while doomers are usually uni-directional in their thinking, at least it is something beyond BAU.

Humans are certainly offing many other species through their actions. From a human perspective...so what...as long as there are enough around to keep me in good barbeque. Also, as long as it seems to bother poor people mosty.

It is the natural order. Nothing supernatural required.

That does NOT appear to be the perspective by folks as to what happened in the world coming out of WWII. That is the time period, as one example, that peak oilers keep pointing out trying to claim that it was supposed to be what the world looked like until peak oil started coming. Growth growth growth, living wages from a single middle class person, buying a home and car while mommy stayed home, etc etc. The good ol' days. So that appeared to be the natural order for the First Worlders for half a century. I imagine cycles of growth and economic malaise have happened before, therefore it seems unreasonable to just presume outright that things are only unidirectionl, in terms of the human condition. If true...we would never have invented agriculture. We would have had natural decline as Neanderthals and died off before we hit Cro-magnon.

Humans as an apex predator have certainly been bad news for most other species on the planet. The meek inheriting the earth and all that I guess. But us meek humans do enjoy those other species at a barbeque.

Vegetarianism will not solve humanity's problems.

I didn't say it would. I implied that humans have been bad news for other species on the planet, and some of them make a great barbeque, the next implication being that our taste for great barbeque might have something to do with their demise.

[UndercoverElephant]

There are no facts in the future.

There are conditional facts.

Oh, you are going to need to elaborate on that one. Assuming we both accept that a fact is a mutually agreeable thing, historical event, definition, equation, whatever, then a fact is a fact, and conditional on nothing other than it being known and agreed to.

I am not sure what needs elaborating. Either humans go extinct, or humans eventually arrive at a new ecological equilibrium. It is a fact that one of these things must happen, because there is no other possible outcome.

And you, being no more precognitive on a grand scale then I am, can ONLY do what everyone else can, which is couch things in terms of probabilities.

OK then. The probability that economic growth will continue for the next 100,000 years is precisely zero.

Either humans go extinct or humans end up back in balance with the global ecosystem, presumably after both have changed. Also: economic growth will eventually end. This is inevitable, so it is a fact about the future.

I do not agree with your either/or supposition, therefore it, and neither of the scenarios, are facts, conditional or otherwise. Let's hear it for Dyson Spheres!!! Catton outlined the other 6-7-8 times your conditional perspective might have looked reasonable to the species. Like peak oil...it looks reasonable...right up until it doesn't.

I have no idea what you are trying to say. Can you try to be a bit clearer, instead of attempting to communicate in what are apparently metaphors? What, exactly, are you saying or asking?

That does NOT appear to be the perspective by folks as to what happened in the world coming out of WWII. That is the time period, as one example, that peak oilers keep pointing out trying to claim that it was supposed to be what the world looked like until peak oil started coming.

Is English not your first language? Are you dyslexic, maybe? I cannot understand your posts. What has this got to do with the supernatural?

Growth growth growth, living wages from a single middle class person, buying a home and car while mommy stayed home, etc etc. The good ol' days. So that appeared to be the natural order for the First Worlders for half a century.

What do you mean by "natural order"? I don't know what that term is supposed to mean.

I imagine cycles of growth and economic malaise have happened before, therefore it seems unreasonable to just presume outright that things are only unidirectionl, in terms of the human condition. If true...we would never have invented agriculture. We would have had natural decline as Neanderthals and died off before we hit Cro-magnon.

Are you an AI?

I didn't say it would. I implied that humans have been bad news for other species on the planet, and some of them make a great barbeque, the next implication being that our taste for great barbeque might have something to do with their demise.

OK then.

[kenneal - lagger]

I've been away for a few days and there were four pages to catch up on!! Where do i start?

Regarding colonising other planets, That doesn't just involve sending a few tens of thousands of people to find a new planet that is suitable for human life. This also assumes that we can build a vessel capable of transporting and supporting a very large number of people for probably a number of decades, that means providing food and water and recycling all the waste into something that can produce more food and water. Unless the colonists include people who can find minerals, who can process those minerals, smelt them, cast them and then machine them into tools that can produce the machines that we rely on to produce tools, food, water, shelter, cooking, heating and cooling the colonists would be entirely reliant on what they could take with them. If the colonists didn't take it with them they would have to find their new home, determine what was wanted, send back word of what was wanted and the wait for it to be assembled and sent on. Assuming a ten year voyage time, which is probably on the short side of the actual, you are looking at a thirty year cycle time at least!

When you consider that the colonists to North America only had a year to wait for backup and nearly starved in that time, a thirty year wait would either have to be extremely well resourced or they would have to be met by a very accommodating indigenous population or they will need to find Shangri La. The colonists to the Americas bought with them diseases which killed off much of the indigenous population but there would be no guarantee that the colonists wouldn't succumb to diseases which we hadn't seen before and not be there when backup arrived. The idea that we could turn up on a new planet and just carry on as we do on earth is pure pie in the sky!

When it comes to collapse and how far we go we only have to look at the Ukraine war for what would happen in many places where the invader is systematically destroying everything in their path, starting with symbols of culture. If we go further back in history you can see the destruction of libraries in many wars and the loss of accumulated knowledge. Even if we retain the knowledge we might have to go back to basic principles to rebuild the tools to rebuild the industrial production which we rely on for basic food and water production. What we can do now is built on the shoulders of many previous generations. It would be all too easy to lose the base that we rely on for our way of living.

Without industrial food production we wouldn't have the time or manpower to educate our children to keep our industrial society going. It has been estimated that one man can produce, by his own labour, enough food to feed one and a half people so the numbers of doctors and nurses, industrial designers and workers, distribution workers, social workers and teachers and other non food producing people that could be supported by the food growers would be very limited. So the amount of non food producing work we could do while we bred and trained enough horses and oxen, and the people to train and work them, to work for us would be very little until we built up some form of industrial food production. We come to be basics of net energy here.

[Vortex2]

Regarding colonising other planets,

We aren't going anywhere.

However, our machines might.

We could possibly get a tiny AI equipped probe up to a decent velocity, so that our grandchildren could get a response from another solar system.

Or maybe we wouldn't expect a reply : the probes may be set up to deliver life in some form to other planets.
Perhaps that will be our heritage, once we die out on this planet?

[kenneal - lagger]

........................................................................
We aren't going anywhere.
.............

That's not what many industrialists are telling us because they want to carry on polluting while having an excuse to do so.

[johnny]

I am not sure what needs elaborating. Either humans go extinct, or humans eventually arrive at a new ecological equilibrium. It is a fact that one of these things must happen, because there is no other possible outcome.

You saying it doesn't make it true. Sorry..having never had a class in philosophy, I'm surprised that basic logic isn't mixed in there somewhere.

And you, being no more precognitive on a grand scale then I am, can ONLY do what everyone else can, which is couch things in terms of probabilities.

OK then. The probability that economic growth will continue for the next 100,000 years is precisely zero.

Well, at least you are clever enough to say it is still a conditional without having to use the word. And economic growth continuing and human extinction are two different things, and we haven't been talking about economic growth but extinction. So you changed the conditions of the question at the same time, you clever fellow.

I do not agree with your either/or supposition, therefore it, and neither of the scenarios, are facts, conditional or otherwise. Let's hear it for Dyson Spheres!!! Catton outlined the other 6-7-8 times your conditional perspective might have looked reasonable to the species. Like peak oil...it looks reasonable...right up until it doesn't.

I have no idea what you are trying to say. Can you try to be a bit clearer, instead of attempting to communicate in what are apparently metaphors? What, exactly, are you saying or asking?

I did not agree with your either/or supposition.

[UndercoverElephant]

I am not sure what needs elaborating. Either humans go extinct, or humans eventually arrive at a new ecological equilibrium. It is a fact that one of these things must happen, because there is no other possible outcome.

You saying it doesn't make it true. Sorry..having never had a class in philosophy, I'm surprised that basic logic isn't mixed in there somewhere.

There's nothing wrong with my logic. My saying it doesn't make it true, because it was true before I said it. What other outcome do you think is possible?

[johnny]

There's nothing wrong with my logic. My saying it doesn't make it true, because it was true before I said it. What other outcome do you think is possible?

Any other outcome that isn't included in your myopic perspective of course. I've already mentioned a few, perhaps if I had made them bold you would have noticed?

[UndercoverElephant]

There's nothing wrong with my logic. My saying it doesn't make it true, because it was true before I said it. What other outcome do you think is possible?

Any other outcome that isn't included in your myopic perspective of course. I've already mentioned a few, perhaps if I had made them bold you would have noticed?

I didn't notice because you haven't mentioned any. Now, what other outcome do you think is possible, apart from human extinction and humans eventually achieving a new equilibrium with a changed global ecosystem?

[johnny]

There's nothing wrong with my logic. My saying it doesn't make it true, because it was true before I said it. What other outcome do you think is possible?

Any other outcome that isn't included in your myopic perspective of course. I've already mentioned a few, perhaps if I had made them bold you would have noticed?

I didn't notice because you haven't mentioned any. Now, what other outcome do you think is possible, apart from human extinction and humans eventually achieving a new equilibrium with a changed global ecosystem?

Easy. Human extintion as the ONLY option (perhaps you missed my short term, mid term and long term astrophysical based obvious scenarios?), equilibrium is just an eye blink temporary thing in your schema, it is no permanent solution. Beyond this, I wrote more on this on Sunday, and it was what I was referring to.

Any probability distribution of future events must also include that incoming GRB sterilizing the planet. And something other than what any of us can even imagine perhaps. The Vulcans show up and congratulate us on surviving our civilizations infancy and help us out with our fusion issue perhaps.

My favorite as an old Trekie is the Vulcan scenario. Although fusion saving the world seems like it might have legs, I'd say it comes before galactic colonization and even beginning to harvest off earth resources. You do understand that we've already sent out the equivalent of our old miners atop donkeys to explore for minerals and cool stuff right? Picture included for proof. Why is your human thinking so...closed system? We've done that before...and then lo and behold.. a New World was discovered! By the way, how did your precogntive thoughts on peak oil go? Did you see the future correctly there as well?

[UndercoverElephant]

Easy. Human extintion as the ONLY option (perhaps you missed my short term, mid term and long term astrophysical based obvious scenarios?), equilibrium is just an eye blink temporary thing in your schema, it is no permanent solution. Beyond this, I wrote more on this on Sunday, and it was what I was referring to.

That is a string of words, not an answer. I am asking about the future of the human race. There are two possible outcomes in the long-term (where "long-term" is from a human perspective, NOT the heat death of the universe). One is that humans go extinct during the mass-extinction that has already started, and the other is that they do not. If they do not, then the logical implication is that they will have achieved ecological equilibrium.

If you think another outcome is possible, please explain it clearly and concisely. I have asked you several times to do this, and you clearly cannot do it. Instead of admitting you are wrong, you are posting word spaghetti. What you are trying to do is known, philosophically, as "sophistry". It means something like "providing an answer that sounds very clever to a person who doesn't understand the argument, but actually isn't."