What really matters?

[Greta]

As for terrestrial life reaching its final stages, life on earth commenced around four billion years ago. The Sun is heating up and in about a billion years it will be game over, except for some underground organisms.

No need to panic just yet, luvvy. A billion years is ample time to prepare more salubrious digs.

Mum Earth appears to be the one doing the pushing. I'm just one of her quintillions of mouthpieces.

It would be a shame if we went too far and managed to bump ourselves off. Despite the political games around climate change, generally humans are assiduous when it comes to steering controls, which has kept us afloat in unbalanced ecosystems for a while now.

The biggest threat is disease IMO. Once the fighting ramps up over refugees and resources, diseases will flourish. This century I expect there will be disease outbreaks that will achieve a far, far greater headcount than the Black Death.

[Obvious Leo]

As for terrestrial life reaching its final stages, life on earth commenced around four billion years ago. The Sun is heating up and in about a billion years it will be game over, except for some underground organisms.

No need to panic just yet, luvvy. A billion years is ample time to prepare more salubrious digs.

Mum Earth appears to be the one doing the pushing. I'm just one of her quintillions of mouthpieces.

It would be a shame if we went too far and managed to bump ourselves off. Despite the political games around climate change, generally humans are assiduous when it comes to steering controls, which has kept us afloat in unbalanced ecosystems for a while now.

The biggest threat is disease IMO. Once the fighting ramps up over refugees and resources, diseases will flourish. This century I expect there will be disease outbreaks that will achieve a far, far greater headcount than the Black Death.

I agree completely and don't by any means discount the possibility that such a pandemic disease could be deliberately engineered by some psychopath hell bent on engineering Armageddon on his own terms. What is also very poorly understood is that even a pandemic on a far lesser scale would have catastrophic consequences on the world's economy. The recent swine flu scare turned out to be a false alarm but it could all too easily have been otherwise. Many of the local commentariat at that time were saying that even if this disease had killed only 1% of our country's population it would have stunted any possibility of economic growth for at least a generation and drastically lowered average living standards for a similar period. 1% doesn't sound like much but even in a sparsely populated country like ours it's a quarter of a million people and the expectation is that in such a pandemic most other countries in the world would be a lot more badly affected than us.

I find this possible prospect both more plausible and more scary than of the nuclear holocaust scenarios which are often talked about. However, notwithstanding any of the above, I still reckon that if we manage to survive for another hundred years we might well survive for another billion.

Q. What are our chances of surviving for another hundred years?

A. Marginally above absolute zero.

[Greta]

I find this possible prospect both more plausible and more scary than of the nuclear holocaust scenarios which are often talked about. However, notwithstanding any of the above, I still reckon that if we manage to survive for another hundred years we might well survive for another billion.

I agree.

Q. What are our chances of surviving for another hundred years?

A. Marginally above absolute zero.

A. It depends on "our". If you mean us plebs, sure.

I expect the (by then) trillionaires and their descendants/circle to be well and truly insulated from whatever is happening to the hoi polloi with the best access to the best protected resources. The poorest are known to be the most vulnerable to the effects of climate change. First, developing countries (apart from the protected few who may well flee). Then the poor in the west (large numbers due to refugees). The middle class will effectively become the new poor by the end of the century, if they survive.

There will be sure quite a scrabble for water supplies, high ground, arable land, power generation and telecommunication assets, property, manufacturing equipment and technology (esp military). In the hard times ahead, whomever controls those assets controls everything. Futurists say that the most habitable places will be those most of would consider too cold today - places like Alaska, Northern Canada, Antarctica, Scandinavia, northern Russia, South Africa. The future of nations around the tropics appears especially dire.

Tassie might be okay too except it seems their rainforests aren't coping with the hotter weather. At this rate all the conservation efforts to preserve the forests could be in vain.

[Dubious]

Dubs, yes, it's a demanding discussion and understand your decision to stop. Thanks. it was fun. I'll focus on the key point:

Well! Sounds like something of a challenge so having nothing better to do at the moment, I'll continue having fun myself!

The organisation needed for cancers to multiply is in no way comparable with the levels of organisation of humans.

There's nothing that says they have to be and have no idea why you mention as if it should be.

As mentioned before, we cannot be parasites on the biosphere because parasites come from outside, and we have a long proud history in the biosphere as one of the current branches of the great ape family.

In it's literal, clinical meaning obviously not. The last time I looked through a microscope I didn't notice any resemblance either but I didn't realize this had to be overtly affirmed. The point was, to repeat again, that our EFFECT on the planet has much in common with how parasites, cancers, etc., operate within an animal body being itself a micro version of a biosphere. There are very palpable reasons why people like David Attenborough - among many others - regard the human race as a plague on the planet which I'm sure he meant to be indicative of effect rather than us poor humans being a clinical description of one.

This is the key point. We are not parasites and we aren't cancers.

Correct...as noted above.

Parasites and cancers, like us, are responsible for destructive processes to living systems, but neither has a product even remotely analogous to human society.

...and so! They obviously don't need anything like a human society to promote their wicked deeds which means only ONE thing: they're more efficient than we are.

However, there is another destructive process in nature - apoptosis, where structures are broken down during growth and/or metamorphosis, and are replaced by new, more complex structures. This appears most likely unless humanity's roles are entirely unprecedented in nature.

This is a subject in itself especially if we preempt nature to become our own god in the recreation of ourselves through technology...which many imagine to be inevitable.

The biosphere is doing it to itself - breaking down established systems and replacing them with systems capable of becoming far more complex.

I'll never understand how anyone can make claims like this with such certainty! Of course on philosophy forums anyone can create any kind of virtual reality even a whole customized universe if you like.

My certainty comes from evidence - it's the story of evolution of the last few billion years. A few extinctions along the way and then life returns - more complex and adapted than ever.

Evolution, as I quoted to Leo, does not ensure any such thing...or as they say in the stock market:
Past Performance Is Not A Guarantee Of Future Returns

Despite all this, on individual and societal levels, natural conservation is in our best interests, no matter what the long term future may hold. I also think that aiming to hold a balanced view of humanity's strengths and weaknesses is more likely to bring happiness (or at least not bring misery) than an emotionally-driven focus on weaknesses, perpetually outraged with inevitable* realities.

I agree but there are very potent reasons as to why we should be disgusted and outraged.

* Even if we all scaled back our resource use to that of people in developing countries, all it would do is slow the inevitable. We are the empowered species and we are taking over the place, just as trilobites and dinos did. It's a new phase in the making and, as said before, change is always difficult, always resulting in the loss of treasured things.

Some losses are not in any way "acceptable" if we are to call ourselves "Human" in the best sense of the word...ESPECIALLY if it didn't have to be sacrificed in the first place. What you convey here in a very nonchalant, mundane manner is the very opposite of an "empowered species"! We are NOT trilobites and dinos. As the one and only preeminent intelligence ever created on this planet our responsibility toward it and other life forms, I expect, would have been considerably more tangible.

[Obvious Leo]

Obvious Leo wrote:
Q. What are our chances of surviving for another hundred years?

A. Marginally above absolute zero.


A. It depends on "our". If you mean us plebs, sure.

if you insist on pursuing the finer detail then in my own personal case another decade would probably put me well over the odds, given that some of the lifestyle choices I made in my miss-spent youth were less than conducive to my longevity. Diseases tend to be very egalitarian and ecumenical in the modern day so I'm not sure that being wealthy is likely to provide much immunity to a carefully engineered one. In principle a sufficiently lethal influenza strain could wipe out over 90% of the entire global population within a week and the technology to develop such a strain already exists. The technology to develop a preventative vaccine for such a disease within a week does not exist and possibly never will. Not that I'm trying to be alarmist, you understand. Personally I'm more concerned about my dodgy hips and fractious liver.

Tassie might be okay too except it seems their rainforests aren't coping with the hotter weather. At this rate all the conservation efforts to preserve the forests could be in vain.

To say nothing of the want of political will. I think the possible effects of climate change are being grossly underestimated in many areas but the one which concerns me most is the acidification of the oceans. Far too little is known about the possible long-term effects of this to make any meaningful predictions but the doomsayers are managing to paint a fucking scary picture with the little bit of evidence they've got. Flathead fillets are going to get expensive.

[Obvious Leo]

Some losses are not in any way "acceptable" if we are to call ourselves "Human" in the best of the word...ESPECIALLY if it didn't have to be sacrificed in the first place. What you convey here in a very nonchalant, mundane manner is the very opposite of an "empowered species"! We are NOT trilobites and dinos. As the one and only preeminent intelligence ever created on this planet our responsibility toward it and other life forms, I expect, would have been considerably more tangible.

I don't think anybody is actually arguing against this point and Greta and I have at least agreed that as a species we have arrived at the crossroads. For an individual species evolution cannot stand still so probably the most endangered species of all is US. We either evolve or vanish into the wastebasket of nature's failures but in our case the direction of our future evolution is something which we ourselves will need to determine. This is an unprecedented development in the evolutionary trajectory of the biosphere thus far, because in the course of determining our own biological future we inevitably determine the future of that of the rest of the biosphere at the same time. The real question then becomes "Are we up to the task?"

[hazlett]

Are you referring to eternity?

[Lacewing]

To calmly acknowledge what seems to be an inevitable outcome of humankind's attitudes and actions, simply reflects that we are bearing witness with eyes-open to the unfolding. Like watching (in this moment) a beloved struggle, or even die, due to circumstances beyond our control. Will it change anything if one runs around screaming in outrage, and adding to the reactionary fervor that already drowns out all other awareness and clarity? Or might this be an opportunity for us to recognize and explore (more than ever) the extent to which we are part of an expansive SYSTEM that we cannot ultimately rule with our will and intelligence?

At an individual level, we can seek to be more aware and respectful and appreciative of the moments we have. I'm guessing that this might be the greatest act of clarity and courage and usefulness that we can perform (rather than looking outward for who to blame and/or rage against). After all, wouldn't the nature of our RELATIONSHIP WITH EACH MOMENT be the same pattern WE IMPRINT ON ALL ELSE through our every thought/action? So wouldn't that be the truest place to start transformation? Claiming to have answers and intelligence doesn't seem to mean much when it's coming from a noisy, willful platform... despite the best of intentions.

The way I see it... if all is connected, our individual transformation can empower and ripple throughout the system more effectively than any external/superficial hoopla.

[Skip]

I wish the world had a lot more lacewings - also Lacewings.

[Lacewing]

I wish the world had a lot more lacewings - also Lacewings.

Now that's so sweet it makes my wings quiver.

[Skip]

Sweetness matters. So does biodiversity. Jillionnaries and their accumulated stuff won't replenish the earth.

[Dubious]

For an individual species evolution cannot stand still so probably the most endangered species of all is US.

A species with a bakers dozen left to copulate on a seasonal basis normally has almost no time left compared to one whose members exist in the billions and who keep on screwing nonstop. A nuclear war couldn't wipe them out!

[Obvious Leo]

For an individual species evolution cannot stand still so probably the most endangered species of all is US.

A species with a bakers dozen left to copulate on a seasonal basis normally has almost no time left compared to one whose members exist in the billions and who keep on screwing nonstop. A nuclear war couldn't wipe them out!

I tend to agree that the risk of our complete extinction is negligible considering our weight of numbers and that even if 99% of the human population were to be wiped out this would represent only a minor hiccup in our evolutionary trajectory. In fact in evolutionary theory such an almost wipe-out event even has a name. It is called a bifurcation and in self-determining systems a bifurcation has effects which are raised to a power of their cause in a process known as punctuated evolution. Such a punctuation in the evolutionary trajectory of a self-causal system inevitably leads to a state of higher informational order and complexity in the overall system itself. In layman's terms what this means is that the 1% who survive the almost Armageddon will in all likelihood smarten up their act and make sure that such an event could never occur again.

The choice is ours. We can do this the easy way or we can do it the hard way but evolution towards informational complexity is the fundamental organising principle of the entire universe and it is absolutely unstoppable. We either learn how to use our intelligence intelligently or we die in the attempt. We didn't ask to evolve into the Intelligent Designers which we've become but the information genie can never be stuffed back into the bottle. It's time for homo sapiens to man up and realise what he's become.

The only thing that bothers me about this entire scenario is the fact that I'm an incorrigibly curious bloke and I won't get to see how the story unfolds. However in an infant universe with a trillion trillion stars and at least as many planets I'm confident that if we don't get it right then somebody else will.

[Greta]

The point was, to repeat again, that our EFFECT on the planet has much in common with how parasites, cancers, etc.

And I repeat again that you and many others hold an unbalanced view that focuses entirely on destruction without considering the construction side, and this is due to negativity bias, an evolved response as mentioned earlier.

Parasites and cancers, like us, are responsible for destructive processes to living systems, but neither has a product even remotely analogous to human society.

...and so! They obviously don't need anything like a human society to promote their wicked deeds which means only ONE thing: they're more efficient than we are.

Is human culture - the arts, morality, intelligence and understanding - really just a filthy plague polluting the Earth or something that may actually be worthwhile in the greater scheme of things?

This is a subject in itself especially if we preempt nature to become our own god in the recreation of ourselves through technology...which many imagine to be inevitable.

We are not preempting nature - that is an observer effect. We are driven by nature because we're part of it. It's very common for people underestimate the agency of other animals and overestimate their own, which I suspect stems having a predator's mind, which necessarily must objectify its prey. If humans are shaping the Earth in a deliberate way then I'm a monkey's aunt. We are flying by the seat of our pants and making numerous mistakes as we have always done - just like any other animal.

Evolution, as I quoted to Leo, does not ensure any such thing...or as they say in the stock market: Past Performance Is Not A Guarantee Of Future Returns

Cute idiom and I'm sure the colour will bring people's attention to it, but it doesn't mean much in context.

One day there will be an extinction event from which the biosphere never recovers. Obviously. If you think it's this one now then you are buying into "humans as super powerful beings" line. Yet, if we became extinct tomorrow, any hypothetical aliens visiting the Earth in 10,000 years would have to excavate to find evidence of our existence. Nature will be just fine. New species will replace the extinct ones, as always. "Oh, but it takes millions of years!". That's a small fraction of the billion years life on Earth has left - unless a comet or other rogue body too big for humanity to deflect destroys the planet's surface.

I agree but there are very potent reasons as to why we should be disgusted and outraged.

Yes, if it is a spur to productive action rather than a source of pointless personal stress or a means to feel morally superior, which tends to be politically counterproductive because unbalanced views generate more resistance than balanced ones.

Some losses are not in any way "acceptable" if we are to call ourselves "Human" in the best sense of the word...ESPECIALLY if it didn't have to be sacrificed in the first place.

The key phrase is, "if we are to call ourselves human". What does it mean to be human? To be more empowered, knowing and responsible than other species?

Do you feel that humanity are highly experienced in controlling their impulses? Do you feel that humanity should achieve maturity after 10,000 years of agriculture and 50 years of advanced technology, even though they were engaged in savagery and barbarity for the previous million years? Tough marker.

Women only got the vote not long over 100 years ago. Australian Aboriginal people were allowed the vote in 1967. In the 70s there was finally a kickback against the exploitation of unequal gender pay. Gays still can't get married in most places and are killed and persecuted by many. Women lack rights in many places. The raising of food animals is frequently monstrous, even more so in Asia than in the west (which is saying something). Mining is permitted by corrupt politicians in environmentally sensitive areas, potentially contaminating water supplies and arable land. Numerous people are seduced by Murdoch propaganda and think all this is just fine.

Humans are beginners. Hopefully we'll learn quickly enough to reduce the upcoming effects of our high population and reckless wastefulness.

What you convey here in a very nonchalant, mundane manner is the very opposite of an "empowered species"! We are NOT trilobites and dinos. As the one and only preeminent intelligence ever created on this planet our responsibility toward it and other life forms, I expect, would have been considerably more tangible.

Expectations of humanity often seem akin to expecting a toddler to be reasonable.

[Obvious Leo]

Expectations of humanity often seem akin to expecting a toddler to be reasonable.

Nicely put. We're barely out of the trees and a substantial proportion of our numbers still reckon that the events of nature are being determined by an external causal agent who we have to suck up to so we can live forever. We've got a ways to go and what we're witnessing now is just a species which has managed to outsmart itself. We know stuff that we are not mature enough to understand properly and this must inevitably have adverse consequences, rather like small kids watching internet porn and then assuming they know everything there is to know about sex.