A bit clickbait, but he does run down a lot of big risks out there. I have read about these before. These are all natural events, not human political events like Trump Obeying the four paragraph rule, the first few: Ha ha, the headline is just clickbait. Most of these aren't really extinction level events, they're just really bad. And the odds of any of them happening in 2024 are minuscule. But still possible! Miyake event. This mysterious burst of cosmic rays has occurred several times in the past 10,000 years. It wouldn't actually kill a lot of people aside from, maybe, passengers on jet airliners, but "the induced current would flood the thousands of satellites that encircle Earth, crippling them for months and possibly years. Power grids would topple immediately, leaving anything reliant on electricity, like lights, electric vehicles, and ventilators, inoperable." Bad! Cascadia subduction zone. This is the fault line that runs under Seattle. A magnitude 9 earthquake there would basically flood the entire area, level everything in its path, and kill upwards of 100,000 people. The Toba supervolcano. Forget Yellowstone. The Toba eruption was bigger and happened a mere 74,000 years ago. It's credited with almost destroying the human race, leaving only a few tens of thousands tenuously alive. If it happened again it would blacken the skies; send temperatures plummeting; destroy crops globally; and produce huge tsunamis. It would likely kill millions immediately and many, many more over the course of a few years. Top 10 extinction level natural disasters for 2024 - Kevin Drum
That is a lot of destruction predicted from less than 24 tree samples all from one river back in France. Which is not meant to disparage the work of the teams of people doing the analysis, modelling, extrapolating and "filling in the blanks". Just very interesting how small of a sample set such sweeping science can be extrapolated from in terms of the most recent "Miyake Event" from the late 700 AD period.
If the human race went extinct, I'm sure that the Earth, if it could talk, would say, "Good riddance." Humans need to ask themselves why that is.
Just a matter of time. And in a few hundred million years perhaps intelligent life will evolve again and humanity can be improved upon. The older I get the less I’m convinced that our species deserves saving.
I am human, I will answer: Humans, since the dawn of recorded time, in their efforts to understand the physical world, came up with the disasterous "Gods or God" concept to explain all things humans could not explain themselves, that occur in the natural world. Interestingly Humans then decided that "God", of course made humans in "HIS" (lol at the sex identification part) image. Once humans convinced themselves that they were of the same name, image and likeness of "God", convinced themselves that the planet and everything on it, or in it, was subject to every whim and fancy of ........ Humans. Irregardless of destruction to the planet, or extinction to the planet and all other species therein. Then us "humans" which we determined was "just under" the "God" category, decided that while humans are made in God's image, this did not equal equality. Oh No, tribes of humans cast envious eyes at other more prosperous "tribes" and decided it was "Gods will" to discriminate against other tribes, by virtue of skin color, wealth, military proficiency, and the ability to transform letters and numbers into a means of communication, amongst MANY other things. This set in motion a series of technological innovations thanks to the semi opposable thumb, combined with thought processes that did not only concern itself with food and sex, to come up with some clever innovations. Think Agriculture, Medicine and MURDER WEAPONS and numerous other things. This in turn gave rise to the industrial revolution and the ability by humans to "get rich quick", a motivation which has led humans, since around 1715, or barely more than 200 years, into a world where good ole religon and "Gods" (i.e. supernatural entities) are still presumed to be in control, a planet supporting 8 Billion mouths with hundreds if not thousands of different tribal "political systems", polluted atmosphere and oceans, wars, species extinction (at an ALARMING RATE), pestilance, ignorance, cultural and sexual dimorphism, spent nuclear rods with radioactive half lives of 500,000 years, and if science is to be believed, perhaps a non-biological evolution via A.I. If you were Gaia, don't you think it's time to "sneeze"?
Humans are often selfish, mean, and act in all sorts of ways that cause suffering, but how much should we expect from primates? Somebody posted a video on X the other day of a chimp beating a monkey to death. Last month, there was story about a wolf/dog hybrid pet killing a baby in Alabama. It's sad to consider these as examples of the state of our world. Based on our aspirational goals, perhaps very few species would meet our test for deserving to be saved. Even the universe and the Earth are riddled with explosions and natural disasters. I intended to write about our progress, but it's tough to be positive when I really start thinking about this stuff, lol.
One of my favorite poems is "Original Sin" by Robinson Jeffers, which concludes with these lines: …. As for me, I would rather Be a worm in a wild apple than a son of man. But we are what we are, and we might remember Not to hate any person, for all are vicious; And not be astonished at any evil, all are deserved; And not fear death; it is the only way to be cleansed. Original Sin by Robinson Jeffers (poetry.com)
I'll not take issue with most of your post. I'm aware of your passionate concern for the viability of the Earth and I respect your concerns and agree with them. However, if you want to reference the Genesis story of the creation of Adam and Eve, it should be made clear what God's image was to the person who wrote the Genesis account. The account says mankind is to be made - and was made - in God's image. 26 Then God said, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals over all the creatures that move along the ground.” The account then further details what that image is - male and female - three times for emphasis. So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them. I will not push the point, only putting it out there for consideration. There are those (most) who disagree and I'm not interested in debating it at this time, or derailing this thread. The same ones who believe in the doctrines of the trinity and original sin reject the male/female image of God, despite their professed belief God is 3 persons. Go figure.
We're one of countless trillions of species that have roamed this planet. We are uniquely more capable of compassion and uniquiely more capable of violence than any other species to date. By orders of magnitude. That goes for intra and inter-species interactions; as well as how we treat the planet. One can choose to look at the violence and hatred and throw in the towel, or one can look at the compassion, cooperation, and love to find hope and a way to build upon them. Or we can watch Netflix and wait for a sudden extinction. God, I hope the Gators can win another NC first.
