[onlooker]

I wish to if possible here explore the views of posters here about our possible future or futures on this planet. I certainly consider myself aligned with the pessimistic or doomer view. It is undoubtedly ominous the burden of overpopulation, climate change, ecosystem degradation, species extinction, resource depletion etc. I am of the mind that it is at this point inevitable that these factors have created a state called "overshoot" and that population reduction or decimation is forthcoming. Now, is their a light at the end of the tunnel. After we are reduced in numbers significantly can we still maintain a viable culture or civilization. Well, my opinion is probably not because of climate change or warming. I will hesitantly offer the notion that perhaps their are extraterrestrial beings who may intervene for our benefit. But for the sake of discussion ignore that possibility and consider what scenarios seem most likely for our future. Thanks.

[Kylon]

Personally, I'm of the opinion that with the proper leadership, and mass changes in human behavior, combined with the application of certain technologies, humanity could end up in a better situation than we have been in the past.

However, I don't think that is likely. Due to human nature being what it is, I think we will enter a dark future of mass civil unrest, dieoff, starvation, hoarding by the power elites of society, as well as entering a more neofeudal way of operation.

Put it simply, I think due to human nature, and human corruption, our future is going to be close to hell on Earth.

It would take a level of co-operation not seen in a single period of the whole human race to pull off the more utopian kind of world. The power elites would also have to be willing to allow people from the bottom of society the opportunity to become more powerful if they solved the problems.

The simple plan goes like this-

The whole world gets together to work on creating a fusion reactor technology that can both produce surplus energy, and via application of stronger magnetic fields, create elements up to iron(after that binding energy requirements make fusion unfeasible from an energy standpoint).

The governments don't simply create a massive blackhole where a small number of well paid beaurcrats and academics work on the project (and who have a vested interest in NEVER FINISHING as they would have to do something else(in other words lose their job)). Instead that have their projects, but they break the problem of creating a fusion reactor into a large number of smaller problems, and crowdsource the problem out. If you happen to come up with the idea for solving a particular problem, and you can demonstrate that the idea works to solve that particular aspect of the fusion reactor problem, then you either get a percentage of future revenues of the application of fusion technology, or a massive lump sum cash prize.

Basically you create a massive incentive for communities, individuals, families, groups, nations to all work on creating solutions to various aspects of the problem. You tap the collective creativity of 7 billion people, the greatest strength that we as a species have.

If the incentives were large enough, I'm sure you would also get a large number of private contractors, and private entrepreneurs working on the project as well.

If crowdsourcing became a common method of governments solving technical problems related to resource generation for a large enough period of time, then eventually there would be firms that would come into existence, that would take a mere idea(so long as it can be backed by math and physics or related scientific calculations), and explore it a little, invest in it experimentally, and then if that worked scale up more research on this, leading to the ability to use the creative output of a far larger number of people. This would be backed up with financial firms who would finance them, and facilitate the whole operation and eventually get it to the government, take a percentage for themselves, and help solve the problem.

The downside of this, from the power elites standpoint, is that someone from a different culture, from a different class, with different interest, political, social, and economic than their own, would suddenly become wealthy and powerful. This would, inherently create a threat to their power. The easiest solution for them (in the short run, but not the long run), would be to instead of crowdsourcing solutions to problems, and thus making everyone wealthier, to increase oppression, abuse and control. To use war, violence, and survelliance, to control the fewer resources that remain, in order to bolster their own power. Because if they killed off 6.5 billion people, there would be plenty of resources available to keep everything going (for them) far into the future.

So you would require the power elites to put aside their own interest in the interest of humanity. From my understanding of history, they have never done that in any large society where it wasn't beneficial to them.

So my belief is that although it's possible for humanity to live in a better world, we will not, because of human nature. Instead we will have hell on Earth. A world deprived of the basic necessities of life, and the things that bring joy and comfort. We will have more war, more oppression, more abuse from those with power. We will have more survelliance, more control, rationing combined with the corrupt allocation of those rations to people who do not produce, but who are well connected, and who reinforce the control of whichever group of people happens to be in control of whichever country, civilization, state, city, or territory.

And since the disease of human nature is universal to humans, even when revolutions and uprisings occur and succeed, the people who get in power will be just as corrupt, but instead will service a different group of people (their connected friends, flunkies and subordinates will drain the populations and the Earth's resources, instead of the group just displaced). The people who work and produce will still be oppressed as before, just with new masters.

This is why I have a dark view of the future.

[KaiserJeep]

All philosophies of life aside, there are presently more than 7.3 Billion people on the Earth, the rate of population increase is itself increasing, and there really is no telling when or if the overshoot population will stop increasing.

The consequences of the overshoot population are that a mass extinction of plant and animal species is occurring as mankind spreads over the globe. The Ecology gets more and more broken links every day, and the rate of extinctions is increasing still.

I do not personally believe that Climate Change is near as serious as will be the depletion of cheap and available Fossil Fuels. The overshoot population without cheap energy will not have enough clean water, food, or space heating.

There is approaching a population peak followed by a rapid human die-off. The exponential nature of the population curve means that when the die-off happens, more people die than have occupied the Earth throughout History. This event will scar the human psyche and shape the squalid and unhealthy world that remains - if indeed there ARE any human survivors.

The oft-expressed opinion around this Forum: "We have to get smarter and behave differently" is a fool's opinion. Mankind the species will not significantly change except extremely slowly over millenia due to evolutionary forces. But we don't have millenia, we have decades.

[ROCKMAN]

“I do not personally believe that Climate Change is near as serious as will be the depletion of cheap and available Fossil Fuels. The overshoot population without cheap energy will not have enough clean water, food, or space heating.” IOW life won’t be much different than it has been for centuries? LOL Consider the 100+ million who have died in the last 100 years as a result of armed conflicts. Granted it isn’t as simple as pointing to resource limitations as the sole cause but one cannot ignore that much of the expansionism was driven by resource acquisition. Resources that have become more difficult/expensive to attain while demand, thanks to population growth, has boomed.

Folks seem to worry a lot more about folks living in low lying areas being displaced over a period of decades vs. the many thousands currently dying over resource driven territorial disputes. Again, other factors then resource completion but that component still ranks significantly IMHO. And will loom even larger as many of the have-nots struggle to join the club of the haves.

[Newfie]

Yes the future looks bleak.

The exact trajectory of decline is impossible to predict, as noted in The Limits to Growth. Some sectors may do well for a long time, most will not.

The only advice I have for preparation is to stress flexibility and resilience, and pray.

[Ibon]

Be a mentor to your core inner circle of friends and family whereby you communicate very clearly that within the context of dodging consequences one can still have a fulfilling life.

Mice wake up and still go about their merry way in spite of the mink, cat, hawk and snake.

Learn to do the same.

[onlooker]

Thanks Ibon for the reply to my post. Certainly great challenges await but is that not part of existence and has it not always been so. Besides does it not make existence all the more interesting and motivating. I plan to do so, as long as those critters do not bother me.

[dohboi]

"the rate of population increase is itself increasing"
Evidence?



I think it is telling that, whether it is ETs or fusion, we tend to look for some deus ex machina to magically extract us from our multiple predicaments.

On one level, the answer is stunningly simple--start living within our ecological limits and stop having kids (or not more than one kid per couple on average, and not till the mother is at least 30 years old).

The first one most humans have managed to do through most of the existence of the species, so why shouldn't we be able to? The second would ideally be brought about mostly through female empowerment and education.

So...stunningly simple.

But almost certainly impossible.

Sad, really.

Classic monkey trap.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UTX7Cxq8aGc

[Timo]

The future of this planet is defined a whole lot more than just by resource depletion and the conflicts for the remains. Climate chane will magnify those events 10 fold. Climate change will disrupt our entire agricultural system, leading to untold famine.Climate change will condense our populations, thus leading to an increase the rates of disease. Climate change will make a significant portion of this planet uninhabitable by humans, thus leading to armed conflict by humanity for what lands are available for habitation. Ditto for water, and every other natural requisite resource for survival. Climate change will release the inhumanity in humanity, and our darkest instincts will dictate our behaviors. The lack of resources will prevent human navigation across the planet according to current means. This will create smaller areas of humanity, each living by their own seperate code of conduct. Some will be more human than others. Some will bear no resemblance to humanity, at all. There will be a population correction on this planet, but the damage currently being leveled against our planet will be devestating, and will preclude any return to our current civilized state for several millenia. Humans will be forced to evolve to a new environment. Humans could even evolve into an entirely different species.

Here's hoping for an early exit from that future.

[onlooker]

Thanks Timo and Dohboi for those thoughtful replies. I would add that the level of ongoing degradation of nature is such that we are already seeing untimely deaths from precisely this situation. Whether it is violent conflict over scarce resources, lack of proper hygiene , food or medical care, respiratory illnesses from poor air quality hastening death of elder people or poor nutrition as catalyst for early infant deaths across the planet albeit mostly in poorer areas we are already seeing culling of the herd. However as others have pointed out the coup de grace will certainly be the combination of scarcity of fossil fuels and climate change.

[RepublicanfromEngland]

When I had learnt of this energy crisis subject about seven years ago, I had the SETI software installed, I had imagined the idea of extraterrestrial contact.

I'm notsure where to stand on this subject, so far I'm looking forward to America's cotinuing space program, personnel as well as non personnel missions such as the Mars Science Labortary, and the Mars Atmosphere volatile Evolution mission which just pulled into oribit last weekend.

Great stuff, should be exciting the results ahead in the weeks, months.

It isn't all doom, we might just find out that we weren't the only planet to of supported life in the solar system, we just happened to be much more lucky than anywhere else. Having had the MSL rover giving the proof that Mars could of supported life in the first billion years of the history of that world gives perspective on us.

[dohboi]

"we just happened to be much more lucky than anywhere else"

[onlooker]

haha, too bad that for about 10,000 years or so we have been squandering our "luck" or blessings so that I am not sure at this moment in time too many people feel too fortunate to live on this planet!

[rdberg1957]

I don't think it's a competition between climate change and resource depletion for the prize of most responsible for negative consequences. I am pretty sure that the interaction between climate change, resource depletion, habitat destruction, and population growth will amplify each factor. Peak oil means more pressure to use coal. Adaptation to climate change will require more energy use (heating, cooling, shoring up cities, moving populations). Increased population means more pressure on resources. Destruction of ocean life may change composition of atmosphere. I worry about how long we will be able to keep our atmosphere. I don't know what it would take for the atmosphere to be taken by the solar wind, but we are on track to find out. My wish is that we would cooperate to find a way to step back from the precipice. My hope is that we will be wiped out as a species before we make the planet uninhabitable for all life. At least if we go extinct, other species may rise to replace us.

[dohboi]

"Peak oil means more pressure to use coal"

Good point. One of the first uses of oil was in coal mines, and its likely to be one of its last.

[Graeme]

8 Surprising, Depressing, and Hopeful Findings From Global Survey of Environmental Attitudes

The latest Greendex survey, conducted by the National Geographic Society (NGS) and the research consulting firm GlobeScan, shows that although consumers in many countries are adopting environmentally friendly behaviors, others live in wasteful cultures of consumption.

"There's a sort of stagnation," says GlobeScan's Eric Whan. "There's a planetary revolution that needs to happen."

The 2014 online survey of 18,000 people in 18 countries gauged environmental attitudes and habits—and their sustainability—when it came to housing, transportation, food, and consumer goods. The first survey, released in 2008, included 14 countries. The latest survey, the fifth, includes consumers in Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, Great Britain, Hungary, India, Japan, Mexico, Russia, Spain, South Korea, Sweden, the United States and, for the first time, South Africa.

The survey had questions on 65 topics. Respondents were asked things such as how important it was to own a luxury car or big house, whether they used disposable household products rather than things they needed to wash and reuse, whether it was important to know where their food was produced, and whether they kept the thermostat low to save energy.

Some major takeaways:

1. Some consumer behavior is improving.

In half the countries surveyed—Argentina, Australia, Great Britain, Hungary, India, Mexico, Russia, Sweden, and South Korea—people acted in more environmentally friendly ways than they had in 2012. For example, Russians are using more public transportation, and British consumers are buying more green electricity.

But five countries—Canada, China, Germany, Japan, and the United States—reported that people's habits were less sustainable than in the previous survey. Sixty-eight percent of Germans drink bottled water daily, and Canadians are among the most likely to own at least two cars or trucks.

2. Anxiety about the environment is growing.

nationalgeographic

[Keith_McClary]

World wildlife populations halved in 40 years

The global loss of species is even worse than previously thought, the London Zoological Society (ZSL) says in its new Living Planet Index.

The report suggests populations have halved in 40 years, as new methodology gives more alarming results than in a report two years ago.

The report says populations of mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians and fish have declined by an average of 52%.

Populations of freshwater species have suffered an even worse fall of 76%.