Is humanity doomed?

[Noone From Nowhere]

Maybe it will be doomed someday but it likely won't be for a while yet. By then, there might already be some other sapient species ready to help humanity out of its dillema (or to take its place), so it's no big deal, at least it shouldn't concern you too much.

Our species has survived all manner of natural disasters up until this point, so we probably don't need to bail out of planet Earth just because something nasty looms on the horizon. More importantly, where would we go, anyway? Earth is the only planet capable of supporting human life that we know of, being the place where Humanity is from as it is. It would be a lot more work to terraform some other planet or find another 'M-Class' planet than it would be to restore this planet to proper working order.

As for Peak Oil, we'd all just have to use other fuel sources then scale back for a bit. Cooking oil can be used in modified combustion engines. We could all probably use hamsters on exercise wheels to supplement the rest. Be creative!

[HEADING=2]No it isn't, and everyone who says otherwise is a Nietzsche Wannabe.[/HEADING]

We always managed to find our way out of the fuck-ups, because there were resolute and resourceful people among us. Some are here right now - just let them do their job properly. It'd take something really big (cosmic scale) to really "doom" the humanity.

And fossil fuels are an idiotic idea anyway - to paraphrase Mendeleev, i'd rather fuel my car with cash. Better solutions are on the way right now.

[HEADING=3]I'm so gonna get flamed and insulted for not hating Life and Universe and everything else.[/HEADING]

Thank you. People forget that humanity has overcome many serious problems throughout history. we aren't dumb enough to let our current crisis be the end of us.

I believe that the only thing that could truly doom the human race is something beyond our power.

Both of you dolts seem to forget we've almost been killed off as a species at least 3 times as a species, and survived by sheer luck.

I'm not forgetting it, I'm disregarding it. That's a pretty big difference. Humans in the past didn't have the technology that they have access to now and plenty diseases that wiped out empires have been wiped out themselves. Disasters that took cnturies to recover from, if at all, now only take years. Who is to say how far that technology will advance before such an extinction/threatening event occurs again?
We're also much more populous as a species as we've ever been. Thank modern medicine for that!

I'm not arrogantly declaring Humanity's invincibility, I'm just not selling humans as short as you seem to be.

 

[Internet Kraken]

Both of you dolts seem to forget we've almost been killed off as a species at least 3 times as a species, and survived by sheer luck.

First of all, don't insult other people. It makes it harder for me to care about your opinion.

Second, read my post again. Notice how I said that the only thing that could kill the human race is "beyond our power". I am mainly talking about catastrophic natural disasters, which we have little control over. These could wipe out our entire species, especially if these disasters occur on a global scale.

 

[Vrex360]

Well I don't know if the energy crisis is the main thing but I think it is safe to say that even eventually the human race will have an expiration date. It's something that we kind of have to accept as an inevitability.
That said, humans have done a fairly good job of adapting so far, so odds are they may actually survive through any would be environmental disaster or war.
[sub]However they will not survive ME[/sub]

 

[Poyer]

well, lets just be happy that life is fairly short. So all of these problems will feel small by the time we are about 40 or so.

 

[JWW]

Humanity has always been doomed, no matter how advanced we become.

Despite our flaws, we have a way of implementing technologies only when we need them, because that's how lazy we are. If we need to find a way to survive, we (probably) will.

However, I'll randomly guess that we'll be wiped out around the year 67,894 AD

 

[internetzealot1]

It's kind of hard for me to imagine us not finding a way out of our problems.

 

[TheOnceandFutureKing]

I dont even need to read yours or anyones comments to answer this and yes you are doomed.

 

[Xanadu84]

[HEADING=2]No it isn't, and everyone who says otherwise is a Nietzsche Wannabe.[/HEADING]

We always managed to find our way out of the fuck-ups, because there were resolute and resourceful people among us. Some are here right now - just let them do their job properly. It'd take something really big (cosmic scale) to really "doom" the humanity.

And fossil fuels are an idiotic idea anyway - to paraphrase Mendeleev, i'd rather fuel my car with cash. Better solutions are on the way right now.

[HEADING=3]I'm so gonna get flamed and insulted for not hating Life and Universe and everything else.[/HEADING]

Bravo, sir. These days, it takes courage to go against the grain, and say that maybe were doing alright.

 

[Sindre1]

In Norway we use waterfalls to produce most of our energy.
Then we sell most of our underwater oil and gas to other countries.

Excuse me as I go to count my money while I laugh.

 

[Canadamus Prime]

Well yes eventually, but not for that reason because that's where all those fancy alternative fuel sources come in, like say hydrogen which is the most abundant element in the Universe.

 

[ostro-whiskey]

They are coming up with some pretty awesome modes of transportation that we will probably see more of in the years to come, the most kick ass of which is Magnetic Levitation, which doesnt rely on fossil fuels.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maglev_%28transport%29

 

[Commissar Sae]

Well eventually we'll probably either die off or evolve into a different lifeform. However both those options are in the distant future. Honestly, I don't think were doomed, just kinda slow on the uptake. Maybe the post-human lifeforms will run into trouble, but I'll be long dead and beyond caring at that point.

 

[BonsaiK]

I was watching the road warrior recently (great movie if you havnt seen it ) and i was thinking... what if we run out of fuel to even leave the planet in case we need to do so? we are high past peak oil, and personally, i think this is the beggining times for the ending of all civilization. your thoughts/ feelings/ comments?

History has shown that humans are extremely adaptable. The big mondo apocalypse that takes out the human race simply isn't going to happen.

Don't sweat Peak Oil. It's not that big a deal. Everyone who panics about Peak Oil makes two very wrong assumptions:

1. That nobody sees and wants to fix the problem
2. That people haven't planned ahead

Yes we have a finite supply and yes it is running out. This is a good thing and frankly, the faster oil runs out, the better for everyone (except maybe the oil companies, but even they have seen this coming and planned ahead for this). When we inevitably move to cleaner energy sources, we're actually going to solve two problems at the same time because we'll be pumping out less Co2 as well, slowing global warming.

Oil substitutes grow on trees (literally!). Don't worry. The human race has gotten past bigger problems than this before. Necessity is the mother of invention etc.

 

[Caligulove]

For a time, maybe.

But I think it goes against what it means to be human to say that we would be doomed and put down forever.

 

[BENZOOKA]

We're doing great. There's absolutely nothing to worry.

 

[Firia]

The needs of the people are more important than the needs of the market.

Sadly, the need of the Market is what dictates our collective future direction. If it's not profitable, it's not feasible. Not to say there isn't a drive for the future in some form. Goodness no! There's profit in the future; and the most profit goes to the one that gets there first.

 

[heyheysg]

It's still possible, but we'll need a few more million years

1) Most of humanity dies out
2) Environment is restored
3) Human bones become fossil fuel
4) A few million years later, redevelop technology to leave the planet
5) Use the oil and run!

 

[Nannernade]

We were doomed when McDonalds came into existence.

 

[Space Spoons]

Oh, undoubtedly. If you want to be pedantic about it, every living thing on Earth is doomed- if your definition of doomed is "destined to die".

But seriously, yeah, we're completely screwed [http://www.sodahead.com/world-news/happy-new-year-its-2030/blog-227695/]. As the article outlines, methods to stop our headlong fall into oblivion do exist, and could in fact save us all... That is, if anyone were willing to use these methods. No one is, and so we're doomed.

Sorry if that spoiled your week. Try not to think about it too much.

 

[geldonyetich]

Anyone who thinks we'd devolve into raving lunatics the minute we run short on energy greatly underestimates humankind's capability to adapt.

Granted, once in awhile, we get an indicator that there are those people who are just looking for an opportunity to greedily snatch something the minute society lets its guard down. I like to call those people the "first against the wall" crowd.