The Real Apocalypse

[Jackel86]

Never made a topic before, and my constant mulling over of this idea has led me to bring it to the Escapist community as my first attempt.

With all this hubub about 2012 and the "end of the world", I think people may be missing some important details. While the Earth has been around for a long time and is unlikely to be going anywhere, the human race could be nearing it's end sooner than we realize.

Think about population vs. resources. To go from 4 billion humans to 5 billion humans took 17 years or so. It took only 13 years to reach 6 billion. The trend continues exponentially through history. Thus, it could be as little as 30 years from now that we reach 10 billion people on Earth. At that rate, we are far outstripping our resources (land, food, fuel, etc.) at an alarming rate. Food is by far the greatest concern. We are nearing a crossroad, and history has not shown humans to be good at dealing with crises.

What does everyone think? Can humans deal with this when the time comes, or even right now? Any suggestions on how?

(Side note: Unless I'm mistaken, we don't actually know how old our sun is. So it could go red giant on us at any time, putting a quick and decisive end to our species. That seems almost preferable to the above scenario.)

 

[Reaperman Wompa]

We need to limit the number of people and work on either non environment harming food/fuel/houses etc. or we will kill ourselves. We cannot survive with so many people stripping the few resources we have.
In all reality, in my personal opinion, we need only 1 Billion people on this earth, max, and we need those people working to make it more habitable and continue the species in a way that we advance, not stagnate.

And looking at humanity, we are going to die. The poor nations will try to reverse it, while the rich nations will do too little too late. Without some sort of global government that enforces these things we have at max a few hundred years.

 

[Jimmyjames]

I plan on becoming a cannibal and being a nomadic hunter if there's a food shortage. Man will be my target. The most dangerous game.

Or, maybe I'll just hide in my kitchen.

Dunno.

 

[Neo Kojiro]

If push comes to shove, i figure we'll just herd everyone onto huge, apartment complex cities, knock down all the houses, and turn that into farmland. Not to mention, mind you, golf courses, which could certainly be put to better use than some shitty game for rich white males.

Then there's the less likely scenerios or turning deserts into ariable land or encouraging people to not waste nearly as much food as they do, now. I can't count the number of times i've gone to a resteraunt and seen people leave half-full plates behind; makes me want to commit genocide.

 

[rossatdi]

Think about population vs. resources. To go from 4 billion humans to 5 billion humans took 17 years or so. It took only 13 years to reach 6 billion. The trend continues exponentially through history. Thus, it could be as little as 30 years from now that we reach 10 billion people on Earth. At that rate, we are far outstripping our resources (land, food, fuel, etc.) at an alarming rate. Food is by far the greatest concern. We are nearing a crossroad, and history has not shown humans to be good at dealing with crises.

That doesn't necessarily follow:

'The number of Elvis Presley impersonators has reached an all-time record high - there are now at least 85,000 Elvis's around the world, compared to only 170 in 1957 when he died. At this rate of growth, experts predict that by 2019 Elvis impersonators will make up a third of the world population.'

Food is not a major concern globally. Famine is lower than it was 10 years ago. Europe is throwing food away to maintain a market for its farmers. Energy concerns will be removed as soon as nuclear fusion is up and running properly.

Once we have near unlimited energy we can literally make food out of nothing by hot housing crops in green houses with artificial UV. Also desalination becomes easy for water when energy prices drop. The major cause of environmental pollution is fossil fuel burning, which will be rendered obsolete when fusion is generating power.

With fusion energy, the production cost will not increase much, even if large numbers of plants are built. It has been suggested that even 100 times the current energy consumption of the world is possible.

Don't panic, everything will be fine.

 

[Labyrinth]

10,000 BC -
1 Million people
9,500 BC -
2 Million people
9,000 BC -
3 Million people
8,500 BC -
4 Million people
8,000 through 5,000 BC -
5 Million people
4,500 BC -
6 Million people
4,000 BC -
7 Million people
3,500 BC -
10 Million people
3,000 BC -
14 Million people
2,500 BC -
20 Million people
2,000 BC -
27 Million people
1,500 BC -
38 Million people
1,000 BC -
50 Million people
500 BC -
100 Million people
Year 1 AD -
170 Million people
500 AD -
190 Million people
1,000 AD -
254 Million people
1,500 AD -
425 Million people
Year 2,000 AD -
6,080 Million people

And then...

The year 2,010 AD: 6,823 Million people
2,020 AD: 7,518 Million people
2,030 AD: 8,140 Million people
2,040 AD: 8,668 Million people
2,050 AD: 9,104 Million people

Until finally:

2,060 AD: 1.2 Million people...

Thank you, Pain Of Salvation - BE.

 

[Lord Krunk]

I agree. Overpopulation is an issue, and a big reason why the Pope should be silenced.

Overconsumption is a bigger issue though, and if Western Culture keeps going like Western Culture, we're all screwed.
And yet, of course, people will still turn a blind eye to the issue until it's too late, like that hole in the Ozone layer.

 

[Rolling Thunder]

There is no hole in the ozone layer!

And if you want to curb population and consumption, try and encourage India and China to go to war with each other...

 

[SmoothGlover]

Well while we are all so divided by things like religion and political systems theres little to no chance of the level of compliance between nations thats needed to make a change.

Anyway, shouldn't Obama have fixed the planet by now!

 

[RAKais]

Its quite simple, we should stop pussying about waging wars and shit and start developing clean fuel and then the next step is getting our ass off this planet and colonising others, terraforming and shit. The human race is smart, we can surely come up withsomething

EDIT: And the world will not end on 2012. The Mayan calender ends because im sure they could only have a calender that goes so far ahead into the future. It will just reset to 0 and start again.

 

[beddo]

Never made a topic before, and my constant mulling over of this idea has led me to bring it to the Escapist community as my first attempt.

With all this hubub about 2012 and the "end of the world", I think people may be missing some important details. While the Earth has been around for a long time and is unlikely to be going anywhere, the human race could be nearing it's end sooner than we realize.

Think about population vs. resources. To go from 4 billion humans to 5 billion humans took 17 years or so. It took only 13 years to reach 6 billion. The trend continues exponentially through history. Thus, it could be as little as 30 years from now that we reach 10 billion people on Earth. At that rate, we are far outstripping our resources (land, food, fuel, etc.) at an alarming rate. Food is by far the greatest concern. We are nearing a crossroad, and history has not shown humans to be good at dealing with crises.

The world's population is actually much closer to 7 billion. There is no way to be sure if the population will continue to increase exponentially. Throughout Europe many countries have a higher death rate than birth rate. There's no reason the population couldn't begin falling.

What does everyone think? Can humans deal with this when the time comes, or even right now? Any suggestions on how?

Throughout history people have been fixated on some apocalyptic event. Floods, plagues, war, nuclear bombs, mass infertility, asteroids hitting the earth, global warming and so many more. The human race is obsessed with the notion of its own demise.

Yet how often has it happened? Never.

Even if the population did explode the subsequent wars over resources and the lack of resources itself would keep the population size in check. I know that sounds crude and obtuse but it's just the way things are.

(Side note: Unless I'm mistaken, we don't actually know how old our sun is. So it could go red giant on us at any time, putting a quick and decisive end to our species. That seems almost preferable to the above scenario.)

Did you go to school where they don't teach evolution and believe the world is flat!? You are most certainly mistaken, while we don't know exactly how old the Sun is but we have a pretty good idea. The Sun is basically a massive nuclear reactor, it's turning hydrogen into helium. By observing how other stars react and by using computer models we have calculated an approximation of the Sun's life cycle.

In about five billion years the Sun will enter it's Red Dwarf phase, by then it is likely that the human race will no longer be around, if we are then we won't have long to build a ship and get out of the local area.

While it's 'possible' that the Sun could unexpectedly begin its Red Dwarf phase the chances are so unlikely it's irrelevant. It's a bit like the chance that all of the atoms in you body might rearrange and turn you into a giraffe, not impossible but highly unlikely.

 

[beddo]

There is no hole in the ozone layer!

And if you want to curb population and consumption, try and encourage India and China to go to war with each other...

It's not a hole per se but the ozone layer is becoming depleted.

 

[WolfThomas]

There is no hole in the ozone layer!

And if you want to curb population and consumption, try and encourage India and China to go to war with each other...

It's not a hole per se but the ozone layer is becoming depleted.

Actually its refilling slowly. We stopped the large amounts of CFCs. We're still killing the planet, but not that way.

Maybe we actually need a zombielypse to cull pop and reduce emissions...

 

[OurGloriousLeader]

Even if we become so overpopulated that it becomes impossible to feed everyone, that is not the end of the world. We'll just feed as many as we can, and the rest will die, thus leaving us with the perfect amount. I hope I'm one of the fed, mind.

 

[Xvito]

It's very unlikely that all of humanity will die simi... sumyl... At the same time.
So when 99% of all the humans are dead, the others will have plenty to eat

 

[TwistedEllipses]

It's very unlikely that all of humanity will die simi... sumyl... At the same time.
So when 99% of all the humans are dead, the others will have plenty to eat

There was overpopulation in the middle ages and even coupled with bad harvests, plague and war it only killed around 10%...So yes, it won't wipe us out...

 

[Mr. Squirrel]

10,000 BC -
1 Million people
9,500 BC -
2 Million people
9,000 BC -
3 Million people
8,500 BC -
4 Million people
8,000 through 5,000 BC -
5 Million people
4,500 BC -
6 Million people
4,000 BC -
7 Million people
3,500 BC -
10 Million people
3,000 BC -
14 Million people
2,500 BC -
20 Million people
2,000 BC -
27 Million people
1,500 BC -
38 Million people
1,000 BC -
50 Million people
500 BC -
100 Million people
Year 1 AD -
170 Million people
500 AD -
190 Million people
1,000 AD -
254 Million people
1,500 AD -
425 Million people
Year 2,000 AD -
6,080 Million people

And then...

The year 2,010 AD: 6,823 Million people
2,020 AD: 7,518 Million people
2,030 AD: 8,140 Million people
2,040 AD: 8,668 Million people
2,050 AD: 9,104 Million people

Until finally:

2,060 AD: 1.2 Million people...

Thank you, Pain Of Salvation - BE.

Was about to post that myself
It is very fitting here.

 

[L33tsauce_Marty]

If we don't fix it then war will.

 

[Jackel86]

'The number of Elvis Presley impersonators has reached an all-time record high - there are now at least 85,000 Elvis's around the world, compared to only 170 in 1957 when he died. At this rate of growth, experts predict that by 2019 Elvis impersonators will make up a third of the world population.'

The difference is, Elvis gets less popular with time, breeding does not. Between the endless desire for sex in humans, religions that ban birth control, and medicine that extends the lifespan, population growth is far more steady.

Even if we become so overpopulated that it becomes impossible to feed everyone, that is not the end of the world. We'll just feed as many as we can, and the rest will die, thus leaving us with the perfect amount. I hope I'm one of the fed, mind.

The people the world can't possibly feed will not be the only one's to die. Think about it. Do you think the rich and lavish idiots out there will give up their way of living because others are starving? They don't even do that now. So many will starve that could be fed (just like today). Plus, once those levels of starvation reach more industrialized nations where people have become accustomed to eating regularly, there will be worldwide riots/war.

 

[rossatdi]

'The number of Elvis Presley impersonators has reached an all-time record high - there are now at least 85,000 Elvis's around the world, compared to only 170 in 1957 when he died. At this rate of growth, experts predict that by 2019 Elvis impersonators will make up a third of the world population.'

The difference is, Elvis gets less popular with time, breeding does not. Between the endless desire for sex in humans, religions that ban birth control, and medicine that extends the lifespan, population growth is far more steady.

Actually not necessarily true. Birth rates in developed countries have come down massively over the centuries. There is also a strong correlation between a country's wealth and its birth rate.

Prime example is China's. Yes it's artificial but it essentially accelerates a trend in developing countries.

As a society becomes more urban and developed the pressure that lead to the old behavioural defence mechanism of having lots of children to ensure surviving progeny and a supported old age, fall away.

Cost cuts and social changes in contraception can also help combat this.

Overpopulation is far less of a concern than say the energy and environmental crises (caused by the low population, high consumption West).