Environment & Energy
Related: About this forumIs a Climate Disaster Inevitable?
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/18/opinion/sunday/is-a-climate-disaster-inevitable.html?_r=0By ADAM FRANK | JAN. 17, 2015
[font size=3]OUR galaxy, the Milky Way, is home to almost 300 billion stars, and over the last decade, astronomers have made a startling discovery almost all those stars have planets. The fact that nearly every pinprick of light you see in the night sky hosts a family of worlds raises a powerful but simple question: Where is everybody? Hundreds of billions of planets translate into a lot of chances for evolving intelligent, technologically sophisticated species. So why dont we see evidence for E.T.s everywhere?
The physicist Enrico Fermi first formulated this question, now called the Fermi paradox, in 1950. But in the intervening decades, humanity has recognized that our own climb up the ladder of technological sophistication comes with a heavy price. From climate change to resource depletion, our evolution into a globe-spanning industrial culture is forcing us through the narrow bottleneck of a sustainability crisis. In the wake of this realization, new and sobering answers to Fermis question now seem possible.
Maybe were not the only ones to hit a sustainability bottleneck. Maybe not everyone maybe no one makes it to the other side.
Since Fermis day, scientists have gained a new perspective on life in its planetary context. From the vantage point of this relatively new field, astrobiology, our current sustainability crisis may be neither politically contingent nor unique, but a natural consequence of laws governing how planets and life of any kind, anywhere, must interact.
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ffr
(22,670 posts)someone said that if we multiply the number of possible conscious species on other worlds, like our own here, who were able to break free of their world's gravitational pull and attempt to further their aims, that they might be just as imperiled as we are and may also self-destruct as we are doing.
So yes, climate disaster is already too far along to prevent some form of sixth mass extinction, but maybe if we leave enough clues behind about how we failed, the next generation of species that learns from our mistakes in 2 - 40 million years might be able to get it right, depending on how far backwards humans set evolution.
tavalon
(27,985 posts)I usually say that Earth will be fine but the bald apes are dead men walking and we will be taking most if not all of the species with us. Luckily, earth measures in epochs, not years.
bananas
(27,509 posts)Climate isn't the only disaster we might encounter, there are now a number of organizations devoted to analyzing existential risks.
Prophet 451
(9,796 posts)Once we were aware of what was happening, the time was already short. And I fear the deniers have done for us.
pscot
(21,024 posts)But it's hard not to see what's coming down if you really look at it. It's written on the wall
GliderGuider
(21,088 posts)Duppers
(28,125 posts)truebrit71
(20,805 posts)... and more importantly, what they learn from it...
hunter
(38,317 posts)Yes, the pessimists are correct, the sky is falling; it simply hasn't fallen on everyone yet.
The Fermi "paradox" doesn't bother me at all. It's only a paradox to people who think humans have some sort of "special" intelligence, or that this universe is in some supernatural way "special." It's simply more creationist blather, but with a "scientific" flavor.
We actually exist in a Very Big Empty. Maybe some sorts of beings we'd recognize as our intellectual siblings make it out into the Big Empty, maybe into places not yet visible to us, but that's just speculation as meaningless as some religious person's vision of "heaven."
My own silly and meaningless speculation would be that if we ever develop the technology to travel among the stars then we'll no longer have any reason to stay in this universe; we'll simply build our own.
Here on earth today I'm fortunate to share the planet with all sorts of intelligent species -- dogs, whales, gorillas, elephants, parrots etc. -- but most humans are too stupid and self-centered to recognize that.
I'm not especially fond of our human species in general because we are so good at killing off the other intelligent species we share this planet with. We are grossly handicapped by our selfish, self-destructive, and frequently idiotic ideologies, religions, and behaviors.
The2ndWheel
(7,947 posts)Obviously we can't know for sure, but we've just found a way around the limits that other species still exist within. Human progress comes at a cost. We wouldn't be where we are today had we not killed off other species. We need the space, we need the resources. It's not about sharing. It's first come first serve.
hunter
(38,317 posts)... most likely because I am human.
But on the scale of the universe, it's nothing.
We humans don't "need" anything more, or anything less, than other social animals do.
To believe otherwise is exactly the kind of "special" I'm talking about.
Such beliefs are nothing more than variations on "Creation Science," merely religions, not any sort of science at all.
Fermi's Paradox is a religious question, yet another version of "How many angels may fit on the point of a needle?"
Just because some math might be involved doesn't make something science.
The2ndWheel
(7,947 posts)We do what every other species does, we've just gotten really good at it. That success, at the same time, is why we have some of the particular environmental issues we have today. We can't escape it. Everything comes with a cost.