How do you think the world will end

  • Thread starter Thread starter mrfeathers
  • Start date Start date
Click For Summary

Discussion Overview

The discussion revolves around various speculative scenarios regarding the potential end of the world, focusing primarily on the extinction of the human race and the fate of Earth itself. Participants explore a range of theories, including environmental disasters, nuclear warfare, cosmic events, and fictional scenarios.

Discussion Character

  • Exploratory
  • Debate/contested
  • Conceptual clarification

Main Points Raised

  • Some participants suggest that environmental disasters, such as toxic air and water, could render Earth uninhabitable.
  • Others propose that nuclear holocaust or warfare could lead to human extinction.
  • Several viewpoints express the idea that humanity may self-destruct through its own actions, including warfare and environmental degradation.
  • Some participants speculate about cosmic events, such as the Earth being consumed by the sun or impacted by a meteor.
  • A few contributions introduce fictional or humorous scenarios, including alien invasions and whimsical interpretations of human evolution.
  • There are discussions about the potential for space exploration as a means of survival, though opinions vary on its feasibility.
  • Some participants express a pessimistic view regarding humanity's future, suggesting that a catastrophic event could lead to extinction.
  • Others argue that life may continue in some form, even if human civilization collapses.

Areas of Agreement / Disagreement

Participants do not reach a consensus on the specific causes or likelihood of the world's end, with multiple competing views and uncertainties expressed throughout the discussion.

Contextual Notes

Participants raise various assumptions about the nature of disasters, the role of human agency, and the potential for recovery or continuation of life, but these remain unresolved and depend on differing interpretations of scientific and speculative scenarios.

How do you think the world will end?

  • Warring countries/ terrorists will nuke the world until it is uninhabitable

    Votes: 8 14.5%
  • Angry citizens will create a world-wide free-for-all deathmatch

    Votes: 9 16.4%
  • There will be and environmental disaster

    Votes: 19 34.5%
  • A new disease will come that will wipe out all humans

    Votes: 3 5.5%
  • We desert planet earth

    Votes: 7 12.7%
  • The air and water becomes so toxic that it is uninhabitable

    Votes: 9 16.4%

  • Total voters
    55
mrfeathers
Messages
6
Reaction score
0
simple question, but i know i probably left out a few scientific reasons, so post them!
 
Physics news on Phys.org
free for all death match!
 
Do you mean how will the Human Race end or the actual earth?
 
I think he means human race because a nuclear holocaust's results would be nothing compared to some of the stages hte Earth has been through in its life-time.
 
human race
 
There will be and environmental disaster
The air and water becomes so toxic that it is uninhabitable

These two seem closely related.
 
Just reading through the options I'm dying for a free for all deathmatch, but Penguino beat me to it with his enthusiasm. Like a real life game of Quake or UT, last man standing. I'm so there. Lock and load, Penguino. One day.. Now I must fantasise about the inevitable apocolapyse. Rock on!
 
The Earth gets sucked into the sun?
 
world will expand as much as possible and then a big explosion will happen again!who knows maybe sth like big bang would happen again and again ...
and a new world will come into existence!
 
  • #10
The Sith Empire will invade us and turn all humans into slaves and use us as fodder against the galactic republic
 
  • #11
I don't think we'll make it. How so pessimistic that is and I'm usually so optimistic. You read stories about what man will do in the distant future, you know, like when the sun becomes a red-giant. Are they kidding? There won't be any humans around when that happens. We're all a part of one grand genetic lineage that ebbs and flows like a wondering river. We'll take our place for a moment and the next act will follow.

Some catastrophe will wipe us out, an extinction like so many before us. We solve differential equations in here about population growth and note that when the population drops to a certain level, it does not rebound but rather tends to extinction. So if such a catastrophe does occur and fails to wipe us all out, it may drop the number below a threshold that we cannot recover from.

Suppose though space exploration and colonization is an avenue for escape.
 
  • #12
saltydog said:
I don't think we'll make it. How so pessimistic that is and I'm usually so optimistic. You read stories about what man will do in the distant future, you know, like when the sun becomes a red-giant. Are they kidding? There won't be any humans around when that happens. We're all a part of one grand genetic lineage that ebbs and flows like a wondering river. We'll take our place for a moment and the next act will follow.

Some catastrophe will wipe us out, an extinction like so many before us. We solve differential equations in here about population growth and note that when the population drops to a certain level, it does not rebound but rather tends to extinction. So if such a catastrophe does occur and fails to wipe us all out, it may drop the number below a threshold that we cannot recover from.

Suppose though space exploration and colonization is an avenue for escape.

There is another possibility. (Maybe?)
Depending where we are in the area of genetic research when/if such an event occurs, we may be able to rebound from it and end up with a stronger, more advanced population. Of course, it would depend on the catastrophe. A large enough meteor, nuclear winter, climate change, or plague would present different problems. A plague would probably be the easiest to overcome; since it wouldn't change the environment.
 
  • #13
By environmental disaster, do you mean any disaster (human caused included), or those beyond our control? Would human induced global warming with catastrophic effects such as flooding due to the melting of polar ice caps be under environmental disaster or the last option with the air and water being toxic (presumably due to our own waste output)?
 
  • #14
Global warming will melt the polar ice caps enough to throw us into a quick ice age. Countries will wage war against each other for survival which will ensure the world wide use of nuclear weapons ending total human life on earth. Many years later the world will come out of the ice age, the Earth will heal itself and nature will continue on. Millions of years later something or someone will be studying our remains trying to figure out how we died off so quickly, just as we do with the dinosaurs.
 
  • #15
Heh, myngoblin do you believe life is inherently self-destructive then?
 
  • #16
humans are already killing each other... so i guess... like the giants in harry potter... we will be our own doom... whether it is nuclear warfare, man against man deathmatch, environmental disaster (global warming, ozone depletion whatever), new diseases (what with all the mutation... it's not unlikely), or whatever... humans will make humans extinct like we have many other species...
 
  • #17
The sun is turning into a white dwarf, a black hole will suck the galaxy, the final version of the string theory will help us fleeing..
 
  • #18
I think human life, and much animal life, will end when we've simply buggered up the environment enough. Either that or a comet or meteor or whatever does for us what it did for the dinosauruses. Enough humans would probably survive a nuclear disaster to maintain the race. Someone would win the death match, and so survive. If that was a woman pregnant with twins then, while we may get a bit stupider, we may well carry on for a bit longer. There's always someone immune to something, so I doubt disease will do it. And deserting planet Earth won't end human life, just human life on Earth.
 
  • #19
It won't end.

We will keep it going until the universe is petering out, and by then we will have
figured out how to start new universes.
 
  • #20
I think it is most likely humanity will eliminate itself by using our own weapons. The threat of nuclear weapons is ever present and could be catastrophic in the wrong hands(anybodys hands for that matter). Biological weapons created in the labs of rogue terrorist groups could be used to kill millions of people at a time.

Humans seem to be more likely to use their intelligence for some destructive purpose than good. This has been demonstrated throughout history as ever more destructive weapons have been developed for the sole purpose of killing more and more people.
 
Last edited:
  • #21
other

God will turn humans into armless and legless blobs of flesh because we don't use our arms and legs for anything other than working out and looking good:!) . Then we'll be known throughout the gallaxy as slugs. Soon, we'll develop a slime trail and will no longer be able to drink beer or use salt on our fries. Watch for it. :rolleyes:
 
Last edited:
  • #22
I think we will die from a nuclear halocaust. It would only take one bomb to start a nuclear war, and there is no theoretical limit to how big a nuclear weapon can be :bugeye:
 
  • #23
Why can't I pick more than one of the choices? :mad:
 
  • #24
I don't much care which of the options actually occurs as long as I'm not sung to death by Barry Manilow! THAT would be TORTURE! :smile: :smile: :smile:
 
  • #25
I think it will be one of the following:

1). A meteor or comet impact
2). Supervolcano
3). Giant space guppy eats planet
 
  • #26
I think the best explanation was given by the late Douglas Adams. The Earth will be destroyed by alliens for the pourpes of building a hiperspace bypass .
 
  • #27
Antiphon said:
It won't end.

And neither will The Simpsons. :cool:

"...And on the pedestal these words appear:
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings,
Look on my Works ye Mighty, and despair!
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away."
-Shelley
 
  • #28
The universe will end at the Coming of the Great Handkerchief.
 
  • #29
Sun will grow to red giant -- the end.
 
  • #30
This kind of question is all to common
 

Similar threads

Replies
7
Views
2K
  • · Replies 69 ·
3
Replies
69
Views
8K
  • · Replies 17 ·
Replies
17
Views
2K
  • · Replies 14 ·
Replies
14
Views
3K
  • · Replies 16 ·
Replies
16
Views
2K
  • · Replies 10 ·
Replies
10
Views
3K
  • · Replies 1 ·
Replies
1
Views
324
  • · Replies 8 ·
Replies
8
Views
2K
  • · Replies 9 ·
Replies
9
Views
2K
Replies
15
Views
5K