The Human Race

[Bijo]

Let us discuss our human race, our being, our history, what will be, and so forth. But what I especially wish to ask is the general big question "Is the human race mature?" Yes or no and explain.

If the human race is immature, is it reasonable to think it will ever reach maturity?

What is maturity?

[Strike For The South]

Why do you worry about pointless stuff?

[Mikeus Caesar]

Why do you worry about pointless stuff?

Because, like me, he has nothing better to do.

It's like asking 'why do you love Texas?'

Well, sort of. You get my drift. Well, i hope you do. I don't.

What?

[rory_20_uk]

Maturity is a relative thing. Without a reference it is not a worthwhile concept.

[English assassin]

What is maturity?

Extinction, and yes, I'd say we have a good chance of acheiving that.

[Odin]

I agree with EA, and better yet I think we are closing in on the end game. I mean how much better is it going to get? Star Trek?

I honestly think the next 50-100 will be petty fief wars for resources. After that we will be kicking in our neibhors doors anyway because there is no food as it will be a 120 everyday.

[English assassin]

I agree with EA, and better yet I think we are closing in on the end game. I mean how much better is it going to get? Star Trek?

I honestly think the next 50-100 will be petty fief wars for resources. After that we will be kicking in our neibhors doors anyway because there is no food as it will be a 120 everyday.

That reminds me, I really must get round to buying that shotgun...

[Odin]

That reminds me, I really must get round to buying that shotgun...

Are you allowed to in the UK?

Seriously, on the anniversary of Katrina here in the states I am reminded of the aftermath of desperation.

Given the rate we are going, I dont think it will be a convential end. It will be slow erosion of society, meyered in small break downs of food distribution, class warfare, yadda yadda.

I dont think its too late to stop that outcome, but in the end we are animals and our instinct for survival trumps most other notions of ethics and morality.

I know you have kids mate, get the shotgun, if I am wrong you can always throw it away later. If I am right about human nature and the future global/climate outcome your going to need it.

Assuming you have food yourself, and arent one of the ones kicking in your neibhors door, but if you are one of them, at least you will be armed.

[rory_20_uk]

I agree with EA, and better yet I think we are closing in on the end game. I mean how much better is it going to get? Star Trek?

I honestly think the next 50-100 will be petty fief wars for resources. After that we will be kicking in our neibhors doors anyway because there is no food as it will be a 120 everyday.

I imagine that apocalyptic pictures have been with us for years. As every Empire ends they tend to extrapolate that the species (or at least we we know it) is going too.

Resources are decreasing, but finally we're making new ways to get existing ones. Sure, solar / wind etc are only 1% of the energy market, but the only reason it's not everywhere is the cost factor.

And food. The number of times we were going to run out is legion. Somehow we always seem to increase production; and in terms of total land usage there's one hell of a lot os spare capacity.

And to assume that we've done everything and been everywhere is extremely arrogant. The rate of innovations is increasing, not decreasing. Surely if we were nearly "there" we'd be running out of things to do, or be running up against more and more insurmountable problems.

[Odin]

Resources are decreasing, but finally we're making new ways to get existing ones. Sure, solar / wind etc are only 1% of the energy market, but the only reason it's not everywhere is the cost factor.

Perhaps, but the reality is that its only 1% (your number) I concede no future is certain, but there are likely scenarios, and your !% figure lends credence to a more dyer one.

Unless of course you see some evidence of India and China (the majority populations) of moving toward alternative fuel sources in 10-20 years?

And food. The number of times we were going to run out is legion. Somehow we always seem to increase production; and in terms of total land usage there's one hell of a lot os spare capacity.

I'll concede on this point and agree, with the cavaet that the land wont be usable if its a 100 degree's daily (not to mention floods, fires and all the other wonderments of global warming symptoms)

And to assume that we've done everything and been everywhere is extremely arrogant.

Now now, you know how pissy I get when members call me names.

The rate of innovations is increasing, not decreasing. Surely if we were nearly "there" we'd be running out of things to do, or be running up against more and more insurmountable problems.

Okay, innovation is increasing. So is resource consumption (you admitted it yourself) yet the undefined element in this discussion is the environmental factors for Humans. Your scenario is rosey, assuming the environment dosent change.

How many died in the floods in the UK this year? How many in paris died from heat 2 years ago? In the states the midwest is underwater again, and fires dot the west coast.

Have you taken the environmental factor into your equation?

[rory_20_uk]

I believe that humanity will survive. This allows for the deaths of billions, the destruction of massive areas of the ecosystem and even the development of enclosed cities as the outside is too toxic for 100's - 1000's years. The envoronment will recover - it has several times before. Species diversity again can either recover naturally or we can give it a prod. With all the carcinogenic pollutants it would be far quicker as a result. After all animals are nesting in Chernobyl - we humans are afraid every time one of us drops dead. Nature plays the numbers game.

Deaths in the floods were less than those who died in DIY. I don't think that DIY is going to ruin the UK either. Deaths in France was mainly the elderly. Again, the fact they are alive is testamony to the success of medicine; their loss is one that society can easily take - and is probably fitter for doing so.

Rosey? Probaby not. But we are adaptable, and as things get worse we will find ways around the problem. Indeed, we get lazy when there isn't a problem to be "fixed".

[English assassin]

Originally Posted by English assassin
That reminds me, I really must get round to buying that shotgun...

Are you allowed to in the UK?

Yes. You need to have a gun safe to store it in, and if your GP says you have mental health issues you'll be barred, but otherwise anyone can have a shotgun certificate for asking. "They" try to create the impression that you can't, but you can. I got one when I applied for my firearms certificate and freely told the rozzer that I had only used a shotgun twice in my life, had no real plans to get one now and nothing I wanted one for, but as it was only a tenner on top of the firearms ticket I thought why not. He said fair enough.

I imagine that apocalyptic pictures have been with us for years.

Two points: just because a prediction has been wrong in the past doesn't mean it will be wrong in the future. Every prediction of collapse is always wrong, until the last one.

Second point: Predictions of collapse have not always been wrong. And I believe collapses have almost always been rather unpleasant.

I find it very hard indeed to see how we will support a population of, what, 8 billion? 10 billion? At what we would regard as an OK standard of living, and without catastrophically turning over basically the whole of the earth to feeding human mouths. IMHO you just have to look at the demographics to see that the world when I die (hopefully not for many years) will be a fundamentally different place to the one I was born in. I wouldn't say Odin's eat the neighbours scenario is likely, but I reckon its a serious chance.

And so does the US government, if their concerns for energy security and exotic military capabilities are any guide. To which I say I wish our government had the cojones to look out for us in the same way.

[Agent Miles]

I think Buckminster Fuller showed how the entire population of the Earth could live comfortably on Haiti if it was organized to the same population density as New York City. It just takes a consensus to make it happen. Of course, other choices short of Star Trek are plausible.
Dyson showed that environments can be constructed in near Earth orbit that could sustain life comfortably. These would be designed so as to spin around an axis to create a centrifugal pull equal to the Earth’s gravity for the inhabitants. All the cities in the western hemisphere were built in the last half millennium. Five hundred years from now, everyone will live in space habitats. In space, the sun can provide limitless energy and one mile-wide iron-nickel asteroid would provide more ore than has been mined in all of history. The technology already exists to do all of this. Provide for ten billion people? How about providing for ten billion times the Earth’s population?
Our species is just a teenager. We haven’t done anything…yet.

[HoreTore]

I think Buckminster Fuller showed how the entire population of the Earth could live comfortably on Haiti if it was organized to the same population density as New York City. It just takes a consensus to make it happen.

He must be high.

Population density of New York City: 10,194/km²

Size of Haiti: 27,560 sq km

Which means that you can fit 280.946.640 people in Haiti using the same density of NYC. And then there is the question of food, goods, etc etc...

[Odin]

He must be high.

Population density of New York City: 10,194/km²

Size of Haiti: 27,560 sq km

Which means that you can fit 280.946.640 people in Haiti using the same density of NYC. And then there is the question of food, goods, etc etc...

Common, your going to ruin it.

Heck we've only just begun as a race !

[Innocentius]

Why do you worry about pointless stuff?

Putting a lot of effort into reinforcing the image of the stereotypical Texan redneck, are we?

[Papewaio]

Pop Quiz:
If half of the worlds population was wiped out, what year would that take us back to in terms of population?

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

1965

If nine-tenths of humanity were wiped out in a zombie-octosquid from outer space plague, what year in terms of human population would we be at?

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Approx 1700 AD

We would have still all the technology and knowledge about our world...

[Strike For The South]

Putting a lot of effort into reinforcing the image of the stereotypical Texan redneck, are we?

I doubt it. Why worry about these lofty questions? You'll never be satisfied with the answer you get never. You will just keep searching and searching until the day you die. The "maturity" of the human race? who cares? Why care? You only have a finite amount of time on earth. You get shot out of the womb and they turn your hourglass over. No one can ever answer the big questions maybe simply becuase there just to big to be answered. Why not just live? Carpe Diem! enjoy the time and make the most of it. Get drunk get laid go to the beach eat allot of food take a walk breathre the air. I mean thats what makes life special not the big questions all you puesdo philosphers think you can figure out on an internet fourm. Its rather silly really. So to answer your question. No Im not I rather think Im smarter than most of you.

[Csargo]

Putting a lot of effort into reinforcing the image of the stereotypical Texan redneck, are we?

[English assassin]

It just takes a consensus to make it happen.

Its funny how people won't believe in catastrophe, which has happened, but do believe in consensus, which never has.

Not to be a nay sayer but space is not a solution to overpopulation until we find some way to get objects with the mass of a human body out the gravity well without burning massive amounts of energy. It really would be a lot easier not to overpopulate in the first place. Failing which starving is also a low tech "solution".

[Agent Miles]

It is because of catastrophes that we will move to space. Mega-tsunamis, super volcanoes and asteroid impacts are a little more than our civilization is equipped to survive. This will drive the consensus. It is a scientific fact that it will always take massive amounts of energy to move a human to orbit. We have yet to mass produce a way to do this. However, this doesn’t mean that we can’t. One plan is to use the Earth’s own atmosphere as fuel. Oxygen would be super-heated by a laser satellite to lift the spacecraft to orbit. The laser is powered by the sunlight and the atmosphere is essentially free. Whatever the cost involved people from Europe originally came to my country as indentured settlers who worked off the price of their journey. Future settlers traveling to orbit may do the same. In two hundred years, six billion people (or less) could “share” an environmentalist police state on Earth, or sixty billion people could live in space habitats.

[Andres]

Here I am, reading this thread, thinking about the (im)maturity of the human race and what happens? I stumble over this gem:

I doubt it. Why worry about these lofty questions? You'll never be satisfied with the answer you get never. You will just keep searching and searching until the day you die. The "maturity" of the human race? who cares? Why care? You only have a finite amount of time on earth. You get shot out of the womb and they turn your hourglass over. No one can ever answer the big questions maybe simply becuase there just to big to be answered. Why not just live? Carpe Diem! enjoy the time and make the most of it. Get drunk get laid go to the beach eat allot of food take a walk breathre the air. I mean thats what makes life special not the big questions all you puesdo philosphers think you can figure out on an internet fourm. Its rather silly really. So to answer your question. No Im not I rather think Im smarter than most of you.

Refreshing thoughts. And what's best: he spoke the truth, the truth and nothing but the truth!

Thanks for brightening up my day SFTS

You have another fan

Now, can someone give this man the HOF award "smartest Orgah" ?

[Strike For The South]

Enlighting minds one at a time

[HoreTore]

Its funny how people won't believe in catastrophe, which has happened, but do believe in consensus, which never has.

Not to be a nay sayer but space is not a solution to overpopulation until we find some way to get objects with the mass of a human body out the gravity well without burning massive amounts of energy. It really would be a lot easier not to overpopulate in the first place. Failing which starving is also a low tech "solution".

I know I'll do my part to avoid more brats coming to this world. Only the final part of it though... The first parts are too fun to give up.

If nine-tenths of humanity were wiped out in a zombie-octosquid from outer space plague, what year in terms of human population would we be at?

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Approx 1700 AD

That settles it, now I'm a zombie-octosquid fanboy for life!

[English assassin]

I know I'll do my part to avoid more brats coming to this world. Only the final part of it though... The first parts are too fun to give up.

Really? Seeing as everyone else is spamming out the brats I decided it was only sensible to do the same. Someone's got to be holding the shotgun when Grandpa E Assassin is too old to aim straight.

[Papewaio]

Thats when you get a blunderbuss... eh sonny speak up! Boom. There, I can't see ya but I can 'ear ya.

[Innocentius]

I doubt it. Why worry about these lofty questions? You'll never be satisfied with the answer you get never. You will just keep searching and searching until the day you die. The "maturity" of the human race? who cares? Why care? You only have a finite amount of time on earth. You get shot out of the womb and they turn your hourglass over. No one can ever answer the big questions maybe simply becuase there just to big to be answered. Why not just live? Carpe Diem! enjoy the time and make the most of it. Get drunk get laid go to the beach eat allot of food take a walk breathre the air. I mean thats what makes life special not the big questions all you puesdo philosphers think you can figure out on an internet fourm. Its rather silly really. So to answer your question. No Im not I rather think Im smarter than most of you.

Wait? Getting drunk, laid and all that is what makes life worth living? HOLY ****, A LIFE CHANGING EXPERIENCE!!1

Just because these are the funniest (and simplest, and most unintelligent) things to do, doesn't mean we should stop caring about the great questions. I consider discussing philosophy and such to be very funny, but that doesn't mean I don't like drinking or taking a walk.
You're a narcissist (apparently... also, did you know of the term or do such things not interest you?) since you hold yourself to be superior to "most of us". I am not blaming you though, since almost everyone is narcissistic in a way, and I hold myself to be a lot smarter than most of you who don't care for knowledge and philosophy. Of course, technically I am smarter since I'm using brain more, and I engage in the same simple means of entertaining myself as you, while at the same time understanding the futility in doing so.

Pseudo philosophers? Is there such a thing? Isn't everyone capable of contemplating about philosophical questions (like why we are here, to pick the most basic one) a philosopher? Philosophy isn't sience, and it's open to everyone who can use their brain really. Your philosophy is Carpe Diem, making you a philosopher.
Also, I consider Carpe Diem to be thorough BS. I'm a nihilist (for what it's worth) and to think getting drunk is in any way preferable to staring into a wall all day long is downright stupid in my eyes. "You are all the same piece of decaying organic material", as Tylder Durden said, so what we do doesn't matter. If you like getting drunk: fine, then do so, but don't tell those who like to contemplate on the big questions to do what you consider to be the proper way of doing things. You have no right to do so, just like I have no right to give you this piece of advice. See my point?

[master of the puppets]

well said Innocentius, the quest for understanding may always be more important then understanding.

Now i say that Global Warming is BS as some of you might know, it has very little supporting proof. My real worry would be in humanity attacking itself, nuclear war. but even if this came to pass humanity has recovered from a population dip to 10,000 members...

ugh, my little brother is sobbing to get onto the computer. i'll finish this post later.

[Bijo]

Well, I could insert a nice story for you, but it seems Innocentius has already mentioned a lot of important things I concur with.

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Quick question: where is that ignore button again?

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What is maturity?

Extinction, [...]

Please explain for I do not yet clearly understand you.


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At the moment my notion of maturity is more or less like the following:
---On the lower levels:
* financial independence
* steady serious properly functioning relationship (if applicable)
* ability to survive and move about business normally in society
* etc.

---On the higher levels:
* intellectual virtue and maturity
* philosophy (knowledge, wisdom, truth, morality, etc.)
* the control of emotions, passions, and desires to prevent conflict and facilitate peace

What say you of it?

[Andres]

What say you of it?

Add self-relativism.