9 possible catastrophes that can destroy humanity forever

2024 Author: Malcolm Clapton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:44

If people die, it is most likely through their own fault.

Natural disasters

Mass extinctions have happened on our planet more than once. Various natural disasters can almost completely destroy life on Earth.

The possible scenarios are ranked from less expected to more likely.

1. Powerful bursts of radiation on nearby stars

It is known that gamma-ray bursts can occur on supernovae - large-scale emissions of radioactive radiation that is destructive for living organisms, which the atmospheres of the planets will not stop. Such outbreaks are capable of destroying all life within the entire galaxy.

In addition to radiation, they can cause a chemical reaction in the upper atmosphere. The result is a large amount of nitrogen dioxide. Gas is capable of destroying a significant part of the ozone layer, which protects us from cosmic radiation.

And nitrogen dioxide will change the atmosphere for the worse. This reddish-brown gas with an unpleasant odor is dangerous not only because of its high toxicity, but also because of its opacity. It will block the flow of sunlight, which will lead to a cold snap and the extinction of living organisms that did not die before.

One good thing is that no such stars have yet been found in our galaxy and nearby. And the Sun will not die soon.

2. Consequences of a large-scale volcanic eruption

Volcanoes can cause earthquakes, destroy nearby settlements, and interfere with aircraft. But only the largest can lead to a large-scale catastrophe that will destroy humanity. They are called supervolcanoes - the most powerful on Earth.

Here's an example to help assess the scale of the destruction: The size of the Yellowstone Volcano Basin is approximately 45 by 70 kilometers. Imagine the kind of eruption that had to take place to form such a hole!

The supervolcano releases lava that spreads for tens of kilometers and creates large-scale earthquakes and tsunamis. It also throws vortices of hot gases and stones into the atmosphere that can strike at a distance of thousands of kilometers, and also generates up to thousands of cubic kilometers of dust and ash. The latter will not only settle in the lungs of those who are still alive, but will also hang in the air, blocking the sunlight. Such a veil will not disappear quickly. Temperatures will drop across the planet and a volcanic winter will come.

The lack of sunlight and heat, as well as the ash settling on the ground, will destroy many plants and animals. People will have a hard time too. And not only because of the onset of cold weather: the volcanic winter will cause severe crop failures and loss of livestock.

Fortunately, supervolcanic eruptions occur about once every 50 thousand years. The latter happened about 26,500 years ago and formed Lake Taupo. It is the largest in New Zealand, with an area of 623 km².

However, this does not mean that the next such event will not take place soon. Seismologists have no reliable way to predict the eruption of a supervolcano. And if it starts, humanity will only have a few weeks to get ready.

3. The fall of a large asteroid or comet

Such events are called impact events. They can be destructive because they cause fires, earthquakes and tsunamis, and they release huge amounts of dust, ash and chemical compounds into the atmosphere. As a result, just like during volcanic eruptions, the temperature will drop dramatically.

Scientists have no consensus on how large a "gift" from space should be to lead to the mass extinction of people. Most likely, an asteroid or comet with a diameter of 10 km or more is sufficient. At least about this size was a boulder that fell 66 million years ago on the Yucatan Peninsula in Mexico and left behind a crater 150 kilometers in diameter. According to a popular scientific hypothesis, it was because of this incident that the dinosaurs became extinct.

A space object with a smaller diameter (up to 1 km) can lead to great destruction, but civilization, most likely, will not be destroyed.

In order not to miss the threat from space, scientists are collecting information about near-earth objects - those whose orbit passes near the earth: up to 7, 6 million km from the orbit of our planet. The choice of such a wide range is due to the fact that the trajectory of asteroids and comets can be predicted only with a very large error. This is because they are influenced by the gravity of various space objects: the Sun, Earth and other planets, as well as the Moon and asteroids.

In the next 100 years, only 17 out of 1,265 near-Earth objects will come close to us. None of them exceed 1 km in diameter.

Larger asteroids can easily be seen tens of millions of kilometers away. Astronomers can know about their approach in five to six years.

The bad news is that a potentially dangerous object will not necessarily fly in low-earth orbit and we may not notice it in time. And protection measures do not exist at all: only hypothetical projects, the preparation of which will take 5-10 years. So Bruce Willis with a drilling rig and a nuclear warhead is unlikely to save us all.

Moreover, the methods that are being developed by NASA do not involve drilling, explosions, or Bruce Willis.

NASA recently published the first ever test project for a defense system against meteorites, asteroids and comets. The agency will try to crash the DART spacecraft into the asteroid Dimorfos, which orbits another, larger, Didymos. Researchers want to try changing the orbit of Dimorphos by slowing it down. The DART launch should take place from November 24, 2021 to February 15, 2022, and a collision with an object is scheduled for September 26 - October 2, 2022.

Man-made disasters

There is such a project: "Doomsday clock". Their arrows show not the time, but the proximity of mankind to a global catastrophe, which is indicated by midnight. This metaphor for the fragility of our world was invented by Albert Einstein and the creators of the American atomic bomb. In 2020 and 2021, the Clock for the first time in 73 years of its existence approached the 100 seconds to midnight mark. So scientists seek to draw attention to the destructive consequences of human activities.

Indeed, the chances that we will destroy ourselves, and possibly all living things at the same time, are quite high.

Here are the scenarios the researchers are considering. As in the case of natural disasters, the options are arranged in ascending order of probability.

1. Uncontrolled spread of nano- and biotechnology

While nanotechnology is useful, it can pose many challenges. Theoretically, the appearance of nanorobots is possible, which will recreate themselves and anything else with precision to the atom. And this fast production technology will not necessarily be used for something good. For example, with its help, governments will be able to create weapons. The arms race will accelerate and the world will be even less stable.

Moreover, there is a possibility that the nanorobots themselves will become weapons. For example, a swarm of small devices (smaller than a molecule), which are programmed to destroy enemy equipment and use the resulting materials for self-reproduction. Such an autonomous weapon is also dangerous because it can develop consciousness in itself and begin to devour everything in general.

However, today these theories are very far from reality and are more like science fiction.

Biotechnology can be dangerous too. For example, scientists from Australia inadvertently modified the smallpox virus so that it began to infect both immune-resistant and vaccinated mice.

With the proliferation and cheapening of genetic engineering technologies, such mistakes will be very expensive. For example, the virus can become immune to human vaccines. And the consequences will be unpredictable if he accidentally "gets out" of the laboratory or falls into the wrong hands. For example, to fanatics like members of the Aum Shinrikyo sect (a terrorist organization banned in Russia). They tried to stage biological attacks using anthrax and the Ebola virus.

2. The emergence of artificial intelligence that wants to destroy humanity

Engineers and developers are working to create artificial intelligence. The first successes in this direction have been achieved: programs are already defeating a person in different games.

But machines cannot think yet. This is probably only for now. Artificial intelligence capable of abstract thinking will be able to surpass humans in all areas of life.

And although this opens up great prospects, new threats are also emerging. An AI that knows how to set its own goals does not necessarily want to fulfill our desires. For example, a machine may decide that it knows best how people live and establish its own dictatorship. Or he will even come to the conclusion that a person is superfluous in this world.

However, a more optimistic scenario is also possible here. Thanks to new technologies, people will disappear. But not because we will perish, but because we will move to a new level and it will no longer be possible to call us people in the usual sense of the word. For example, we will expand our capabilities with the help of bionic prostheses and neurointerfaces.

3. Use of weapons of mass destruction

Existing technologies pose no less, if not more, danger.

For example, the massive use of atomic weapons will lead to a nuclear winter. Roughly the same thing will happen as in the case of a supervolcano eruption or a collision with a comet: a lot of dust and ash will rise into the sky, and it will become much colder on Earth.

In addition, new holes will appear in the ozone layer, and radioactive elements will enter the water and air. Because of this, people will contract radiation sickness, even if they survive the bombing.

For the onset of irreparable consequences, only 100 nuclear explosions are enough. All in all, there are nearly 14,000 atomic weapons in the world. Most are in the United States and Russia.

At the same time, a nuclear war can be unleashed over a trifle. After all, people control weapons, and they make mistakes, and equipment sometimes malfunctions. It is no coincidence that the world has already been on the brink of nuclear war several times.

The new era also brings new dangers. For example, control centers are capable of being attacked by hackers. And with the current level of technology, nuclear weapons can be developed by almost any country and even terrorist organizations.

4. Overpopulation of the Earth and depletion of natural resources

According to the UN, 7.7 billion people live on our planet. By 2050, there will be 9.7 billion of us, and by 2100, 11 billion. The planet's population is growing very quickly, and this promises problems.

So, the reserves of the Earth may not be enough to simply feed so many people. For example, agriculture today is largely dependent on resource extraction. Planting and harvesting equipment will not work without fuel, and many of its spare parts cannot be made without oil products. Glass, polyethylene for greenhouses, as well as different types of fertilizers, are also made from fossils.

A shortage of black gold, for example, may arise in the next 100 years. Products will start to rise in price, or even become a rarity. Humanity will face an unprecedented famine.

In addition, the larger the population of the planet, the more it consumes. The amount of electricity, fuel, clothing and household items needed is constantly growing. For all this, non-renewable natural resources are used.

So, only one deforestation together with population growth in 20-40 years can lead to a catastrophic collapse. We will have nothing to eat and nothing to breathe. The probability of surviving in such a situation is less than 10%. And this is just one model that is based on the dynamics of felling.

Of course, these are only rough estimates, but they make you wonder whether it is worth giving up excessive consumption.

The way out can be a more careful attitude to natural resources, limiting agricultural areas and improving its methods, using alternative energy sources.

5. Large-scale pandemics

Population growth has another negative consequence: people begin to live more crowded, which creates favorable conditions for the spread of viruses. The more often they are transmitted, for example from person to person, the more often they multiply, and, accordingly, mutate. As a result, viruses can become more infectious or more resistant to vaccines. This clearly shows the development of the current coronavirus pandemic.

On the other hand, we ourselves are encouraging the spread of diseases. Thus, due to the uncontrolled and often unjustified use of antibiotics, bacteria develop drug resistance. In fact, this makes drugs useless, increases mortality, and makes treatment more expensive.

All this could cause a new pandemic, which will be more destructive and deadly than the current one.

Perhaps the coronavirus has already changed the world and now we will always maintain social distance and wear masks in public places. But this is not enough. To prevent a new tragedy, we need a well-functioning system of prevention and treatment of diseases.

6. Climate change and environmental disasters

People are cutting down forests, building factories, making cars. Because of this, the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is constantly increasing. It traps heat on the surface of the Earth, preventing it from spreading in space.

Over the past 170 years (since the second half of the 19th century), the average temperature on the planet has increased by 1.5 ° C. By 2055, it may grow by another 0.5 ° C. If it increases by 20 ° C, the globe will become uninhabitable.

Although this is still a long way off, scientists are sounding the alarm now. Because of global warming, glaciers are melting, ocean levels are rising, and ecosystems are being destroyed. For example, corals die, which affects all living organisms that live on reefs.

Global warming will negatively affect human life. For example, many parts of the world will become deserts and cannot be used for agriculture. And an impressive part of people will be left without clean drinking water.

Another consequence of the warming is an increase in the number of natural disasters. For example, rising sea levels will increase the number of devastating hurricanes and tsunamis. In addition, the climate will become sharper: it will be colder in winter and hotter in summer.

Production and the associated emissions are hazardous in and of themselves. According to the authors of a study published in The Lancet, about 9 million people die each year due to air pollution. It increases the likelihood of heart disease, strokes, and lung cancer.

World leaders are trying to solve the climate problem at the international level: more than 190 countries have signed the Paris Agreement on the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions. However, while the document looks only as a formality and the negative impact of people on nature does not diminish.

Of course, it is naive to think that humanity will not adapt to climate change. But the main thing is not to be too late.