The Human Race – Finished?
Many commentators find it hard to escape the conclusion that the human race is doomed to return to the stone age fairly soon. This is predicted fairly soon – in geological terms, at any rate – maybe in around 500 or 1,000 years time.
What reasons are there for this? Look at the rate we have discovered new fuel and metal sources and progressively burnt them out. In the two hundred years or thereabouts we have been living an industrial lifestyle, most of the planet’s resources have been pillaged. The rate we are burning up the planet’s resources is simply unbelievable.
Before long, all the oil and natural gas reserves will have gone. After that the coal will run out. Even the uranium will eventually be depleted and finished – and that means the lights will finally go out. When that time comes, metals will be severely depleted, and iron will be worth what gold is now.
The only power supplies will be wind, solar and tidal generators -perhaps with some limited geothermal power in a small number of areas. And with no metals to build or maintain them, their lifetime will be limited to a few short years – perhaps a generation or two. Not really a problem, though, as there will be little left to power anyway by then. The seas will probably be a fished-out toxic waste dump by then, so there’s not much hope there either.
The prospects for human life after this point look extremely grim. Essentially we will have burnt the planet out and thrown ourselves back to the Stone Age – except that we won’t even be able to survive at that level of ‘civilisation’. That’s because previously there was an abundance of flints, wood and game to hunt. All that has gone now of course.
We can only try to imagine the grim reality of life at this time – a knife or spade will be worth about twenty or thirty cows by then; food will be whatever you can grub up with your bare hands, or with a piece of expensive wood. There will be no money, only barter with pigs, cows and slaves. For as we sink back down into a Neanderthal existence once more, from which there can never ever be any escape, all the vile old ways will return. Men will once again become animals.
The shortage of food will result in cannibalism, until the population has shrunk back down to the size that can be supported without any technology. Cannibalism will probably be widespread, since without any technology to produce and distribute food, the population will have to shrink down to a fraction of the current numbers, and until that happens hunger will be universal. As the shortages begin to bite, starvation and disease will reduce the earth’s population to around 5 percent of the present number. The earth’s human population will be much larger than now when all this occurs, so that around 99 percent will die.
We should also note that those countries with higher levels of technology will be hardest hit. It is probable that rural regions in third-world countries will not see much change, and will carry on as normal. The most advanced countries will experience a return to a pre-Stone Age existence since we have removed all the resources that enabled even a Stone Age lifestyle. Therefore life in the US and UK for example will resemble that in rural Burma now. This viewpoint should not be controversial since no one can suggest any realistic alternative.
And don’t forget there is no way out – ever.
No transport, no metals, no power, no industry, no energy, no plastics – and that means no medical care of any kind. No antibiotics, no surgeons, no survival if you fall ill.
A Neanderthal lifestyle of an animal quality is the only option then, as timber, game and flints no longer exist. It seems possible though that after life in the West has virtually died out, that in remote areas of places like Brazil might remain and even flourish. When the toxic urban humanity that chainsaws the trees and bulldozes the land has died out, native tribes – if any remain – should have a brighter future.
Only one escape route is possible here: perhaps by this point in time we might have found a way to make space exploration a viability, so that we can mine the asteroids and planets, to provide resources for vital industries.
And the only vital industry by that time will be space travel research, because the planet will on a short trip to extinction in the near future. The only way out is off – and the only way off is by finding a way to other planetary systems, where we might be able to locate another similar planet.
If we’re lucky. And what’s the betting that will be for some senators, billionaires and a couple of doctors. Maybe a pilot or two of course.
Cutting lumber with Fitzen’s Knives
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