[Ironhide]

I came across a sobering article by BBC. The scenario that they paint stands to logic and is scary in its implications. As the smartest (and the most destructive) organism on the planet, are we hurtling unchecked towards self destruction fuelled by unimpeded consumption and population growth?

Here are some sombre excerpts from the article.

Among the many global catastrophic risks known to humans, some are entertained in the media more than the others. Asteroid impacts, supervolcano eruptions and climate change have all received the Hollywood treatment. And each of these have taken a devastating toll on our planet's life in the past. Yet, unknown to many people, a new global threat capable of destroying life itself is brewing in the shadows of our everyday lives. It's driven by the immense human desire for material consumption. And paradoxically it is a consequence of human life itself. Just look around – you are inseparably surrounded by material objects *– whether they are needed in your life or not. For every bit of this material we use, there is a growing web of global actions that is slowly stripping human's emotional health, depleting Earth's resources and degrading our planet's habitats. If left unchecked, is there a risk that human consumption may finally turn the Earth into an uninhabitable world? Do we have it in us to stop before it is too late?
A team of researchers from Weizmann Institute of Sciences, Israel, recently published a study that compared human-made mass – aka anthropogenic mass – with all the living mass, or biomass, on the globe. They revealed that for the first time in human history the former has either surpassed the latter or is close to doing so in coming years.
The Weizmann Institute study estimates that on average, each person on the globe now produces more anthropogenic mass than his or her bodyweight every week. "The finding that anthropogenic mass – human made stuff - now weighs as much as all living things, and the fact that it keeps accumulating rapidly, gives another clear perspective on how humanity is now a major player in shaping the face of the planet," says Professor Ron Milo, whose laboratory conducted this study. "Life on Earth is affected in a major quantitative manner by the actions of humans."

There is an oft repeated quote about the earth. It goes like this - We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors; we borrow it from our children.

If we read the article in its totality and relate to it, we are probably heading towards the edge of a cliff.

There is also something called Earth Overshoot Day. It marks the date when humanity’s demand for ecological resources and services in a given year exceeds what Earth can regenerate in that year. In 2020, it fell on August 22.

Rampant , unchecked consumption also fuels Global Warming. There's an article that postulates that in a few years the earth may already be too hot for human habitation. According to another article on similar lines...

The normal temperature you see reported on weather forecasts is called the “drybulb” temperature. Once that rises above about 35°C, the body must rely on evaporating water (mainly through sweating) to dissipate heat. The “wetbulb” temperature is a measure that includes the chilling effect from evaporation on a thermometer, so it is normally much lower than the drybulb temperature. It indicates how efficiently our sweat-based cooling system can work. Modelling studies had already indicated that wetbulb temperatures could regularly cross 35°C if the world sails past the 2°C warming limit set out in the Paris climate agreement in 2015, with The Persian Gulf, South Asia and North China Plain on the frontline of deadly humid heat.

As a result of the human race's need (a euphemism for greed?) for more, deforestation and forest degradation continue to take place at alarming rates, which contributes significantly to the ongoing loss of biodiversity. Since 1990, it is estimated that 420 million hectares of forest have been lost through conversion to other land uses, although the rate of deforestation has decreased over the past three decades. Between 2015 and 2020, the rate of deforestation was estimated at 10 million hectares per year, down from 16 million hectares per year in the 1990s. The area of primary forest worldwide has decreased by over 80 million hectares since 1990. Here's another old article from National Geographic about how consumerism is fuelling climate change.

Scary.

(Article and Picture Courtesy : Respective Authors / websites.)

[Renjith Rajan]

Human actions have huge impact on our planet and beyond. It may kill many species on earth. But no way humans can end ALL life. Life started in the most unimaginable time on earth and has seen so many extinction events. Yet every time it rebounded, filling almost all ecological niches.

Every species on earth acted selfishly, even the micro organisms that filled our atmosphere with oxygen . But it is the best interest for humans to keep the climate and earth the way it is, inhabitable for us.

[haisaikat]

I fear politics more than regular human act when it comes to being bigger enemy of humans.

Self destruction of life on earth to me is similar to trying to choke myself to death using my own hands. I believe humans have come to a point where they can learn or figure out ways to protect their existence from their own destructive acts, science being on both sides of the table.

The only thing for which I do not see a ready solution is rising water levels on ocean due to glacier melting but how much of that is a natural phenomenon tagged to evolution of our planet and how much due to claimed global warming that I am not certain and do not want to believe every other article on internet.

[TrackDay]

No matter how green we go, we will still end up impacting the planet. With population only rising since the advent of mankind, the only way to instill order is to maintain an order in society by generating jobs and a growing economy. Sadly, no matter what we do it will affect the planet. But no, never can it destroy all life. The very question of the origin of our universe and life is beyond us humans to understand. We are nothing but a tiny speck or dot in the greater sense of things. The video below by google can answer to some extent the impacts of us human beings on the planet.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5W-zPqrGQWA

[Kosfactor]

The humans who are concerned about their own impact on earth are free to leave to Mars or wherever they feel it's appropriate. As long as they don't preach climate nonsense to the poor fellow who is simply trying to make the ends meet, I'm fine.

[V.Narayan]

Topics like this on environment, climate change etc are very dear to my heart. As dear as aircraft. And I consciously waited for a day before responding to test my hypothesis that topics like this, which represent the single biggest threat facing humans, our way of life, mother nature and all we hold dear, do not elicit much of interest on TBHP even though the average age here is of folks in their 30s or 20s. And indeed 24 hours after the thread was opened we have a luke warm response at best, almost cold. Sadly so. 650 reads out of a quarter million unique daily readers. That number screams a lot.

Mother nature on planet Earth in its entirety works in more complex and more inter-dependent ways than we know or can comprehend. Mother nature also has a million ways of curing its self from all kinds of depredations be it a meteor strike or a super gigantic volcanic eruption that blots out the sun for weeks or one organism living on its surface getting too selfish and smart.

Now to address the question of the OP. We humans are not capable of destroying all life on Earth though we are capable of causing very substantial damage to life on Earth and thus to ourselves. Even if we cause severe damage to the climate it will destroy us and repair itself. It might repair itself to a different configuration than what exists today which will then support different life forms. Some like the cockroach might live through it all!! They pre-date the dinosaurs having been around for 350 million years so it is reasonable to expect they'll figure out how to outlive us and our selfishness.

Climate change and the first direct effects on us will be witnessed by many on TBHP in the 2050s or 2060s. Fuddy duddies like me would be gone but this is a real challenge for my children (all in their 20s) and one day for grand children too. Today the chopping of the Amazon forest, the breaking of glaciers in Antarctic all seem too remote but if in a few years, say 10, it starts affecting crops in your own countries that's when the wake up calls will become real.

The Earth can support the 760+ crore humans today and all can be fed well provided we all, especially the top 20%, live our lives with some restraint on consumerism. But as of now I don't know how that will happen. As Kosfactor says this should not be at the expense of the bottom 80% and I concur. While I don't have figures but metaphorically the top 20%, which BTW includes all of us on TBHP (!!!) consume a vastly disproportionate quantum of Earth's resources and create a super vastly disproportionate volume of the waste - liquid, solid and gaseous.

Having said all this I have faith in humankind's ability to course correct in time, usually just in time. And that occurs not because our minds change but because the generation of people alive changes.

[VKumar]

This is a classic case of improper resource utilization. The key question is: Will Humans Destroy All Life on Our Planet? And the answer is a simple 'NO'!

The developed economies have well exhausted their carbon budget, the developing ones are near to it, but none of the two are willing to cut their per-capita carbon emissions, solely because carbon emissions are directly associated with development.

Resources are plenty, and we are instead on a path of recovery compared to where we stood 20 years back. Today also we waste a lot, our per-capita emissions have gone up, but so has the efficiency of usage.

RRR of resource utilization is well under practice now, and the rate of trees being felled is actually coming down now.
R - Reduce
R - Reuse
R - Recycle

30 years back, we were not reusing and recycling, nor were we reducing. Today the e-methods has brought down the use of paper by leaps and bounds, Reusing and Recycling is possible in nearly everything. Although even the recycling also comes coupled with the carbon emissions, but they are still lesser than the fresh manufacture, and also reduce the raw material mining.

Agriculture has become more modern, flood irrigation is lesser being used now, water table depletion is an issue - but one has to pay for over using the resources. Near our village, I know of a group of people who simply want to cut the annual sugarcane production by 10,000 tons (I belong to the super prosperous sugarcane belt), and shift to the crops which require lesser water, and are more profitable.

Overall what I feel is, environmentalists will always make a hue and cry about what all is going wrong, but never present to you the positive side of it. See how every country is targeting the carbon neutrality goals. Although I know that it will come at the cost of a few glaciers till it's achieved, but then it's a slow and gradual process. Even if you park every single vehicle in your house today, then also the global temperature won't come down in probably even a year, because the carbon in atmosphere needs to be sequestrated, and that takes time.

Instead of looking at what all we have done wrong, equally important is to see what all is being done right. Coal fired power plants are being rapidly converted into natural gas fired ones, many gigawatts of solar energy production capability is being added per day. Cars are emitting way lesser than before, household emissions have come down drastically due to adaption of LPG and electric methods. Some people argue that electric vehicles, recycling etc all require energy, but the key point is not the requirement of energy in a process, the key to the solution is the efficiency with which the available energy is being used. If I can cut my emissions by 10 grams per unit by recycling instead of producing fresh, then it's a welcome move. If my electric car is emitting 25 grams of Carbon Dioxide per kilometer via the grid or power plant to produce that energy, instead of generating 50 grams through my IC engine, it is more efficient and less emitting - no two ways about it.

Overall, resources are in plenty, and everyone is now moving in right direction. Probably we have next 15-20 years more of the pain, after which the things will adjust to the new normal, nobody is going to get wiped out is what I say.

To get a perspective of where we are heading, this story says it all. From how they are being treated 20 years back, and then how people listened to them at Paris summit, the change is happening, and will soon reach our doorsteps too:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Lc_dlVrg5M

[condor]

Keep aside all these big actions. Just reduce the bees to sufficiently low numbers and see what happens. This path will be the path of least effort. Wont take too long to upset plant life, food production, and cause mayhem.

[am1m]

Originally Posted by V.Narayan

And indeed 24 hours after the thread was opened we have a luke warm response at best, almost cold. Sadly so.

I think a lot of us (me included) do acknowledge that this is a serious concern, but don't know what to do and how to contribute meaningfully. I don't think I can contribute meaningfully to threads on climate change because: a. Apart from the small things I can do- take public transport, try to consume less, avoid plastic, etc. I don't know what else to do and I'm also painfully aware that most of that doesn't make any real, meaningful difference anyway. b. It would be hypocritical considering the lifestyle I lead!

Most of these discussions unfortunately avoid the elephant in the room- mainly that if we really 'care about the planet', we need to reduce drastically the number of people we keep adding to the planet. The proven way to do that is to educate women as much as possible and to get rid of the "must have x children" mindset that is so ingrained in each of our societies and religions.

Originally Posted by V.Narayan

And that occurs not because our minds change but because the generation of people alive changes.

I wish I could echo your optimism sir, but I see successive generations becoming more trapped in the cycle of consumerism than anything else. I don't blame them, each generation gives to the next generation more than what they had, it is natural. I have a far more explosively consumerist mindset and lifestyle than my parents did, they more than their parents. The kids I see around me start living the "buying/having things=good life" mindset right from the start. So I'm not sure how it ends.

[dragonfire]

For centuries we had been actively trying to eradicate mosquitos with little effect. We tried every trick in the book, spent billions worldwide yet hasn't been able to make even a dent to it's population. If such a conscious effort didn't bring any appreciable result, how would our actions without even an intend going to eradicate ALL life on earth?

[roy_libran]

Originally Posted by am1m

..... we need to reduce drastically the number of people we keep adding to the planet. The proven way to do that is to educate women as much as possible and to get rid of the "must have x children" mindset that is so ingrained in each of our societies and religions.....

Although the above is an established perspective, it is flawed and I believe it is not thought through sufficiently. The real problem is increased longevity, and not increased fertility or reproductive rates! An increase in the latter provides a species with a more productive population that draws lesser resources for just sustenance, whereas an increase in the latter requires a lot more resource consumption to support the prolonged existence.
This increase in longevity at a very rapid pace has happened mainly in the last 80-100 years, through artificial support and because of the way our socio-political environment is nowadays, but it has a lot of ramifications in terms of our overall consumption levels, gene pool quality, and on our misplaced priorities as a society.
As any close observer of other species in nature knows, increased reproductive rates with lesser longevity is ultimately good for both the species as well as the environment. Sadly for us supposedly intelligent humans, this fact is a bit inconvenient to digest.


P.S. I must add, in the context of the Threat Title - Yes I do believe we now have the capability to destroy ALL LIFE on this planet. We, as a species have never had this level of capability in the past, even say 15-20 years back, but now we can. We have everything in our arsenal that we would ever need to turn this entire planet into one huge radioactive desert incapable of supporting even the building blocks of life for the next few thousand years.

[Nav-i-gator]

I read the OP, and was reminded of the following conversation from the movie "The day the Earth stood still" between Professor Barnhardt (an Earthling) and Klaatu (an Alien who came to Earth to wipe out humans and save life).

Professor Barnhardt : There must be alternatives. You must have some technology that could solve our problem.

Klaatu : Your problem is not technology. The problem is you. You lack the will to change.

Professor Barnhardt : Then help us change.

Klaatu : I cannot change your nature. You treat the world as you treat each other.

Professor Barnhardt : But every civilization reaches a crisis point eventually.

Klaatu : Most of them don't make it.

Professor Barnhardt : Yours did. How?

Klaatu : Our sun was dying. We had to evolve in order to survive.

Professor Barnhardt : So it was only when your world was threated with destruction that you became what you are now.

Klaatu : Yes.

Professor Barnhardt : Well that's where we are. You say we're on the brink of destruction and you're right. But it's only on the brink that people find the will to change. Only at the precipice do we evolve. This is our moment. Don't take it from us, we are close to an answer.

[Ironhide]

Originally Posted by TrackDay

No matter how green we go, we will still end up impacting the planet. With population only rising since the advent of mankind, the only way to instill order is to maintain an order in society by generating jobs and a growing economy. Sadly, no matter what we do it will affect the planet. But no, never can it destroy all life. The very question of the origin of our universe and life is beyond us humans to understand. We are nothing but a tiny speck or dot in the greater sense of things. The video below by google can answer to some extent the impacts of us human beings on the planet.

Originally Posted by Kosfactor

The humans who are concerned about their own impact on earth are free to leave to Mars or wherever they feel it's appropriate. As long as they don't preach climate nonsense to the poor fellow who is simply trying to make the ends meet, I'm fine.

While that may be your point of view, and I agree that the 80% or so that you mention - the low income group / low income countries are indeed the ones most impacted by climate change. But if we , supposedly the remaining 20% will not raise a voice , make it visible , discuss then who will?

Originally Posted by V.Narayan

Topics like this on environment, climate change etc are very dear to my heart. As dear as aircraft. And I consciously waited for a day before responding to test my hypothesis that topics like this, which represent the single biggest threat facing humans, our way of life, mother nature and all we hold dear, do not elicit much of interest on TBHP even though the average age here is of folks in their 30s or 20s. And indeed 24 hours after the thread was opened we have a lukewarm response at best, almost cold. Sadly so. 650 reads out of a quarter million unique daily readers. That number screams a lot.
----snip----
While I don't have figures but metaphorically the top 20%, which BTW includes all of us on TBHP (!!!) consume a vastly disproportionate quantum of Earth's resources and create a super vastly disproportionate volume of the waste - liquid, solid and gaseous.

Having said all this I have faith in humankind's ability to course correct in time, usually just in time. And that occurs not because our minds change but because the generation of people alive changes.

Astute observation Sir. Climate change and its impact on our environment isn't something that we take seriously, maybe because it doesn't affect us all that much. Temperatures going up - get the AC to chill a bit more . Crops drying due to drought, reduced soil fertility, pestilence ? Those who can afford it shall just buy it at a higher price at the next supermarket. Unfortunately the ones most impacted do not have that luxury. There is a term called Climate Refugees which shall be a reality in none too distant future. We can be keyboard warriors all we want but only concrete actions on ground shall help in this crisis.

Originally Posted by VKumar

This is a classic case of improper resource utilization. The key question is: Will Humans Destroy All Life on Our Planet? And the answer is a simple 'NO'!


----- snip------


Agriculture has become more modern, flood irrigation is lesser being used now, water table depletion is an issue - but one has to pay for over using the resources. Near our village, I know of a group of people who simply want to cut the annual sugarcane production by 10,000 tons (I belong to the super prosperous sugarcane belt), and shift to the crops which require lesser water, and are more profitable.

Overall what I feel is, environmentalists will always make a hue and cry about what all is going wrong, but never present to you the positive side of it. See how every country is targeting the carbon neutrality goals. Although I know that it will come at the cost of a few glaciers till it's achieved, but then it's a slow and gradual process. Even if you park every single vehicle in your house today, then also the global temperature won't come down in probably even a year, because the carbon in atmosphere needs to be sequestrated, and that takes time.

Instead of looking at what all we have done wrong, equally important is to see what all is being done right. Coal fired power plants are being rapidly converted into natural gas fired ones, many gigawatts of solar energy production capability is being added per day. Cars are emitting way lesser than before, household emissions have come down drastically due to adaption of LPG and electric methods. Some people argue that electric vehicles, recycling etc all require energy, but the key point is not the requirement of energy in a process, the key to the solution is the efficiency with which the available energy is being used. If I can cut my emissions by 10 grams per unit by recycling instead of producing fresh, then it's a welcome move. If my electric car is emitting 25 grams of Carbon Dioxide per kilometer via the grid or power plant to produce that energy, instead of generating 50 grams through my IC engine, it is more efficient and less emitting - no two ways about it.

Overall, resources are in plenty, and everyone is now moving in right direction. Probably we have next 15-20 years more of the pain, after which the things will adjust to the new normal, nobody is going to get wiped out is what I say.

To get a perspective of where we are heading, this story says it all. From how they are being treated 20 years back, and then how people listened to them at Paris summit, the change is happening, and will soon reach our doorsteps too

The positive changes are great and indeed need to be applauded. But they are not nearly enough. I don't wish to sound pessimistic, but the rate at which we are cutting down our forests - whether for Palm Oil production or for cultivation, or simply for making space for livestock for dairy / meat is scary. Here's a timelapse video about the rate at which we're aiding in rampant deforestation - forests that took hundred of years to grow. To paraphrase WWF .

We depend on forests for our survival, from the air we breathe to the wood we use. Besides providing habitats for animals and livelihoods for humans, forests also offer watershed protection, prevent soil erosion and mitigate climate change. Yet, despite our dependence on forests, we are still allowing them to disappear. Looking at it beyond our narrow, human – mostly urban – perspective, forests provide habitats to diverse animal species. They are home to 80% of the world’s terrestrial biodiversity, and they also form the source of livelihood for many different human settlements, including 60 million indigenous people. In addition, 300 million people live in forests, including 60 million indigenous people.Yet, we are losing them. Between 1990 and 2015, the world lost some 129 million ha of forest, an area the size of South Africa. When we take away the forest, it is not just the trees that go. The entire ecosystem begins to fall apart, with dire consequences for all of us.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b4eLTYUcj7k

Originally Posted by condor

Keep aside all these big actions. Just reduce the bees to sufficiently low numbers and see what happens. This path will be the path of least effort. Wont take too long to upset plant life, food production, and cause mayhem.

I agree, and that's a scary thought. To paraphrase from an article on this

If all of the world's bees died off, there would be major rippling effects throughout ecosystems. A number of plants, such as many of the bee orchids, are pollinated exclusively by specific bees, and they would die off without human intervention. This would alter the composition of their habitats and affect the food webs they are part of and would likely trigger additional extinctions or declines of dependent organisms. Other plants may utilize a variety of pollinators, but many are most successfully pollinated by bees. Without bees, they would set fewer seeds and would have lower reproductive success. This too would alter ecosystems. Beyond plants, many animals, such as the beautiful bee-eater birds, would lose their prey in the event of a die-off, and this would also impact natural systems and food webs. In terms of agriculture, the loss of bees would dramatically alter human food systems but would not likely lead to famine. The majority of human calories still come from cereal grains, which are wind-pollinated and are therefore unaffected by bee populations. Many fruits and vegetables, however, are insect-pollinated and could not be grown at such a large scale, or so cheaply, without bees. Blueberries and cherries, for example, rely on honeybees for up to 90 percent of their pollination. Although hand-pollination is a possibility for most fruit and vegetable crops, it is incredibly labor-intensive and expensive. Tiny robotic pollinator drones have been developed in Japan but remain prohibitively expensive for entire orchards or fields of time-sensitive flowers. Without bees, the availability and diversity of fresh produce would decline substantially, and human nutrition would likely suffer. Crops that would not be cost-effective to hand- or robot-pollinate would likely be lost or persist only with the dedication of human hobbyists.

Originally Posted by dragonfire

For centuries we had been actively trying to eradicate mosquitos with little effect. We tried every trick in the book, spent billions worldwide yet hasn't been able to make even a dent to it's population. If such a conscious effort didn't bring any appreciable result, how would our actions without even an intend going to eradicate ALL life on earth?

We may not have eradicated mosquitos but have managed to accelerate the pace at which we're destroying insects, and cumulatively that shall have catastrophic effects. Here's a sobering report.

All in all , what is plain for all to see is that the damage that we as a species are wreaking upon the planet is unbelievable. And the efforts, laudable as they are, that the countries around the world are putting in need to be augmented by a fair margin. Only with a determined, effective and workable plan to reduce the damage to the environment and bring in sustainable, green practices shall help reverse the damage caused by us humans to the climate.

[AZT]

For India, drinking water scarcity is the biggest issue facing us. I remember reading a while back our ground water reserves are already at all time lowest and we are having to dig deeper and deeper.

Rain water is not enough to replenish this. There's something called virtual water export where developing countries export food grains, meat, garments, footwear, etc which all require significant water to either grow or manufacture in their home countries.

India is the worlds largest virtual water exporter and with the size of our population this is probably the thing that will most affect us. Quality of air would come second and deforestation, illegal mining, beaches being reduced bec of sand mafia etc. would be a close third.

[DigitalOne]

Offering here without comment : 50 Years of Failed Predictions

Modern doomsayers have been predicting climate and environmental disaster since the 1960s. They continue to do so today.

None of the apocalyptic predictions with due dates as of today have come true.

What follows is a collection of notably wild predictions from notable people in government and science.

Please read on here