Robin van Spaandonk wrote:
>You
>wonder how the human race will survive.
What makes you think it will?
I bet we will. Two reasons:
1. We survived the "evolutionary furnace" as Samuel Florman put it.
2. We survived the cold war and Soviet Union without going nuclear
Arthur Clarke used to say "I am 51% sure we will survive."
We just have to get through the early stages of the postindustrial
era. Survival will be assured when we accomplish a few things:
Develop some unlimited, nonpolluting source of energy such as cold fusion.
Control human population everywhere in the world.
Colonize the Moon and Mars.
Develop the ability to stop large meteors from striking inhabited
planets and moons.
We could accomplish these goals without many fundamental
breakthroughs or a huge investment in money.
Indoor farming and in vitro production of meat will probably be
necessary to preserve many other species, but we can survive without
them. Artificial intelligence and advanced robots would be nice too,
but not essential. It would be good if we could eliminate
thermonuclear weapons worldwide, or at least put every single one of
the damn things constant monitoring and lock and key, but even if a
few of them are set off by terrorists or in war it will not cause
human extinction.
- Jed
