That is why we must have human colonies on moon , mars ,
europa and titan and terraform venus as soon as possible , in fact
should have been done long ago.

guardian.co.uk

What a way to go

Super-volcano, robotic rebellion or terrorism? Kate Ravilious asks 10
scientists to name the biggest danger to Earth and assesses the
chances of it happening

Thursday April 14, 2005
The Guardian

How will it all end? Some say we are likely to go with a bang, others
predict a slow lingering end, while the optimists suggest we will
overcome our difficulties by evolving into a different species.
According to Sir Martin Rees, author of Our Final Century, astronomer
royal and professor of cosmology and astrophysics at the University of
Cambridge, humans only have a 50-50 chance of making it through the
21st century without serious setback. "Some natural threats, such as
earthquakes and meteorite impacts, remain the same throughout time,
while others are aggravated by our modern-interconnected world. But
now we also need to consider threats that are human induced."

So what are the greatest threats to humans and can we do anything
about them? Below, 10 scientists talk about their greatest fears and
explain how society could be affected. Afterwards we estimate each
threat in two ways: first, the chance of it occurring in our lifetime
(the next 70 years); and, second, the danger that it would pose to the
human race if it did happen (10 = making humans extinct, to one =
barely having an impact on our lives).

1: Climate Change

Nick Brooks is a senior research associate at the Tyndall Centre for
Climate Change Research at the University of East Anglia:

"By the end of this century it is likely that greenhouse gases will
have doubled and the average global tempera*ture will have risen by at
least 2C. This is hotter than anything the Earth has experienced in
the last one and a half million years. In the worst case scenario it
could completely alter the climate in many regions of the world. This
could lead to global food insecurity and the widespread collapse of
existing social systems, causing mass migration and conflict over
resources as some parts of the world become much less habitable. I
don't think that climate change will sound the death knell for humans,
but it certainly has the potential to devastate."

Chance of temperatures rising more than 2C (the level considered to be
dangerous by the European Union) in the next 70 years: High

Danger sco 6

2: Telomere erosion

Reinhard Stindl, a medical doctor at the University of Vienna, says
every species contains an "evolutionary clock", ticking through the
generations and counting down towards an inevitable extinction date:

"On the end of every animal's chromosomes are protective caps called
telomeres. Without them our chromosomes would become unstable. Each
time a cell divides it never quite copies its telomere completely and
throughout our lifetime the telomeres become shorter and shorter as
the cells multiply. Eventually, when they become critically short, we
start to see age-related diseases, such as cancer, Alzheimer's, heart
attacks and strokes.

"However, it is not just through our lifetime that telomeres get
shorter. My theory is that there is a tiny loss of telomere length
from one generation to the next, mirroring the process of ageing in
individuals. Over thousands of generations the telomere gets eroded
down to its critical level. Once at the critical level we would expect
to see outbreaks of age-related diseases occurring earlier in life and
finally a population crash. Telomere erosion could explain the
disappearance of a seemingly successful species, such as Neanderthal
man, with no need for external factors such as climate change."

Chances of a human population crash due to telomere erosion during the
next 70 years: Low

Danger sco 8

3: Viral Pandemic

Professor Maria Zambon is a virologist and head of the Health
Protection Agency's Influenza Laboratory:

"Within the last century we have had four major flu epidemics, along
with HIV and Sars. Major pandemics sweep the world every century, and
it is inevitable that at least one will occur in the future. At the
moment the most serious concern is H5 avian influenza in chickens in
south-east Asia. If this virus learns to transmit from human to human
then it could sweep rapidly around the world. The 1918 influenza
outbreak caused 20m deaths in just one year: more than all the people
killed in the first world war. A similar outbreak now could have a
perhaps more devastating impact.

"It is not in the interests of a virus to kill all of its hosts, so a
virus is unlikely to wipe out the human race, but it could cause a
serious setback for a number of years. We can never be completely
prepared for what nature will do: nature is the ultimate
bioterrorist."

Chance of a viral pandemic in the next 70 years: Very high

Danger sco 3

4: Terrorism

Professor Paul Wilkinson is chairman of the advisory board for the
Centre for the Study of Terrorism and Political Violence at the
University of St Andrews:

"Today's society is more vulnerable to terrorism because it is easier
for a malevolent group to get hold of the necessary materials,
technology and expertise to make weapons of mass destruction. The most
likely cause of large scale, mass-casualty terrorism right now is from
a chemical or biological weapon. The large-scale release of something
like anthrax, the smallpox virus, or the plague, would have a huge
effect, and modern communications would quickly make it become a
trans-national problem.

"In an open society, where we value freedoms of movement, we can't
guar*antee stopping an attack, and there is a very high probability
that a major attack will occur somewhere in the world, within our
lifetimes."

Chances of a major terrorist attack in the next 70 years: Very high

Danger sco 2

5: Nuclear war

Air Marshal Lord Garden is Liberal Democrat defence spokesman and
author of Can Deterrence Last?:

"In theory, a nuclear war could destroy the human civilisation but in
practice I think the time of that danger has probably passed. There
are three potential nuclear flashpoints today: the Middle East,
India-Pakistan and North Korea. Of these, North Korea is the most
worrying, with a hair-trigger, conventional army that might start a
war by accident. But I like to believe the barriers against using a
nuclear weapon remain high because of the way we have developed an
international system to restrain nuclear use.

"The probability of nuclear war on a global scale is low, even if
there remains the possibility of nuclear use by a rogue state or
fanatical extremists."

Chance of a global nuclear war in the next 70 years: Low

Danger sco 8

6: Meteorite impact

Donald Yeomans is manager of Nasa's Near Earth Object Program Office
at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California:

"Over very long timescales, the risk of you dying as a result of a
near-Earth object impact is roughly equivalent to the risk of dying in
an aeroplane accident. To cause a serious setback to our civilisation,
the impactor would have to be around 1.5km wide or larger. We expect
an event of this type every million years on average. The dangers
associated with such a large impactor include an enormous amount of
dust in the atmosphere, which would substantially shut down sunlight
for weeks, thus affecting plant life and crops that sustain life.
There would be global firestorms as a result of re-entering hot ejecta
and severe acid rain. All of these effects are relatively short-term,
so the most adaptable species (cockroaches and humans, for example)
would be likely to survive."

Chance of the Earth being hit by a large asteroid in the next 70
years: Medium

Danger sco 5

7: Robots taking over

Hans Moravec is a research professor at Carnegie Mellon University's
Robotics Institute in Pittsburgh:

"Robot controllers double in complexity (processing power) every year
or two. They are now barely at the lower range of vertebrate
complexity, but should catch up with us within a half-century. By 2050
I predict that there will be robots with humanlike mental power, with
the ability to abstract and generalise.

"These intelligent machines will grow from us, learn our skills, share
our goals and values, and can be viewed as children of our minds. Not
only will these robots look after us in the home, but they will also
carry out complex tasks that currently require human input, such as
diagnosing illness and recommending a therapy or cure. They will be
our heirs and will offer us the best chance we'll ever get for
immortality by uploading ourselves into advanced robots."

Chance of super-intelligent robots in the next 70 years: High

Danger sco 8

8: Cosmic ray blast from exploding star

Nir Shaviv is a senior lecturer in physics at the Hebrew University in
Jerusalem, Israel:

"Once every few decades a massive star from our galaxy, the Milky Way,
runs out of fuel and explodes, in what is known as a supernova. Cosmic
rays (high-energy particles like gamma rays) spew out in all
directions and if the Earth happens to be in the way, they can trigger
an ice age. If the Earth already has a cold climate then an extra
burst of cosmic rays could make things really icy and perhaps cause a
number of species to become extinct. The Earth is at greatest risk
when it passes through a spiral arm of the Milky Way, where most of
the supernova occur. This happens approximately every 150m years.
Paleoclimate indicators show that there has been a corresponding cold
period on Earth, with more ice at the poles and many ice ages during
these times.

"We are nearly out of the Sagittarius-Carina arm of the Milky Way now
and Earth should have a warmer climate in a few million years. But, in
around 60m years we will enter the Perseus arm and ice-house
conditions are likely to dominate again."

Chance of encountering a supernova in the next 70 years: Low

Danger sco 4

9: Super-volcanos

Professor Bill McGuire is director of the Benfield Hazard Research
Centre at University College London and a member of Tony Blair's
Natural Hazards working group:

"Approximately every 50,000 years the Earth experiences a
super-volcano. More than 1,000 sq km of land can be obliterated by
pyroclastic ash flows, the surrounding continent is coated in ash and
sulphur gases are injected into the atmosphere, making a thin veil of
sulphuric acid all around the globe and reflecting back sunlight for
years to come. Daytime becomes no brighter than a moonlit night.

"The global damage from a super-volcano depends on where it is and how
long the gas stays in the atmosphere. Taupo in New Zealand was the
most recent super-volcano, around 26,500 years ago. However, the most
damaging super-volcano in human history was Toba, on Sumatra,
Indonesia, 74,000 years ago. Because it was fairly close to the
equator it injected gas quickly into both hemispheres. Ice core data
shows that temperatures were dramatically reduced for five to six
years afterwards, with freezing conditions right down to the tropics.

"A super-volcano is 12 times more likely than a large meteorite
impact. There is a 0.15% probability that one will happen in your
lifetime. Places to watch now are those that have erupted in the past,
such as Yellowstone in the US and Toba. But, even more worryingly, a
super-volcano could also burst out from somewhere that has never
erupted before, such as under the Amazon rainforest."

Chance of a super-volcano in the next 70 years: Very high

Danger sco 7

10: Earth swallowed by a black hole

Richard Wilson is Mallinckrodt Research Professor of Physics at
Harvard University in the US:

"Around seven years ago, when the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider was
being built at the Brookhaven National Laboratory in New York, there
was a worry that a state of dense matter could be formed that had
never been created before. At the time this was the largest particle
accelerator to have been built, making gold ions crash head on with
immense force. The risk was that this might form a stage that was
sufficiently dense to be like a black hole, gathering matter from the
outside. Would the Brookhaven labs (and perhaps the entire Earth) end
up being swallowed by a black hole created by the new accelerator?

"Using the information we already know from black holes in outer
space, we did some calculations to find out if the Brookhaven particle
accelerator was capable of forming such a black hole. We are now
pretty certain this state of matter won't form at Brookhaven and that
the Earth won't be swallowed when these particles collide."

Chance of Earth being gobbled up by a black hole in the next 70 years:
Exceedingly low

Danger sco 10

· Naked Science: Clash of crises, is a free event at the Science
Museum's Dana Centre on Wednesday April 20. The event is free but
tickets should be prebooked on 020 7942 4040 or
. Please see www.danacentre.org.uk for full
details. You can also take part in the Dana Centre's survey,
investigating the nation's biggest fears for the future at
www.sciencemuseum.org.uk

· What did you think of this article? Mail your responses to
and include your name and address.

In sci.physics habshi wrote:

None of this has anything to do with any of the groups you posted to.

You are still an idiot.

snip non-relevant crap

--
Jim Pennino

Remove .spam.sux to reply.

On Thu, 14 Apr 2005 22:57:48 GMT, habshi wrote:

Thursday April 14, 2005
The Guardian

How will it all end?

That presupposes a bit too far for my taste, honey.

Since when a "Westerner" allows himself to talk about
matters of humankind's concern anyway? Go do what you _can_
assholes.

What a revelation! All ten scenarios mentioned are bull****.
Amazing even the most supposedly brilliant minds among
Westerners _always_ miss the obvious when the obvious could
mean their own demise and/or degradation, or would point to
their stupidity. They're not thinkers, they're jackasses.
From "Feynman" who couldn't even put two and two together in
some of his observations, to the other couple of hundred
professors and degreed beacons of knowledge I came across to
know and study and have contempt for, for natural and
obvious reasons. Overgrown infants.

Do you want to know what's taking you down? Spend _weeks_
and find out what I said about it here in this forum. You'll
have to scrutinize ten years of usenet activity. Otherwise
quit this ugly show and **** off.


--

"Westerners are not 'ignorant'. They're _stupid_."

- Maleki

Maleki wrote:
What a revelation! All ten scenarios mentioned are
[sic] bull****.

[In reference to an article from the April 14, 2005 Guardian.]

Obviously, they are NOT all bull**** since some are things that are
completely out of anyone's control which can happen at any time.

Let's run down the list.

1: Climate Change
Life will adapt ... as it did in the other catastrophic mass extinction
events.

2: Telomere erosion
Fact. All Mammal species (except one) have all the male reproductive
machinery on the Y chromosome which -- notwithstanding its ability to
recombine -- is already in the process of losing viability.

Some species will adapt as the machinery progressively migrates to
other parts of the DNA, as has happened numerous times in the past. In
one case, this has already happened (a mouse species).

In the rest, the male of the species will simply go extinct and,
barring the possibility of the species going all-female (all-female
species exist), the species will go extinct.

3: Viral Pandemic
1300 is a case in point. Look at the world population estimates at the
US Census Bureau or UN sites; also the graph in the Kapitza paper
(Figures 1 and 2) reproduced under
http://www.federation.g3z.com/Population/Kapitza.htm

Interestingly, recent research has shown that the plague (despite being
bacterial) is very close in terms of its effects to AIDS and this is
being exploited (for instance) with historical research uncovering what
was behind those people who showed immunity to the plague, to try and
determine a way to engender immunity to AIDS.

4: Terrorism
Danger sco 2
It's a topical issue.

5: Nuclear war
Danger sco 8
Actually, under 5.

6: Meteorite impact
It could happen anytime, anywhere.

7: Robots taking over
Cyborgs. Not robots. It will happen. That's not a prediction. It's
a promise.

8: Cosmic ray blast from exploding star
Another anytime anywhere. We recently had a major blast so intense
that it momentarily lit up the entire night sky.

9: Super-volcanos
"Approximately every 50,000 years the Earth experiences a
super-volcano.
Including one c. 70,000 BC which virtually wiped out the human race.
Another: anytime anywhere.

10: Earth swallowed by a black hole
Would the Brookhaven labs (and perhaps the entire Earth) end
up being swallowed by a black hole created by the new accelerator?

Brookhaven, in fact, reported the possibility of *already having*
created a momentary black hole recently.

Small black holes are not stable and will decay away in microscopic
time.

Rogue black holes in interstellar space are a complete unknown, since
they would not show themselves until close enough to a substantial
amount of matter to start giving off radiation.

On 15 Apr 2005 11:53:47 -0700, wrote:

Obviously, they are NOT all bull**** since some are things that are
completely out of anyone's control which can happen at any time.

The question is what has a better probability of doing it.
The one with highest probability is not mentioned. And I'm
too ****ed at it to say it for you. Go dig it for yourself.


--

"feyze ruholghodos ar bAz madad farmAyad
digarAn ham bokonand Anche masihA mikard"

- Hafez

On a sunny day (15 Apr 2005 11:53:47 -0700) it happened
wrote in .com:
You mention 10 points.
Here are some more;
11) Alien invasion, they desinfect the place before they set up shop here.
Can happen anytime.

12) massive suicide attack by all people on all other people.
Happens now on small scale, but could spread.

13) Next US weapon test has much more power then expected.
Can happen anytime, they were wrong about the last nuke test too.

14) Gentically modified food causes humans to mutate to plants, that then die.
Something will go wrong for sure.

wrote in message
oups.com...
Maleki wrote:
What a revelation! All ten scenarios mentioned are
[sic] bull****.

[In reference to an article from the April 14, 2005 Guardian.]

Obviously, they are NOT all bull**** since some are things that are
completely out of anyone's control which can happen at any time.

Let's run down the list.

1: Climate Change
Life will adapt ... as it did in the other catastrophic mass extinction
events.

2: Telomere erosion
Fact. All Mammal species (except one) have all the male reproductive
machinery on the Y chromosome which -- notwithstanding its ability to
recombine -- is already in the process of losing viability.

Some species will adapt as the machinery progressively migrates to
other parts of the DNA, as has happened numerous times in the past. In
one case, this has already happened (a mouse species).

In the rest, the male of the species will simply go extinct and,
barring the possibility of the species going all-female (all-female
species exist), the species will go extinct.

3: Viral Pandemic
1300 is a case in point. Look at the world population estimates at the
US Census Bureau or UN sites; also the graph in the Kapitza paper
(Figures 1 and 2) reproduced under
http://www.federation.g3z.com/Population/Kapitza.htm

Interestingly, recent research has shown that the plague (despite being
bacterial) is very close in terms of its effects to AIDS and this is
being exploited (for instance) with historical research uncovering what
was behind those people who showed immunity to the plague, to try and
determine a way to engender immunity to AIDS.

4: Terrorism
Danger sco 2
It's a topical issue.

5: Nuclear war
Danger sco 8
Actually, under 5.

6: Meteorite impact
It could happen anytime, anywhere.

7: Robots taking over
Cyborgs. Not robots. It will happen. That's not a prediction. It's
a promise.

8: Cosmic ray blast from exploding star
Another anytime anywhere. We recently had a major blast so intense
that it momentarily lit up the entire night sky.

9: Super-volcanos
"Approximately every 50,000 years the Earth experiences a
super-volcano.
Including one c. 70,000 BC which virtually wiped out the human race.
Another: anytime anywhere.

10: Earth swallowed by a black hole
Would the Brookhaven labs (and perhaps the entire Earth) end
up being swallowed by a black hole created by the new accelerator?

Brookhaven, in fact, reported the possibility of *already having*
created a momentary black hole recently.

Small black holes are not stable and will decay away in microscopic
time.

Rogue black holes in interstellar space are a complete unknown, since
they would not show themselves until close enough to a substantial
amount of matter to start giving off radiation.


piggybacking; famine, pestilence, war and strife. just like always.

--
-- Geo. Michael Henry
No! Bad dog! I said sit! anonymous

"Jan Panteltje" wrote in message
news:1113603788.f640875a843de4997fae426b1399191e@t eranews...
14) Gentically modified food causes humans to mutate to plants,
that then die. Something will go wrong for sure.

[hanson]
Jan, Jan, don't bother us with your personal fears,
as you obviously have mutated into a plant already
and die we must all, since uncle Murphy (not uncle Al)
is in charge of such matters.
Thanks for the laughs
ahahaha... ahahahanson

On a sunny day (Sat, 16 Apr 2005 15:08:25 GMT) it happened "hanson"
wrote in
. net:

"Jan Panteltje" wrote in message
news:1113603788.f640875a843de4997fae426b1399191e@ teranews...
14) Gentically modified food causes humans to mutate to plants,
that then die. Something will go wrong for sure.

[hanson]
Jan, Jan, don't bother us with your personal fears,
as you obviously have mutated into a plant already
and die we must all, since uncle Murphy (not uncle Al)
is in charge of such matters.
Thanks for the laughs
ahahaha... ahahahanson
I see you have been at the genetically modified food again!
15) We all get the ahahaha virus.

On Fri, 15 Apr 2005 22:22:19 GMT, Jan Panteltje wrote:

On a sunny day (15 Apr 2005 11:53:47 -0700) it happened
wrote in .com:
You mention 10 points.
Here are some more;
11) Alien invasion, they desinfect the place before they set up shop here.
Can happen anytime.

12) massive suicide attack by all people on all other people.
Happens now on small scale, but could spread.

13) Next US weapon test has much more power then expected.
Can happen anytime, they were wrong about the last nuke test too.

14) Gentically modified food causes humans to mutate to plants, that then die.
Something will go wrong for sure.

Hahhahhah

That article kept saying "within the next 70 years". I don't
know why. This is not the best way of finding out _what_
will kill human race. The journalist who was behind the
article was just stupid.

Remember that we only need to stop making babies for 50
years or so. That's it. That will wipe us out. I talked
about this some years back and conditions under which this
scenario can be _forced_ on us. Go dig it.

And it doesn't matter when, within 70 years or later. But
that's what has the highest probability to eventually do it.

--

"dosad gofteh chon nim kerdAr nist
bozorgi sarAsar be goftAr nist"

- Ferdowsi