The End of the World

[Arcturus]

I don't believe in the 2012 nonsense, or any of these "prophecies". Wasn't the world supposed to end sometime in 2003 or any previous years? Gee, look at how that turned out.

 

[primemover]

I don't believe in the 2012 nonsense, or any of these "prophecies". Wasn't the world supposed to end sometime in 2003 or any previous years? Gee, look at how that turned out.

End of the world prophecies have been a racket for thousands of years, humans put a lot of stock in things that line up in patterns, our brains are built to recognize those, so we're ripe for people to manipulate the masses just that way. The real masters of reading patterns aren't these a-holes, they work as market analyzers and detectives.

 

[November Rain]

Why are people concerned with the end of the world. Surely it'll just mean that everybody else dies on the same day you die.

if you're dead, what does it matter if everyone else is alive or not?

and we are all fully aware we could die at any second so why all the fuss.

 

[The Joker_1000]

I actually don't think about I could die now, or later on today, or tomorrow. I live for the moment. Btw, we're allowed to discuss anything & I'm still convinced that this end of the world crap is, well, crap.

 

[The Joker_1000]

We will, and have gotten somewhat more robust, but not via evolution, but via medical science and general improvements in living standards. We really are the same as we were a quarter of a million years ago, just more clothed.

I think it'd be kind of cool if humans someday got powers. I know it's a stretch but hey, a lot of weird things have happened with our race. For all we know, we'll evolve & look totally different than we do now. I think something major will happen with the human race as millions of years pass by. That's just my two cents.

 

[primemover]

I think it'd be kind of cool if humans someday got powers. I know it's a stretch but hey, a lot of weird things have happened with our race. For all we know, we'll evolve & look totally different than we do now. I think something major will happen with the human race as millions of years pass by. That's just my two cents.

Unless the laws of physics change or we are touched by some magical force, I wouldn't expect anything close to 'superpowers' to happen, unless you are talking about things outside of evolution, like technology.

 

[Superhobo]

Unless the laws of physics change or we are touched by some magical force, I wouldn't expect anything close to 'superpowers' to happen, unless you are talking about things outside of evolution, like technology.

 

[The Joker_1000]

Unless the laws of physics change or we are touched by some magical force, I wouldn't expect anything close to 'superpowers' to happen, unless you are talking about things outside of evolution, like technology.

It could happen but you're probably right about the fact that it may not happen. Even if it does happen, it'll be a long time from now.

 

[Varient]

I just want to know what you all think: Will the world come to an end?

Personally, I don't believe in all of the nonsense that "points" to the end of the world. If it does end though, it just ends. The end of the universe, however, just sounds ridiculous altogether.

Hmmmn.

If you mean you - It ends when you die.

If you mean us - It ends when we mess up - Sometime this century.
Barring that,.. we have three near misses with asteroids this century.

If you mean the planet - It ends when the sun goes red Giant.

If you mean the Solar System - when the Black Hole in the center of our Galaxy gets to our arm of itself,... or the scheduled collision with another Galaxy shreds the Milky way.

If you mean "period?"

Either "heat death"
or
Big Crush.


BTW - GOOD thread.

 

[TBadora]

Whoever is here right now tune to discovery channel. They are talking about 2012. Obviously not everyone will get it now as time zones are different. Try it anyway. Eastern.

 

[Asgard]

The world isnt going to end in 2012.

See, Im kinda psychic, and I had a premonition that when 2012 comes around, a wholy bevy of hot sexy porn stars are going to bust into my room and bust my nut four times.

Oh yeah.

 

[Enriquespy]

The world isnt going to end in 2012.

See, Im kinda psychic, and I had a premonition that when 2012 comes around, a wholy bevy of hot sexy po%n stars are going to bust into my room and b%st my n#t four times.

Oh yeah.

And that's not a sign of the end?

 

[Asgard]

The only thing that's going to end is my blue balls. And that's a good thing.

On a serious note, I really dont think the world's going to end on Dec 22, 2012. I do believe that mankind as a whole is going to go through a very dramatic change on that date. Im not sure what kind of changes are going to happen, but I think it's going to be for the betterment of our species.

Maybe we'll all grow horns like the ones on The Lord of Darkness from the movie Legend.


Anybody who doesnt want horns like that is a piece of scat.

 

[Steve Rogers]

Let's not confuse the end of the world with the end of human existance, people.

 

[The Joker_1000]

I don't believe in either of them, we're too advanced to just die out. And no, just because other species have died out means we will as well. For all we know, evolution could end up playing a major role in what happens to our race. We could become a totally new species or become smarter, stronger, etc. You never know, a lot of things have happened that were first deemed impossible. I'm not ruling out the possibility of humans having powers just yet because as I've said before, anything can happen.

 

[Steve Rogers]

I don't believe in either of them, we're too advanced to just die out.

I don't even know what that means, but no one is so advanced that they become immune to death.

 

[Carcharodon]

I don't believe in either of them, we're too advanced to just die out. And no, just because other species have died out means we will as well. For all we know, evolution could end up playing a major role in what happens to our race. We could become a totally new species or become smarter, stronger, etc. You never know, a lot of things have happened that were first deemed impossible. I'm not ruling out the possibility of humans having powers just yet because as I've said before, anything can happen.

Uhm...if that happens as you state it here (i.e., that humans will universally make the evolutionary transition into another species), then the human species will, in fact, have died out.

You're not really making any sense, in that regard. We would no longer be humans.

 

[Carcharodon]

Let's not confuse the end of the world with the end of human existance, people.

Vegeta_1000 doesn't believe that the sun will eventually (in billions of years) rapidly expand and engulf/destroy earth, or wipe out life on the planet either...even though all known observation and evidence points toward that event occurring.

 

[Steve Rogers]

Vegeta_1000 doesn't believe that the sun will eventually (in billions of years) rapidly expand and engulf/destroy earth, or wipe out life on the planet either...even though all known observation and evidence points toward that event occurring.

We won't be around to see it. Hundreds of millions of years is pushing it. Sharks and dinosaurs had a nice long reign, but history shows that most species dies out within a few million years or less. To think man kind is to advanced and will never die out is just ludicrous.

I heard that in a 24 hour time scale, the sun was creted at midnight and will blow up at the next midnight. We are at six a.m. So, we got time. But like I said, we will be long gone by the time that happens, and Earth won't resemble what it looks like today.

 

[Carcharodon]

We won't be around to see it. Hundreds of millions of years is pushing it. Sharks and dinosaurs had a nice long reign, but history shows that most species dies out within a few million years or less. To think man kind is to advanced and will never die out is just ludicrous.

I heard that in a 24 hour time scale, the sun was creted at midnight and will blow up at the next midnight. We are at six a.m. So, we got time. But like I said, we will be long gone by the time that happens, and Earth won't resemble what it looks like today.

That's what I believe, too. What we'd likely see long before the sun actually goes into its death throes is a gradual and sustained heating of our atmosphere, leading to potential selective pressures that will severely alter our planet's biodiversity.

Humans, as they exist today, would eventually buckle as a species under these pressures (if we're even around then, and, as you said, we likely won't be) unless we're somehow able to colonize other planets/regions of space.

Diverging from the primary topic a bit, and not to sound too sapien-centric, but we're the first (known) species that has been able to (largely) bypass natural selective pressures. Of course, there can (and will) be pressures that even we cannot control or avoid, as we aren't invincible by any stretch of the imagination, but to compare us to other species by a purely naturally selective standard seems a bit ridiculous.

We're approaching a point where we can fully and intentionally engineer ourselves on a genetic level. Again, we're not invincible, but until some other species is (or is found to have been at one point in time) capable of such feats, such a comparison is a bit removed from reality.

 

[Steve Rogers]

We're approaching a point where we can fully and intentionally engineer ourselves on a genetic level. Again, we're not invincible, but until some other species is (or is found to have been at one point in time) capable of such feats, such a comparison is a bit removed from reality.

That's a good point. But it won't save us from the inevitable.

 

[Carcharodon]

That's a good point. But it won't save us from the inevitable.

Totally...whatever that may be. I don't have a friggin' clue.

 

[Steve Rogers]

Totally...whatever that may be. I don't have a friggin' clue.

If I had to guess...I'd say that the Earth will undergo some major changes that we and a good percentage of the species on the planet will be unable to adapt too. In the new Earth new species will flourish and if you were able to take a time machine millions of years into the future you would not recognize the world around. This is just a guess howver, based on too many hours in front of the Discovery channel.

 

[The Joker_1000]

Uhm...if that happens as you state it here (i.e., that humans will universally make the evolutionary transition into another species), then the human species will, in fact, have died out.

You're not really making any sense, in that regard. We would no longer be humans.

I don't mean we'd totally change & look green or something. I mean it's possible our genetic structure could change quite a bit which could result in us becoming more physically advanced than previous humans.

 

[The Joker_1000]

I don't even know what that means, but no one is so advanced that they become immune to death.

What are you talking about? I never said any one person is immune to death, I was stating I don't think the human race will become extinct.