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How much longer will Earth support Intelligent Life?

How much longer will Earth support Intelligent Life?

100 years
5
21%
500 years
3
13%
1,000 years
2
8%
2,000 years
1
4%
3,500 years
0
No votes
5,000 years
1
4%
7,500 years
0
No votes
10,000 years
0
No votes
More than 10,000 years
12
50%
 
Total votes : 24

Re: How much longer will Earth support Intelligent Life?

Unread postby Ibon » Tue 02 Jul 2019, 14:24:29

Revi wrote:Does this planet support intelligent life now?


When KJ recently mentioned that it is our mental capacity that makes the human story of overshoot unique I mentioned that we are also capable of reverence.

The Bhuddist story comes to mind regarding the interplay between compassion and intelligence.
Tighten the strings of a guitar too tight and they snap. This is intelligence with no compassion.
Too loose and they don't play. This is compassion with no intelligence.
Music happens when the strings are tightened just right, when intelligence is tempered with reverence and compassion. This sounds very idealistic in today's world but there is true wisdom in this.

The evidence is all around us that intelligence and technology not tempered with reverence for our mother earth is leading us to some frightening consequences. And still many point to further technological innovations leading us out of the impasse, where reverence plays no role.

That is when your question Revi if our planet supports intelligent life now is quite relevant.

Intelligence is easy as it really is just brain power. Wisdom is something else indeed. It considers and integrates mind, body and soul..

We are really out of practice with this as a society.
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Re: How much longer will Earth support Intelligent Life?

Unread postby dohboi » Fri 05 Jul 2019, 10:33:27

Another challenge to continued human life (if we can be considered intelligent)...peak phosphorus:


Image

Currently we're extracting 250 million tons a year. How long can that go on? What could possibly go wrong??? :/
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Re: How much longer will Earth support Intelligent Life?

Unread postby Ibon » Fri 05 Jul 2019, 14:33:23

dohboi wrote:Another challenge to continued human life (if we can be considered intelligent)...peak phosphorus:


Image

Currently we're extracting 250 million tons a year. How long can that go on? What could possibly go wrong??? :/


A lot of that mined phosphorus goes into growing bananas. All of you high latitude folks eating imported tropical bananas should recycle those banana peels in your garden. A really lazy way to compost a banana peel is to just toss them under any fruit trees you have.

As you fling it through the air toward your apple tree using nothing more than your muscle power you are doing your fair share to save the planet!
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Re: How much longer will Earth support Intelligent Life?

Unread postby Tanada » Sat 06 Jul 2019, 12:55:32

dohboi wrote:Another challenge to continued human life (if we can be considered intelligent)...peak phosphorus:


Image

Currently we're extracting 250 million tons a year. How long can that go on? What could possibly go wrong??? :/


The problem with this particular peak prediction is urine. Right now mining natural phosphate deposits is the cheapest method of getting the mineral for use in agriculture. However right now there are also 7.5 Billion humans out there around the world urinating about a liter to a liter and a half a day of phosphorus rich liquid. That doesn't even consider the livestock and poultry we keep in captivity. In point of fact mined phosphates are so cheap that big agricultural interests put on the order of 50% excess fertilizer on their crops because it gains then a few percent higher yield. when the prices start rising they will cut back to adding just a sufficient quantity instead of an excess and that will cut demand substantially all by itself. When prices hit a cut off point then processing human sewage to recover the phosphates will become a money making enterprise and the demand for raw natural phosphate will be greatly reduced even further.
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Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
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Re: How much longer will Earth support Intelligent Life?

Unread postby dohboi » Sat 06 Jul 2019, 14:36:38

"The problem with this particular peak prediction is urine"

Are you saying it's a piss poor argument?? :-D :-D
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Re: How much longer will Earth support Intelligent Life?

Unread postby Plantagenet » Mon 08 Jul 2019, 20:27:47

New mathematical model suggests rapidly adding CO2 to the oceans triggers mass extinctions

breaching-carbon-threshold-mass-extinction

Once a certain threshold of CO2 dissolved in the oceans is reached, a threshold is passed that leads to a cascade of effects including ocean acidification and global mass extinction.

We should reach that threshold by about the year 2100 as we are adding CO2 to the oceans at a rate far greater then ever before seen in the geologic record.

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Re: How much longer will Earth support Intelligent Life?

Unread postby dohboi » Sat 17 Aug 2019, 11:30:46

Cold Climate Lizards Face Rapid Extinctions in Next 60 Years

https://phys.org/news/2019-08-lizards-c ... tions.html

Lizards that produce live young are significantly more likely to be driven to extinction through climate change than those that lay eggs, new research suggests.

... Researchers investigated how strategies for reproduction that live-bearing (viviparous) or egg-laying (oviparous) modern lizards evolved in the past can affect their chance to survive ongoing climate change caused by humans.

As part of the work, the team argue they have confirmed the emerging 'cul-de-sac' theory, which suggests that live-bearing reproduction evolved in lizards that colonized cold climates, such as high elevations and latitudes.

This adaptation, however, is dragging them to extinction.

... Reproducing live young is not very effective in hot environments, and once reptiles evolve in this way, they remain 'trapped' in cold areas.

As climate warming rapidly progresses towards higher elevations and latitudes, the 'suitable' cold climates where live birthing species live will be pushed towards mountain tops and continent edges until lizards run out of space and are eventually wiped out.

"This phenomenon would apply to other reptiles, such as snakes, anywhere in the world."

... "Our results highlight the extent of the extinction crisis that modern biodiversity is currently facing. By 2080, more than half of the current 'cold lands' in the area we investigated in South America will have become warm, leading current resident species to extinction.


Open Access: Manuel Jara et al. Alternative reproductive adaptations predict asymmetric responses to climate change in lizards, Scientific Reports (2019)
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Re: How much longer will Earth support Intelligent Life?

Unread postby dohboi » Tue 20 Aug 2019, 09:01:16

500 Million Bees Died in Brazil

https://www.bbc.com/news/newsbeat-49406369

- More than 500 million bees have died in Brazil in the last three months.

- In the state of Rio Grande do Sul, 400 million dead bees were found - with beekeepers in four states reporting the mass deaths.

- Researchers have blamed the use of pesticides - chemical substances which are used to kill pests.

... in 2018 Brazil lifted restrictions on pesticides - despite opposition from environmentalists who called it the "poison package"


...Things aren't looking good for bees around the world.

In the United States, beekeepers lost four in 10 of their honeybee colonies in the past year, making it the worst winter on record.

In Russia 20 regions reported mass bee deaths, with officials also warning it could mean 20% less honey being produced.

At least one million bees died in South Africa in November 2018, with fipronil being blamed.

And countries such as Canada, Mexico, Argentina and Turkey have all also reported mass die-offs of bees in the last 18 months
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Re: How much longer will Earth support Intelligent Life?

Unread postby Ibon » Tue 20 Aug 2019, 09:31:34

dohboi wrote: More than 500 million bees have died in Brazil in the last three months.



Irony? Brazil brought in the African honey bee to cross with the European honey bee back in the 60's. The reason for this was to increase the resistance of the new hybrid bee to tropical diseases......to make a more hardy bee..... and thus the killer bee saga was born that eventually spread all the way north to North America.

And now the hybrid bee is experiencing a massive die off due to petro chemicals.

Deep deep irony.

Our 3 bee hives are healthy with no sign of disease. The closest agriculture land is 4km away.... Except our few hectars of coffee of which is not entirely but mostly organic. No noxious petro chemicals used.
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Re: How much longer will Earth support Intelligent Life?

Unread postby dohboi » Thu 22 Aug 2019, 15:28:14

Well put, Ibon, as usual.

This seems to be the thread where we discuss extinctions and near-extinctions/die offs now, so I'm gonna put this here:

Shocking Rate of Plant Extinctions in South Africa


https://phys.org/news/2019-08-extinctio ... frica.html

Over the past 300 years, 79 plants have been confirmed extinct from three of the world's biodiversity hotspots located in South Africa—the Cape Floristic Region, the Succulent Karoo, and the Maputuland-Pondoland-Albany corridor.

According to a study published in the journal Current Biology this week, this represents a shocking 45.4 percent of all known plant extinctions from 10 of the world's 36 biodiversity hotspots. Biodiversity hotspots are areas that harbor exceptionally high numbers of unique species, but at the same time they are under severe threat from human disturbance.

The main drivers for extinctions in South Africa were found to be agriculture (49.4 percent), urbanization (38 percent) and invasive species (22 percent).[/b]

... The researchers emphasize that biodiversity loss and climate change are the biggest threats confronting humanity: "Along with habitat destruction, the effects of climate change are expected to be particularly severe on those plants not capable of dispersing their seeds over long distances," they conclude.


https://www.cell.com/current-biology/fu ... 60-9822(19)30943-1?_returnURL=https%3A%2F%2Flinkinghub.elsevier.com%2Fretrieve%2Fpii%2FS0960982219309431%3Fshowall%3Dtrue
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Re: How much longer will Earth support Intelligent Life?

Unread postby ralfy » Tue 03 Sep 2019, 09:16:37

Why hierarchy creates a destructive force within the human psyche (by Dr. Robert Sapolsky)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A4UMyTnlaMY
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Re: How much longer will Earth support Intelligent Life?

Unread postby dohboi » Thu 12 Sep 2019, 19:44:13

Controversial Insecticides Shown to Threaten Survival of Wild Birds

https://phys.org/news/2019-09-controver ... vival.html

New research at the University of Saskatchewan (USask) shows how the world's most widely used insecticides could be partly responsible for a dramatic decline in songbird populations.

A study published in the journal Science on Sept. 13 is the first experiment to track the effects of a neonicotinoid pesticide on birds in the wild.

The study found that white-crowned sparrows who consumed small doses of an insecticide called imidacloprid suffered weight loss and delays to their migration—effects that could severely harm the birds' chances of surviving and reproducing.

"We saw these effects using doses well within the range of what a bird could realistically consume in the wild—equivalent to eating just a few treated seeds," said Margaret Eng, a post-doctoral fellow in the USask Toxicology Centre and lead author on the study.

Although the toxic effects of neonicotinoids were once thought to affect only insects, most notably pollinators such as bees, there is growing evidence that birds are routinely exposed to the pesticides with significant negative consequences.

"Our study shows that this is bigger than the bees—birds can also be harmed by modern neonicotinoid pesticides which should worry us all," said Stutchbury.

... results seem to be associated with the appetite suppression effect of imidacloprid. The dosed birds ate less food, and it's likely that they delayed their flight because they needed more time to recover and regain their fuel stores,"

Because the researchers used controlled dosing, they were able to confirm a cause and effect between neonicotinoid exposures and delayed migration, not just a correlation that is more typical of field studies.

... In North America, three-quarters of bird species that rely on agricultural habitat have significantly declined in population since 1966.

The results of the new study show a mechanism by which pesticides could be directly contributing to this drop-off.


M.L. Eng el al., "A neonicotinoid insecticide reduces fueling and delays migration in songbirds," Science (2019)
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Re: How much longer will Earth support Intelligent Life?

Unread postby asg70 » Fri 13 Sep 2019, 21:57:47

This sort of thing would have freaked me out back in the day but I've been anticipating this. First people try to popularize the idea of eating bugs, then fake-meat, and now this. No need to hide soylent green behind a cover-story if we just convince people to adopt cannibalism.

https://www.businessinsider.com/canniba ... nge-2019-9

Sometimes I think human adaptability is more of a curse than an asset. Now if we could only adapt to not reproducing anymore (well, I guess that's already happening in the first world thanks to #MeToo and the zero-sum-game of hookup culture).

BOLD PREDICTIONS
-Billions are on the verge of starvation as the lockdown continues. (yoshua, 5/20/20)

HALL OF SHAME:
-Short welched on a bet and should be shunned.
-Frequent-flyers should not cry crocodile-tears over climate-change.
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Re: How much longer will Earth support Intelligent Life?

Unread postby Ibon » Sat 14 Sep 2019, 07:14:56

asg70 wrote:
Sometimes I think human adaptability is more of a curse than an asset. Now if we could only adapt to not reproducing anymore (well, I guess that's already happening in the first world thanks to #MeToo and the zero-sum-game of hookup culture).


I'm wondering if Plant would eat Obama if push came to shove.
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Re: How much longer will Earth support Intelligent Life?

Unread postby dohboi » Sat 14 Sep 2019, 09:21:49

I think he prefers a Plant-based diet! :)
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Re: How much longer will Earth support Intelligent Life?

Unread postby asg70 » Sat 14 Sep 2019, 10:16:57

dohboi wrote:I think he prefers a Plant-based diet! :)


Given living in Alaska, if he's concerned at all about global footprint he should only eat fish and seal blubber.

BOLD PREDICTIONS
-Billions are on the verge of starvation as the lockdown continues. (yoshua, 5/20/20)

HALL OF SHAME:
-Short welched on a bet and should be shunned.
-Frequent-flyers should not cry crocodile-tears over climate-change.
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Re: How much longer will Earth support Intelligent Life?

Unread postby EnergyUnlimited » Sat 14 Sep 2019, 11:42:44

Recently I am coming to conclusion that Mother Earth is no longer supporting intelligent life.
Any existing remnants of it are being replaced by Millenials right now.
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Re: How much longer will Earth support Intelligent Life?

Unread postby dohboi » Sat 14 Sep 2019, 12:41:18

Well, that would be very Aleut of him! :)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CK0cUv3ba-o
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Re: How much longer will Earth support Intelligent Life?

Unread postby Newfie » Sat 14 Sep 2019, 12:45:51

ralfy wrote:Why hierarchy creates a destructive force within the human psyche (by Dr. Robert Sapolsky)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A4UMyTnlaMY


Yeah, Sapolski is a real interesting guy.
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Re: How much longer will Earth support Intelligent Life?

Unread postby EnergyUnlimited » Sat 14 Sep 2019, 14:13:08

Ibon wrote:I'm wondering if Plant would eat Obama if push came to shove.

What about Obama eating Plant?
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