EPTThe End of Humanity - Page 6
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spetial
United States688 Posts
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BottleAbuser
Korea (South)1888 Posts
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TheOvermind77
United States923 Posts
On August 13 2008 13:56 BottleAbuser wrote: The chance is not as high as .00001%/sec. If we compounded this we'd have a 50% chance of having a nuclear weapon exploding every 2 months. Besides, there is no event that affects the use of a nuclear weapon every second. Silly. We have way too small of a data set to perform statistics on it - nuclear weapons have been used exactly TWICE, in ONE war. Well, the chances are probably much smaller (I wasn't doing math, just throwing something small out there). You are right, I mistakenly presented that post as a very concrete and mathematically describable problem. It is not, and I am incorrect on that point. But, I still believe that chance shows that with 20,000 of these things sitting around, something is bound to happen soon! But when you say there are no events that affect the use every second? I disagree. There are lots of unaccounted nukes that slipped away right after the fall of the Soviet Union. They didn't have the money to pay their scientists or to guard the facilities well, and many nukes have "disappeared". What happened to them? Terrorists? Black market? They just got lost? You also have Iran. And an increasing number of countries working on nuclear weapons. Don't forget nearly any armed conflict involving large powers (Russia, cough cough). Although it is highly unlikely these powers will use nukes, there is always that chance. There is also the standoff concerning Taiwan (er, excuse me, "Chinese Taipei" as referred to in the Olympics) between the U.S. and China. Both of who have lots of nukes. Sure, now the likelihood of them being used is small, but who knows what will happen years from now? The chance of someone eventually using them is very high. A 10 kiloton fusion bomb dropped on NYC would kill millions and leave a radiation cloud that would kill even more. Responding to a nuke with a nuke has always been a inferred policy of many large nations like the U.S., and we all know this could slide towards all out nuclear war. It might not be in my lifetime or my children's lifetime, but we both know that if it happens then nuclear war is very much a possible end result. It is the war were no one wins. Unless we dismantle all of our warheads, there will always be a large chance of ending our own civilization with nukes. Sure, we only have to roll the dice for 70 years until we die. But if you are talking about the existence of Humanity, you have to roll those nuke dice for awhile...and that's not a game I think we can win for many more millenia. It will be either nukes or some other weapon of mass destruction, created by ourselves, that will kill us. | ||
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LaLuSh
Sweden2358 Posts
Travis, you should recognise the fact that you don't actually present many arguments, making it extremely difficult for any opponent to debate your stance. I think your idea of diversification is interesting. But dancefayedance already posted a rebuttal that you conveniently failed to address (which seems to be a common trend in the way you debate). Claim -- Opponent explains --> New claim -- More thorough explanation --> Modification of claim -- Rebuttal --> Posting new questions instead of answering rebuttal -- End of discussion. I'd actually like to see a continuation on the diversification debate. fayedance seems to argue that diversification is pretty much random, the ratio of geniuses produced relative to the human populace remains constant. And furthermore seems to sement that fact by showing that -- since human reproduction doesn't seem to be guided by natural selection -- children and grandchildren of those geniuses don't necessarily get to see those traits passed on unto them. Beneficiary genes face the probability (and probably a high one at that -- every new generation) of washing out due to humans not employing natural selection. Albert Einsteins and other "geniouses" don't produce genious children --> thus diversification seems mostly random, and likely devoured by human reproductionary patterns within a couple of generations. I.e. If biological evolution occurs -- most likely, within the first generation of reproduction -- it is already in the process of being weeded out. and since when is biological evolution necessarily fueled by survival of the fittest? that is natural selection, not biological evolution. evolution is about adaptation of every sort - evolution doesn't need to make sense it just happens. And what follows when it happens? You make the assumption that evolutionary changes (due to as you call it "diversification") automatically survive and get a foothold. Like something out of the show Heroes, where interestingly most of the characters breed with eachother, and seem "magically connected". The problem being that this is not how it happens in the real world. In the real world the "diverse hero" would have 3 billion potentially DNA-polluting humans to choose between and maybe just a few hundred other "diverse heroes" where success is guaranteed. If the hero by chance manages to pass on his/her gene despite breeding with a normal human, the next generation hero child will have just as big a chance to run into a more dominant gene, and so on and so forth... With no natural selection evolution will be contaminated. I was going to ask dancefayedance why it seems humans are getting taller. But I decided to turn to google first and I found some very interesting articles: Why are we getting taller? Also this might help explain the "why are there more geniuses?" question: The effect of nutrition Along with this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meme Memetic evolution and diversification and its possible implications may perhaps be viable enough to discuss. After all, most clashes for survival today are the result of cultural differences, religion, ideology... We are fighting for the survival of memes rather than genes. | ||
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BottleAbuser
Korea (South)1888 Posts
But I somehow think that a minimal number of humans would survive a nuclear war, too. We have enough nukes to bomb every major city in the world twice over, and maybe that'll get 90% of the population. That's still far from 100%. Which is what we'll need if you want to call it extinction. We'll need a planet buster if we really want to kill ourselves. | ||
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Famehunter
Canada586 Posts
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TheOvermind77
United States923 Posts
On August 13 2008 15:06 BottleAbuser wrote: Well, my main problem was with the wording, which you've conceded was poor. But I somehow think that a minimal number of humans would survive a nuclear war, too. We have enough nukes to bomb every major city in the world twice over, and maybe that'll get 90% of the population. That's still far from 100%. Which is what we'll need if you want to call it extinction. We'll need a planet buster if we really want to kill ourselves. I really don't know, the radiation clouds churned up from the massive nuclear holocaust would kill many people who were not directly hit by the nuclear weapons. The surviving population would have to live in a world where the amount of dust churned up by the nuclear warheads blocks out the sun and kills many plants, demolishing the already nuked foodchain that relies on them (ie livestock). Water sources would be contaminated with massive amounts of radiation. A nuclear winter would also soon ensue, amplifying the damage on the human food source. Sure, some people might survive, but for how long? I don't think nukes would directly wipe us out, but they would leave a very small, very fragile population in a very scarce world. If humans did somehow manage to survive, we would be set back so far in technology it would be insane. All the infrastructure, government, food supplies, electricity...every modern day convenience would be gone. And do you have faith that a handful of randomly picked humans has the capacity to survive without these modern conveniences in a world were you can't hunt for food to eat because it is all dead? I'm pretty sure a nuclear holocaust would be the end of us. Interestingly enough, on a related note, I read somewhere that the US did a post WW-II study on how large of a bomb it would take to prettymuch wipe out the United States. Turns out it was a 10 Megaton bomb...around 400 times stronger than the bomb dropped on Hiroshima. I don't think this study is entirely accurate but there are plenty of nukes in the world that are in this range. In fact, the Russians once made a bomb called the "Tsar Bomb" in 1961, initially 100 Megatons. They scaled it down to 50 megatons and then tested it via an air burst (the detonated it slightly above the ground to prevent a lot of fallout). The resulting footage is horrifying. From over 650 miles away, you could see and feel the heat from the fireball. At this same distance there was also blast damage. In Finland, a few hundred miles away, windows were broken. Everything was incinerated within a 150 mile radius. The explosion also caused such a large seismic shock that it registered as a 5.5 on the richter scale and the shockwave passed around the Earth three times. This bomb was made in 1960, and is only one bomb. And there are 20,000 nukes in the world, and we definitely have the capability to make ones larger than this (a 100 Megaton one is theorized to be able to fracture the Earth's crust at ground zero). I have no doubt that we can destroy ourselves...entirely...with these. | ||
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BottleAbuser
Korea (South)1888 Posts
I'm thinking that lucky, intelligent, prepared, and quick people (people with all 4 traits, I mean) would survive. Volcanoes easily throw up more debris than any man-made explosive, including nuclear weapons. Mount Helen, for example, is sometimes quoted as being equivalent to a 400 megaton explosive (and that's just a moderate-sized volcano - a really big volcano really could wipe us out... maybe). No human casualties. Surely it would be harder to survive a smaller, but targetted explosion, but I really doubt we could manage to kill EVERYONE. Especially if they were trying damn hard not to die. | ||
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doubleupgradeobbies!
Australia1187 Posts
On August 13 2008 12:50 yOko[LuNyA] wrote: i think that evolution theory is bogus as hell, we might not look like humans, but i doubt natural selection is going to be like hey these guys dont need brains, toss that shit out. We might interpret different, we might sound different, look different, live different, but essentially we will still be human inside, just like now we are still primate inside (dont believe me about the primate thing? try not having sex for a month.) Well the general biological convention is that if some generations down the track, we are no longer to breed with what we are now, then we are 2 different species. So your right in that it dosen't matter if we look and live different. But the theory still holds, if we evolve enough to be classified as a different species, and all members of the same species as we are now are dead, then our species is extinct | ||
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TheOvermind77
United States923 Posts
So let's say humans only can live on land for extended periods of time. ->Land surface area on Earth: 148,940,000 square kilometers Let's estimate the number of active nukes in the world. And I read in a few places that the average weapons yield is around 1 Megaton. ->Number of active nukes: 20,000 ->Total yield: 20,000 Megatons -> # of Tsar Bomb Equivalents: 400 The Tsar bomb's fireball incinerated everything immediately within a 120 mile radius. So let's find a rough estimate of our megatonnage converted to incinerated area by converting that radius to km and doing an area calculation: 400*(120*1.609)^2*3.141=46838449.27 square kilometers. This means that 31.4% of our landmass can be directly incinerated by our nukes. Outside that radius, there is still massive burn damage and shock wave damage, not to mention the radiation effects. Keep in mind that Humans don't even inhabit all 148 million square kilometers of the land on Earth. So maybe we can't GLASS the Earth entirely, but we can sure fuck it up (imho) enough to cause humans to die off. | ||
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BottleAbuser
Korea (South)1888 Posts
 I think that number will be less than 20k.Anyways, I don't think we'd end up with a nuclear holocaust in the first place, but that's a lot harder to argue o.o TEH RAPTURE IS COMINGZ | ||
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Famehunter
Canada586 Posts
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Maenander
Germany4919 Posts
On August 13 2008 14:54 LaLuSh wrote: dancefayedance!~ I really enjoy reading your posts; the arguments you present are worded properly and very thought provoking. Travis, you should recognise the fact that you don't actually present many arguments, making it extremely difficult for any opponent to debate your stance. I think your idea of diversification is interesting. But dancefayedance already posted a rebuttal that you conveniently failed to address (which seems to be a common trend in the way you debate). Claim -- Opponent explains --> New claim -- More thorough explanation --> Modification of claim -- Rebuttal --> Posting new questions instead of answering rebuttal -- End of discussion. I'd actually like to see a continuation on the diversification debate. fayedance seems to argue that diversification is pretty much random, the ratio of geniuses produced relative to the human populace remains constant. And furthermore seems to sement that fact by showing that -- since human reproduction doesn't seem to be guided by natural selection -- children and grandchildren of those geniuses don't necessarily get to see those traits passed on unto them. Beneficiary genes face the probability (and probably a high one at that -- every new generation) of washing out due to humans not employing natural selection. Albert Einsteins and other "geniouses" don't produce genious children --> thus diversification seems mostly random, and likely devoured by human reproductionary patterns within a couple of generations. I.e. If biological evolution occurs -- most likely, within the first generation of reproduction -- it is already in the process of being weeded out. And what follows when it happens? You make the assumption that evolutionary changes (due to as you call it "diversification") automatically survive and get a foothold. Like something out of the show Heroes, where interestingly most of the characters breed with eachother, and seem "magically connected". The problem being that this is not how it happens in the real world. In the real world the "diverse hero" would have 3 billion potentially DNA-polluting humans to choose between and maybe just a few hundred other "diverse heroes" where success is guaranteed. If the hero by chance manages to pass on his/her gene despite breeding with a normal human, the next generation hero child will have just as big a chance to run into a more dominant gene, and so on and so forth... With no natural selection evolution will be contaminated. I was going to ask dancefayedance why it seems humans are getting taller. But I decided to turn to google first and I found some very interesting articles: Why are we getting taller? Also this might help explain the "why are there more geniuses?" question: The effect of nutrition Along with this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meme Memetic evolution and diversification and its possible implications may perhaps be viable enough to discuss. After all, most clashes for survival today are the result of cultural differences, religion, ideology... We are fighting for the survival of memes rather than genes. Why should the process of evolution suddenly stop? You think love is some concept of randomization ? Then why do so many men search in the internet for a concept to get more women ?? Of course it got more complicated with the anti-baby pill nowadays and so on. But to say there are no selection trends anymore in the modern world is preposterous. Yes, memetic evolution matters more, because it´s a much faster process, especially nowadays. Memetic and genetic evolution were probably intertwined in the past, that´s one reason for the fast advances the human race could make. Better mental capabilities lead to a more refined culture and a more refined culture privileged humans that could "use" the culture to their advantage (more intelligence, more language skills, more art etc., better mental capabilities overall). I don´t really have time to discuss this any further, so I just threw in some (hopefully) interesting points. | ||
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LonelyMargarita
1845 Posts
On August 13 2008 14:01 spetial wrote: i hate everyone that voted rapture because they are most likely a bunch of ignorant assholes Voted rapture just to spite you over the fact that I'm better educated than you. | ||
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KrAzYfoOL
Australia3037 Posts
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Nazarene
Denmark996 Posts
That leaves 2 other options that make sense: 1. Evolution (or genetic engineering, same outcome) will with time make us so different from people that lived a long time ago - how long it will take is irrelevant, it will happen sometime. 2. Technological singularity. Even though it's hard to imagine it, this is for me the most plausible option, mostly because genetic engineering will take at least hundreds of years, and 'natural' evolution probably thousands of years. | ||
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Choros
Australia530 Posts
But as guy above said some will survive. But a deep deep ice age may do the trick. | ||
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Krowser
Canada788 Posts
On August 13 2008 04:00 jwd241224 wrote: I'll go with the cosmological catastrophe, just because that's how the dinosaurs bit it. Why not us? Seems like a pretty decent way to go .Uhhh nub, didn't you watch futurama? Fry: What really killed the dinosaurs? Giant Space Brain: ME!!!!!! *PEW PEW PEW* | ||
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Aerox
Malaysia1213 Posts
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VIB
Brazil3567 Posts
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