What's Your Opinion Of The Future Of The Humans Race

[DarthScorpio11]

I hear a lot of people saying that they don't think humans will survive this century alone, and we aren't even talking about future centuries. I don't see that as the case. I think the majority of humans, at least in developed countries will survive the 21st century, however, i also think that somewhere along the line something will happen that greatly reduces the population. As far as humanity going extinct: that isn't going to happen. A small group of humans will probably always survive, at least for 1000s of years. We've survived some pretty tough times as a species in the past, and I think will continue to.

I wonder though, if in 1000 years if all of today's history will be lost. Everyone alive will be just as much as a myth as Jesus, and Moses and the Red Sea.

 

[DarthScorpio11]

Another haves vs the have nots war on a global scale perhaps.

I'm pretty sure in 1000 years we will be well beyond that.

 

[Dr.Panties]

That there is no prize for second place.

 

[Instant K4rma]

1000 years, eh?

I'm guessing it would resemble a society like I-Robot or Deus Ex. People will still have jobs, daily schedules, etc, but we will be much farther along in technological advancements such as robotics and human/genetic augmentation.

 

[chaosyoshimage]

1000 years? What did 1000 years ago look like? I'm guessing that at the rate we're going...

 

[FalloutJack]

Oh, enough with the doomsayers. Thy prophecy comes to naught. The human race'll probably NEVER change. It'll be how society is now, but with shinier gizmos.

 

[Farther than stars]

I wonder though, if in 1000 years if all of today's history will be lost. Everyone alive will be just as much as a myth as Jesus, and Moses and the Red Sea.

Congratulations, you have just applied the nihilistic approach to the understanding of the finality of thing. They say you're an adult now. One thing I do know for certain: come to terms with that understanding of things and you'll be relaxed for the rest of your life, because nothing that comes after that can weaken your belief in the carpe diem. ^.^
Sure, I believe humanity as a whole will carry on. But then it won't be humanity anymore after a while. According to my belief, we'll have evolved and hopefully that evolution of us will carry forward civilization and technology to make an even better society. And what evidence is there that that's not going to be the case? Looking over the past 3000 years, the part of which we know most about human civilization, haven't things always improved for us? Why should things suddenly come to a close now for humanity? What facilitates that way of thinking? Are it the wars with our fancy machine guns and soft matrasses in barracks? Is it the crime rate, which steals cars from villas with clean drinking water and a seemingly endless food supply? Compare that to back when we lived as cavemen and we had to run away from sabertooth tigers with nothing but a club to protect us and I think you'll find we're doing OK, despite the small mishaps. Yes, that's right, compared to the way things used to be, even in the Dark Ages, I'm calling theft and war and arson meaningless (especially in a wellfare state).

 

[Farther than stars]

Oh, enough with the doomsayers. Thy prophecy comes to naught. The human race'll probably NEVER change. It'll be how society is now, but with shinier gizmos.

*Ahem* Evolution? Darwin says: ?It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change.? So I think you'll find we will change, but that doesn't necessarily mean things are going to change for the worst. I know it's basically what you're saying, but as an evolutionist I just needed to reiterate that.

 

[FalloutJack]

Oh, enough with the doomsayers. Thy prophecy comes to naught. The human race'll probably NEVER change. It'll be how society is now, but with shinier gizmos.

*Ahem* Evolution? Darwin says: ?It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change.? So I think you'll find we will change, but that doesn't necessarily mean things are going to change for the worst. I know it's basically what you're saying, but as an evolutionist I just needed to reiterate that.

I meant more in its overall personality, the abstract spirit and behavior model, not the flesh. Whether the physical characteristics will change in a thousand years is up to debate and not really the focus of my post.

 

[Farther than stars]

Oh, enough with the doomsayers. Thy prophecy comes to naught. The human race'll probably NEVER change. It'll be how society is now, but with shinier gizmos.

*Ahem* Evolution? Darwin says: ?It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change.? So I think you'll find we will change, but that doesn't necessarily mean things are going to change for the worst. I know it's basically what you're saying, but as an evolutionist I just needed to reiterate that.

I meant more in its overall personality, the abstract spirit and behavior model, not the flesh. Whether the physical characteristics will change in a thousand years is up to debate and not really the focus of my post.

Personally, I would say that even our personality will change eventually. Or don't you think that our psyche is a bit different these days from when we were apes?

 

[TimeLord]

I'd like to think that humans are the great survivors and will survive till the end of time. Then look like this;

 

[FalloutJack]

Oh, enough with the doomsayers. Thy prophecy comes to naught. The human race'll probably NEVER change. It'll be how society is now, but with shinier gizmos.

*Ahem* Evolution? Darwin says: ?It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change.? So I think you'll find we will change, but that doesn't necessarily mean things are going to change for the worst. I know it's basically what you're saying, but as an evolutionist I just needed to reiterate that.

I meant more in its overall personality, the abstract spirit and behavior model, not the flesh. Whether the physical characteristics will change in a thousand years is up to debate and not really the focus of my post.

Personally, I would say that even our personality will change eventually. Or don't you think that our psyche is a bit different these days from when we were apes?

I'm not concerned with our ape-ish pasttimes either. I'm speaking of that blink in time (A mere few thousand years.) in which humans are humans. During that rough patch, we have our ups and we have our downs, but some things have not changed. We can be petty, war-like, easy to panic, argumentative, short-sighted, idiotic, and highly-destructive. Mind you, this is the same page that's also seen us philosophical, innovative, scientific, and certainly funny as well.

But the POINT I'm trying to make is that a thousand years may not be enough time to change the human condition. Maybe not ten thousand. Maybe just not. The evolution of a being, spiritually and physically, is in response to a need to do such. Spiritually, the human race might be too stubborn to do such for quite some time. Physically...well, I suppose something must eventually come, but you will admit that the use of technology eliminates some need of physical adaptation. The use of tools means we don't have to grow something that'll do the same job.

 

[Farther than stars]

Oh, enough with the doomsayers. Thy prophecy comes to naught. The human race'll probably NEVER change. It'll be how society is now, but with shinier gizmos.

*Ahem* Evolution? Darwin says: ?It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change.? So I think you'll find we will change, but that doesn't necessarily mean things are going to change for the worst. I know it's basically what you're saying, but as an evolutionist I just needed to reiterate that.

I meant more in its overall personality, the abstract spirit and behavior model, not the flesh. Whether the physical characteristics will change in a thousand years is up to debate and not really the focus of my post.

Personally, I would say that even our personality will change eventually. Or don't you think that our psyche is a bit different these days from when we were apes?

I'm not concerned with our ape-ish pasttimes either. I'm speaking of that blink in time (A mere few thousand years.) in which humans are humans. During that rough patch, we have our ups and we have our downs, but some things have not changed. We can be petty, war-like, easy to panic, argumentative, short-sighted, idiotic, and highly-destructive. Mind you, this is the same page that's also seen us philosophical, innovative, scientific, and certainly funny as well.

But the POINT I'm trying to make is that a thousand years may not be enough time to change the human condition. Maybe not ten thousand. Maybe just not. The evolution of a being, spiritually and physically, is in response to a need to do such. Spiritually, the human race might be too stubborn to do such for quite some time. Physically...well, I suppose something must eventually come, but you will admit that the use of technology eliminates some need of physical adaptation. The use of tools means we don't have to grow something that'll do the same job.

I know, I know, but my gripe was with the word "never", because although possible, it is highly unlikely that we will in fact never change.
And since we're on the matter of wording, I'd also like to stress the fact that it is not a "need" which causes us to change, but rather a change in circumstance which eliminates those unadapting to that new enviroment. Evolution is a passive occurrance, not an active one.
Moreover, is it also a gradual thing. And since because it's ever changing, there is no one moment in history when our children will be able to say that we were truly human. And even if we haven't changed noticably over a thousand years, I am convinced that we will have changed in detail, albeit just a slight mutation here and there.

 

[The Code]

Personally, I'm of the belief that history repeats itself invariably. What happened to the Roman civilization will more than likely happen to our current age: We will become too hedonistic and overfed by our own hubris to notice that our empires are crumbling beneath us until it's too late to fix it. The remaining survivors will rebuild, despite myriads of lost technological and philosophical knowledge and artifacts being lost to war and time. History is invariably written by the victor, and the ultimate victor in all wars is time.

 

[Astoria]

I'm thinking sometime in the next 50-100 years some event will happen that will cause the population to drop immensely. I'm thinking probably war over dwindling natural resources or something. After that we might go backwards a bit for a little while but then just continue advancing like we are. Either that or nature will be extremely screwed up and everything will start dying out.

 

[aPod]

I've heard some interesting theories.

Some people believe the global civilization of today will collapse in the near future and give way to local culture and isolationism and a touch of anarchy.

Others that within 50 years we will have robots that are so advanced they become self aware.

A strange theory is we are in the mirrors reflection, an evolutionary and cultural reflection of whats happened past.

I would say in 1000 years people wont even think in the same way as we do now, evolution isn't restricted to physical changes our conscious evolves as well. Then i think 1000 years from now man will try to relate to us as if we are today as they are tomorrow.

At least we will finally have that damned flying car.

 

[badgersprite]

The Jetsons. It will be just like the Jetsons.

So it will be like the '60s but in the future.

 

[Fieldy409_v1legacy]

i dont think our history will be lost. I can quite easily see fragments of it being lost, but we have the internet now. All that data stored on those servers, in a thousand years some historical computer data retrievalist could be trying to recover this very comment to read to see what we were like back before we evolved those tentacles.

 

[Arriba]

I really can't seeing us lasting another 1000 years unless we see some major behavioral changes. I think we'll probably see global over-population in the next 300-500 years, which will lead to dwindling resources, famine, disease, social unrest, and eventually fighting and death.

I can't see us ending because of a World War or some global catastrophe. Kind of sucks to say, but we'll probably leave with a whimper, not a bang. Sorry for being a downer.