assorted writing

Remember when we all died on the 21st of December 2012? Yeah me neither. Our history is full of such apocalyptic dates which supposedly predicted the end of our world. A lot of them seemed to be based mainly on religious beliefs and ancient myths with no concrete scientific proof. Having evolved and acquired enough knowledge of how our universe works, humans are now in a better position to predict the end of our world rationally. You will be astounded by the many possibilities that have the potential to sweep away humankind. Even the Doomsday Clock is foretelling a near catastrophe. This clock was built in 1947 by US scientists involved in the Manhattan Project that developed the world’s first nuclear weapons during the Second World War. The nearer the minute-hand is to midnight (the time of disaster; the closer the earth is to the disaster. Its position is measured on the threat of nuclear attacks, climate change, cyber warfare and bioterrorism – anything that can result in a cataclysm and this year, the clock is pointed at 2 minutes to midnight; the second closest it has been to midnight since its creation.

We were all born in a world of conspiracy. Nikola Tesla, the great physicist and engineer, worked on a tower that could provide free wireless energy to the entire planet but died before he could finish his work. His inventions were possibly viewed as a threat by acquisitive industries. Today, everyone would have had access to free energy without having to burn fossil fuel. Another conspiracy is deforestation. Hemp could have been used to produce paper and furniture instead of trees. Hemp grows 10 to 20 metres tall within 4 months and is ready to be harvested. On the other hand trees must grow for 20 to 50 years after planting. The US Dept of Agriculture report states that one acre of hemp can produce 4 times more paper than one acre of trees. However, hemp is banned and trees continue to be cut down at the expense of the environment. Despite knowing the consequences of burning fossil fuels, industries carried on with their extraction.
     According to scientist David Archer, the majority of C02 emitted from burning a single tonne of coal or oil today will be absorbed over a few centuries by the oceans and vegetation, the remaining 25% will still be affecting the climate in 1,000 years. As Archer puts it, “the climatic impacts of releasing fossil fuel C02 to the atmosphere will last longer than Stonehenge, longer than time capsules, longer than nuclear waste”.
     Based on the latest Copenhagen Diagnosis (authored by 26 leading climate scientists), the carbon that we are releasing into the atmosphere today is in the process of ‘programming’ a potential 2-5 metres of sea level rise by around the year 2300. The polar ice caps are melting at an alarming rate of 9% per decade and the thickness of the Arctic Ice has decreased by 40% since the 1960s as stated by NASA. If the current rate of global temperature rise continues, the Arctic will be free of Ice by 2040. 80% of the sunlight that strikes the polar caps is reflected back out of our atmosphere. Without the ice caps, the heat will be absorbed by our ocean which will increase the ocean temperatures. Warmer ocean temperatures will mean more frequent and more intense weather events as well as the destruction of marine life and coral reefs. The world will have to fight a perpetual and almost losing battle against rising see levels leading to destructive tsunamis, extreme weather, droughts and floods before the Earth finally cools down. But will humanity survive all of this?

Since the beginning of time, man has displayed his superiority among the other species. He has taken everything that was offered to him for granted and abused it in the long run. Today, the environment has to confront the impacts that we human beings have made and are still making on this planet. We were all taught about the causes and impacts of global warming at school. We were all concerned and many of us even adopted ‘green habits’. Little do we know that our actions are not contributing to any change as bigger companies and industries are still polluting the air and water at a much greater extent every single day. One example would be the meat industry. Humans started breeding animals for consumption which led to the emission of a large amount of greenhouse gases. Thousands of gallons of water are used to produce meat while food waste accounts to more than 1/3 of all food. We basically use land to grow crops which will be fed to the animals so its meat can end up on our plate (and some wasted). Wow logic. If only we could eat the plants directly, save so much water, contribute a lot less to climate change and animal cruelty and possibly reduce world hunger. It will be only a matter of time till our resources will be overused by the incessantly growing number of people on the Earth.
     Bailey, Oxfam's senior climate advisor, said: "The food system must be transformed. By 2050, there will be 9 billion people on the planet and demand for food will have increased by 70 %. This demand must be met despite flat lining yields, increasing water scarcity, and growing competition over land. And agriculture must rapidly adapt to a changing climate and slash its carbon footprint.”
     Mass starvation can happen where only the rich will be able to afford clean water and food. It could be the beginning of the end of humanity with people killing each other for food or dying of famine.
     Professor Julian Cribb, author of ‘The Coming Famine: The Global Food Crisis and What We Can Do to Avoid It’, warned in his 2010 book: “The world has ignored the ominous constellation of factors that now make feeding humanity sustainably our most pressing task - even in times of economic and climatic crisis. It is arriving even faster than climate change.”

All the possible threats to humanity so far have been listed with their respective consequences separately nevertheless all these issues are taking place simultaneously in our current world. A term known as the Snowball Effect where multiple events occur is most likely to bring about the end of the world. If we ponder on the previous paragraphs of this essay, we can see that most of the problems are interlinked. Emission of greenhouse gases from our actions has led to global warming. Deforestation is making things worse as fewer trees are now available to counterbalance the huge amount of CO2 in the atmosphere. Agriculture and livestock are currently the leading causes of deforestation and they are also contributing to global warming. It is estimated that within 100 years there will be no rainforest. Climate change has altered the precipitation and moisture levels, making wet areas wetter and dry areas drier. These hot, dry conditions increase the likelihood that wildfires will be more intense and long-burning once they are started by lightning strikes or human error. Wildfires will result in a greater loss of trees (together with its residing animal habitats) and the emission of more greenhouse gases. The rise in ocean temperatures from the melting of ice caps will destroy phytoplankton. With a decline in phytoplankton and trees, the level of oxygen in the atmosphere will decrease while the amount of greenhouse gases will keep on increasing. To make matters worse, the rise in temperature and floods mean an increase in the population of mosquitoes and ticks which carry vector borne pathogens. New virulent pathogens will emerge with the warm and moist environment. A pandemic can break through, killing a significant amount of people. Ducks, pigs and chickens live in close proximity in barnyards all over China and that is exactly the origin of influenza. Animal viruses which are more toxic are passed to humans through uncooked meat. These viruses are so good at mutating that they are posing some serious threat to human beings.
      David Wake, curator at the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology at the University of California, Berkeley talked about our little knowledge of treating fungal infections and how a fatal fungus in humans could be catastrophic. Over a 100, 000 commercial jets full of passengers fly each day. A deadly virus can easily spread across the world within days and vaccines can’t be made fast enough to save us scientifically. There you have an apocalyptic idea of the years to come; the collapse of our ecosystem with people dying in all sorts of ways. Some choking on air pollution; drowning in flood; others dying of diseases, famine or heat waves. People will be seen walking around with oxygen cylinders.

When Stephen Hawking was asked what human trait he’d like to change, he replied ‘aggression’. "There is no sign of conflict lessening, and the development of militarised technology and weapons of mass destruction could make that disastrous," he told the BBC, as part of his 75th birthday celebrations. 90 missiles were fired and four nuclear weapon tests were conducted by Kim Jong Un since 2011. The latest report of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) indicates that Pakistan and India are housing each over a 100 of nuclear warheads and China over a 200. India is also developing a nuclear submarine fleet that can fire missiles from anywhere. A global nuclear warfare is therefore likely to happen if the halfwits in possession of these weapons go berserk. Nuclear fallout will render land inhospitable, irradiated, and economically unusable. There will be a massive destruction of fauna and flora. Radioactive particles from nuclear bombs can be carried by wind to other places, contaminating humans, animals and their food. Plutonium (carcinogen known as the most toxic substance on Earth) was found to have been carried all the way from the melted-down Fukushima power plant to California, thousands of miles away. Man has the potential to wipe itself out with his own destructive technology.

Even if we hadn’t done so much harm to our planet, there would have been still some unpredicted ways that Earth could be destroyed. The most cited one is that we cross path with a really huge asteroid that can wipe us out like the dinosaurs. There are millions of asteroids in Kuiper Belt and many have come close to Earth multiple times without actually hitting us and we are currently in the path of many more asteroids. NASA has to keep an eye on them and figure out a way to blow them up or alter their trajectory. There are approximately 10 million dead stars in the Milky Way that are compressed down to 12- 15 miles wide and they are black holes gobbling up everything around them including light (which makes them unnoticeable). If light can’t escape them, Earth definitely won’t. There is also a possibility of us being hit by a rogue planet and shoved into a deadly orbit. The reversal of the Earth’s magnetic field has occurred many times in our history, the last one taking place 780,000 years ago. The North and South poles swap places and we lose our magnetic field which shields us against cosmic rays for over a period of 100 years. Direct hit of mass coronal ejections from the Sun will fry us all.

Everything has an end but our actions have surely accelerated the end of our planet. Humans have always seen the benefits of the fauna and flora and not its value. This human greed will soon cost us our lives. The only solution left will be people terraforming another planet but that will take up to 300 years minimum to happen and 500 years to do it right. In the meantime, we, as conscientious people will have to continue reducing our carbon footprint and spread awareness and compassion.