What will the Earth be like in 500 years?

[Admin]

Scientists can make some pretty accurate forecasts about the future.

What will the Earth be like in 500 years? : Read more

 

[sam85geo]

Such future predictions about Earth and indirectly humans seems a lot like trying to predict the future of a marriage on the wedding day. I know it's a fact for certain that try as I might, in 500 years I won't be around to make snotty, snide comments on Space.com.

 

[Catastrophe]

I agree with sam85geo (do you have a shorter handle? )
1. We may have become extinct'
2. We may actually have reduced population considerably, possibly with the assistance of Nature providing famines or plagues.
3. If it gets too hot, we may have colonised our own planet e.g., Antarctica after the ice melted.
4. Water level increase may have led to land shortages and possibly wars over the new land continent of Antarctica. Don't forget there is no land under the ice at the North Pole.
5. Aliens may have wiped us out. Any liking hot planets would feel at home.

Just a few ideas,

Cat

 

[Emely Morris]

They say that resources may not be enough for 100 years, and what can we say for 500 years. If you're hoping for the best, chances are the Earth will be full of technology, less green, less fresh air, which is a bit like Cyberpunk. And if humanity is in 500 years, then there will be colonization, perhaps, of Mars or another planet.

 

[Catastrophe]

"They say that resources may not be enough for 100 years"

(Total remaining resources) / (total population) = average wealth.

Decreasing resources divided by increasing population is the way to disaster,

and the way we are following with extreme haste.

Cat

 

[sam85geo]

A study and computer program in the 1970's, (World Dynamics), by the late Jay Forrester of MIT identified 2050ce as a tipping point where human population outstrips living resources. Given our ability to use/invent technology and to discover additional resources, that 2050ce date may actually be much later. Conversely, given our unique primate driven proclivity for violence, greed, and rapaciousness we may not make it to that 2050ce date. I just don't know. If I could accurately foresee even 50 years into the future, I would pawn, borrow and cash-in every asset and make investments. (Thus, with my expected future fortune, I might be able to be insulated from any chaos, the taxman notwithstanding).