Doomsday! Seems so unrealistic and book-ish right? Not possible to even imagine a day with no human on Earth? Though, many Hollywood movies have lately shown some really unexpected parts of the future. But, who cares!  It’s not reality! Just a bunch of actors doing their work!

Well, if these are your thoughts about a doomsday existence, you might want to think again or brush your knowledge a bit. You might consider it impossible but scientists don’t. Yes, scientists have actually stated some scenarios under which human life on earth will end or at least will reach a level of extinction.

Shocked, surprised, curious? You should be. But there is a solution to your eagerness. Here is the list of all the possible scenarios that could lead to extinct human life on earth. Be ready, because you might also be playing a part to it. Oh yes, there are the reasons that we hear about every day but never pay attention to!

Possible scenarios leading to doomsday:

  • Global Warming

Human lifestyle is causing the climate to change; the fact that it is going to affect human life is not hidden. Starting with the melting of ice in the polar region, it will soon start affecting human life in numerous ways. The increase in temperature will soon make the environment unsuitable for the human body. The depletion of the ozone layer due to increasing pollution and other human activities will soon make the sun rays affect the human body. Another effect of increasing temperature is the possibility of climate change causing drought in the Amazon rainforest, the rainforest that generates the largest amount of Oxygen along with removing a significant amount of Carbon from the atmosphere. The rise of water level due to the significant increase in temperature will leave millions of people with no choice other than migration creating chaos among nations getting millions of refugees. This mass mobilization of people may result at the end of global civilization. These changes might just make the earth a place not suitable for human life to exist. Yes!  Stop these activities of yours and even tell your friends or else you’ll one day meet them in the world definitely not earth!

  • Flip in the magnetic poles:

Flip in the magnetic poles is a natural phenomenon that is unavoidable and is seen in all of the earth like planets once in millennia. A slight shift in the magnetic poles can cause a great change in the environmental conditions of the surrounding that in turn can lead to the mass extinction of various living creatures including humans. The magnetic fields surrounding the earth helps protect its environment from getting affected by the harmful cosmic radiations. According to a hypothesis, if this change occurs it may lead to the removal of these magnetic fields of the earth. It may also lead to globe stop spinning for a day making half of the world to overheat. However, many researchers seem to be against this particular idea. Still, due to popular beliefs, it is counted as one of the significant reasons that can cause the extinction of human species on earth. So when it happens, are you going to die? Yes! And as stated earlier, you can’t even avoid it when it strikes up.

  • Orbital collisions of the earth with foreign bodies like Asteroids and Comets:

It is known that there exist asteroids that have significant size and they may collide to earth due to orbital overlapping. Asteroids have a more elliptical path as compared to planets and that does cause some of them to enter earth’s atmosphere and are commonly named as shooting stars in general language as they look beautiful in the night sky. In case, if a large-sized asteroid enters earth’s atmosphere it may lead to mass extinction. One theory about the extinction of dinosaurs supports this argument. Comets, on the other hand, can be more dangerous, they are made of a large amount of ice and dust, unlike asteroids. Comets come from farther distances and thus travel at larger velocities. If they cross paths with earth, this speed would further increase due to gravitational pull causing much harm on collisions on the surface. But for now, you can relax because our super talented scientists have not really alarmed any such collision in the near future.

  • Evolution of deadly diseases:

Every few years, there is seen the evolution of some new kind of pathogens that are deadly enough to wipe out the entire human race. Recently detected include Bird flu, Swine flu, SARS and MERS. Humans have been dealing with viruses throughout history and it is a possibility that one day there arises the evolution of the certain virus that causes the extinction of the entire human population. Leaving the bacterial threats aside, there is a possibility of development of a fungal disease. Fungal diseases are known to affect entities of entire species severely. Scientists fear that one day there may be a possibility that a disease may show up that could not be cured with any medication thereby causing human extinction. And when this will happen, it will just be news that we listen to, but cannot do something about it.

  • The Doomsday Argument:

There is an existence of a theory that states that the number of humans that will ever live on earth has a limit. This theory states that there is a very high probability that we are almost halfway through the actual limit of humans that will ever live on earth. This theory is often criticized by scientists as it lacks reasonability and is oversimplified. It is based on the probability theory that the lifetime humans have lived it through its midway and thus an equal amount of life for humans is left. Thus, considering that around 75 billion humans have lived till date, 75 billion more are going to live, therefore stating that a total of around 1.5 billion humans are ever going to live on earth.

  • Nuclear War:

There is quite a possibility of occurrence of a nuclear war at any possible time. The idea of certain people gaining power and using nuclear technology to create threat and chaos in the world is quite prominent. Most nations have understood the dangerous effects a nuclear bomb can cause after what happened in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. If sometime in future, there occurs a war, then a country might use a nuclear weapon to create a threat or take revenge causing the entire human race to get effected and in turn make it impossible for any living creature to reproduce and thus will ultimately result in the extinction of human species.

  • Super volcanic eruptions:

There have been times tens of thousands of years ago that there have been super-eruptions in the volcano causing global volcanic winters. This does not happen because of the lava that flows out of the volcano, it happens by the formation of ash cloud surrounding the earth’s atmosphere. The super eruption can cause molten metal to reach the stratosphere along with a hundred thousand tons of sulfur dioxide. These eruptions can affect the atmosphere for centuries, thereby wiping out the entire human race. The huge amount of Sulphur Dioxide in the atmosphere may stop the sun rays from reaching the earth’s surface causing volcanic winters. This could lower the world temperature to near zero degrees Celsius. It has been more than 10000 years since the last super eruption. Also, it could take some more thousand years to happen again. But again, it has a possibility and a threat not to us but the human life ahead of us.

  • The Technological Ascension:

Many scientists worry that the day is not far away when the Artificial Intelligence (AI) that is being developed right now will ascend to a stage where they may take over the human race. The developments of such a technology that can make computers think and develop their own army against humans to take over humans can result in the extinction of humans from earth. There have been arguments over the fast development of technologies that help humans live a simpler life, that one day machines may start to feel like slaves to humans and thereby try to take revenge by killing each and every last human living on earth. Think of the possibilities of harm a super-intelligent robot can do if it is armed with weapons on a large scale. So guess what, robots aren’t that good of an invention as they seem.

  • Supernova explosions:

After millions of years, a star has lived, the core of the star collapses creating super booms. These explosions are amongst the most powerful explosions that occur in the entire universe and it affects stars. In our Milky Way galaxy, these explosions occur every 100 years but luckily most of them occur at safe distances. The power of a supernova explosion can be so much that it may cause the depletion of the ozone layer around the earth.

So, here is the question again. Shocked, surprised? It’s understandable. It is a lot of facts and knowledge to gulp in altogether. So have a good time knowing how your species is going to extinct!

 

 

Lyman Ward