Comment by maxxxxx | Hacker News Reader

Comment by maxxxxx | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

It just seems highly unlikely to me. Even if 90% of the world becomes uninhabitable there is still plenty of space left for a lot of people. You can lose 90% or even 99% of world population and will still have a lot of people left. Not saying this is a good thing but I just don't believe civilization will get totally wiped out. Emphasis is on "totally".

I think you are equating "human civilization" with "humanity". I agree that some people are likely to survive a catastrophe, but I don't think that what we think of as civilization is likely to survive a 90% or 99% population reduction.

Or as lifeformed put it elsewhere: "Destroying all civilization doesn't mean destroying all humans, but just the structures that hold society together. A runaway heating scenario may be a pretty effective way of doing that - all crops die, wars for food, nukes get used."

Let's say temps rise by 10 degrees and sea levels rise a lot. I would think there will still be a lot of areas that will be inhabitable. I don't think that the atmosphere will become unbreathable. I think you can have a pretty sophisticated civilization with 100 million or even 10 million people.

Again, I am not saying these things are OK. We should worry about displacing millions of people and probably wars but civilization dying seems overblown and damaging to the argument that we should be doing something.

Of course the planet will be inhabitable. Will there be any of us to inhabit it? Or will war break out because of population migration due to the effects of climate change? I don't know the answer to the first question, but the second one is easy -- it's already happening.

These are important issues but I still doubt civilization will get destroyed. Let's warn of likely scenarios. These are bad enough. No need for exaggeration that then can easily be refuted.

Africa is undergoing a mass migration leading to local wars. The Middle East is subject to the same pressure. There’s plenty of evidence that this is directly leading to European immigration and the rise of nationalist movements. None of this is exaggerated — it is current reality.

If 90% of the world becomes uninhabitable, you and your millions of very close neighbors will have nothing to eat.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com