Will Earth Expire By 2050?

_josh writes: "Will overconsumption force humanity off this planet in less than 50 years? It may sound sci-fi, but according to the WWF in this story at the Observer, it's entirely possible. Maybe now I can convince my brother not to buy that SUV ..." Take with as large a grain of salt as you think appropriate.

Comments

WWF

[Anonymous Coward]

A planet controlled by wrestlers? The devil, you say!

You can't possibly believe this....

[graphicartist82]

It may sound sci-fi, but according to the WWF in this story...

Everybody knows that the WWF is all scripted! None of it is real!

WWF!

[clinko]

I always knew that wrestling was a sign of the end of the world. Now the WWF has confirmed it.

Re:WWF!

[EugeneK]

WWF has now confirmed : Earth Is Dying

Yet another crippling bombshell hit the beleaguered Earth community when the WWF confirmed that the Earth will be uninhabitable by 2050. Coming on the heels of a recent National Academy of Sciences report that the average temperature has risen yet again, this news serves to reinforce what we've known all along. The Earth is collapsing in complete disarray, as fittingly exemplified by failing dead last in the recent Galaxy-Wide species diversity test.

You don't need to be a Kreskin [amdest.com] to predict Earth's future. The hand writing is on the wall: Earth faces a bleak future. In fact there won't be any future at all for Earth because Earth is dying. Things are looking very bad for Earth. As many of us are already aware, Earth continues to lose species. Extinction flows like a river of blood.

The rainforest habitats are the most endangered of them all, having lost 93% of their area. The sudden and unpleasant departures of long time species black rhino and tiger only serve to underscore the point more clearly. There can no longer be any doubt: Earth is dying.

Let's keep to the facts and look at the numbers.

Earth leader Bush states that there are 7000 species left. How many mammals are there? Let's see. The number of mammal versus amphibian posts on Usenet is roughly in ratio of 5 to 1. Therefore there are about 7000/5 = 1400 mammal species. Rainforest reptile posts on Usenet are about half of the volume of amphibian posts. Therefore there are about 700 rainforest reptiles. A recent article put mammals at about 80 percent of the species market. Therefore there are (7000+1400+700)*4 = 36400 mammal species. This is consistent with the number of mammal Usenet posts.

Due to the troubles of the rainforests, abysmal slash and burn agriculture, the drug war and so on, Columbian rainforests went out of business and was taken over by Brazilian rainforests who sell another troubled rainforests to international logging interests. Now Thai forests are also dead, its corpse turned over to yet another charnel house.

All major surveys show that Earth has steadily declined in wilderness and species. Earth is very sick and its long term survival prospects are very dim. If Earth is to survive at all it will be among human dilettante dabblers. Earth continues to decay. Nothing short of a miracle could save it at this point in time. For all practical purposes, Earth is dead.

Re:WWF!

[spectral]

And I suppose you just put RAM memory and a NIC card into your computer last week too?

World will end January 19 2038

[Anonymous Coward]

It is fairly well known that the world will end at midnight on January 19, 2038.
I'm waiting for my PDP-11s to explode then although I'll be in my 70s

Thomas Dzubin

You consumption weenies better watch out!

[metalhed77]

cuz i'll take you down in a steEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEL CAGE!

Re:Bah...

[whiteranger99x]

This reminds me of what George Carlin said in one of his stand-up shows...

"It's a self correcting system...The Planet is fine.....The PEOPLE are fucked!"

Committed to education

[Inexile2002]

I disagree with what you did to that town, but you really need to admire your town's commitment to education. I personally wouldn't starve to death for anyone's homework assignment.

Re:the short answer: no

[Anonymous Coward]

but believe me, SOMETHING will survive.

Not if we get sucked into the sun! (Because elephants and tigers and tree sparrows make the world go around, so if we kill all of them the Earth will suddenly stop spinning, and...)

Re:World Wrestling Foundation?

[jeffehobbs]

...all we really need to do is create a few more peons, build a couple farms, a lumber mill and find another gold mine. No sweat.

~jeff

Re:World Wrestling Foundation?

[nettdata]

That's a load of crap; algae are responsible for the majority of carbon-dioxide recycling, and it's always been that way.

Which is PRECISELY why I haven't cleaned out my fridge in over 3 years... I'm just trying to do my part for the cause!

Renew that license!

[wilkinsm]

The earth is going to expire?

Quick! We better renew that license... The question is who do we call, the manufacturer or um... the reseller?

Re:Another option?

[stirfry714]

Yes, I had a cool history teacher who let me get away with things like that, but other teachers were not so great...

My econ teacher (referenced above) was also my government teacher. We had a Mock Congress. I chose to be a Republican after losing a week-long fight to be a Libertarian ("No, we're only doing the two real parties", she says).

So I'm the Senate Minority Leader, with 22 Republicans (this is Northern California). I manage to get my friend elected as the Senate President Pro-Temp, primarily by telling all the Democrats I knew that I would *hate* for her to get elected - so they voted for her.

She then turns around, and to be "fair", gives the Republicans HALF of the committee chairs. Not none, like in real life, or even 20% as a fair ratio, but 50%! As you can imagine, the committee chairs killed every single Democratic bill.

When we got to the floor, I used every trick in the book to kill bills. I made sure my two whips were the student body leader and the football team captain and suddenly Democrats were defecting left and right. I even pulled off a fillibuster.

End result: Two bills passed that Senate. And they were both Republican bills. That's with 22 out of 100 members... pretty darn successful.

And my grade? I got a D. Why? Because, in the words of the teacher, "I wasn't being cooperative and participating in a constructive manner.."

I was the MINORITY leader!! Since when am I supposed to be cooperative?!?!?!

Anyways, sorry for the long rant, but some of these teachers... some of them are great, but others just need to learn about the real world before trying to teach it to others.

Re:No.

[TheOnlyCoolTim]

One time there was this somewhat heavy snowstorm and I was riding up the hill to my house in a Dodge Caravan minivan.

We passed by at least 5 SUVs of the type that are made and marketed to those who never take it on a rougeher road than their driveway, all stuck helpless in the snow while our fucking MINIVAN was having no problems.

Tim

Flamebait?

[thales]

Ah the expected response from a coward liberal with mod points. Anything that dosen't agree with their PC viewpoint is a flame. They are less open to views crictical of their view than Stalin and Hitler.

Re:Take it with a grain of salt

[Tablizer]

(* In fact, you could fit 27 billion people into a cube one mile by one mile by one mile. *)

Borg!

That's The Answer!

Just give Bill Gates time. He is getting closer and closer.

BTW, do Borg have B.O.?