Human extinction - Knowledge (XXG)

839: 941:, on which future people do not matter (or matter much less), morally speaking. While these views are controversial, they would agree that an existential catastrophe would be among the worst things imaginable. It would cut short the lives of eight billion presently existing people, destroying all of what makes their lives valuable, and most likely subjecting many of them to profound suffering. So even setting aside the value of future generations, there may be strong reasons to reduce existential risk, grounded in concern for presently existing people. 974: 6088: 47: 5936: 305: 6500: 5948: 850:"Existential risks" are risks that threaten the entire future of humanity, whether by causing human extinction or by otherwise permanently crippling human progress. Multiple scholars have argued based on the size of the "cosmic endowment" that because of the inconceivably large number of potential future lives that are at stake, even small reductions of existential risk have great value. 558:

subject to a roughly constant level of natural risk. If the natural risk were sufficiently high, then it would be highly unlikely that humanity would have survived as long as it has. Based on a formalization of this argument, researchers have concluded that we can be confident that natural risk is lower than 1 in 14,000 per year (equivalent to 1 in 140 per century, on average).

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is encroaching on ecosystems that would otherwise be intact. Third, factory farming fosters the creation of millions upon millions of animals for whom it offers nothing but suffering and misery before slaughtering them in often barbaric ways. There is no reason to think that those practices are going to diminish any time soon. Quite the opposite.

3503:, the demise of humanity would be the best imaginable event possible, and the sooner the better. The extinction of Homo sapiens would remove the malignancy ravaging the planet, destroy a parasite consuming its host, shut down the killing machines, and allow the earth to regenerate while permitting new species to evolve. 720:

smaller than 10%. To avoid this collapse, the study says, humanity should pass from a civilization dominated by the economy to a "cultural society" that "privileges the interest of the ecosystem above the individual interest of its components, but eventually in accordance with the overall communal interest."

1774:'s definition: "An existential risk is one that threatens the premature extinction of Earth-originating intelligent life or the permanent and drastic destruction of its potential for desirable future development." Source: Bostrom, Nick (2013). "Existential Risk Prevention as Global Priority". Global Policy. 3530:

Human beings are destroying large parts of the inhabitable earth and causing unimaginable suffering to many of the animals that inhabit it. This is happening through at least three means. First, human contribution to climate change is devastating ecosystems ... Second, the increasing human population

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who would not be born.... (By one calculation), the stakes are one million times greater for extinction than for the more modest nuclear wars that kill "only" hundreds of millions of people. There are many other possible measures of the potential loss – including culture and science, the evolutionary

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writes of a "partnership...between those who are living, those who are dead, and those who are to be born". If one takes seriously the debt humanity owes to past generations, Ord argues the best way of repaying it might be to "pay it forward", and ensure that humanity's inheritance is passed down to

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Parfit argues that the size of the "cosmic endowment" can be calculated from the following argument: If Earth remains habitable for a billion more years and can sustainably support a population of more than a billion humans, then there is a potential for 10 (or 10,000,000,000,000,000) human lives of

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Beyond utilitarianism, other moral perspectives lend support to the importance of reducing existential risk. An existential catastrophe would destroy more than just humanity – it would destroy all cultural artifacts, languages, and traditions, and many of the things we value. So moral viewpoints on

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Experts generally agree that anthropogenic existential risks are (much) more likely than natural risks. A key difference between these risk types is that empirical evidence can place an upper bound on the level of natural risk. Humanity has existed for at least 200,000 years, over which it has been

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continue at current rates, they could culminate in a "catastrophic collapse in human population" and possibly "an irreversible collapse of our civilization" in the next 20 to 40 years. According to the most optimistic scenario provided by the study, the chances that human civilization survives are

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perspective, the value of protecting humanity is the product of its duration (how long humanity survives), its size (how many humans there are over time), and its quality (on average, how good is life for future people). On average, species survive for around a million years before going extinct.

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is accepted, it changes the most likely source of disasters, and hence the most efficient means of preventing them. They write: "...you should be more concerned that a large number of asteroids have not yet been detected than about the particular orbit of each one. You should not worry especially

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Jean-Marc Salotti calculated the probability of human extinction caused by a giant asteroid impact. It is between 0.03 and 0.3 for the next billion years, if there is no colonization of other planets. According to that study, the most frightening object is a giant long-period comet with a warning

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A 2016 survey of AI experts found a median estimate of 5% that human-level AI would cause an outcome that was "extremely bad (e.g. human extinction)". In 2019, the risk was lowered to 2%, but in 2022, it was increased back to 5%. In 2023, the risk doubled to 10%. In 2024, the risk doubled to 20%,

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discussed the extinction of species as a natural process and a core component of natural selection. Notably, Darwin was skeptical of the possibility of sudden extinction, viewing it as a gradual process. He held that the abrupt disappearances of species from the fossil record were not evidence of

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would have difficulty eradicating every last settlement on Earth. Physicist Willard Wells points out that any credible extinction scenario would have to reach into a diverse set of areas, including the underground subways of major cities, the mountains of Tibet, the remotest islands of the South

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has suggested that humans presumably have a number of inherited behavior patterns (IBPs) that are not fine-tuned for conditions prevailing in technological civilization. Indeed, some IBPs may be highly incompatible with such conditions and have a high potential to induce self-destruction. These

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in 1989 rejected Parfit's "impersonal" views but spoke instead of a moral imperative for loyalty and commitment to "the future of humanity as a vast project... The aspiration for a better society – more just, more rewarding, and more peaceful... our interest in the lives of our children and

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Although there are many non-human species – especially carnivores – that also cause a lot of suffering, humans have the unfortunate distinction of being the most destructive and harmful species on earth. The amount of suffering in the world could be radically reduced if there were no more

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Since anthropogenic risk is a relatively recent phenomenon, humanity's track record of survival cannot provide similar assurances. Humanity has only survived 78 years since the creation of nuclear weapons, and for future technologies, there is no track record. This has led thinkers like

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that could endanger the survival of humanity. The geological record suggests that supervolcanic eruptions are estimated to occur on average about once every 50,000 years, though most such eruptions would not reach the scale required to cause human extinction. Famously, the supervolcano

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argues that preventing existential risks is one of the most important moral issues of our time. The book discusses, quantifies, and compares different existential risks, concluding that the greatest risks are presented by unaligned artificial intelligence and biotechnology.

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had identified 23 extinct prehistoric species. The doctrine was further gradually undermined by evidence from the natural sciences, particularly the discovery of fossil evidence of species that appeared to no longer exist, and the development of theories of evolution. In

760:'s formulation: "We do not even know if there should exist some extremely dangerous decay of say the proton which caused the eradication of the earth, because if it happens we would no longer be there to observe it and if it does not happen there is nothing to observe." 590:

to conclude that humanity is currently in a "time of perils" – a uniquely dangerous period in human history, where it is subject to unprecedented levels of risk, beginning from when humans first started posing risk to themselves through their actions. Paleobiologist

999:, posit that human extinction would be a positive thing for the other organisms on the planet, and the planet itself, citing, for example, the omnicidal nature of human civilization. The environmental view in favor of human extinction is shared by the members of 873:(2) would be worse than (1), and (3) would be worse than (2). Which is the greater of these two differences? Most people believe that the greater difference is between (1) and (2). I believe that the difference between (2) and (3) is very much greater. 4260:

writes (p. 28): "Whether you are searching for a cure for cancer, or pursuing a scholarly or artistic career, or engaged in establishing more just institutions, a threat to the future of humanity is also a threat to the significance of what you

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In May 1, 2023, The Treaty on Artificial Intelligence Safety and Cooperation (TAISC) estimated a 30.5% risk of an AI-caused catastrophe by 2200, although they also estimated a 32.2% risk of an AI-caused catastrophe by 2026, if there is no 6 month

670:, scientists estimated a 12% chance of AI-caused catastrophe and a 3% chance of AI-caused extinction by 2100. They also estimate an 8% chance of Nuclear War causing global catastrophe and a 0.5625% chance of Nuclear War causing human extinction. 922:, democratic, custodial, and intuitionist arguments all converge on the common-sense view that preventing existential risk is a high moral priority, even if the exact "degree of badness" of human extinction varies between these philosophies. 130:

The scientific consensus is that there is a relatively low risk of near-term human extinction due to natural causes. The likelihood of human extinction through humankind's own activities, however, is a current area of research and debate.

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wrote that "he prospect for the human race is sombre beyond all precedent. Mankind are faced with a clear-cut alternative: either we shall all perish, or we shall have to acquire some slight degree of common sense." In 1950,

2396: 396:, in which he argues that advances in certain technologies create new threats to the survival of humankind and that the 21st century may be a critical moment in history when humanity's fate is decided. Edited by 821:, which can stay hundreds of meters deep in the ocean for potentially years at a time, should also be considered. Any number of events could lead to a massive loss of human life, but if the last few (see 4491:

institutions over markets. The burden of this effort must fall almost entirely on the richest people and richest parts of the world, because it is they who continue to gamble with everyone else's fate."

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argued that measuring the severity of extinction solely in terms of those who die "conceals its full impact", and that nuclear war "imperils all of our descendants, for as long as there will be humans."

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As the possibility of extinction became more widely established in the sciences, so did the prospect of human extinction. In the 19th century, human extinction became a popular topic in science (e.g.,

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which we have duties to protect and cherish things of value would see this as a huge loss that should be avoided. One can also consider reasons grounded in duties to past generations. For instance,

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Some planetary civilizations see their way through, place limits on what may and what must not be done, and safely pass through the time of perils. Others are not so lucky or so prudent, perish.

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argues that coming into existence is always serious harm, and therefore it is better that people do not come into existence in the future. Further, David Benatar, animal rights activist

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history of the planet, and the significance of the lives of all of our ancestors who contributed to the future of their descendants. Extinction is the undoing of the human enterprise."

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in Antarctica, which has contingency plans and supplies for long isolation. In addition, elaborate bunkers exist for government leaders to occupy during a nuclear war. The existence of

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time of a few years only and therefore no time for any intervention in space or settlement on the Moon or Mars. The probability of a giant comet impact in the next hundred years is

3147: 5388: 4727: 4684: 4317:"Eternal Fascinations with the End: Why We're Suckers for Stories of Our Own Demise: Our pattern-seeking brains and desire to be special help explain our fears of the apocalypse" 444: 116: 4653: 1040:), which depicts human extinction due to infertility, is considered the first modern apocalyptic novel and credited with launching the genre. Other notable early works include 382:

was an academic treatment of the science and ethics of human extinction. In it, Leslie considered a range of threats to humanity and what they have in common. In 2003, British

4518: 362:" in the early 1980s, a specific mechanism by which nuclear war could result in human extinction, again raised the issue to prominence. Writing about these findings in 1983, 320:

The invention of the atomic bomb prompted a wave of discussion among scientists, intellectuals, and the public at large about the risk of human extinction. In a 1945 essay,

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can support at least 10 biological human life-years; and, if some humans were uploaded onto computers, could even support the equivalent of 10 cybernetic human life-years.

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The scale of what is lost in an existential catastrophe is determined by humanity's long-term potential – what humanity could expect to achieve if it survived. From a

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is one of the most fundamental of human traits and helps explain our current inability to come up with a response commensurate with the perils we face." (p. 41.)

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about the chance that some specific nearby star will become a supernova, but more about the chance that supernovas are more deadly to nearby life than we believe."

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Parfit points out that the Earth will remain habitable for around a billion years. And these might be lower bounds on our potential: if humanity is able to

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Our Final Hour: A Scientist's Warning : how Terror, Error, and Environmental Disaster Threaten Humankind's Future in this Century--on Earth and Beyond

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Grace, Katja; Salvatier, John; Dafoe, Allen; Zhang, Baobao; Evans, Owain (May 3, 2018). "When Will AI Exceed Human Performance? Evidence from AI Experts".

1097:(also called an intelligence explosion), drives the plot of innumerable science fiction stories; an influential early example is the 1951 film adaption of 746:, based on the observation that human extinction has never been observed, but requires subjective anthropic arguments. Leslie also discusses the anthropic 6484: 4835: 756:

certainty of observing an "undisastrous past" could make it difficult to argue that we must be safe because nothing terrible has yet occurred. He quotes

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Before the 18th and 19th centuries, the possibility that humans or other organisms could become extinct was viewed with scepticism. It contradicted the

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that could render the planet unlivable. A 1950 Gallup poll found that 19% of Americans believed that another world war would mean "an end to mankind".

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Our Final Hour: A Scientist's Warning: How Terror, Error, and Environmental Disaster Threaten Humankind's Future In This Century – On Earth and Beyond

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We live during the hinge of history ... If we act wisely in the next few centuries, humanity will survive its most dangerous and decisive period.

644:'s 2016 annual report estimates an annual probability of human extinction of at least 0.05% per year (equivalent to 5% per century, on average). 6411: 4269: 838: 6369: 6251: 3616: 4917: 4459: 4118: 4082: 3706: 1545: 1511: 1477: 1420: 6009: 4855: 2684:

My subjective opinion is that setting this probability lower than 25% would be misguided, and the best estimate may be considerably higher.

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In an era of catastrophe and crisis, the continuation of the human species in a viable or desirable form, is obviously contingent and

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I believe that if we destroy mankind, as we now can, this outcome will be much worse than most people think. Compare three outcomes:

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Adams, Robert Merrihew (October 1989). "Should Ethics be More Impersonal? a Critical Notice of Derek Parfit, Reasons and Persons".

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grandchildren, and the hopes that they will be able, in turn, to have the lives of their children and grandchildren as projects."

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wrote in 1983: "If we are required to calibrate extinction in numerical terms, I would be sure to include the number of people in

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Another empirical method to study the likelihood of certain natural risks is to investigate the geological record. For example, a

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For methodological challenges quantifying and mitigating the risk, proposed mitigation measures, and related organizations, see

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has argued that humanity is doing far too little, in general, about small, hard-to-estimate risks of large-scale catastrophes.

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patterns may include responses of individuals seeking power over conspecifics in relation to harvesting and consuming energy.

515:) as a species may also be considered to have "gone extinct" simply by being replaced with distant descendants whose continued 1093:: what would happen to the rest of the planet if humans suddenly disappeared? A threat of human extinction, such as through a 6118: 4800: 4405: 3365: 825:) most resilient humans are unlikely to also die off, then that particular human extinction scenario may not seem credible. 278:", and in 1824 envisaged humanity being threatened by a comet impact, and employing a missile system to defend against it. 6468: 5190: 5096: 4548: 2793: 2422: 961:

may come from the small chance that warming greatly exceeds the mid-range expectations, resulting in catastrophic damage.

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who call for refraining from reproduction and allowing the human species to go peacefully extinct, thus stopping further

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A 2008 survey by the Future of Humanity Institute estimated a 5% probability of extinction by super-intelligence by 2100.

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Although existential risks are less manageable by individuals than, for example, health risks, according to Ken Olum,

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was published in 2008, a collection of essays from 26 academics on various global catastrophic and existential risks.

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The great bulk of existential risk in the foreseeable future is anthropogenic; that is, arising from human activity.

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assigns a 70% chance of humanity surviving the next five centuries, based partly on the controversial philosophical

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is set in a world where humanity has been nearly destroyed by a mysterious plague. At the turn of the 20th century,

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that would cause human extinction before the year 2100 has been estimated at one-in-a-million. Moreover, large

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12: Influence of Supernovae, gamma-ray bursts, solar flares, and cosmic rays on the terrestrial environment

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square in the face. That would mean taking much bigger and more transformative steps: all but eliminating

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There are several economists who have discussed the importance of global catastrophic risks. For example,

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by choosing to have fewer children, displacement of naturally evolved humans by a new species produced by

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Bostrom, Nick (2002), "Existential Risks: Analyzing Human Extinction Scenarios and Related Hazards",

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Moynihan, Thomas (February 2020). "Existential risk and human extinction: An intellectual history".

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estimated a 30% risk over the next five centuries (equivalent to around 6% per century, on average).

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Gott, III, J. Richard (1993). "Implications of the Copernican principle for our future prospects".

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When we think of existential risks, events like nuclear war or asteroid impacts often come to mind.

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The end: 50 apocalyptic visions from pop culture that you should know about – before it's too late

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A.I. poses human extinction risk on par with nuclear war, Sam Altman and other tech leaders warn

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or technological augmentation. Natural and external extinction risks include high-fatality-rate

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stated that the extinction of the human race may be beneficial to the future of the world.

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and began wondering if abstract worlds existed, including a world without humans. Physicist

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predicted the extinction of the human race within a century, primarily as the result of

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normal duration. Bostrom goes further, stating that if the universe is empty, then the

884: 735: 686: 624: 503: 448: 392: 375: 359: 344: 243: 215: 204: 4187:, vol. LXX, no. 18 (23 November 2023), pp. 40–42. De Bellaigue writes: "Like the 2074:

Yost, Chad L.; Jackson, Lily J.; Stone, Jeffery R.; Cohen, Andrew S. (March 1, 2018).

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The notion that species can become extinct gained scientific acceptance during the

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catastrophic extinctions, but rather represented unrecognised gaps in the record.

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Humanity has a 95% probability of being extinct in 7,800,000 years, according to

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Morality, Foresight, and Human Flourishing: An Introduction to Existential Risks

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estimated a 50% chance of collapse of civilisation in the twenty-first century.

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Tempo And Mode in Evolution: Genetics And Paleontology 50 Years After Simpson

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15: Artificial Intelligence as a positive and negative factor in global risk

3577:"Review of The Last Man, Jean-Baptiste François Xavier Cousin de Grainville" 3480: 3124: 2613:"Deforestation and world population sustainability: a quantitative analysis" 2534: 1412: 1348: 678: 592: 516: 491: 161: 157: 149: 4383: 3324:"On modeling and interpreting the economics of catastrophic climate change" 3132: 2903:"Population Ethics | Practical Implications of Population Ethical Theories" 2664: 2230: 2117: 2045: 1941: 1288: 1237:

Snyder-Beattie, Andrew E.; Ord, Toby; Bonsall, Michael B. (July 30, 2019).

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position that human extinction would not be a bad thing, but a good thing.

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10: Super-volcanism and other geophysical processes of catastrophic import

148:, a doctrine that all possible things exist. The principle traces back to 6379: 6354: 5904: 5889: 5420: 5405: 5307: 5145: 4593: 4476: 4390: 4243: 4200: 2563: 1979: 1051: 652: 476: 452: 411: 124: 3602: 3576: 3342: 3279: 3029: 1665: 467:

pose the risk of resource depletion and a concomitant population crash,

5884: 5738: 5733: 5570: 5560: 5368: 5180: 4892: 4887: 3210: 3072: 1866: 1634: 1610: 655:

estimates existential risk in the next century at "1 in 6" in his book

526: 1344:"How Humanity Came To Contemplate Its Possible Extinction: A Timeline" 5894: 5820: 3271: 3021: 2835:

Tonn, Bruce; MacGregor, Donald (2009). "A singular chain of events".

2296: 1657: 1105: 3064: 2019:"Super eruptions as a threat to civilizations on Earth-like planets" 867:(2) A nuclear war that kills 99% of the world's existing population. 4469:"Treading Thin Air: Geoff Mann on Uncertainty and Climate Change", 2629: 2380: 1626: 5565: 5324: 1978:

Asher, D.J.; Bailey, M.E.; Emel'yanenko, V.; Napier, W.M. (2005).

972: 853:

In one of the earliest discussions of ethics of human extinction,

837: 303: 185: 164:

wrote of the end of humankind only as part of a cycle of renewal.

153: 65: 45: 4227:

The Doomsday Book: The Science Behind Humanity's Greatest Threats

3469:

The Politics of Total Liberation: Revolution for the 21st Century

5909: 4463: 4434:

Cosmos and History: The Journal of Natural and Social Philosophy

4212: 4208: 4034:

The End of the World: The Science and Ethics of Human Extinction

3410:

Being brought into existence is not a benefit but always a harm.

3260:"Nuclear War and Climatic Catastrophe: Some Policy Implications" 3006:"Nuclear war and climatic catastrophe: Some policy implications" 2698:"Implication of our technological species being first and early" 2508:

Treaty on Artificial Intelligence Safety and Cooperation (TAISC)

1650:"Nuclear War and Climatic Catastrophe: Some Policy Implications" 933:

Some economists and philosophers have defended views, including

778:

Nuclear holocaust § Likelihood of complete human extinction

521: 296:, advocated avoiding humanity's extinction by colonizing space. 262: 172:

that could lead to human extinction. Later philosophers such as

5991: 4500: 582:

at the time of its last eruption (though this is contentious).

3699:

Technophobia!: science fiction visions of posthuman technology

3548:

The Ahuman Manifesto: Activism for the End of the Anthropocene

795:

have practical implications. For instance, if the "universal"

791:, and Alexander Vilenkin, the possibility of human extinction 274:

wrote about the extinction of life on Earth in his 1816 poem "

5987: 608:

is frequently used instead to obtain probability estimates.

355:

to predict the total number of humans that will ever exist.

270:

authors and poets were particularly interested in the topic.

4338:

Schubert, Stefan; Caviola, Lucius; Faber, Nadira S. (2019).

4332:

Death from the Skies!: These Are the Ways the World Will End

3428:

Better Never to Have Been: The Harm of Coming into Existence

3387:

Better Never to Have Been: The Harm of Coming into Existence

2559:"Humans will be extinct in 100 years says eminent scientist" 1239:"An upper bound for the background rate of human extinction" 681:

users estimate a 1% probability of human extinction by 2100.

604:

Given the limitations of ordinary observation and modeling,

2503: 544:, the entire universe may eventually become uninhabitable. 540:

to make Earth uninhabitable, then destroy it. Depending on

435:

Potential anthropogenic causes of human extinction include

115:. Other scenarios center on emerging technologies, such as 53:

is an often-predicted cause of the extinction of humankind.

4396: