We're all going to die!

[Pepe]

That's a fact. The question is, what will get us first?

Nature: Asteroids, earthquakes, mega-volcanoes. Will nature say enough is enough and send us the way of the dinosaurs?

Nuclear war: Will The Donald + Kim Jong combo and/or Lewis finally push their red buttons and turn us all into three-penised mutants?

Biotech: Nanobots, pandemics, gene-splicing madness. Who the fuck knows.

AI: Even our phones are smarter than Magic nowadays. Will computers turn on us and use us as energy for their paperclip fetish?

Climate change: Droughts, floods, IMMIGRANTS, madness, war. Don't know, it's supposed to be bad.

So what will it be?

[Lewis]

None of the above.

[Spikey M]

Antibiotic resistant bacteria will fuck shit up at some point unless new meds are found. So - Pandemic. Though I am unsure why that belongs under Biotech rather than Nature?

[Pepe]

None of the above.

What then?

Antibiotic resistant bacteria will fuck shit up at some point unless new meds are found. So - Pandemic. Though I am unsure why that belongs under Biotech rather than Nature?

Because antibiotic resistance is our fault.

[Spikey M]

What then?



Because antibiotic resistance is our fault.

Sure, but that doesn’t make the Pandemic Bio-Tech. That would involve designing and delivering a bug into society.

[Pepe]

Choose nature then.

[Lewis]

Nothing. We'll (wealthy countries anyway) kick the shit out of everything that fancies itself.

[Spikey M]

Choose nature then.

I fucking will, son.

[Sir Andy Mahowry]

Spikey would die if he fought Pepe.

[Spikey M]

At some point son utter mentalists like Isis will manage to get a nuke. Aum Shinrikyo nearly manages it with the help of some Ex-Soviet scientists, before having to settle on a hefty dose of Sarin.

[Spoonsky]

Hard to choose between nuclear war and AI. Can't see humans living in any quantity for more than five hundred more years, though, imo (or a thousand at best).

[Spikey M]

Spikey would die if he fought Pepe.

It would be a tragic scene between two beings Ill equipped to go to war.

[Panda Bear]

Climate change and geopolitics can't be separated, so that. Drought and food scarcity are great ways to generate conflict.

Climate change impacts food scarcity, which you can argue is the driving reason for Syria's collapse. Syrian farming yields were always precarious due to the region's climate, and it tipped over the edge in the late '00s when yields cratered and a huge class of uneducated persons lost gainful employment.

Massive drought is going to be another impact. In a Canadian context, the Rocky Mountain glaciers will be gone in 20-25 years. Alberta will go completely dry, Saskatchewan will be okay, and Manitoba will flood the entire time. Coastal provinces like British Columbia and the Maritimes will lose land to higher tides, be at higher risk of hurricane damage, and generally experience more floods due to aquifers being overwhelmed.

[Panda Bear]

But mainly we'll just get old and die of a bacterial outbreak in a hospital since we're first world.

We'll end up with mass-scale aquaponics and modular farming technologies, so we'll be okay on the food front.

[Pepe]

The effects of climate change, some say, should come about slowly enough that we should be able to adapt to them.

[Disco]

If we have to go lets make it interesting, nuclear or nothing please.

[Jimmy Floyd]

I think we'll outgrow the Earth and conquer the universe before it gets to any of the above.

[SincereTheRebel]

I feel the next major event will have to involve all religions failing simultaneously. One way that can happen is either a major drastic climate change or 2 Pac has to return in flesh and blood.

[Reg]

The odd killing, sure, like a self-piloted plane deciding to land in a volcano, but how would AI take us all out?

[Giggles]

The odd killing, sure, like a self-piloted plane deciding to land in a volcano, but how would AI take us all out?

Toggle Spoiler

[Pleb]

Donald Trump.

[Pepe]

The odd killing, sure, like a self-piloted plane deciding to land in a volcano, but how would AI take us all out?

http://slatestarcodex.com/superintelligence-faq/

[Giggles]

http://slatestarcodex.com/superintelligence-faq/

I already posted the TL;DR version.