Which would end us all: zombies, super flu, global warming, or nuclear weapon?

[BOB SAGET!]

what? do you even understand basic mammalian anatomy? metal chains aren't the only things that can make things move. animals have skeletal muscles, which when structured correctly can produce a rotational movement. you cannot cut down a tree with brute force. you must use a chainsaw. or in the case of bears, chainsaw hands.

I said muscle chain. Didn't you read my post? So do you believe bears can have chain hands?

 

[Miggz]

Since a lot of people know the danger of using a nuclear weapon at this time plan, it can't be that to end all humanity. Super Flu is a maybe since a Super Flu could spread fast enough and won't have a cure unless a doctor works endlessly till the cure is found, but it may be too late. Global Warming is the first on my list since it still excise and with the cause of global warming could create strange weather and unusually weather on a few area's of the world like snow in Hawaii. Zombies sounds too fictional to me, though it depends on what cause the zombies to react to say if they were to be revive from the dead.

I might not understand this topic, but my clam is that global warming later on in the future will be a huge issue for the human race to control, then random storms may come and destroy everything, that's my clam of how the world might end.

I would have chosen global warming as well, but I just wanted to be different and imagine a zombie outbreak. Then again, with all this swine flu business kicking in, perhaps super flu would have been my second choice. I think I wrote this debate topic a few days before I heard about swine flu.

 

[L666]

Ozone is depleted. GG, world.

 

[Lovely]

Ozone is depleted. GG, world.

Doesn't that count as global warming?

I'll add more to it, global warming can cause multiple activities across the world. A common example that it can melt the ice on the polar ice caps and raise the water level, meaning that the world could drown under water. But yea, if the ozone layer is gone, the temperature will rise, and the sun rays can cause more effects around the world, (will get more details later).

 

[thesage]

Warning to the Proving Grounds members: this will not win you any brownie points with the senior debaters.

Do not come in here, post one liners, and say you're going to explain later. This could technically be construed as post wh0ring, and it adds nothing to conversation if you're not going to back up your assertions.

Sorry I was planning one editing the post later and then some things came up for me...

Meteors are a clear and present danger to humanity. If you think, "oh it's just some rock, wow big deal" you're wrong. If a large enough one fell into the ocean, it could cause a tsunami. Even if it doesn't hit the earth and break up in the atmosphere it can still do a lot of damage. That's what scientists think happened in Tunguska... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunguska_event. Imagines if that happened over a populated city in New York.

There's also the Shoemaker-Levy 9 comet that collided with Jupiter. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comet_Shoemaker-Levy_9#Impacts

Some sites of meteor impacts (I won't put it in image tags since I don't think we're allowed to post images here): http://sciencenotes.files.wordpress.com/2008/03/meteor-maps.jpg

There was also that meteor/comet that had a very close call with the earth a couple of years back. I forgot the name of it, but it was all over the internet and I think there was even a thread on swf...

Also@lovely: polar ice caps melting would not mean the end of the world. The dinosaurs lived fine without them... http://www.abc.net.au/science/ozfossil/ageofreptiles/climate/polar.htm (I know abc isn't a terrific source, but google isn't working on my computer thanks to a virus...).

 

[Nysyarc]

Sorry I was planning one editing the post later and then some things came up for me...

Meteors are a clear and present danger to humanity. If you think, "oh it's just some rock, wow big deal" you're wrong. If a large enough one fell into the ocean, it could cause a tsunami. Even if it doesn't hit the earth and break up in the atmosphere it can still do a lot of damage. That's what scientists think happened in Tunguska... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunguska_event. Imagines if that happened over a populated city in New York.

There's also the Shoemaker-Levy 9 comet that collided with Jupiter. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comet_Shoemaker-Levy_9#Impacts

Some sites of meteor impacts (I won't put it in image tags since I don't think we're allowed to post images here): http://sciencenotes.files.wordpress.com/2008/03/meteor-maps.jpg

There was also that meteor/comet that had a very close call with the earth a couple of years back. I forgot the name of it, but it was all over the internet and I think there was even a thread on swf...

Also@lovely: polar ice caps melting would not mean the end of the world. The dinosaurs lived fine without them... http://www.abc.net.au/science/ozfossil/ageofreptiles/climate/polar.htm (I know abc isn't a terrific source, but google isn't working on my computer thanks to a virus...).

I agree that IF a meteor were to strike Earth, it could cause catastrophe on a massive scale (depending on how large it is of course). Apparently if a meteor the size of Manhattan Island collided with Earth anywhere, the explosion would affect everything within 2500 km from the point of impact. The shock wave would circle the Earth up to 6 times and still be detectable. On top of that, the debris released into the atmosphere would block the sun for decades if not centuries, causing plants to die and eradicating countless species of animals.

However, the likelihood of that actually happening is incredibly slim to say the least. We have ways of detecting and possibly destroying such meteors. Even if one did strike Earth, most meteors are no larger than a few meters across, and would not cause any significant damage. In fact, small comets and meteors land in the Earths poles quite often, since the magnetic field is weaker in those areas.

No, polar ice caps melting wouldn't mean the end of the world, but it would mean the end of some of the world. If all the ice on Greenland and Antarctica melted, sea levels would rise approximately 68.3 meters. Right now, the Earth has 148 million square kilometers of land. If sea level rose that much, it would flood 13 million square kilometers of land, approximately 87% of which would be densely populated areas.

Obviously the melting process would take centuries, so we would have time to migrate. However, global warming presents much greater problems than sea level rise.

 

[BOB SAGET!]

The most likely cause of worlds end would be global warming. By the time we take major action, it couldbe too late.

 

[Pez55]

The most likely cause of worlds end would be global warming. By the time we take major action, it couldbe too late.

There's no such thing as Global Warming. It's a lie made for attention and made to scare people into thinking that the end is near. People have been talking about global warming for so many years now. Think about it, for all of the years people have been talking about Global Warming, wouldn't life have been killed off by now?

I think nuclear weapons would seem more likely. The only way a nuclear warhead can be stopped is by intercepting it, which is possible but if there were, say a fleet of nuclear submarines that shot of missiles with nuclear warheads, I doubt all of them could be stopped.

 

[Nysyarc]

There's no such thing as Global Warming. It's a lie made for attention and made to scare people into thinking that the end is near. People have been talking about global warming for so many years now. Think about it, for all of the years people have been talking about Global Warming, wouldn't life have been killed off by now?

I really wish I had noticed this sooner. That is a ridiculously uninformed statement. First of all, ask yourself "why would so many scientists and world leaders acknowledge Global Warming if it was just a lie?" Made for attention? Attention to what? What's the point in scaring us into thinking the world is ending?

People have been talking about it for decades because it's been happening for decades. I don't think you understand Global Warming at all, it's not something that happens noticeably on a daily basis, it is a gradual build up of CO2 in our atmosphere that is warming the global average temperature. What people don't realize, is that even a 1 degree change in global average temperature can have dramatic effects.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2004/12/1206_041206_global_warming.html

Read that short article and if you are still not convinced, I can fish out hundreds of other articles with other forms of evidence. Global Warming does not scare me; it's real, but it's existence isn't the scary part... the fact that some people choose to think it's a hoax... now that is frightening, and it is why Global Warming is not likely to stop any time soon.

 

[Vickey]

Global warming, the depletion of the ozone layer, and the melting of polar ice caps are things that would destroy the world in a "long term" context.

Short term, (looking at the swine flu scare and everything) plague, war, and famine would be the most likely causes for global catastrophe and the possible end of the human race.


- The United States alone has enough nukes to blow the world many times over. Coupled with what the rest of the world has, it is an accident waiting to happen. The first country to launch a nuclear weapon on another country will start a chain reaction that can literally destroy the planet overnight.

- With people's obsession with antibacterials and other such things, superbugs are starting to be more common. Look at the swine flu (which is a virus of course) which has mutated and become a lot stronger than the average influenza virus. Bacteria in the same context has been getting much stronger through mutations and through quickly being forced through Natural Selection by the exaggerated use of bacteria killing products. It is not hard to believe there could be a spread of something that we are not prepared to control.

 

[Pez55]

What's the point in scaring us into thinking the world is ending?

I don't know, but obviously some people, especially the media, like to do that. Lets take for example, Swine Flu. The media made it sound like this horrible pandemic that would kill us all, and look now we're all alive. What I'm getting at here is that some people want to scare you into believing things so you eventually grow more dependant on them and believe everything that they say, which has already happened to some people.

People have been talking about it for decades because it's been happening for decades. I don't think you understand Global Warming at all, it's not something that happens noticeably on a daily basis, it is a gradual build up of CO2 in our atmosphere that is warming the global average temperature. What people don't realize, is that even a 1 degree change in global average temperature can have dramatic effects.

Yes, the earth has been heating up a bit...but not because of CO2 or any of that stuff. It's because of Earth's orbit around the sun, which doesn't follow a set path but slightly changes very slowly. Right now the Earth is closer to the sun, thus heating up the Earth, but in a few thousand years or so, it will move away from the sun and cause the Earth to cool down.

 

[BOB SAGET!]

Do u have any proof Pez?

 

[Nysyarc]

I don't know, but obviously some people, especially the media, like to do that. Lets take for example, Swine Flu. The media made it sound like this horrible pandemic that would kill us all, and look now we're all alive. What I'm getting at here is that some people want to scare you into believing things so you eventually grow more dependant on them and believe everything that they say, which has already happened to some people.

We're dealing with scientists here, not the media. You're right, the media does blow things out of proportion, but science deals with facts.

Yes, the earth has been heating up a bit...but not because of CO2 or any of that stuff. It's because of Earth's orbit around the sun, which doesn't follow a set path but slightly changes very slowly. Right now the Earth is closer to the sun, thus heating up the Earth, but in a few thousand years or so, it will move away from the sun and cause the Earth to cool down.

Where is your source for this? Even if that is happening, it's not the only reason, not by far. There is more than enough evidence proving that CO2 emissions as well as the emissions of other greenhouse gasses are trapping heat in our atmosphere, thus global warming.

http://www.ecobridge.org/content/g_cse.htm
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2007-02/pu-neo021807.php
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenhouse_gas

 

[Pez55]

Sorry, forgot the url: http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/ice_ages.html

 

[Nysyarc]

Sorry, forgot the url: http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/ice_ages.html

http://ipcc-wg1.ucar.edu/wg1/Report/AR4WG1_Print_SPM.pdf
http://www.pnas.org/content/104/10/3713.full.pdf

^^^ The two reports above contradict your statement in a sense. The problem with what your article is saying, is that it is using data from a period of thousands of years, but it is not accounting for when exactly each bit of data was collected. It claims that greenhouse gases are responsible for only a small fraction of climate change, which is true if you look at it spread out in comparison to the other factors.

However, that is misleading, because greenhouse gases have accounted for the majority of temperature increase since the mid-twentieth century. If you want to, you can read those whole articles (they are ridiculously long), or you can go here to see the gist of the facts mentioned in them:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_warming

Another reason I wouldn't necessarily trust your source is that it was published by one person, and backed up by only a single scientist. That is hardly reassuring.

In any case, this doesn't really matter because I don't think global warming will be the first thing to end our existence anyways. I think we will destroy ourselves through war long before that happens.