Scientists Say There's A 90 Percent Chance The End Of Civilization Will Happen Within 'Decades'

Scientists 90 Chance End Of Civilization Will Happen Within Decades

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So far, the human race’s batting average when it comes to predicting the end of the world is downright awful. Not that anyone seems to really care when or even if it happens.

We have whiffed on doomsday prophecies that were supposed to occur in July and September of 2016, the three predictions in January of 2017, again in February, twice in May, and December, then again in January, April and July of 2018, and yet again in June, October and November of 2019, as well as in February and June of 2020, none of which actually came true.

We do have a shot at the apocalypse on December 21, 2020 or sometime in the year 2240, so we’re still out there taking our cuts.

Plus, we now can add a prediction by a pair of scientists whose research was recently published in the journal Scientific Reports in which they give humanity a 10 percent chance of not having civilization come to an end with the next few decades.

Theoretical physicists Dr. Gerardo Aquino of the Alan Turing Institute in London and Professor Mauro Bologna of the University of Tarapacá in Chile believe, based on their research, that at the current rate of global deforestation the “irreversible collapse” of human civilization will occur within the next two to four decades.

They also predict that at the current rate of deforestation, all of the forests on the entire planet will disappear in approximately 100 to 200 years.

It’s pretty hard for humans to survive without forests as the study states “it is highly unlikely to imagine the survival of many species, including ours, on Earth without [forests].

It wouldn’t take that long, however, for this situation to become a real problem for humanity.

“Clearly it is unrealistic to imagine that the human society would start to be affected by the deforestation only when the last tree would be cut down,” reads the report.

It continues, “Calculations show that, maintaining the actual rate of population growth and resource consumption, in particular forest consumption, we have a few decades left before an irreversible collapse of our civilization.”

This is where the less than 10 percent chance of survival comes into play as they state “statistically the probability to survive without facing a catastrophic collapse, is very low.”

Thus, the researchers conclude, “Our model shows that a catastrophic collapse in human population, due to resource consumption, is the most likely scenario of the dynamical evolution based on current parameters…. we conclude from a statistical point of view that the probability that our civilization survives itself is less than 10 percent in the most optimistic scenario. Calculations show that, maintaining the actual rate of population growth and resource consumption, in particular forest consumption, we have a few decades left before an irreversible collapse of our civilization.”

The study’s model is based on “a growing human population until a maximum is reached after which a rapid disastrous collapse in population occurs before eventually reaching a low population steady state or total extinction. … We call this point in time the ‘no-return point’ because if the deforestation rate is not changed before this time the human population will not be able to sustain itself and a disastrous collapse or even extinction will occur.”

Maybe Denver Nuggets star Michael Porter, Jr. wasn’t so crazy after all, hmmm? (Okay, he probably was, but in the immortal words of the wise sage O.J. Simpson, I’m just sayin’…)

Scientists Say There’s A 90 Percent Chance The End Of Civilization Will Happen Within ‘Decades’