In agreement with almost everything you posted… although that has me continuing to scratch my head at the disconnect leading up to now.
Just a handful of points to address-
If you truly believe that this trend is going to lead to iron boiling on Earth’s surface
I don’t, nor did I ever claim to. I do believe the fireball we live next to, which is large enough to fit a million-and-some-change Earths inside of it, has more than enough energy to make that happen, especially over the course of a million years, if the right circumstances align; and that those circumstances are within the scope of possibility our universe is capable of serving.
The case I’m trying to make isn’t to support the worse case scenario; but to emphasize that there are a ton of possible scenarios, some really really good, others really really bad; and that we cannot point to any one of them and credibly claim “That IS going to happen!”
Life will survive us.
Absolutely. But that life has its limits, just as we have ours. And when those limits are met, there may be an even more resilient flavor of life that takes the stage; but that chain isn’t infinite, especially within the scope of a single planet. Further narrowed to the million-year scope of this conversation… yeah my wager is with everyone else here that there will probably still be life left on Earth. I just can’t say with absolution that there will be.
Russel’s Teapot
I’m not sure if that’s directed at my inability to prove the worse case scenario (gotta reiterate - that was never my goal!) or the inability to prove life will prevail. Either way, you’re correct to call it out as a fallacy. At this point I think we’re mostly just splitting hairs over where to draw the line between ‘might’ and ‘will’. I tend to treat absolutes at face value, so things like “life WILL survive” vs “life WILL PROBABLY survive” are two very very different things. The former has no room for error, regardless how minute. Or to the previous point “Life will survive us” vs “Life will survive -period-”; can say the first with certainty, but not the second.
I gotta get my ass to bed, but I can’t overstate how refreshing your posts are. The amount of strawman in this thread was really getting under my skin. Not used to seeing that here, even if the source of the discussion is just a 4 panel meme.
I am happy to have raised the bar a little for online science discussion, it’s very tempting and easy to rip someone’s throat out if you don’t understand what they’re trying to communicate, and sadly I think that weird dopamine hit of attacking a stranger has become a worldwide addiction reaching pandemic proportions. But we’re really shooting all ourselves in the foot by making a world where we can’t talk to strangers. People stay strangers that way and strangers are less inclined to help each other, and in the coming decades… we will really, really need each other.
That all said, I am passionate about science with decades of study, and lately, specifically, geology and climate… I highly recommend some youtube channels like https://www.youtube.com/@HistoryoftheEarth or https://www.youtube.com/@myroncook for some starting points that are accessible and fascinating looks at the long, intense, unimaginable history of our planet, or another way of looking at it, the story of how rocks became something that can question where they came from.
Subbed the channels. It’s not my area of study, but I’ve definitely got at least a hobbyist-level of interest in things like physics and astronomy, which Earth sciences ofc fall into. Next semester of nursing school starts NEXT WEEK (fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck) so I probably shouldn’t dive down any new content rabbit holes at this point, but it’s in my feed now so definitely marked for future down time!
![Remember Humans? [War and Peas]](https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/112/932/286/752/215/715/original/9f56f9fffe247894.jpg){kind=link}
In agreement with almost everything you posted… although that has me continuing to scratch my head at the disconnect leading up to now.
Just a handful of points to address-
I don’t, nor did I ever claim to. I do believe the fireball we live next to, which is large enough to fit a million-and-some-change Earths inside of it, has more than enough energy to make that happen, especially over the course of a million years, if the right circumstances align; and that those circumstances are within the scope of possibility our universe is capable of serving.
The case I’m trying to make isn’t to support the worse case scenario; but to emphasize that there are a ton of possible scenarios, some really really good, others really really bad; and that we cannot point to any one of them and credibly claim “That IS going to happen!”
Absolutely. But that life has its limits, just as we have ours. And when those limits are met, there may be an even more resilient flavor of life that takes the stage; but that chain isn’t infinite, especially within the scope of a single planet. Further narrowed to the million-year scope of this conversation… yeah my wager is with everyone else here that there will probably still be life left on Earth. I just can’t say with absolution that there will be.
I’m not sure if that’s directed at my inability to prove the worse case scenario (gotta reiterate - that was never my goal!) or the inability to prove life will prevail. Either way, you’re correct to call it out as a fallacy. At this point I think we’re mostly just splitting hairs over where to draw the line between ‘might’ and ‘will’. I tend to treat absolutes at face value, so things like “life WILL survive” vs “life WILL PROBABLY survive” are two very very different things. The former has no room for error, regardless how minute. Or to the previous point “Life will survive us” vs “Life will survive -period-”; can say the first with certainty, but not the second.
I gotta get my ass to bed, but I can’t overstate how refreshing your posts are. The amount of strawman in this thread was really getting under my skin. Not used to seeing that here, even if the source of the discussion is just a 4 panel meme.
I am happy to have raised the bar a little for online science discussion, it’s very tempting and easy to rip someone’s throat out if you don’t understand what they’re trying to communicate, and sadly I think that weird dopamine hit of attacking a stranger has become a worldwide addiction reaching pandemic proportions. But we’re really shooting all ourselves in the foot by making a world where we can’t talk to strangers. People stay strangers that way and strangers are less inclined to help each other, and in the coming decades… we will really, really need each other.
That all said, I am passionate about science with decades of study, and lately, specifically, geology and climate… I highly recommend some youtube channels like https://www.youtube.com/@HistoryoftheEarth or https://www.youtube.com/@myroncook for some starting points that are accessible and fascinating looks at the long, intense, unimaginable history of our planet, or another way of looking at it, the story of how rocks became something that can question where they came from.
Subbed the channels. It’s not my area of study, but I’ve definitely got at least a hobbyist-level of interest in things like physics and astronomy, which Earth sciences ofc fall into. Next semester of nursing school starts NEXT WEEK (fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck) so I probably shouldn’t dive down any new content rabbit holes at this point, but it’s in my feed now so definitely marked for future down time!