When has there ever been a period of time where humans have the capacity to destroy the planet? I’m not even talking about climate change but nuclear weapons. I think the likelihood of a nuclear exchange is extremely likely within the next hundred years.
Especially as nations learn that once you’re a nuclear power you’re respected on the world stage.
How do you honestly come back from this? I’m genuinely curious because until some technology can be made to prevent this, it’s the only existential threat that can happen at any moment.
It is hard to destroy the planet even with nuclear weapons. A full-scale nuclear exchange will probably put humans back in the stone age, but the species will probably survive (billions will die, the life will be awful, of course, and it will take thousands of years for the civilization to recover, but humans will survive). With some deliberation, it is possible to destroy all complex land-based lifeforms (with radiation weapons / cobalt bombs, and you need _a lot_ of them, like a planet-scale suicidal project, I don’t think it is possible to organize), but even with that, I don’t see how it would be possible to destroy life in the oceans, at this point.
Especially as nations learn that once you’re a nuclear power you’re respected on the world stage.
How do you honestly come back from this? I’m genuinely curious because until some technology can be made to prevent this, it’s the only existential threat that can happen at any moment.