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If you like to worry—or think you Our Final Century: The 50/50 Threat to Humanitys Survival — then this book is for you. Sir Martin plainly describes a host of threats to civilization. The 21st century might well be our last unless we, as a species, take bold steps to Our Final Century: The 50/50 Threat to Humanitys Survival our values and decide how we want to go forward. He judges Our Final Century: The 50/50 Threat to Humanitys Survival the odds are no better than than humankind will survive to the end of the century. Rees isn't the first to sound the alarm. He gives high praise to the young H. Wells identified these risks: "something from space, or pestilence, or some great disease of the atmosphere, some trailing cometary poison, some great emanation of vapour from the interior of the Earth, or new animals to prey on us, or some drug or wrecking madness in the mind of man. The odds of various risks are presented throughout, though with less precision in expression than I prefer. Among the many illustrations in the book is this version of a "doomsday argument" pp. The dead outnumber the living by a factor of ten. Consider two scenarios for humankind's future:. Suppose these ultimate numbers of people to live are represented by two identical-appearing urns: The "Pessimistic" urn contains 10 tickets numbered The "Optimistic" urn contains tickets numbered Each digit represents 10 billion people who will sometime live on Earth. You pick an urn at random and draw a ticket, number 6. Because this is such a low number, you are approximately times more likely to have drawn from the Pessimistic urn. The number 6 represents the 60 billion people who have lived on Earth. Our known place in the birth roll suggests that our species' future will more likely be very short rather than very long. The argument is attributed to astrophysicist Brandon Carter. He holds that conditions in the universe must be very special for life and intelligence to emerge. The central message is to emphasize our responsibility for stewardship: for the Earth and for humanity. There are many threats that one can worry about. Cost-effective actions are available for some of these risks, and I'm hopeful that decision analysis will help us steer a path. This is a well-written, engaging book. Despite the grim topic, I think all persons interested in risk will enjoy reading this book. All rights reserved. Permission to copy with reproduction of this notice. Will humanity survive this century? Sir Martin Rees predicts 'a bumpy ride' ahead

Rees's vision of our immediate future is both a work of stunning scientific originality and a humanistic clarion call on behalf. Rees's vision of our immediate future is both a work of stunning scientific originality and a humanistic clarion call on behalf of the future of life. Goodreads helps you keep track of books you want to read. Want to Read saving…. Want to Read Currently Reading Read. Other editions. Enlarge cover. Error rating book. Our Final Century: The 50/50 Threat to Humanitys Survival and try again. Open Preview See a Problem? Details if other :. Thanks for telling us about the problem. Return to Book Page. Rees. Get A Copy. Paperbackpages. More Details Original Title. Other Editions Friend Reviews. To see what your friends thought of this book, please sign up. To ask other readers questions about Our Final Hourplease sign up. Rees says we have got to The Point of No Returndoes it mean we should just watch and let it flow? Smokey Dymny Yes. When the Arctic ice melts to less than a million square kilome …more Yes. When the Arctic ice melts to less than a million square kilometres, the crops in the northern hemisphere, where most of the planet's grains are harvested, will fail because of a sudden rise in global temp. Peter Wadhams GBR and Natalia Shakova Russia predict that methane released from the bottom of the shallow Arctic will add a "methane bomb" to the greenhouse gasses of the planet less. See 1 question Our Final Century: The 50/50 Threat to Humanitys Survival Our Final Hour…. Lists with This Book. Community Reviews. Showing Average rating 3. Rating details. More filters. Sort order. Possibly the scariest book you'll ever read. For my signed copy, The Good Professor restored the question mark that he wanted in the title,i. I am amazed that someone as erudite and establishment as a Professor and Lord still can't get his book published with the title he wanted. Putting that to one side, we're still Possibly the scariest book you'll ever read. Putting that to one side, we're still here, a decade on from when the book was published. But I doubt any of the risks have diminished. Guns aren't lawful; Nooses give; Gas smells awful; You might as well live. I thought that I would be getting a more Our Final Century: The 50/50 Threat to Humanitys Survival treatment of the topics he covered in the video, but for the most part, I had already learned his most interesting ideas. Also, since the immediacy of the issues is a main thrust of the book, it has gone a bit stale already, as in: Some innovations just don't attract enough economic or social demand: just as supersonic flight I heard about Our Final Hour when I watched Martin Rees' Ted talk on the mounting risks that the Earth now faces, here. Also, Our Final Century: The 50/50 Threat to Humanitys Survival the immediacy of the issues is a main thrust of the book, it has gone a bit stale already, as in: Some innovations just don't attract enough economic or social demand: just as supersonic flight and manned space flight stagnated after the s, today in the potentialities of broadband G3 technology are being taken up slowly because few people want to surf the Internet or watch movies from their mobile phones. Wasn't such a simpler time? I did enjoy some of the philosophical parts ie. Some scientists seem fatalistic about the risk; or else optimistic, even complacent, that the more scarifying "downsides" can be averted. This optimism may be misplaced, and we should therefore ask, can the more intractable risks be staved off by "going slow" in some areas, or by sacrificing some of science's traditional openness? Those are on every page and drove me bonkers. Aug 12, Peter Pete Mcloughlin rated it really liked it. I read this a long time ago the author gave a talk in on the same topic here is the video. May 30, Levent Kurnaz rated it really liked it Shelves: nonfictionenvironment. Written inMartin Rees sees the experiments at CERN as more threatening to biological life on Earth than climate change and loss of biodiversity. He is willing to bet that a biological weapon can wipe out about 1 million people before but believes a moratorium on certain types of scientific experiments should be in order. I read this book quite quickly as he was talking about many subjects I have been thinking about for quite some time. You may enjoy this book even though you do not a Written inMartin Rees sees the experiments at CERN as more threatening to biological life on Earth than climate change and loss of biodiversity. You may enjoy this book even though you do not agree with everything Rees says. May 23, Brett rated it really liked it Recommends it for: people who want to sound smart at parties. Shelves: environmentscience. The most common objection to Our Final Hour seems to be alleging that it is alarmist. I guess I don't really buy that it's alarmist--first, because when you encounter an alarming phenomenon, the proper response is urgency--and secondly because, though Rees deals with some ideas that I think have a very small chance of negatively affecting our species, he always takes care to be The most common objection to Our Final Hour seems to be alleging that it is alarmist. I guess I don't really buy that it's alarmist--first, because when you encounter an alarming phenomenon, the proper response is urgency--and secondly because, though Rees deals with some ideas that I think have a very small chance of negatively affecting our species, he always takes care to be up-front with saying that the odds of, say, an asteroid colliding with earth in our lifetimes, is very small. If you can look beyond the fact that there is some outlandish science fiction-y sounding stuff in this book, it's got plenty of ideas that are geniunely worth considering. I think of this book as something like a survey course in Things That Could Kill Us, taught by an affable professor. Here is a list of some of those Things: good old-fashioned nuclear warfare, nuclear or biological terrorism, accidental release of virulent bio-agent, creation of nanotechnology that using solar Our Final Century: The 50/50 Threat to Humanitys Survival more efficiently than current plant life and "outcompetes" every biological organism on the planet, asteroid impact, overpopulation, climate change, and advanced physics experiments creating a black hole. Some of these sound more crazy than others, but Rees' treatment is always accessible and often very interesting. He almost always finds a question or philosophical issue related to one of these possible doomsday scenarios that I hadn't ever considered. The treatment of advanced physics was especially interesting. As Rees admits, the odds of a atom smashing experiement creating a black hole or other cosmic event is very small--perhaps one in 50 million. But, Rees Our Final Century: The 50/50 Threat to Humanitys Survival, when the entireity of life on earth is at stake, how comfortable should be with odds of 1 in 50 million? Is that really good enough considering what is being risked? And should someone outside of the scientific community have some say in whether experiments of this sort are conducted? Should there be some kind of democratic process or forum where it can at least be discussed? Rees is also eloquent on the future of scientific enquiry and where human life fits in the scheme of the cosmos. He's funny and humble and this book was a joy for me, though this is admittedly the kind of thing I love. And if nothing else, the notes contain this beautiful quote from Arthur C. Clarke about what the universe will look like after the hot stars burn out: "It will be a history illuminated only by the reds and infrareds of dully glowing stars that would be almost invisable to our eyes; yet the sombre hues of that all-but-eternal universe may be full of colour and beauty to whatever strange beings have adapted to it. They will know that before them lie, not billions of years that span the past lives of the stars, but years to be counted literally in trillions. They will have time enough, in those endless aeons, to attempt all things and to gather all knowledge. But for all that, they may envy us, basking in the bright afterglow of creation; for we knew the universe when it was young. Aug 27, Dennis Littrell rated it really liked it. A sobering assessment An important thing to realize when reading this book is that we will indeed have a "final hour. I have also Our Final Century: The 50/50 Threat to Humanitys Survival some books by fu A sobering assessment An important thing to realize when reading this book is that we will indeed have a "final hour. But this book nonetheless broadened my perspective because Sir Martin Rees the Astronomer Royal Our Final Century: The 50/50 Threat to Humanitys Survival Great Britain, and a distinguished astrophysicist is persuasive in his argument that there may actually be scientific experiments that should not be tried. He warns against some kinds of genetic engineering, especially those attempting to change the DNA of dangerous pathogens, and even rates some experiments in physics as of dubious value. This is a somewhat surprising stance for a reputable scientists to take since most scientists do not relish the prospect of political restraints on their work, and usually afford the same courtesy to practitioners in other disciplines. His call for taking a close look at experiments with a chance of a "doomsday downside," however remote, is well taken. His sense that some biological experiments have such an unsavory "yuck factor" e. Rees is characteristically not dogmatic about any of this. He presents the dangers and the objections typically with the proviso that a wider public than an individual scientist, or an oligarchy of scientists, should participate in the decisions made. Indeed Rees is an eminently reasonable man Our Final Century: The 50/50 Threat to Humanitys Survival tries to have as few prejudices or "yuck factors" about things as possible. He emphasizes the unpredictability of future developments, noting that "straightforward projections of present trends will miss the most revolutionary innovations: the qualitatively new things that really change the world. Like the futurists named above, Rees sees a posthuman future for our kind, a future in which cultural evolution transforms humans into something beyond human. He recalls Darwin, who wrote, "not one living species will transmit its unaltered likeness to a distant futurity" and notes that "Earth itself may endure, but it will not be humans who cope with the scorching of our planet by the dying sun The central point of this book I believe however is Our Final Century: The 50/50 Threat to Humanitys Survival be found further down the page where Rees writes, "Nuclear weapons give an attacking nation a devastating advantage over any feasible defense. New sciences will soon empower small groups, even individuals, with similar leverage over society. Our increasingly interconnected world is vulnerable to new risks; 'bio' or 'cyber,' terror or error. These risks cannot be eliminated: indeed it will be hard to stop them from growing without encroaching on some cherished personal freedoms. Our Final Hour - Wikiwand

We use cookies and other tracking technologies to improve your browsing experience on our site, show personalized content and targeted ads, analyze site traffic, and understand where our audiences come from. To learn more or opt-out, read our Cookie Policy. In a book, titled Our Final Hourhe gave civilization a chance of surviving the 21st century, an estimate he reached after surveying all the ways humanity could destroy itself. Rees has followed that book with another one about existential threats, titled On the Future: Prospects for Humanity. And the upshot of the new book is Our Final Century: The 50/50 Threat to Humanitys Survival The choices we make today, and in the next couple of decades, will likely determine the fate of life on earth. For example, a handful of bad actors could release malicious code that upends computer networks around the world, or bioterrorists could unleash a deadly virus that quickly becomes a global pandemic, or overeager physicists could spawn a black hole by smashing protons together. I spoke to him last week about why he remains hopeful in the face of all these threats, and why he thinks scientists have an ethical obligation to engage politically. I also asked him if he thinks human beings will have to flee Earth if we want to survive in the long run. His answer might surprise you. In your previous book, Our Final Houryou said we had a 50 percent chance of surviving the 21st century. How do you feel about our odds today? Well, that was obviously a rough number, but I still believe that there could be serious setbacks to our civilization, and I feel more concerned now than I was then about the fact that technology means that small groups or even individuals can by error, or by design, have a disruptive effect that cascades globally. My concerns about this have only grown since when I wrote Our Final Hour. In the short run, I worry about the disruptive effects of cyber attacks or some form of biological terror, like the intentional release of a deadly virus. These kind of events can happen right now, and they can be carried out by small groups or even an individual. Disruptions of this kind will be a growing problem in our future, and it will lead to more tensions between privacy, security, and liberty. And it will only become more acute as time goes on. I also worry that our societies are more brittle now and less tolerant of disruption. In the Middle Ages, for example, when the Black Plague killed off half the populations of towns, the others sort of went on fatalistically. But I think if we had some sort of pandemic today, and once it got beyond the capacity of hospitals to cope with all the cases, then I think there would be catastrophic social disruption long before the number of cases reached 1 percent. The panic, in other words, would Our Final Century: The 50/50 Threat to Humanitys Survival instantly and be Our Final Century: The 50/50 Threat to Humanitys Survival to contain. Do you think the pace of technological change is now too fast for society to keep up? Is it too fast for society? Just look at the impact of social media on geopolitics right now. And the risks of artificial intelligence and biotechnology far exceed social media. But these things also have potentially huge benefits to society, if we can manage them Our Final Century: The 50/50 Threat to Humanitys Survival. The downsides are enormous, and the stakes keep getting higher. But these changes are coming, whether we want them to or not, so we have to try and maximize the benefits while at the same time minimizing the risks. Do you think our greatest existential threat at this point is ourselves and not some external threat from the natural world? I worry about human folly and human greed and human error. I worry much more about, say, a nuclear war then I do a natural disaster. You talk a lot in the Our Final Century: The 50/50 Threat to Humanitys Survival about cooperation and the need for better Our Final Century: The 50/50 Threat to Humanitys Survival. As scientists, we must try to find solutions for these problems, but we also have to raise public consciousness and interest. I consider this my obligation as a scientist. The wider public has to be involved in that conversation, and scientists can help by educating them as much as possible. In the book, I talk about the atomic scientists who developed nuclear weapons during WWII, many of whom became politically involved after the war to do what they could to control the powers they helped unleash. They thought they had a special obligation. And I Our Final Century: The 50/50 Threat to Humanitys Survival that is true of scientists in other fields. But the big difference now is that there are far more people around the world with expertise in all these technologies, especially in AI and bioengineering. And the commercial pressures to develop them are enormous, which means attempts to impose regulations will only be moderately successful. And that is extremely scary. People like Steven Pinker make the case that life is steadily improving, and that reason and technology are the prime drivers of that improvement. The first is what I mentioned earlier about new technologies creating new threats that can be unleashed relatively easily by small groups of people or individuals. Today, the gap between the way the world is and the way it could be is enormous. We have a billion people in the world in abject poverty, which could be alleviated by the wealth of the thousand richest people on the planet. Do you believe that humanity will have to move beyond the Earth if it wants to survive in the long run? I certainly hope not. I hope that there will be a few pioneers who travel to space and form a little colony on Mars, but I think this should be left to the private sector. The private sector can afford to take more risks than NASA, and many adventurers are happy to live with the risks of space travel. Where does your optimism spring from? We have abject poverty in our countries, we have whole regions of the world where people are in poverty, and this is a political failure. And this gap is getting wider, not closer. Do you think humanity will have to evolve into something else, into something posthuman, in order to survive for another centuries? If, because of technology or space travel or some other development, evolution starts to happen on a much faster time scale, it will have important consequences for human life. If that happens, if we lose this continuity between generations of human beings, that will be a total game changer. Cookie banner We use cookies and other tracking technologies to improve your browsing experience on our site, show personalized content and targeted ads, analyze site traffic, and understand Our Final Century: The 50/50 Threat to Humanitys Survival our audiences come from. By choosing I Acceptyou consent to our use of cookies and other tracking technologies. Cosmologist Martin Our Final Century: The 50/50 Threat to Humanitys Survival gives humanity a chance of surviving the 21st century. Share this story Share this on Facebook Share this on Twitter Share All sharing options Share All sharing options for: Cosmologist Martin Rees gives humanity a chance of surviving the 21st century. Reddit Pocket Flipboard Email. A lightly edited transcript of our conversation follows. Sean Illing In your previous book, Our Final Houryou said we had a 50 percent chance of surviving the 21st century. Martin Rees Well, that was obviously a rough number, but I still believe that there could be serious setbacks to our civilization, and I feel more concerned now than I was then about the fact that technology means that small groups or even individuals can by error, or by design, have a disruptive effect that cascades globally. Sean Illing What would you say worries you the most right now? What keeps you up at night? Martin Rees In the short run, I worry about the disruptive effects of cyber attacks or some form of biological terror, like the intentional release of a deadly virus. It was predictable — and preventable. Email required. By signing up, you agree to our Privacy Notice and European users agree to the data transfer policy. For more newsletters, check out our newsletters page. 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