Are you thinking that human beings (Homo sapiens) will live till the end of the world? There might be certain organisms on earth who survive till the end of the world, but certainly not humans.
Till the end? Till When?
No one knows when the world ends. Or what can be called the end of the world. It is believed (according to the Big Bang Theory) that the universe originated 1700 crore years ago (17000 million years ago) and the Solar system and the Sun some 500 crore years ago, while the earth’s age is calculated as 460 crore years. Life on earth is supported by the energy from the Sun, and our scientists say that the Sun has fuel in it for nearly 500 crore more years to burn. But that doesn’t mean that there will be life on earth till that time, leave the case of man.
Origin of Life
The origin of the earth is estimated to be 460 crore years back. Life originated on earth 390-430 crore years back in the form of bacteria. The vast variety of organisms we see today have evolved since then – protozoa, fungi, plants and animals. Human beings appeared on this planet only very recently. If you take a calendar of 460 days, each day corresponding to 1 crore years, the origin of human beings can be mapped on the evening of the last day in that calendar. Yes, we are not even 1 crore years old, but many bacteria are more than 400 crore years old!
And those scientists and archaeologists who study evolution say that Human beings (Homo sapiens) evolved sometime around 2 lakh years before, in the African continent and moved out to all other continents. Proto-humans like Homo erectus were there on this planet before (20 lakh years before), but none of them is alive today. Neanderthal Man was a close relative of modern man, and He co-existed with human beings for a few thousand of years before becoming extinct.
What does this say? Not every species exist on this planet for long. Dinosaurs, Mammoths – this list of species which became extinct is long. How did they become extinct?
How Long Will Human Beings Survive On This Planet?
As I said before, human beings have just started living their life. They are like newborn babies. What makes newborn babies think that they are not vulnerable if the giants like Dinosaurs and Mammoths didn’t last long? Cockroaches might live long, but not humans. The list of extinct species among the homo genus is long, and the last species surviving among them is Humans – the species with superior brain power than any creature that lived and reined in this world (at least we think so)!
The last epoch was the Pleistocene which ended in BC 12000. Since then there was a major climatic change, which brought radical changes to the glaciers of the northern hemisphere. The present epoch is Holocene. The Holocene epoch saw humans changing their behaviour from gathering/hunting to domestication (cattle rearing) and then to cultivation. Within a short span of fewer than 10,000 years since humans started cultivation, they moved towards industrialization – which was the process of using machines to mass produce things at ease to meet the demands of the ever-growing human population. Industrialization – without which human beings might still lead a life based on crops and cattle – had in it seeds for the destruction of this species – another climatic change.
Climatic Change – This is how Humans are gonna end!
You might have guessed it right. The cause of death of mammoths, dinosaurs or Neanderthal-man can affect us too. The climatic change as a result of global warming is alarming. The level of CO2 in the atmosphere is increasing, leading to an increase in global temperature and the melting of glaciers. Many areas are going to be uninhabitable – either due to floods or high temperatures. Epidemics will spread; you know that humans can be killed even by microscopic bacteria and that nuclear bombs are not necessary. We might last 5000 years or 10,000 years more – but that itself needs a change of habits from our side. If a world war happens between nuclear powers, we will not have to worry about counting even till that.
Humans perish, so what next?
There will be other animals surviving – Darwin’s theory of survival of the fittest is a universal truth. Yes, cockroaches might survive! And if this blog last that long (not serious this time, OK!), the readers will not be you or me – probably some amphibians or insects! Then after millions of years, a more superior, intelligent species might evolve to decipher the codes (including this blog!) left out by humans. But the question is from which species, will the next super-humans evolve? Chimpanzees and gorillas? Or, we might need some help from Mars.