Are We Doomed?

That’s the title of a course at the University of Chicago taught by an astrophysicist and a sociologist.  Students meet for three hours every Thursday afternoon to hear guest speakers, watch movies, and discuss topics like climate change, artificial intelligence, and nuclear war.

I could teach this class.  At San José State I usually ended the last session of the semester with graphs of population growth, a description of a nuclear explosion a list of how many countries had nuclear weapons, and a timeline of how long dinosaurs lived compared to how long humans have been around.  The concluding question: “Given current trends do you think humans will last anywhere near as long as the dinosaurs?”  Students told me it was the most depressing lecture they had ever heard.

Let’s just look at nuclear weapons.  Nine countries–U.S., France, UK, India, Pakistan, Russia, China, North Korea, and Israel–have nuclear weapons.  The strategy of MAD (“mutually assured destruction”) has worked reasonably well to keep things under control, but accidents can occur (and almost have on at least two occasions).  Two of those countries are led by crazy people.  In the U.S. one person can decide to launch nuclear weapons.  One.

Now add to that climate change, religious fanatics (Muslim, Christian, Hindu, Jewish, even Buddhist), artificial intelligence, global climate change, willful ignorance, and growing irrationality.  Yes, we are doomed.

(Quick story:  in 1983 a Soviet early-warning satellite system reported five incoming American missiles.  Stanislav Petrov, who was on duty at the command center, managed to convince his superiors that any American attack would have started with more than five missiles.  No action was taken, and Petrov was proved correct.  Petrov has been labeled as the man who saved the world.)

Info for this post was taken in part from Rivka Galchen, Are We Doomed? The New Yorker, (June 10, 2024), pp. 22-27.