Which do you believe is the biggest immediate threat to mankind?

[Navy Pride]

Your comments please:

 

[steen]

Bridflu will kill a bit of the population and the rest get immunity. GW will change the patterns of "habitat" and food sources.

 

[Billo_Really]

Corporatism!

 

[LeftyHenry]

Corporatism!

THat's the first thing that popped into my head when I clicked on this thread.

Bird flu is more dangerous presently, but global warming will kill us all in the long run if we don't stop it now

 

[Kandahar]

Bird flu is the bigger problem, because it has the potential to kill millions of people. Global warming will be reversed by advanced technology long before it becomes a problem.

 

[steen]

Habitat destruction has ALWAYS been the much more destructive force than the killing off of individuals.

 

[Navy Pride]

Corporatism!

Nah,

Go Washington Huskies, Pitt Panthers, and Gonzaga Bulldogs!!!!!!!!

 

[Real Korimyr #9]

Given the end of the Cold War, there's really no longer any immediate threat to humanity.

A few million here, a few million there-- whether war, natural disaster, or epidemic disease-- but it would require a major meteorological event for the world's population to decrease between one day and the next.

 

[lily]

Bird flu. This **** can get nasty really fast. Global warming is going to take longer........and let's face it, how many of us will be around? I can and do my bit to slow it down.

 

[George_Washington]

I would think global warming would be. I didn't know bird flu was really that big of a deal, I guess at least not in the industrialized world.

 

[Kandahar]

I would think global warming would be. I didn't know bird flu was really that big of a deal, I guess at least not in the industrialized world.

It has the potential of mutating into a more transmissable form and killing millions of people worldwide. And all indications are that it will.

 

[teacher]

Besides Billo with a pocket full of cash in Tijuana?

Terrorists with nukes.

 

[alphamale]

THat's the first thing that popped into my head when I clicked on this thread.

Bird flu is more dangerous presently, but global warming will kill us all in the long run if we don't stop it now

How will it do that? Just more open-ended stream of consciousness blather from you?

 

[teacher]

How will it do that? Just more open-ended stream of consciousness blather from you?

The seas will rise, sick birds will mutate and breed with sharks. Then we'll have sick shark-birds flying around biting and infecting people. We're doomed. Only monkeys can save us. They hate shark-birds.

 

[Navy Pride]

Bird flu is really scary.......I could kill tens of millions and there is no known cure........It could start happening any time............

If there is global warming we won't have to worry about it for 10,000 years.......

 

[steen]

It has the potential of mutating into a more transmissable form and killing millions of people worldwide. And all indications are that it will.

Lets say it kills off 1% of the Earth's population before we all have immunity. 60-70 Million people. The other 5.9+ billion people will still do fine.

But if global warming messes with the crop adaptability of food supply, leading to dessertification etc, then what do we do with a halving of our food supply? And lack of water. Do we see wars over water supply and shared rivers? How far does GW take us before we all hunker down and shoot at the other users of resources?

 

[Kandahar]

Lets say it kills off 1% of the Earth's population before we all have immunity. 60-70 Million people. The other 5.9+ billion people will still do fine.

So 60-70 million dead is OK since it's a small percentage of the world's population? The Holocaust killed less than 1% of the Earth's population too...

But if global warming messes with the crop adaptability of food supply, leading to dessertification etc, then what do we do with a halving of our food supply? And lack of water. Do we see wars over water supply and shared rivers? How far does GW take us before we all hunker down and shoot at the other users of resources?

This ignores the fact that worldwide crop yields have continued to increase for several decades, despite the warming of the earth, and there is every reason to believe that they will continue to do so since technology gets better every year. In fact, the rate of improvement will probably improve itself, since we're just beginning to reap the fruits of biotechnology. The relatively slow drag of global warming is no match for the breakneck speed of our agricultural technology.

This also ignores the fact that long before global warming makes people fight massive wars over survival resources, nanotechnology will almost certainly enable the reversal of global warming.

 

[alphamale]

ABC News quoted some group doing a simulation which said if the virus mutates to a form that could go from human to human, and ten people are initially infected, then half the country will be infected in 3 months.

 

[Kandahar]

ABC News quoted some group doing a simulation which said if the virus mutates to a form that could go from human to human, and ten people are initially infected, then half the country will be infected in 3 months.

I saw that in Wired Magazine. Bird flu definitely has all the characteristics of a major pandemic.

 

[Scarecrow Akhbar]

I saw that in Wired Magazine. Bird flu definitely has all the characteristics of a major pandemic.

Except for that minor little detail of not being transmitted person to person.

It may become a problem if it evolves in that direction. Until it does, it's not a real threat.

Global warming...no one's ever answered the question of "it's warmer, this is bad because?".

So neither is a real threat. Why isn't Lucifer's Hammer on the list? What about the sun going nova? Perhaps we'll discover the Bronson Bodies? What if the universal constant of gravity, G, changes?

 

[Kandahar]

Except for that minor little detail of not being transmitted person to person.

It may become a problem if it evolves in that direction. Until it does, it's not a real threat.

...and a small child trapped in a den of grizzly bears is in no danger, until they get hungry. :roll:

It's virtually inevitable that bird flu (or something similar) WILL mutate into a more transmissable form sometime in the next few years.

 

[Willoughby]

I think global warming will probably affect our children/grandchildren , by me still must be worried about it.
Bird flu will kill some people but nowhere as many as to be a threat to humanity
I personally think the biggest threat is nuclear weapons, who ever has got them be it india, china, US Iran Britain etc

 

[steen]

So 60-70 million dead is OK since it's a small percentage of the world's population? The Holocaust killed less than 1% of the Earth's population too...

And relatively, it was a small number that didn't threaten the species existence. Neither did the Chinese famines under Mao or the Stalinist purges. Nor did war and pestilence at other times. We are talking about threats to the species here.

This ignores the fact that worldwide crop yields have continued to increase for several decades, despite the warming of the earth, and there is every reason to believe that they will continue to do so since technology gets better every year. In fact, the rate of improvement will probably improve itself, since we're just beginning to reap the fruits of biotechnology. The relatively slow drag of global warming is no match for the breakneck speed of our agricultural technology.

Ah, so you can grow wheat in a dry desert?

This also ignores the fact that long before global warming makes people fight massive wars over survival resources, nanotechnology will almost certainly enable the reversal of global warming.

Why? How is this subjective invention of yours a "fact"?

 

[steen]

...and a small child trapped in a den of grizzly bears is in no danger, until they get hungry. :roll:

It's virtually inevitable that bird flu (or something similar) WILL mutate into a more transmissable form sometime in the next few years.

And then we will ALL die, just like with the Spanish Flu. Oh, wait, most people DIDN'T die, they developed immunity :doh

 

[Scarecrow Akhbar]

...and a small child trapped in a den of grizzly bears is in no danger, until they get hungry. :roll:

It's virtually inevitable that bird flu (or something similar) WILL mutate into a more transmissable form sometime in the next few years.

The question specified "bird flu". I answered re: "bird flu".

IMO the real biggest threat is deadly combination of smallpox, fanatical terrorists, and bureaucratic lassitude.