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Page added on May 28, 2016
Countdown to Extinction
How I quite worrying and learned to love the apocalypse
According to the online website The Death Clock, a man born on my birthdate can be expected to die 20 years from now in 2036. This assumes, however, that the entire human race does not become extinct before the estimated date of my demise.
In a February 9, 2012 post on the blog Arctic News, Malcolm Light writes there will be “Global Extinction within one Human Lifetime as a Result of a Spreading Atmospheric Arctic Methane Heat Wave and Surface Firestorm.” Light predicts “This process of methane release will accelerate exponentially, release huge quantities of methane into the atmosphere and lead to the demise of all life on earth before the middle of this century.” For those interested in more specific dates, Light has done the calculations:
The absolute mean extinction time for the northern hemisphere is 2031.8 and for the southern hemisphere 2047.6 with a final mean extinction time for ¾ of the earth’s surface of 2039.6 which is similar to the extinction time suggested previously from corrrelations between planetary orbital mechanics and the frequency increase of Great and Normal earthquake activity on Earth (Light, 2011). Extinction in the southern hemisphere lags the northern hemisphere by 9 to 29 years.
This certainly sounds scientific, doesn’t it? Light’s blog post is complete with charts and graphs and seemingly-precise figures. But his analysis has not undergone peer review by scientists or publication in a peer-reviewed journal. Not that any of that matters if we’re all about to die!
“If it bleeds, it leads,” the saying among editors goes. Predictions of imminent human extinction by scientists, or people who pretend to be scientists, are sure to be picked up during slow news cycles. “Humans will be extinct in 100 years says eminent scientist” screamed the headline on June 23, 2010 in Phys.Org. Frank Fenner, an emeritus professor of microbiology in Australia who had helped to eliminate smallpox, predicted that the human race would be gone within a century, thanks to climate change and overpopulation.
Fenner told The Australian he tries not to express his pessimism because people are trying to do something, but keep putting it off. He said he believes the situation is irreversible, and it is too late because the effects we have had on Earth since industrialization (a period now known to scientists unofficially as the Anthropocene) rivals any effects of ice ages or comet impacts.
Fenner passed away at the age of 95 in the same year, 2010, in which he made his apocalyptic prediction. But belief in the near-term extinction of the human race is a hardy perennial. “Steven Hawking Warns Humanity Could Destroy Itself in the Next 100 Years,” according to a headline of January 19, 2016. The culprits? The usual suspects —global warming and/or nuclear war — plus, genetically-engineered viruses. On a previous occasion he suggested that intelligent machines “could spell the end of the human race.”
It should come as no surprise that there is a Near Term Human Extinction movement (not to be confused with the anti-natalist Voluntary Human Extinction movement). Among its leaders are a retired natural scientist at the University of Arizona named Guy McPherson, who runs a blog called Nature Bats Last. In an October 4, 2014 blog post McPherson portrayed himself as a spurned prophet:
I abandoned the luxury-filled, high-pay, low-work position I loved as a tenured professor to go back to the land. I led by example. Vanishingly few followed. I’m reminded of the prescient words attributed to American existential psychologist Rollo May: “The opposite of courage in our society is not cowardice, it is conformity.”….I no longer communicate with most of those colleagues, friends, and family. It’s too difficult to justify the occasional conversation.
He is not the first to feel this way:
But Jesus said unto them, a prophet is not without honour, but in his own country, and among his own kin, and in his own house. (Mark 6:4, KJV).
The method of many near term human extinction believers is to take the worst case scenarios from numerous projections, without treating them as low-probability events. In the case of my own extinction, it is possible that I will be killed, as Valerius Maximus reported that the Greek poet and playwright Aeschylus was killed, by a passing eagle that drops a tortoise on my head, but the odds are very low.
The near term human extinction movement has been subjected to devastating criticism by scientists and well-informed journalists, many of whom think climate change is a genuine danger. Critiques are easily found on the Internet and I will leave them as an exercise for the reader.
What I want to focus on here is the psychology of the apocalyptic mind. It is a subject which has fascinated me since my childhood in Texas, where I enjoyed listening to radio broadcasts by evangelical Protestant interpreters of “prophecy.” Every Sunday a preacher could be heard, interpreting current events in light of the Book of Revelation. This or that nation in the European Economic Community, the predecessor of the European Union, was one of the ten horns on the seven heads of the dragon in Revelation. For those who could read the Signs of the Times, it was clear that the latest crisis in the Middle East or in the Cold War proved that the Last Days were about to begin. In the next few years the seven-year Tribulation would begin, complete with the Battle of Armageddon, the Second Coming of Jesus Christ, and the beginning of the Millennial Kingdom of Christ on earth. It was all great fun.
My introduction to the secular environmentalist version of apocalyptic thinking occurred when I, at the age of 10 or so, received a letter from the great marine biologist Jacques Cousteau, whose television program about undersea exploration mesmerized me and countless other young viewers. “Dear Michael,” the great man began. I was very excited until my parents explained that it was a fundraising form letter.
According to Jacques Cousteau, pollution was destroying the world’s environment (this was in the 1970s, before global warming had displaced pollution as the greatest danger to humanity in Green thinking). By 1984 all of the plankton in the oceans would die, the oxygen in the earth’s atmosphere would become extinct, and…well, you know. Disaster might be averted by a tax-deductible contribution to Jacques Cousteau.
I don’t remember whether I sent money or not. But I do recall being extremely anxious on New Year’s Eve, 1983. After the ball dropped in Times Square, I took a deep breath … and discovered that there was still oxygen in the earth’s atmosphere in 1984, notwithstanding the prediction of my childhood scientist-hero.
The structure of apocalyptic predictions is similar, whether they are religious or scientific. Timing is everything. The apocalyptic event, be it the Second Coming or human extinction as a result of nuclear war, Peak Oil or climate change, has to be in the near term future, to generate excitement. Nobody is going to join a sect whose prophet claims that Jesus will return on May 2, 4158 A.D. And no news outlet in search of eyeballs is going to publish this headline: “Scientist predicts human race will become extinct within the next 10 to 20 million years.”
If the apocalypse can be averted or postponed by individual or collective repentance, then you need two futures: the near term future, in which human action can avert the catastrophe, and the medium term future, in which catastrophe is inevitable if human action is inadequate in the near term future. Much environmentalist writing takes this form: If humanity does not act within the next X years, then global disaster will take place in Y years.
Frequently X — the short term period in which action may still be effective — is 10-15 years, while Y is around 30 years. These numbers make psychological sense. Arguing that we must act in the next decade or so can inspire people more than insisting that something must be done in the next half century. And global doom in the next three decades creates a greater sense of urgency than global doom in the next three centuries or the next three millennia or the next three hundred thousand years.
Examples of the 10-year rule and the 30-year rule were provided by Al Gore in 2006, in an interview with the Associated Press accompanying a screening of his documentary An Inconvenient Truth.
First, the 30-year timing, if the apocalypse is not averted (“a few decades”):
If the pace of pollution continues, Gore’s projections for carbon-dioxide levels are off the charts within a few decades.
Among the worst-case consequences: A new ice age in Europe, and massive flooding of regions in India, China and elsewhere that could make refugees of tens of millions of people.
Then, the 10-year rule for effective, short-term action:
And politicians and corporations have been ignoring the issue for decades, to the point that unless drastic measures to reduce greenhouse gases are taken within the next 10 years, the world will reach a point of no return, Gore said.
10 years have now passed since Gore warned that we had only ten years to avert “a true planetary emergency.” Humanity failed to unite and act in time. So I reckon there is nothing to be done, except to reconcile ourselves to the coming global catastrophe “within a few decades.”
Will the human race in the near future be wiped out by a methane-caused firestorm —Malcolm Light’s prediction—or, at least in Europe, by a new ice age, as in Al Gore’s 2006 prophecy? Like Robert Frost, I would prefer the former:
Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I’ve tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But it doesn’t really matter—if you’re extinct, you’re extinct. And extinction may not be as bad as people make it out to be. To quote the humorous verses that Ogden Nash wrote to accompany the section of “The Carnival of the Animals” by Camille Saint-Saens entitled “Fossils”:
Amid the mastodonic wassail
I caught the eye of one small fossil.
“Cheer up, sad world,” he said, and winked—
“It’s kind of fun to be extinct.”
107 Comments on "Countdown to Extinction"
penury on Sat, 28th May 2016 10:23 am
My prediction is that 100 years from now anyone currently reading this article will be dead. The rest of humanity?
Who knows.
Apneaman on Sat, 28th May 2016 12:03 pm
Again with the conflating of science based doomer predictions with the religiously minded. No mention of the well under way 6th mass extinction or unprecedented GW. Most biologists and climate scientists are in agreement on that fact, because that is where the evidence has taken them. but not the “smartset”.
“ABOUT US
The Smart Set is an online magazine covering culture and ideas, arts and science, global and national affairs — everything from literature to shopping, medicine to sports, philosophy to food. Named for the turn-of-the-century literary magazine edited by H.L. Mencken and George Nathan, the Smart Set strives to present big ideas on the small, the not-so-small, and the everyday.
We publish high quality writing and photography in a broad range of genres including reportage, personal and critical essays, travel writing, memoirs, and stories. The Smart Set is an independent magazine, generously supported by the Pennoni Honors College at Drexel University.
The Smart Set is published for people who enjoy reading, and enjoy thinking about what they read. The Smart Set feels that what unites its readers is their intellectual curiosity, and this cuts across age, gender, income, and education level.”
Obviously who else could be more qualified to write on biologly (that’s what extinction is about – life) than a magazine written by elitists for their elitists graduates sponsored by their elite private university?
OK, that’s my rhetoric, lets break down his.
So, Malcom Light is disqualified because he is not a scientist (He’s an engineer if I remember correctly), Frank Fenner is a scientist, but he’s disqualified because he’s old and died. Guy McPherson is a scientist (whose an expert in this), but he’s disqualified too because he’s disgruntled. This is called arguing against one’s self and wanting it both ways. His argument is about personalities – not the data and history of this planet.
Here’s the deal – you can’t “prove” human extinction. What you can do is look at what’s going on, what we have done and what we’re still doing to the biosphere and compare it to the record of what happened during other times when the biosphere was dying off and extrapolate. It can’t be a direct comparison because the speed of the dying and the speed of climate change and ocean acidification (don’t here much about that killer do ya?) that are underway are unprecedented in earth’s history . Extinctions are the rule on this planet and all the same processes that made them happen in the past are underway again, only much faster and severe.
Current pace of environmental change is unprecedented in Earth’s history
http://www.bristol.ac.uk/news/2016/january/pace-environment-change.html
Humans could be among the victims of sixth ‘mass extinction’, scientists warn
“The world is embarking on its sixth mass extinction with animals disappearing about 100 times faster than they used to, scientists warn, and humans could be among the first victims of the next extinction event.”
“We emphasise that our calculations very likely underestimate the severity of the extinction crisis because our aim was to place a realistic lower bound on humanity’s impact on biodiversity.”
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-06-20/sixth-mass-extinction-impact-humans-study-says/6560700
Another scientist (biologist).
Web of life unravelling, wildlife biologist says
“Wildlife biologist Neil Dawe says he wouldn’t be surprised if the generation after him witnesses the extinction of humanity.”
“Economic growth is the biggest destroyer of the ecology,” he says. “Those people who think you can have a growing economy and a healthy environment are wrong. “If we don’t reduce our numbers, nature will do it for us.”
https://web.archive.org/web/20150425132240/http://www.oceansidestar.com/news/web-of-life-unravelling-wildlife-biologist-says-1.605499
I guess smartset will have to do a follow up article with all personal reasons/flaws for why Neil Dawe and the 20 authors of that 6th mass extinction paper are disqualified too. Rhetoric/off…..again
I’m not an adherent to NTE, I estimate about another century for the humans. The methane clathrate gun is physically possible and large methane bursts have heated up the planet before, but that does not mean it’s a certainty by or before 2030. Could happen – could not happen, but more subsea methane is hitting the atmosphere every year. It’s small potatoes compared to CO2, but still adding to the greenhouse gas accumulation.
The argument is academic. For anyone paying attention and who posses the least bit of honesty, it’s crystal that we have already done enough to destroy techno industrial civilization within the next decade or two. That will cause a major die back and change all our lives. That and losing their privileged living arrangements is really what these people who write for and read the smartset are really arguing against.
Only thing left is to prepare (if you think it matters) and enjoy what we have that most humans who ever lived did not or will not have and stay away from dooming sites if it bothers you….if you’re able to look away;)
Apneaman on Sat, 28th May 2016 12:10 pm
Here’s an explainer article about previously fast methane releases leading to quick global temperature rise. Bet you won’t see it over at the “smartset”…….in the shopping (cancer) section.
Dissecting Paleoclimate Change
Using a core sample from the Santa Barbara Basin, UCSB researchers decipher the history of paleoclimate change with surprising results
“New research from UC Santa Barbara geologist James Kennett and colleagues examines a shift from a glacial to an interglacial climate that began about 630,000 years ago. Their research demonstrates that, although this transition developed over seven centuries, the initial shift required only 50 years. Called a deglacial episode because of its association with the melting of large Northern Hemisphere ice sheets, this interval illustrates the extreme sensitivity to change of the Earth’s climate system.”
“One of the most astonishing things about our results is the abruptness of the warming in sea surface temperatures,” explained co-author Kennett, a professor emeritus in UCSB’s Department of Earth Science. “Of the 13 degree Fahrenheit total change, a shift of 7 to 9 degrees occurred almost immediately right at the beginning.”
“Kennett noted that this remarkable record of paleoclimate changes also raises an important question: What process can possibly push the Earth’s climate so fast from a glacial to an interglacial state? The researchers may have discovered the answer based on the core’s geochemical record: The warming associated with the major climatic shift was accompanied by simultaneous releases of methane — a potent greenhouse gas.
“This particular episode of climate change is closely associated with instability that caused the release of methane from gas hydrates at the ocean floor,” Kennett said. “These frozen forms of methane melt when temperatures rise or pressure decreases. Changes in sea level affect the stability of gas hydrates and water temperature even more so.”
– See more at: http://www.news.ucsb.edu/2015/016158/dissecting-paleoclimate-change#sthash.zyJatoiE.dpuf“
Plantagenet on Sat, 28th May 2016 1:16 pm
Temperatures in Alaska and northern Canada have been running about 10° F above normal for the last 5 months. The short term result is massive forest fires.
The long term result of continued warming will be the release of many gigaton of carbon from the permafrost. In fact, its already starting.
Cheers!
Apneaman on Sat, 28th May 2016 1:34 pm
You got it Planty. So does this mean you no longer consider yourself part of that group of uber stupid, reality denying humans called republicans? No worries, the opposition group is stupid in their own way – they think alt energy will “save the planet” and let them carry on with their privileged life styles. Both groups are nothing but tools for TPTB. Better to be groupless (I just made that word up) methinks. Stay frosty planty.
Apneaman on Sat, 28th May 2016 1:46 pm
The author of this piece’s name is Michael Lind. Michael is a busy guy. You could say he is a neo liberal liberal.
Michael Lind
Policy Director, Economic Growth Program
https://www.newamerica.org/our-people/michael-lind/
Mikey is pro economic growth. AKA pro cancer
shortonoil on Sat, 28th May 2016 2:44 pm
Now exactly what good did it do to tell everyone that they will be dead in 14 years. Anyway, I’m sitting here in Virginia taking in the sun, drinking a glass of wine that came from Chile, and smoking a cigar that came from the Dominican Republic. It’s a beautiful day after 8 weeks of nasty cold, and rain. Think I’ll worry about being dead in 14 years tomorrow; right after I worry about how I’m going to get that damn spring that fell out, back into the riding lawn mower. I’m not going to worry about it today because the spring fell out after I mowed the lawn. As far as being dead in 14 years goes, I hope it’s not on a Tuesday or Thursday. Those are match days for my Pickle Ball team.
Fourteen years may be enough time for Hillary to make another run at the White House?
peakyeast on Sat, 28th May 2016 3:27 pm
@ape:
One of places in the world with the highest economic growth today is … Zimbabwe – just look at their currency. With numbers like that nobody can be a loser.
The economic growth in the rest of the world is more or less the same type of growth. – That is: Its purely a mental exercise in delusion.
Zimbabwe at least is more honest about it since its obvious to the common citizen what is happening.
penury on Sat, 28th May 2016 3:47 pm
If you cannot spell “quit” it might be time to quite writing.
Apneaman on Sat, 28th May 2016 3:58 pm
Short, I guess it all depends on where you live – some have cause to “worry” sooner than others, but yeah – enjoy it while we can.
Welcome to India, a country gripped by 51C heatwave
“For farmers in particular, the effects have been widespread and devastating, worsening poverty and even prompting suicide.
The Indian government has estimated that as much as 25 per cent of the country – 330 million Indians – could be affected by the shortages.
And to make matters worse, Australia has recently ranked as one of the worst countries for helping to make a difference.
INDIA’S WEATHER IS OUT OF CONTROL
Temperatures in the northern desert province of Rajasthan have soared to 51C, the highest in the country’s recorded history, and the third-highest temperature ever documented on Earth.
To put that into perspective, the hottest temperature ever recorded in Australia’s history was 50.7 degrees, in the small South Australian town of Oodnadatta back in 1960.
Temperatures across much of northern India have exceeded 40C for weeks. With much of the country densely-populated, this only makes the problem worse.”
http://www.news.com.au/technology/environment/climate-change/welcome-to-india-a-country-gripped-by-51c-heatwave/news-story/04d0ded07b8f6303280efc75a8163103
Looks like there are two more in Texas that will never worry again thanks to that new abnormal AGW jacked hydrologic cycle.
Texas Flooding Kills 2, Leaves 3 Missing; Evacuations Underway
“Two people have died and three are missing in Texas after a storm system fired up once again in the Plains, bringing heavy rain and severe flooding to parts of the region. Numerous rivers in the state are heading toward historic crests, and officials are asking for madatory and voluntary evacuations of homes.”
https://weather.com/storms/tornado/news/plains-deadly-severe-weather-outbreak-flooding-tornado
I’m just sitting here drinking tea on a rainy Vancouver day dooming away while folks in other locals are frying and drowning and having their infrastructure smashed to shit. Just waiting for a break in the rain so me and this dog I’m watching for someone can go for a walk – no worries here.
10, 9, 8 , 7……………..
Apneaman on Sat, 28th May 2016 4:21 pm
peakyeast, from the big picture perspective the economic growth dopamine squirting impulses of the humans is just them verbalizing their inherent biological imperative. I’m pretty well convinced that they, along with all life, operate under the dictates of the MPP. Small examples aside, the humans are incapable of stopping their use of fossil fuels in their growth addiction. Even the big green NGO’s (who are corrupt and in bed with corporations, btw) are growth obsessed. They think it can be done without fossil fuels and more gently on the “environment”. And of course none of them will touch overpopulation either. The humans are not in control of themselves.
OVERSHOOT LOOP:
Evolution Under The Maximum Power Principle
“Today, when one observes the many severe environmental and social problems, it appears that we are rushing towards extinction and are powerless to stop it. Why can’t we save ourselves? To answer that question we only need to integrate three of the key influences on our behavior: 1) biological evolution, 2) overshoot, and 3) a proposed fourth law of thermodynamics called the “Maximum Power Principle”(MPP). The MPP states that biological systems will organize to increase power[2] generation, by degrading more energy, whenever systemic constraints allow i”
http://www.dieoff.org/
Apneaman on Sat, 28th May 2016 4:29 pm
Earth enters sixth extinction phase with many species – including our own – labelled ‘the walking dead’
Report was authored by scientists at Stanford, Princeton and Berkeley
“The research, which cites climate change, pollution and deforestation as causes for the rapid change, notes that a knock-on effect of the loss of entire ecosystems could be dire.”
“The report, which builds on findings published by Duke University last year, does note that averting this loss is “still possible through intensified conservation effects,” but that “window of opportunity is rapid closing.””
http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/earth-is-entering-sixth-extinction-phase-with-many-species-including-our-own-labelled-the-walking-10333608.html
“….averting this loss is “still possible through intensified conservation effects,…”
Bhahahahaha that part gets me every time.
Plantagenet on Sat, 28th May 2016 5:15 pm
@Apneaman
You are even stupider then I thought.
You are welcome to support Trump if you wish, but I’m supporting Bernie.
Cheers!
Apneaman on Sat, 28th May 2016 5:34 pm
Planty, I live in Canada and thus do not get to vote in American elections retard. I’m for Trump though because he will help end the big mess.
Apneaman on Sat, 28th May 2016 5:38 pm
Here’s another one who knows the truth, but then try’s to hopium his way out of it at the end. Humans.
Is there any way to save the world?
“Is there any glimmer of hope left for our species, whose members were designed by evolution to seek immediate comfort and maximize their reproductive potential, with brains big enough to control and even dominate the forces of nature, but not quite big enough to comprehend how that all plays out at a global level, or how to quit while we’re ahead?”
https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/sex-murder-and-the-meaning-life/201605/is-there-any-way-save-the-world
I can’t help myself. I get immediate comfort from dooming.
Apneaman on Sat, 28th May 2016 5:42 pm
Peculiar how the humans think they are immune to something that has happened many times before, even while they have caused it to happen again-big time.
List of extinction events
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extinction_event#List_of_extinction_events
Silly humans
energy investor on Sat, 28th May 2016 5:49 pm
I like what Malcolm Light has to say, because I didn’t plan on living to 100 years anyway and because I am in the Southern hemisphere, I’ll be alright mateys.
Sad about you folk though 🙂
Plantagenet on Sat, 28th May 2016 7:07 pm
@Apneaman
I didn’t say you were going to vote for Trump. I said you support Trump, which you now admit.
Case closed.
Cheers!
Plantagenet on Sat, 28th May 2016 7:09 pm
@energy investor
It really depends on precisely where you are in the southern hemisphere and how careful you are in your preps. You may be all right or you may be in a world of hurt.
Good luck!
Cheers!
MSN Fanboy on Sat, 28th May 2016 7:19 pm
Apneaman i think you spend too much time dooming, then commenting on dooming.
Your funny, but it isn’t something we already don’t know. Your beginning to sound like (Renewables) will save us all Kenz.
Apneaman, start prepping, put that knowledge to good use.
And whilst one is here.
FUCK YOU PLANT
Cheers!
GregT on Sat, 28th May 2016 7:56 pm
You really are quite the piece of work planter. I bet you’re a real hoot at social functions.
shortonoil on Sat, 28th May 2016 8:00 pm
“the humans are incapable of stopping their use of fossil fuels in their growth addiction.”
The growth is over, finished, peaked, come to its final demise, kaput. Its all a matter of waiting for the bottom to drop out, and it doesn’t look like we will be floating downward toward the ground. It will be more like getting thrown off the top of a 4 story building. You had better hope that there is something like some soft bushes down there rather than a concrete slab.
How many famines have hit India in the last 200 years that have killed 10% of it population? In one of the big ones the British let 5 million die before they figured out that there was a real problem. This time the Middle East is coming apart, Europe is like to be no more than a collection of individual countries back to shooting at each other, and South America is melting down. Go to Venezuela and have a nice helping of dog stew, and you don’t get any toilet paper to wipe it off with.
None of those people are worried about global warming, or American hegemony. They are concerned with surviving the day.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-05-28/dont-listen-ruling-elite-world-economy-real-trouble
Apneaman on Sat, 28th May 2016 8:10 pm
@ planty, I support Trump yes. He is the only person who can end this big mess. I don’t know how he’ll do it and Trump hasn’t to the best of my knowledge told anybody what his plan is but he clearly is a very smart guy and knows how to fix all the problems. All those links I post that describe the worlds problems- Trump will fix them all.
makati1 on Sat, 28th May 2016 8:18 pm
I laughed at the Death Clock program he mentions. According to that, I have a few days less than two years to go. Now, unless I am going to be killed by some outside source, I am going to live at least 10 to 20 years beyond that. As I have no medical problems or take any meds, it is unlikely that I am going to die from natural causes. The men in my family lived well into their 80s for generations and I have a great grand father that made it to 98 in the 1800s and a current uncle who is 94.
Just another hopey, feely, religious infected, article wandering around an interesting topic by the NOT so smart set. Extinction is in our future. Only the timing is in question. Soon by nuclear war or later by Mother nature? Only time will tell.
Apneaman on Sat, 28th May 2016 8:18 pm
Short how many records need to broken for you to get it? Rain fall, temperatures, record amount and strength of storms, record fire in area burnt, starting earlier, intensity, etc, etc. Ain’t you got anything better then that tired old denier shit “climate’s always changed”?
You’re out of your league shorty.
makati1 on Sat, 28th May 2016 8:20 pm
Ap, If I bothered to put my X on a ballot, it would be for T rump just to see what happens. Bernie has less chance than an ice cube in hell, and Billary would bring nuclear war before her time was up. Fun to watch though.
Apneaman on Sat, 28th May 2016 8:22 pm
planty, that last comment is not me.
@cocksucker using my handle. Only on the internet will you get away with that shit. Fucking sneaky hiding skulking little coward.
JuanP on Sat, 28th May 2016 8:24 pm
Apneaman, Thanks for the laughs!
I am with you on NTE. Plant has always made sense sometimes.
I have said before that Plant can write smart and well informed comments sometimes, and I got a beating for that, but I still believe it. He has been at PO for more than a decade.
I have been wondering a lot lately about what I’d do if I had to choose between H. Clinton & D. Trump. I think I would vote for Trump if I was forced to choose because Hillary really, really scares. I am 100% convinced that she suffers from Narcissism and Antisocial Personality Disorder. That is an extremely dangerous combination of mental problems. I think Hillary is more likely to fire the nukes than any other politician in US history. She truly terrifies me!
JuanP on Sat, 28th May 2016 8:27 pm
Mak ,I posted my comment before I read yours. I completely agree that Hillary is a very dangerous person.
Apneaman on Sat, 28th May 2016 8:40 pm
@JuanP
I stand by my belief that Trump will fix this big mess. I don’t mean to say he’s the lesser of two evils, I mean he really has solutions to the problems we face. Give Trump two terms and USA will be a whole new place. No Latinos (no offence) and he’ll put women back in their place!
Davy on Sat, 28th May 2016 8:47 pm
Makati Bill said “I laughed at the Death Clock program he mentions. According to that, I have a few days less than two years to go.” I laugh at people that laugh at death. Atheist tend to have an obsession with death because it is the end with nothing else. Atheism is nothing more than any other religions and like other religions they have their beliefs and faith. I have no clue and have no desire to figure it out having attempted that in my youth but I am pretty sure it is not one of the messages of the various established religions including the religion of atheism.
We should be adapting the death clock to the collapse curve complete with locations and a collapse awareness coefficient. It might be simpler to just divide your death clock death day by pi and add 5 years.
Northwest Resident on Sat, 28th May 2016 8:58 pm
“Go to Venezuela and have a nice helping of dog stew…”
They still have dogs in Venezuela?
I personally believe that Trump is just another tool of the financial elite, playing a specific role for which he has been groomed, and playing it well. Don’t let the fact that he’s saying what you want to hear and giving voice to points of view that you tend to agree with cloud your perception of who and what he really is. Just a performer, a celebrity and another face of the tabloid spectacle that presidential electioneering has devolved into. If elected, Trump won’t be able to put any of his big plans into action. He’ll be hamstrung from the get-go by special interests, lobbyists, established power bases and congressional bickering just like Hillary or Bernie would — or anybody.
Or, alternatively, it may be that certain entrenched powers want to put into action some or maybe all of Trump’s ideas. But on their terms. Wouldn’t that be something!
Survival Acres on Sat, 28th May 2016 9:46 pm
I thought this article was ridiculous. Why was it posted? Infotainment? Demonstration of straw arguments? Slow news cycle?
Froggman on Sat, 28th May 2016 9:53 pm
This guy convinced me. Because evangelical preachers get it wrong about the second coming, infinite growth on a finite planet is now possible, and science doesn’t matter! Brilliant!
What a bunch of straw-man nonsense.
makati1 on Sat, 28th May 2016 9:59 pm
“James Bradley, the best-selling author ofFlags of Our Fathers and son of one of the US marines who raised the flag on Iwo Jima, said, “[One] great myth we’re seeing play out is that of Obama as some kind of peaceful guy who’s trying to get rid of nuclear weapons. He’s the biggest nuclear warrior there is. He’s committed us to a ruinous course of spending a trillion dollars on more nuclear weapons. Somehow, people live in this fantasy that because he gives vague news conferences and speeches and feel-good photo-ops that somehow that’s attached to actual policy. It isn’t.”
On Obama’s watch, a second cold war is under way. The Russian president is a pantomime villain; the Chinese are not yet back to their sinister pig-tailed caricature – when all Chinese were banned from the United States – but the media warriors are working on it.
Neither Hillary Clinton nor Bernie Sanders has mentioned any of this. There is no risk and no danger for the United States and all of us. For them, the greatest military build-up on the borders of Russia since World War Two has not happened. On May 11, Romania went “live” with a Nato “missile defence” base that aims its first-strike American missiles at the heart of Russia, the world’s second nuclear power.
In Asia, the Pentagon is sending ships, planes and special forces to the Philippines to threaten China. The US already encircles China with hundreds of military bases that curve in an arc up from Australia, to Asia and across to Afghanistan. Obama calls this a “pivot”.
As a direct consequence, China reportedly has changed its nuclear weapons policy from no-first-use to high alert and put to sea submarines with nuclear weapons. The escalator is quickening.”
http://www.globalresearch.ca/silencing-the-united-states-as-it-prepares-for-war/5527570
The WAr Drum beats are getting ever louder…
Boat on Sun, 29th May 2016 2:01 am
What did the Putin mastermind think would happen. He can withdraw his support and troops from the the Ukraine and crimea and easily rejoin free world trade.
China can drop the Island development, squash the threat of N Korea and instantly carve out goodwill throughout the world especially Asia.
If not, escalation of tensions is inevitable.
GregT on Sun, 29th May 2016 2:37 am
‘The Putin mastermind’ has more wherewithal in the wart on his left testicle, than you have in your entire dormant cranial cavity Boat. Go back to huffing PVC cement.
Boat on Sun, 29th May 2016 3:09 am
http://www.wsj.com/articles/a-first-look-at-americas-supergun-1464359194?mod=WSJ_article_EditorsPicks_0
GregT on Sun, 29th May 2016 3:20 am
More expensive and redundant weapons of mass destruction from the dying empire. Won’t matter Kevin. The next War will not be fought with conventional weapons, and it will be coming to a neighbourhood near you. Supa-gun no match for globa-therma-nucula war.
makati1 on Sun, 29th May 2016 4:25 am
Boat, Putin proved his weapons systems worked in Syria when he fired them 1,000 miles away and they hit their target. Russia has real operable systems. The us has expensive junk. You have to stop guzzling that government Koolaid. It’s killing the few brain cells you have left.
makati1 on Sun, 29th May 2016 4:30 am
GregT, I’m glad you see the future of warfare today. Many here believe it will be a long drawn out affair like past world wars. This one will likely be over in an hour and there will be no major cities left across the Western world, including, especially, the Us.
The US would not be trying to place missiles at Russia’s back door if they had home based systems that worked. The problem with land based systems is that they cannot block nukes from subs, which both Russia and China have in significant numbers. When you launch 5 minutes from NYC or DC or LA…
makati1 on Sun, 29th May 2016 4:32 am
Food for thought: If I were to launch a first attack, it would be when the enemy’s country was in the middle of the night. Not during the day. Much more effective and the flashes would be more visible, farther.
Davy on Sun, 29th May 2016 5:41 am
Spoken from a true war pig obsessed with war and death.
JuanP on Sun, 29th May 2016 8:21 am
Boat, Russia should isolate itself from the USA and the West rather than integrate itself to them. The same thing applies to every other country in the world.
I completely agree with PCR on this matter. Russia is stronger, more independent, and self sufficient than it was two years ago so it is obviously headed in the right direction in a world driven mad by the USA and its minions. Your lack of understanding of what is going on in the world is hard to comprehend for me. I can’t understand how another human could live in the same planet I live in, and get every single thing wrong the way you do. You are an incredibly stupid and ignorant person in so many ways.
http://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2016/05/25/will-russia-succumb-to-washingtons-economic-attack-paul-craig-roberts/
makati1 on Sun, 29th May 2016 8:59 am
JuanP, I think they know but are scared shitless that we could be right. When a missile is fired by accident only minutes away form one of your cities, you are going to send your own missiles on the way before they can be neutralized. THAT is likely how the end will come.
Some, particularly Americans don’t believe that they are vulnerable to the foreign powers weapons. I would not want to rely on a country that still uses 8″ floppy disks for their nuclear control system, like the Us does. Or a country that spends hundreds of billions on a plane that doesn’t work after 7 years of design and testing.
Davy on Sun, 29th May 2016 8:59 am
While I don’t care for PCR I do agree with Juan. Russia is the best placed of all major powers for what is ahead although no major power will survive in tact including Russia. I want to add Russia is going to face some climate change disturbances being so close to the thawing Arctic. It is not clear yet if being in the far North is going to be advantageous. Currently it is proving destructive at least with permafrost decay and wildfires.
Davy on Sun, 29th May 2016 9:02 am
Makati Bill, you yourself always say you can’t believe everything you read but I guess for you that depends on how good it matches your agenda.
That article was likely a hoax or not properly research and or MIC looking for a new reason to get money.
makati1 on Sun, 29th May 2016 9:18 am
FYI:
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-05-28/how-russia-preparing-wwiii
The Nuclear Clock is closer to midnight than during the Cold War.
Apneaman on Sun, 29th May 2016 10:03 am
But there’s always been lighting bla bla bla……..
Fire in the Sky — More Than 330,000 Lightning Strikes Hit Europe in Just Eight Hours
“In Poland, a mountain hiker lost his life to one strike. Three more people were injured by lightning in the same region. A nearby flash flood related to the storms also resulted in a drowning.
In Germany, a bolt from the blue sky — likely coming from a towering storm in the area — injured 30 people at a soccer field. Three were listed as seriously injured including the referee who had to be revived in the helicopter en-route to the hospital.
In Paris, 8 children and 3 adults were struck by lightning in the midst of a birthday celebration at a park in northwest Paris. As the thunderstorm rolled in, children sheltered under a nearby tree whose higher branches attracted a lightning strike. According to a report from The Guardian, one child from this group remained in serious condition.
Conditions in Context — Global Warming Expected to Increase Lightning Strikes
A widespread storm outbreak of this kind generating such a high number of lightning strikes and related casualties in a single day is not a normal event for the European Continent. That said, this type of event is likely to become more frequent due to a greenhouse gas related warming of our world.”
“Added atmospheric moisture content — which increases by about 7 to 8 percent per degree Celsius of global temperature rise — generates more storm clouds with higher tops. These clouds, in turn, produce an increase in the number of overall lightning strikes. According to a Science study published during 2014, lightning strikes are expected to increase by 50 percent in the United States alone due to the human-forced warming of our world.”
https://robertscribbler.com/2016/05/29/fire-in-the-sky-more-than-330000-lightning-strikes-hit-europe-in-just-eight-hours/
Study: lightning strikes will increase with global warming
“In a picture of the dystopian future many paint for us, the world is scorched, and full of powerful storms. A new report suggests that might not be too far from the truth, should climate change continue unfettered. In a study published today in the Journal of Science, we find that the new thinking around climate change will bring increased lightning storms. According to the study, every two degrees fahrenheit we see in global warming will result in 12% more lightning in the US.”
http://www.slashgear.com/study-lighting-strikes-will-increase-with-global-warming-14355596/
Sissyfuss on Sun, 29th May 2016 10:07 am
Remember, my children that the kingdom of god resides within you until you take your first really big dump.