I am curious to know if, based on your faith, you think it is possible for the human race to become utterly extinct. Does the free will we have been endowed with make even that awful fate possible, or do you think that, because of the particular interest God has in us (we being created in His image, for example) this is not something that would ever be allowed to happen? In a word, should we take steps to ensure that there will still be human life in 100 years, or (assuming–at least for the moment–that the apparent dangers to our continuance haven’t just been fabricated somehow) homo sapiens are safe in God’s hands.
I’m particularly interested in the Judeo-Christian response to this, but I hope those with less traditional theist views will also chime in. Thanks in advance for any responses. I have “Believer” in the title because I’m less interested in the responses of those who, e.g., consider themselves Jewish because their parents were Jewish and they enjoy matza ball soup. I’m interested in the responses of believers.
walto,
I asked my pastor a similar question as a kid. His response was that God wouldn’t allow humanity to go extinct, but he would allow us to create massive problems for ourselves, some of which might drastically reduce the population.
It was incumbent upon us to be good stewards of the earth, both for our own sakes and as a moral duty to God, who had placed it in our care.
Thanks. I wonder if all the theists here agree with your pastor.
I note that all but a small fraction of species have gone extinct — those alive today. And we seem to be in the midst of another mass extinction. I read that the average life span of a species generally is about 15 million years, about 20% of which is spent actually branching from a parent species. I can’t speak for theists, but most estimates I’ve read predict a relatively short life span for humans, certainly far less than one million years.
Also, they predict a population implosion after the planet’s carrying capacity for humans has been exceed by a large enough margin for long enough, making recovery unlikely due to resource depletion (read: fresh water). Human population growth since the scientific revolution has resembled bacteria more than it has resembled other mammals. I note also that reducing our carbon footprint will be achieved by reducing our population, and probably no other way. But nobody seems to be willing to mention this.
The consensus, as I read it, is that high intelligence is NOT a positive survival characteristic. That experiment might never be attempted again.
walto:
My pastor’s position is arguably supported by scripture.
Regarding the stewardship issue, we have Psalms 24, which begins:
The idea is that we’re not entitled to abuse the earth, since the earth is God’s property.
On the extinction question: My pastor, an inerrantist, believed that all the biblical prophecies concerning the end times would actually come to pass. Some of them depend on the continued existence of humans, right up to the end. If God allowed humans to go extinct, he’d be falsifying those prophecies.
I used to think overpopulation was the biggy, the one that would kill us, but then climate change crept up and overtook it.
Climate-change skepticism seems to be far more common in those with a vested interest in not believing it, usually the devout, and those in the fossil fuel industry. This seems to be a classic case of motivated reasoning: such people are often quite genuine in their belief that we cant possibly be on a path to our own destruction.
So, one glance at the Keeling curve and I think we are fucked, but Im not a believer, so it will be interesting to see what they think.
Hi walto,
I’d go along with the answer given by keiths’s pastor. One only has to think of the parable of the Last Judgment (Matthew 25:31-46) to see that from a Christian perspective, human extinction is not on the cards. Belief in the Last Judgment is also one of the six articles of the Muslim faith, and many Jews believe in it as well.
Re threats to humanity: graham2 raises the twin specters of overpopulation and climate change. But the world’s population looks set to peak at 9 billion, later this century. Of the 200 countries in the world, only 38 countries have a fertility rate of more than 4 children per woman. India’s fertility rate is 2.303 children per woman, while China’s is 1.635 children per woman.
As for global warming (or climate change): the problem is real enough. I tend to fo along with what Steven Pinker says in his latest book, Enlightenment Now. We’ll probably deal with the problem in the short term by pumping aerosols into the atmosphere. The technology to produce aluminium, steel, glass and concrete in an eco-friendly manner isn’t yet available, but it will probably be in about 20 or 30 years. Also, despite rapid advances in solar and wind energy, China and India have a coal-based infrastructure already in place, and can’t reasonably be expected to spin on a dime. In a recent review article in Scientific American, John Horgan echoes the conclusion of ecomodernist journalist Will Boisvert: “Despite climate change, rising food production will save millions of lives.” Boisvert elaborates: “Human greenhouse emissions will warm the planet, raise the seas and derange the weather, and the resulting heat, flood and drought will be cataclysmic. Cataclysmic—but not apocalyptic. While the climate upheaval will be large, the consequences for human well-being will be small,” thanks to “advances in agricultural productivity that will dwarf the effects of climate change.” In short: I wouldn’t worry too much about the fate of the human race.
Now, if I were going to worry about something decimating (but not destroying) the human race, it would be nuclear war, or a pandemic, or possibly an asteroid strike – but not climate change.
Thanks for asking the question, Walto.
When I nearly left the faith, it was these words by the atheist/agnostic Russel that made me return to the faith.
I love Russell’s works to this day, and ironically, like Quine, I got acquainted with Russell not really because of philosophy but because of their contributions to math/computer science!
Civilization will end, independent of free will, it is exactly as Russell says:
But even secular evolutionary biologists/population geneticists prophesy of the end of humanity because of our decaying genome. One former atheist turned creationist who is a world-renowned applied geneticist also chimed in recently to say the same here:
So to answer your question:
Possible? It’s inevitable! The only question is who civilization will end. Of course, creationist have seized on this to say then, if our genome is naturally going awry, and we’re getting sicker both physically and mentally, then we could not have evolved — we are, to paraphrase Michael Behe – DEvolving.
This is the Christian belief how civilization will end:
The numbers indicated would be on the order of billions instantly.
Yes we should, but we won’t, human nature will not act in it’s own interest, not the least of the reasons is we can’t agree what the right course of action is, and when there are disagreements, war has often be the way to settle disputes — like in the Middle East, or between India and Pakistan, etc.
Will more atheism help? Well, I would prefer atheism to Islam, but look at what happened with Elevatorgate, or the dispute between Sargon of Akkaad and the SJW Atheists, or Richard Carrier and Freethought Blogs, or the Feminists and the Trangenders, etc.
So, I believe science and reason cannot save us because the world was cursed by God because of Adam’s sin. The Christian hope is in the next world, and this hope has helped Christian carry on despite the scientific inevitability which Bertrand Russell prophesied. To me it is the Christian faith which fulfills what Russell believes is the proper foundation of philosophy:
So after pondering this, I felt I began to think more clearly and dump utopian beliefs out of my life. I could have chosen nihilism, but I chose faith whereby working for the good in this life brings rewards in the next.
Some facts are not emotionally comforting or pleasing to us, but they are no less facts for that reason. I claim to be able to accept and believe what is true on the evidence despite of whether the consequences are appealing to me, and I didn’t stop being a Christian because I found the alternative more emotionally appealing.
I don’t think there’s anyone here who wants all life to utimately go extinct, the Earth to erode away from radiation and gravitational forces, the solar system to one day completely decay away, and all stars and black holes to evaporate and burn out.
Deciding what to believe simply because of how it emotionally affects you is patently irrational. But thanks for the candor I guess.
I’m confused. Isn’t “the end” extinction?
Thanks for your response, Vince. Would it be possible to briefly explain why a Last Judgement is inconsistent with human extinction. As you must know, I’m not very well-versed in this stuff.
And Happy Easter!
Thanks, Sal. But I’m just more confused than ever now! Do you have a sense where Vince and Keith are coming from in their assurance that extinction is inconsistent with the Bible?
Vince and Keith–do you have a sense where Sal is coming from with the excerpt he gave? I mean, maybe there just isn’t consensus on this matter among Christians–that’s possible and OK too, of course. I’d just like to know where the mainline Christian who has ever thought about his matter is likely to come down on it.
FWIW, my wife, an Arkansan, was raised as a Methodist (though her father was Catholic), and she says this topic never came up in her church or her home–in spite of all the stopping, dropping and rolling occurring in her Little Rock schools during many years of fears regarding nuclear holocausts and MAD in that state.
Happy Easter to all!
Thanks. So you think being a Christian involves (at least for the more devout) a theory that extinction is impossible?
walto,
Hi Walto
I personally no not have a strong opinion on the end of days.
As to Sal’s point on extinction I think our future ability to fix the human genome may get in the way of this prediction.
colewd,
Thanks, Bill.
I would say that Christianity predicts that the humanity won’t be extinct at least until “the end”….
Defining what extinct and “the end” means are another matter.
Being more specific would require exegesis.
peace
Sorry if it wasn’t clear, my post was meant a response to Sal’s, not to your OP.
On the topic, I don’t remember having ever considered God’s views on the possible extinction of humanity when I was a Christian. I was never much for Biblical interpretations in any case, but I when I think about it I guess my answer would have been that God would technically allow it to happen should we fuck things up for ourselves enough.
I do remember having thought about something similar. When I was still a believer, not too far before I began seriously questioning and assessing my beliefs, I did go through some weird phase toying around with ideas about the ultimate fate and purpose of humanity. I remember thinking that perhaps God’s big challenge for humanity was for us to ensure our long-term existence by figuring out how to prevent either the Big Crunch, or ultimate heat-death of the universe.
In all honesty today I think of many of my former beliefs as downright crazy, not least because I didn’t really have any sort of epistemological positions at the time. I had never studied or read any philosophy seriously, and had only vague ideas about the scientific method. I suppose you could say I went through several phases where I entertained different ideas seriously enough that I did believe them in some sense.
quote:
For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. But each in his own order: Christ the firstfruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ. Then comes the end, when he delivers the kingdom to God the Father after destroying every rule and every authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death. For “God has put all things in subjection under his feet.” But when it says, “all things are put in subjection,” it is plain that he is excepted who put all things in subjection under him. When all things are subjected to him, then the Son himself will also be subjected to him who put all things in subjection under him, that God may be all in all.
(1Co 15:21-28)
and
so that you may walk properly before outsiders and be dependent on no one. But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep. For this we declare to you by a word from the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. Therefore encourage one another with these words.
(1Th 4:12-18)
end quote:
peace
Thanks folks. I appreciate the trouble.
Logically, there should always be at least a few believers who have eternal life. Otherwise Jesus/God did not save anyone. That would be a bummer.
Were you reading a lot of Frank Tipler at that time? That is pretty much his view If I remember correctly.
peace
You’re probably right. Vince and I have different views on why one might believe in the resurrection. I do agree with Vince, the historical account of Easter is very sketchy — not as much evidence to be an obvious conclusion.
There were people in my life both friends and acquaintances and one person I only met once in person who were influential in my faith. One of the was astronaut Charles Duke became a Christian after walking on the moon and returning to Earth.
He claims he prayed over a blind girl and she was given sight. I have no reason to doubt the account. It could of course be a coincidence or any number of explanations, but I accept the account and I accept his sincerity because he now is a minister to prisoners in the USA. Whether right or wrong, he is most clearly sincere by the way he lives his life. There are lesser accounts to this effect which have affected me, not the least are personal experiences.
The question of course is why God is so hidden and why faith so hard to come by. I respect that.
I haven’t studied much of what Vince or Keiths think Christian theology says about the end of humanity, I only know my own thoughts.
The Bible does teach some people will be alive to see the Lord return, but the implication is that this is mostly by God’s grace and miraculous power, not anything humanity can take credit for.
Jesus and his apostles said:
Hume, though not a Design advocate, actually articulated the design argument quite well. However, one thing that Christian theology does above Paley’s Natural theology is that it emphasizes the world is designed to live and be destroyed.
When I studied physics, I noticed physicist were perplexed that the universe seemed so fine tuned to allow life only to destroy it.
Weinberg said, as he lamented the end of the fine-tuned universe:
But this accords with the theology of Paul
The Christian belief is this is part of a Divine Drama. Many great dramas begin with tragedy to make the happy ending meaningful.
In Christian theology, the destruction of the present universe is early chapter toward an eventual happy ending.
Paul wrote:
This was also echoed in the parable of Lazarus and the Rich Man.
I suppose for me, the alternative was nihlism. Instead, I chose to hold onto what little facts I had in hand and go forward with incomplete information about things that might be formally unprovable. I realized most of us make huge decisions about life with incomplete information. There is some level of faith in everything we do. We just make our best guess as to what is really true and act accordingly.
Rumraket,
FWIW, I feel like my own “religious phases” have been those in which I tried to convince myself that my desires–on their own–had some effect in the world. I was important because wishing/wanting/praying had bite. Not so different from when I’d be worried about not picking up a penny I saw on the street on the chance that if picking up a coin was good luck, failing to do so might screw up my wife’s pregnancy. Same thing with the feeling that a team lost some game because I’d failed to watch it. Magic, you know?
Interestingly (to me, anyhow), my current views about the conglomeration of the desires of the populace in when they vote and what should result from it, may stem from a less religious way of treating the same basic desire for my wishes to count.
Yes, that could be the way to harmonize the two views. Thanks.
Pascal called this sort of thing a God shaped hole
peace
I would say that a great reason to go forward with incomplete information is that the alternative is unthinkable.
I think that is possibly the only way off the skeptics nihilist path.
peace
Like a popcorn kernal, kind of.
More like an empty pecan husk with the imprint of the nut I think.
peace
Hi, Erik. Is “eternal life” consistent with the extinction of the species? I mean, that kind of thing is “life after death” isn’t it?
I think you must be confusing it with a Dr. Strange-shaped hole. Not having those powers make for the pecan-shaped hole. Not having a God to take care of you is popcorn-shaped.
Although some would say it’s snowflake.
FMM, it’s nice that you take your extreme neediness as a virtue.
You’re welcome, and Happy Easter to you as well. 🙂
Nope. I did not interact at all with any apologetics literature, theistic or atheistic, before I became an atheist. I just had lots of different weird ideas about it all. I suppose many of us tend to think the same thoughts and make similar inferences. Never read any books or watched any debates or blogs about all this stuff I now do today. I never spoke to anyone about my beliefs back then, never debated or discussed them, I basically just had them in the privacy of my own head.
Not much more than a year ago I was also surprised to read some christian apologist make a similar case for the persistence of the mind beyond physical death of the body and brain, as I had rationalized when I was a believer, based on the fact that the electromagnetic fields surrounding the elementary particles of which the brain is made, continue to exist after you die.
I’ve had similar experiences several times coming across accounts by believers on the internet, having had similar ideas to myself.
Tipler is not an apologist AFAIK he is a Mathematician and Physicist at Tulane University. He does have some odd ideas though.
It’s almost like we are hardwired in some way 😉
peace
Any good 12 step program will tell you that the first step to recovery and moving forward is recognizing that there is a problem.
😉
peace
No, because there would never be a future time at which all humans had died.
As Missouri Synod Lutherans, my pastor and I believed that people who were still alive at the time of the Last Judgment would retain their bodies and go to their eternal reward (or punishment). Those who had already died would be physically resurrected.
I often wonder if atheists feel that they need anyone else to make life meaningful? Or if meaning is a solitary subjective quality that you simply ascribe on your own…..or not as the case my be.
peace
It’s not about some one taking care of you it’s about your choices mattering in the world.
As apposed to “in a million years or so we will all be dead so what is the difference?”.
peace
What makes them matter?
Aha! Thanks.
Now that is a question for the ages.
As a Christian I would say ultimately things matter only if God thinks they matter and our choices are things….
I wonder what you would say
peace
In a very real way this is what makes them matter
https://vimeo.com/331636084
peace
Christ almighty, CO2 has just passed 400 ppm (from a historic level of approx. 280 ppm), and is heading steadily upwards.
We have a few decades left before we hit 2 to 3 deg warming, leading to possibly catastrophic climate change, sea-level rises, massive waves of climate refugees.
Glaciers are disappearing. Greenland ice is melting at a rate never observed before. If it all goes the sea rises 7m (though not for a long time). Ditto for Antarctic ice.
And the response from the believers is to quote bible verses. Oh mother.
A beautiful song by the Jayhawks about the longing for a safe and peaceful afterlife:
graham2:
Let’s hope they’ll emphasize verses like
…and…
…and that they interpret the ‘dominion’ bit in this verse as being about good stewardship:
Weak
Keiths: I presume your last post was parody/irony ?
graham2,
No — many Christians, including even evangelicals, are serious about protecting the environment.
Here’s part of the mission statement of the Evangelical Environmental Network:
There’s also an organization called Young Evangelicals for Climate Action:
Keiths: Yes, there are the occasional good signs, but what worrys me is the pretty solid connection between faith and climate-change denial.
In a citizen its tolerable, but in a politician (for eg), its a big worry.
Our current prime Minister (Im from OZ) recently brought a lump of coal into parliament, holding it aloft, telling us all we had nothing to fear from coal. Hes a Pentecostal or some shit. Another PM (Catholic in this case) declared ‘Climate change is crap’.
I watched a short clip of a US politician (congressman?) proudly declaring that the we are all OK because of some verse in his book of fables. I suspect he was just being more candid than the rest.
These are nutters but nutters that make decisions for the country.
Meanwhile CO2 just keeps going up and up.
graham2,
It might have been John Shimkus, an Illinois congressman who is a member of my old denomination, the Lutheran Church, Missouri Synod:
Yes, that looks like him, though the loony god botherers all look alike to me.
Now, this character is …
seeking the leadership of the Energy and Commerce committee, which has a wide-ranging portfolio covering energy policy, environmental initiatives…
Please, please, please tell me that this keeps you awake at night. Please.