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the other day bryan told me that the earth is not due to explode for another five billion years, disapointing, i was possitive it was going to happen within my lifetime. i still have hope, i suspect i'll be in my mid 30's. i am so good at wasting time.
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An atom’s nucleus is made of tiny entities we call ‘particles’. But that’s just for lack of a better word. When you say ‘particles’, you think of little balls. But in quantum physics, there’s no such thing as solid `balls’ you can touch or see.
In fact, ‘particles’ like quarks, electrons and photons are so incredibly and utterly different from everything we know of, our language lacks the words to describe them. Particles can be in two places at the same time, and behave both like a wave and a tiny chunk of matter, depending on what you do with them. Particles can pop in and out of existence from nowhere. And ‘grabbing’ them is impossible: it is simply not possible to both know where a particle is and how fast it moves about.
But still, a particle has to be something, right?
That’s why more and more physicists turn to `string theory’. In string theory, matter is ultimately made of extremely small elastic circles, called strings. These strings vibrate. But not like anything we know: the strings vibrate in at least ten dimensions! Our particles are the vibrations of the strings. They are the music the strings make.
The Universe: Bubbles Of What?
Okay, hold that thought: matter is ultimately the manifestation of something else.
Gladly, there are also things that are normal. Take the Universe. Again, it is something we think we know. The Universe is that big black thing with all the lights in it over your head. Perhaps you’ve even heard it’s expanding: first, there was a kind of blast (called the ‘Big Bang’), and from that moment on, the Universe grew bigger and bigger.
But hold it right there. Once more, the real story is far stranger than that. For starters, the Universe has no ‘outside’. To ask what is ‘outside’ the Universe is a meaningless question - it would be like asking what continent lies ‘outside’ our planet. ‘Outside’ the Universe there are no dimensions, and there is no time. The Universe is best seen as an expanding bubble of dimensions in a sea of nothingness - although ‘nothing’ isn’t really a word you can use to describe what is ‘outside’ the Universe.
It is extremely difficult to fully comprehend what that means. According to one theory, there are many dimensional bubbles like the one we live in. Our Universe could be the result of two of such bubbles - or ‘planes’ - colliding. And wait, now you’re doing it again: you’re picturing a place with bubbles floating around. But there’s no such thing as a ‘place’. Instead, the other Universes should be wrapped up within our own reality, remember?
An even more bizarre theory has it the place we call the Universe is actually best compared with a hologram. Our Universe could be some kind of optical illusion, the result of several dimensions resonating.
And it goes even further. For in fact, it could actually be possible to create a Universe! Basically, the only thing you’d have to do is squeeze a huge amount of energy together into a very dense, small spot. This would lead to a Big Bang, the theories predict. We wouldn’t see it happening: the Big Bang would create a new dimensional bubble, far beyond reach of our own bubble.
OK, let’s pause for a second. Just think about it. Is it possible that our reality is actually made by some other civilisation, in some other Universe? It would explain why the fundamental constants are fine-tuned…
And You? How Real Is Your Mind?
So, to wrap things up: we live in a place that’s not really a ‘place’, we’re made of stuff that’s not really ‘stuff’ and what we see is only a small part of what’s really there. Matter, time, dimensions, the Universe - it’s all lucid, unreal. And to make things even more bizarre, for some reason, our Universe is exactly preset to make our existence possible. Pretty confusing, don't you think?
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But do you really?
Let’s do an experiment. Speak out your name over and over and over and over again. After a while, you’ll notice something weird. Your name will begin to sound strange. It’s no longer something that is you - your name is just a word, a random sequence of syllables and sounds that other people utter when they want to catch your attention. If your parents had given you another name, you would listen to another sequence of sounds.
The same happens when you look in the mirror. Stare at your own face long enough, and you’ll suddenly realize it’s just another face. The face in the mirror is, of course, yours. But after a while, it won’t feel like that anymore. The face you see could be anybody's.
Most neuroscientists agree the same applies for your consciousness. The thing you call your ‘self’ is most likely an illusion, created by your brain. Your brain gives you vision, sound, speech, feelings, and thoughts. When you add all these things up, you’ll have some overall feeling of awareness you call your consciousness. But still, your brain is the thing running it. Your feeling of ‘self’ is best compared to a software program running. It looks very real - but it isn’t.
Of course, most people believe there is something like a ‘soul’ or a ‘spirit’ living inside of you. But when it comes down to facts, there just isn’t any evidence for that. Every thought you have, every move you make, every emotion you feel - it’s just brain, brain, brain.
There are actually experiments that prove it. When you disturb your brain in a certain way, your feeling of ‘self’ can get detached from your brain. Suddenly, it will feel as if ‘you’ are not inside your body anymore. You experience what is known as an ‘out of body experience’, or a ‘near death experience’.
But you don’t have to be nearly dead to feel it. The sensation can easily be created in a laboratory, by placing a helmet with rotating magnetic fields on your head. The magnetic field acts like a ‘jam signal’ on your brain. Suddenly, you'll feel like you're floating outside your body. But you aren’t. It’s just your brain going confused.
And you don't really need a helmet to do the trick. Visiting a place where the movement of the Earth's crust generates magnetic fields can give you the experience. Being in a situation where your brain doesn't get enough oxygen sometimes does it. Certain brain operations bring out the experience. Meditation and intensive prayer can generate it.
In fact, exactly this is why some people see ghosts, or Maria, or feel like they are visited by aliens. It is an incredible weird experience to be ‘outside of your brain’. Your brain will try to make sense of it. Immediately, the rational part of your brain will come up with an ‘explanation’ for the experience. You will sense a ‘presence’ near you. If you’re religious, you might see Maria, or Jesus. If you believe in UFOs, your brain might tell you you’re visited by aliens. If you believe in ghosts, you’ll feel the presence of a ghost of a dead person. But in reality, it’s your own feeling of self you’re experiencing.
So... Are We A Game Of Sims?
So there you are. You’re just a walking piece of matter that’s pretending to be someone. But in reality, things like matter, or self, or the Universe, or time, or dimensions are all illusions. Everything we see and everything we feel are, in fact, the manifestations of some underlying reality.
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That leaves you with an unsettling question: what exactly is that reality?
The truth is: we don’t know. Could be almost anything, really. A dream, even. Or a simulation. Or a kind of computer game, an advanced kind of Civilization or Sims. There’s no way of knowing if there’s someone or something pushing the buttons. There’s no way of knowing if there isn’t, either.
And then, there’s this other thing most theorists agree on: our reality could suddenly end. Our universe could fold up. The dimensions we live in could be wrapped up. The very fabric of our physical world could be disrupted by some unprecedented, weird physical event. From one second to the other, our reality would no longer be there. Sounds like fun, right?
But then again, why bother? For that’s the deeper consequence of these things. If there is no such thing as a place we call Earth, we needn’t really worry about its end. Would the characters of a Sims-game feel sad or disappointed when you turned off the computer? Or would the people you dream of at night mind if you wake up? You guessed it: they probably wouldn't. What isn’t really there, doesn’t really end.
That being said, there’s only one small problem. You see: you have to be a good philosopher to really feel it that way!
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I escape reality on weekends
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We’re in for a surprise. A few tens of years more, and our climate might suddenly go totally berserk. For starters, it would turn our planet into a lifeless, super hot oven, much like the planet Venus. Welcome to the ghastly phenomenon dubbed ‘the runaway greenhouse effect’. And the really scary part is: we seem to be heading straight towards it.
Phew! Aren’t we lucky? In the 1990s, they predicted we would get climate warming. The poles were about to melt, they said. Entire countries would get flooded. Huge hurricanes would sweep across the globe. Millions of people would die. Well: they had it all wrong. It’s the 21st century now -- and little has happened so far.
But then, suddenly, it all changes. From one month to the next, the climate of the world goes wild. Temperatures jump. The ice caps of the poles crumble, pushing the sea levels up. The snow caps on the mountain tops melt, turning even the tiniest rivulet into a roaring body of water. Cities are flooded, countries washed away. Tornadoes and hurricanes push across the globe. Harvests fail. Economies crumble. Tropical diseases like malaria and dengue push northwards. Forests turn into deserts. And of course, millions of people perish during all the mayhem.
Wet Feet: When we think of global warming, we tend to think of floods. But that's only a minor inconvenience. Chances are the greenhouse effect "unleashes catastrophic and irreversible changes to key planetary processes", as the IPCC puts it.
And if you thought that was bad: you haven’t seen nothing yet. Within a few years, the situation goes totally out of hand. Temperatures just keep on rising, faster and faster. And as they do, more and more water on Earth begins to evaporate. The sea level starts to drop again. If you’re one of those poor souls who had his country or city flooded when the ice caps melted, you might be glad to find the sea retreating. But don’t put that flag out yet. What you’re witnessing, is the end of the world. Nothing more, nothing less.
Here’s how it goes. As the temperatures rise, more water evaporates. But as more water evaporates, our atmosphere gets thicker -- causing the temperatures to rise even more. And as the temperatures rise even more, even more water evaporates. And as even more water evaporates... You've got it: there’s a chain reaction going on. The dreaded ‘runaway greenhouse effect’ has just kicked in.
Governments and scientists will desperately look for a way to turn the tide. But they won’t find one. There’s just no way you can stop something as mighty as the Earth’s climate. Although our politicians might still mumble some reassuring words to prevent a general panic, deep within they will realize how bad the situation really is. A few years more, and our planet will no longer be habitable. All life is about to vanish from the planet formerly known as Earth. There is no escape, not even a remote possibility things will improve.
The best evidence for that is hovering in the night sky: the planet Venus. For many years, scientists wondered why Venus has an atmosphere so hot that lead and tin actually melt in it. Only in the late 1990s they realized that Venus too has undergone the runaway greenhouse effect. Its atmosphere is so dense, incoming solar heat cannot escape from it.
Exactly that, my friends, is what is happening. Earth is about to join Venus. We’re about to literally fry to death.
Bad Omen: The planet Venus has an atmosphere over 90 times thicker than Earth's. And it's bloody hot out there: about 750 degrees Celsius. Still, exactly the same could happen to our own planet if the Runaway Greenhouse Effect kicks in.
By now, temperatures on Earth start getting really uncomfortable. Everywhere you look, there’s this dense, watery fog -- it’s water vapor, as you might have guessed. Where there used to be rivers, only dry gullies are left, carving through the barren landscape. And where the oceans used to be, only some lakes remain -- and they get smaller each day.
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One thing is absolutely certain, though: it will be some gruesome, hellish end. After a few years or decades, our planet has become a deserted fog planet, with an atmosphere so hot that lead and tin actually melt in it. Life will be no longer possible -- except perhaps for a handful of soil bacteria that are able to withstand all the nastiness.
The Runaway Greenhouse: The facts
Of course, we could have known what was coming. Ever since the 1990s, there were some climatologists warning for it. But their calculations were laughed away, ill understood by the general public or ignored by the politicians in charge of things. The climatologists were dubbed pessimists. Even though their computer models told otherwise.
As late as 2001, the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) formally warned that the greenhouse effect could ‘unleash catastrophic and irreversible changes to key planetary processes that make the world habitable.’ In 2005, a British government research council repeated the warning. And added the effect could kick in as soon as 2015.
The runaway greenhouse effect works quite simple, really. First, you should realize why we have an atmosphere in the first place. That’s because there’s a lot of water vapor and carbon dioxide in the air. There’s nothing wrong with that. The carbon dioxide and the water vapor serve as a ‘blanket’: they prevent some of the incoming heat from the sun from flying off again into space.
Killer Fog: The atmosphere will turn the planet into a shadowy fog world, as the atmosphere fills itself with water vapor.
At least, that’s how things went until one day, six billion humans came around. Mankind literally pumps trillions of tonnes of greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide and methane into the atmosphere.
No big deal, so far. Calculations show that this massive amount of extra greenhouse gas will only push up the Earth’s temperatures a few degrees. Besides, about one quarter of all the methane and the carbon dioxide is cleaned up by nature each year.
But around 2015, that could suddenly change. The climate warming could pass a critical threshold. The ice caps of the poles could melt. This would set free billions of tonnes of extra carbon dioxide: the ice caps are full of tiny bubbles of trapped ancient air with a lot of carbon dioxide in them. This suddenly gives an extra push to the greenhouse effect.
Also, the warming could unleash carbon dioxide that is trapped in sea sediments, in the permafrost of Greenland and in the soil. And worse: the warming could set free the trillions of tonnes of methane that are stashed away below the ocean's floor. At the same time, nature could get ‘saturated’ with carbon. Of course, plants and soil organisms will still breathe carbon dioxide. But there will be too much of it.
And in the end, the water vapor kicks in. While it gets hotter, oceans and rivers start to evaporate. This would make the atmosphere denser and hotter, pushing up the evaporation, making it hotter... And so on.
Then you would have it: an environmentalists nightmare. The greenhouse effect will go wild. And wilder still -- until we live on a planet with an atmosphere so hot that lead and tin actually... You can fill in those words yourself by now, right?
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To be honest, of all end of world scenarios outlined on this site, we at Exit Mundi find the one with the runaway greenhouse effect particularly scary. Of course, there’s the problem with meteors, and the risk of robots taking over. But the greenhouse effect is happening today, as we speak. It seems to be only a matter of time before we can begin to melt that lead and tin.
On the other hand: climate is a difficult beast. If we’ve learned one thing over the past few decades, it is that no one can really predict how the climate will change on us. For example: there’s a good chance the greenhouse effect unleashes not a runaway chain reaction -- but an ice age, as reported elsewhere on this site.
Also, Earth survived intense heat before. 50 Million years ago, the North Pole had no ice, but a subtropical climate. And before that, in the era of the dinosaurs, CO2-levels were about four to six times higher than today. Back then, sea temperature was up to 40 degrees Celsius, and many continents were flooded. It was really a greenhouse world - and it didn't went out of hand.
On the other hand, even if there's a remote possibility it DOES go out of hand, there’s plenty of need to worry. We don’t know about you, but we at Exit Mundi prefer neither the ice age, nor the super hot Venus-like atmosphere. We like things the way they are.
So if you read this and you happen to be one of those top dogs in charge of things: hey, it’s only one atmosphere we have here, PLEASE be a little careful with it!
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