Humans In The Future Universe

Given that us humans don't eradicate ourselves and actually survive as a species for millions upon millions more years, when the universe is a much more distant, cold place, how would we look? How different would we act? Would we even be recognizable as 'human' anymore?

It's feasible to conclude that if we invested all our time and effort to science and the advancement of mankind instead of wars, that our technonogy's power would explode at a rate that in just a few years could make a terabyte seem as small as a byte

Like it or not, our sun is one big ball of energy that will eventually run out. Staying residents of Earth will not be an option at this point. Years before that happens, humans will need to have to capabilities of inter-stellar travel to ensure survival of our species. Eventually settling down in a nice, quite, young solar system, or perhaps branch off in groups as cosmic explorers.




Technology without a doubt can make us lazy. Want to change the channel? Use the remote. Want to communicate with a friend? Simply call them instead of making the effort to travel to where they are. This over time could genetically change us as a species. But don't expect us all to turn into hobbits and smeagles. Some scientists believe that humans have reached an evolutionary stopping point.

Natural selection, as outlined in On the Origin of Species, occurs when a genetic mutation—say, resulting in a spine suited to upright walking—is passed down through generations, because it affords some benefit. Eventually the mutation becomes the norm. But if populations aren't isolated, crossbreeding makes it much less likely for potentially significant mutations to become established in the gene pool—and that's exactly where we are now

However, some scientists see plenty of evidence that human evolution is far from over.

A team led by Yale University evolutionary biologist Stephen Stearns found that, due to ovulatory characteristics, shorter, slightly plumper women tend to have more children than their peers. These physical traits are passed on to their offspring, suggesting natural selection in humans is alive and well. "We're also going to get stronger sexual selection, because the more advanced the technology gets, the greater an effect general intelligence will have on each individual's economic and social success, because as technology gets more complex, you need more intelligence to master it," he said.

"That intelligence results in higher earnings, social status, and sexual attractiveness."

There is a third prediction that says humans could achieve electronic immortality. It's called trans-humanism. It is when humans take charge of their evolution and transcend their biological limitations via technology.

Nick Bostrom, director of the Future of Humanity Institute at the University of Oxford, said Darwinian evolution "is happening on a very slow time scale now relative to other things that are leading to changes in the human condition"—cloning, genetic enhancement, robotics, artificial intelligence, and nanotechnology, for starters. Transhumanism raises a spectacular array of possibilities, from supersoldiers and new breeds of athletes to immortal beings who, having had their brains scanned atom by atom, transfer their minds to computers. In addition to living forever, "uploaded" beings would be able to "travel at the speed of light as an information pattern," download themselves into robots for the occasional stroll through the real world, think faster when running on advanced operating systems, and cut their food budget down to zero

Oh, and just to put things in perspective for you to just how far away these amazing human changes are to us, Michio Kaku explains in this brief video how we are merely infants in our journey through the cosmos.




My question is this: Do you think we will not even survive the next century, let alone millions of years, or do you have faith that the human spirit can can, in a sense, live forever?

(all quotations are from this National Geographic article)

Do you think we will not even survive the next century, let alone millions of years, or do you have faith that the human spirit can can, in a sense, live forever?

Both of those questions require variables that can't be seen at this point and time.

Someone in 30 years with make an action that will cause a reaction 30 years after that.
And that cycle will continue, between 7billion people interacting every second.

A Hitler/Stalin/Mao carbon copy could be born tomorrow that could lead a rebellion on our first space colony.
We just don't know.

The fact we are sitting on computers typing this is proof that humans are amazing, and can do amazing things over a long period of time.

But that stops when we add massive weaponry into the mix and the possibility of extra-solar travel.
Society would need mass education on everything from Technology itself to the chain-of-command.

One person could kill the entire mission with the push of a button.
So all people would need to be on the same page or it all falls apart.

reply to post by LiquidNova


My take on this is this...

If we survive as a species, then our evolution will continue to take multiple paths, just as it has done woth every others species. Some will be stronger,but dumb, some weaker but smarter and some a combination of both...wait...we already have that.

Or we will cease to exist.

This is what we all call life.

reply to post by TDawgRex


this sounds like the most logical explanation, of our future ancestors... eventually we will start to branch off like our past ancestors did, for example neanderthals...

in the future we humans will slowly start evolving into separate group types, eventually as it always has, through natural selection, the most equipped to survive will succeed and breed, eventually the other groups will go extinct ..

i predict our future selves to be a lot less intelligent than our current selves, our future counterparts will be shorter, thin and scrawny, due to technology massive muscle loss is expected, the males will be more effeminate, and the "macho" man off the old days would be all but extinct by then.. you can already see it happening even now, comparing males of today to those of the 50's 60's 70's and 80's...of course this is based on a somewhat "peaceful" future...

however there exists an infinite number of paths that our evolution could take, for example if a world war were to break out, then our evolution (if we survive) will be completely different, in this case i would see a world were only the most ruthless, and cunning would thrive, a world where the word mercy is as rare as world peace

Interesting, thanks for sharing.