in the year 9595

[Gato Moteado]

just listened to the old zager and evans song "in the year 2525".

they're unsure if man will still be alive in 9595, saying 10,000 years have passed. i guess they're going by the biblical timetable that the world and mankind are only about 5000 years old.

in reality, homo sapiens has been around for about 200,000 years. is it possible that mankind will still be around in 9595 A.D.? i mean we made it 200,000 years so far, but we've advanced so quickly technologically in the last 100 years or so. within the last 65 years or so we developed the atomic bomb, a horrible thing that could destroy the world in a flash. and just think about the technology we've created in the last ten years or less.

when you think about people like hitler who wanted to take over the world. or now with the bush administration and their pre-emptive wars. when you hear about things like columbine where kids go to school and start killing each other for no apparent reason. people driving planes into buildings. people strapping bombs on themselves and walking into crowded places.

i mean, how long will civilization survive? with or without the detonation of the "bomb", it seems like we'll never make it to 9595 A.D. after i saw the shootings at columbine, i wondered if we'd last another fifty years. what about the environment? the ozone layer? global warming? it sure seems like man is getting dangerously close to creating his own demise.

we've lasted 200,000 years so far, but with all the technology available to us and the fact that humans are violent and greedy animals (just look at freepers, for example), how much longer do you think homo sapiens has on the planet before they go the way of the dinosaurs?

[Deja Q]

1. But what about the Y10K (pronounced "yank") problem?

Peak oil will do a lot of us in, but we will survive. The few, I suspect, will be as devolved as before. If not moreso as, given how our farming industry is so sparsely placed, food's gonna be a bugger. Water too. Especially with those creepy yucky things swimming in the water...

Science can do a lot, when not wasted on the plastic fantastic lover, but I believe it is too late to reverse mankind's damage to this planet. Deforesting, CFCs, pollution... even to simply press the "STOP" button wouldn't be even a beginning to reverse the damage.

But extinct is forever. We all should be happy for the miniscule period of time we're tapdancing on this sad planet. 35 years compared to 65,000,000 years speaks volumes.

Be happy. Even in harsh times. Or try to be.

[Boomer]

6. Probably not extinct for awhile yet,, just miserable

The drop in oil availability will to major social disruptions and probably a substantial "adjustment" in population, and most likely a drop back to pre-industrial technology.

But as HypnoToad noted, that hardly wipes us off the face of the planet. Our species will probably continue to survive, though not necessarily thrive, in small farming communities and even a return to hunter/gatherer tribes. All for the better, as far as the rest of the ecosytem is concerned.

The most likely contender for killing us off would be the release of frozen methane if the oceans get warm enough. THAT will kill us, and just about every other mammal, sure enough.

Unfortunately, the odds of that happening seem to rise every year our planet grows warmer. I probably won't see it in my lifetime, but some of today's children may well have that unfortunate distinction.

[Boomer]

2. Where did you get 200,000 years?

It's more like 400-500,000 years since the emergence of homo sapiens.

http://hypertextbook.com/facts/1997/TroyHolder.shtml

[Gato Moteado]

4. true....but i was talking about modern homo sapiens....

...homo sapiens sapiens. i should have been more specific. even your link estimates homo sapiens sapiens emerging within the last 200,000 years (150,000 to be exact):

"The subspecies Homo sapiens sapiens appears first around 150,000 years ago"

some of the sources i checked dated homo sapiens sapiens as 195,000 years old.

[Boomer]

8. Ah.

Either way you look at it, we are an incredibly YOUNG species compared to the dinosaurs, who thrived for millions of years.

We'll be luck to the 1 million mark ourselves. Hell, we'll be lucky to make into the next century.

[Flying Dream Blues]

3. I remember a song called In the Year 2525...not 9595? just curious...

[Gato Moteado]

5. yes the name of the song is "in the year 2525"

but at the end of the song they sing "in the year 9595" and that's the part of the song i was referring to.

i'm having a hard time being specific and clear tonite.

sorry about that.

[Flying Dream Blues]

13. aaah! Thanks!

[nankerphelge]

7. They go thru a bunch o' years...

In the year 2525
If man is still alive
If woman can survive
They may find
In the year 3535
Ain't gonna need to tell the truth, tell no lies
Everything you think, do, and say
Is in the pill you took today
In the year 4545
Ain't gonna need your teeth, won't need your eyes
You won't find a thing chew
Nobody's gonna look at you
In the year 5555
Your arms are hanging limp at your sides
Your legs got not nothing to do
Some machine is doing that for you
In the year 6565
Ain't gonna need no husband, won't need no wife
You'll pick your son, pick your daughter too
From the bottom of a long glass tube
In the year 7510
If God's a-comin' he ought to make it by then
Maybe he'll look around himself and say
Guess it's time for the Judgement day
In the year 8510
God is gonna shake his mighty head
He'll either say I'm pleased where man has been
Or tear it down and start again
In the year 9595
I'm kinda wondering if man is gonna be alive
He's taken everything this old earth can give
And he ain't put back nothing
Now it's been 10,000 years
Man has cried a billion tears
For what he never knew
Now man's reign is through
But through the eternal night
The twinkling of starlight
So very far away
Maybe it's only yesterday
In the year 2525
If man is still alive
If woman can survive
They may find
In the year 3535
Ain't gonna need to tell the truth, tell no lies
Everything you think, do or say
Is in the pill you took today ....(fading...)

[Art_from_Ark]

9. Ever since I heard that song back in '69

I've been a pessimist about the future.

[OPERATIONMINDCRIME]

10. Wooooo Hoooooo Zager and Evans! I LOVE THAT SONG

Just played it for my wife a few weeks back, she never heard it.

That song has terrified me since I was a child and still gives me chills to this day!

[Conan_The_Barbarian]

11. There will be ups and downs

While man is greedy and violent you forget man is also extremely resourceful, with a screaming passion to survive. We are as far as I know the first and only species that can possibly consider our own extinction. You could say the human is a great evolutionary expierment, we seem to hold our destiny in our own hands more and more. We posses the ability to ensure our species survival in countless situations nature may throw at us, yet we also could destroy the planet if tempted.

A Nucleur weapona will detonate, the technology is old, the concepts behind such weapons are pretty simple. A nuclear war does not mean the end of times, it will mark the beginning of a new era of civilization. Hundreds of Millions would die, and later billions as famine, disease, and chaos set in. Maybe the population of the world would be reduced down to 100,000,000. A major set back... of course. The end of humanity, no. Eventually all would be stable again and civilization would begin to pick back up again. Remeber, primitive humans have gotten through a lot worse than humans have in the past 5000 years.

Who knows, we could end up masters of the universe with trillions of humans spread out across hundreds and thousands of planets. Lots of possibilities for humanity, don't be so negative, the species is much more capable than given credit for when push comes to shove.

[shugah]

12. well, we need a lathe of heaven

that ought to fix it all up.

[spacelady]

14. Zager & Evans--from my home state Nebraska, but in 1969 I was only

7 years old, so I enjoyed the song in later years.