The editors of Kennislink regularly receive questions from readers. For example, Arthur Jansen wondered whether humanity could live as long as the dinosaurs lived. They lasted for 165 million years.
Although this cannot of course be stated with certainty, it is possible to state with a degree of certainty that the absolute limit of our existence is 5 billion years. Then, according to calculations, the sun will explode, and all life on earth will disappear. If we complete this time, we will have existed longer than the dinosaurs, but this chance does not seem so great. After all, there are still a lot of ways imaginable in which we could come to an end. Below I walk through a number of ways.
Nuclear war
The argument that we could live longer with broad knowledge and modern equipment also works the other way around. Because it is thanks to this knowledge that man has been able to produce nuclear weapons, with which we can put an end to our existence. Developments in this area have even come so far that unstable countries are now able to equip themselves with this. It is not inconceivable that terrorist organizations will also have access to these weapons in the future.
It is true that an enormous number of atomic bombs will have to be detonated to wipe out the entire world. This is only possible when a third world war breaks out, and even then is not very likely because almost every country knows that if they fire the first nuclear bomb, they may be responsible for a nuclear winter that will cost billions of people reading. Governments do a lot of research into the consequences of a nuclear attack. Yet there is a real chance that humanity will end in this way.
Epidemic
Another possibility that could spell our end is the outbreak of a global epidemic to which we have no answer. Although science is already so advanced that the chance that we would cease to exist in this way is not very great, the chance is there. This can be compared, for example, to the bubonic plague that ravaged mankind in the Middle Ages; at that time, a third of all Europeans died. It is difficult to estimate the probability of a new epidemic. However, an epidemic never kills all of humanity, so in the end we will survive.
Meteorite impact
The impact of a meteorite has been the death knell for the dinosaurs, and in my opinion is also the most realistic way in which humanity could come to an end. Although the probability of a meteorite impact is difficult to calculate, the damage it will inflict on the Earth and its inhabitants is enormous. In the above disasters we have a good chance that we will survive, although we will probably lose a large part of the population. However, with a meteorite impact, it can all be over in one fell swoop. The advantage is that technology can possibly help here. Space agencies are mapping potentially dangerous space debris and in the future we might be able to defuse meteorites if we see them arrive in time.
I have now covered a number of events that could spell our end. However, it is not possible to calculate how long it will take before one of these factors (or any other trigger) destroys humanity. However, it is certain that not all species last as long as the dinosaurs. The reason these animals lasted so long is because they were relatively stronger than most other animals. In addition, dinosaur is a broad concept. It's true that dinosaurs lived for some 165 million years, but that doesn't mean all dinosaur species have survived that long. We, the Homo sapiens, are less than 200,000 years old. Only ten thousand years ago, our ancestors started farming. We haven't been around that long, so hopefully we'll be around for a while.