Ice doom of DOOM!

[james_davis_nicoll]

The previous ice age lasted some 110,000 years and ended about 11,000 years ago. In other words, some 4,000 generations of humans knew of nothing but harsh winds and eternal snows. The apparently "normal'' periods between ice ages, like the present one, have averaged between 8,000 and 12,000 years. In short, the next ice age is overdue. The key question is when it will come. Can space be colonised by a sufficiently large population so that, when the next ice age strikes, it will not threaten the survival of the race?

Comments

Re: *sigh*

[ross-teneyck.livejournal.com]

I seem to recall a Spider Robinson story speculating that the sudden loss of the internet would destroy civilization and kill millions.

I don't doubt it would fairly dire. But "collapse of civilization" seems excessive. We struggled along without it within the living memory of people who are not in any way old fogies, because they're my age.

Re: *sigh*

[redbird]

There's a lot of complicated interconnected stuff that leans on the Internet, including significant amounts of food transport. But there's a difference between "this might kill as many people as World War II" and "this would destroy all of civilization." And that in turn is very different from a level of "ice age, woe!" that requires pretending that rain forests are uninhabitable by humans.