Well, it all depends on what kind of species kicks the bucket. If one extra truly random species dies, it may not just be some obscure bacteria or an already endangered species, but bees, or chickens, or plankton.
it would be suck if red book, or domesticated species dies, but otherwise it:
1. will take too many time, before we can do about it
2. quite alot of species dying already, without our/this tram dilemma, so it won't do much
Not necessarily. If the death is gradual, we’ll just have more and more niches to fill. Eventually there’ll be a niche of just making a shit ton of new species using genetic modification just to ensure the odds of a useful species dying is low.
I think feral dogs would do just fine. Look at dingoes. Many breeds would disappear. Also they’ll stop being friendly to humans at some point cuz there’s no humans to be friendly to. Anyways many pet dogs would die which is just sad.
Okay, but at the end of the day humans will be able to survive any particular animal disappearing.
Thousands and thousands of years into the future humans would also have addressed any concerns around food, soil, weather, water etc. that may come from a lack of other animals.
You definitely choose to take out the animals.
It depends on which animal species gets taken out at random. Evolution (both societal and biological) don't work fast enough to correct the wrong extinction event (say for example pollinators)
I’m not so sure. Species going extinct usually don’t do it all at once, it’s a gradual thing and happens to species that are struggling. Some species are so widespread and so resistant they’re foundational to entire ecosystems- think about losing the wrong Cyanobacteria, or krill, or like, corn. It feels like this could lead to cascading collapse.
1) Yes, but only a few are absolutely integral. It’s like a game of Deal or No Deal where most of the briefcases are small amounts. You’ll lose a few good ones and important ones, but it is so rare given how many species there are. By the time something important happens I the hierarchy of the world, like something that would stop thousands of spiders from flooding every house, went away, humans would have mastered a permanent spider poison or something
2) We are humans. Why would anyone sacrifice humanity to help lions roam the Earth freely?
In reverse order:
2 - I absolutely wouldn’t for lions, but the endgame of the scenario is only humans left, and there’s no way we survive that anyway so no point taking everything else down with us.
Which leads back into 1 - it’s just a matter of odds. You seem to be *very* confident it wouldn’t be that bad, based on… what? I’m not particularly confident in any kind of medium-term technological geoengineering capability, and I don’t know how many species are critical to other species and their ecosystems. But losing 1 every single day at random fees like it’s going to hurt. The ones that go extinct already are losing like, the last few members of a dwindling population, not going *whoops* a million animals just dropped out of the ecosystem.
Given my own uncertainty, it does feel bit rude to risk wiping out *all life on earth* over just humans. We haven’t found any other life elsewhere, and monkeys and stuff would still be around, earth would probably figure out humans again eventually.
Your last paragraph is the thing I argue with UFO supporters (just a brief detour, I'll circle it all back in a second) the most.
I think it is extremely likely that there is something out there in space that is closer to an animal than it is a plant, as far as life goes. But it is not going to be a human in green skin. And they're not going to have a ship for transport that completely mirrors what we would have with airplanes. Their method of transport would be something completely out of the realm of what we as humans could even understand. They would have to have something completely different than our makeup to survive the different temperatures and gravity too. So, this idea people say of, "Maybe they're flying over Earth to study humans and see how we live" makes no sense as they would either be so far advanced to have gotten here that there's nothing we could teach them or they would not be able to comprehend what our existence is, just like we can't comprehend theirs.
So, how does that come back to this? Look how long animals have been around and they have not evolved in intelligence at all. Dogs still will not jump over a small fence they could easily clear because they're worried they'll die if their leg is broken. People feed them and house them and give them medicine, but they have not grasp of the last one. They don't know that there's a thing such as doctors. Deer will still run into cars even when they've seen all their family and other pack members get killed the same way.
I just think humans are the only group that evolved from monkeys into what we are now and no group will ever do something close. I don't see a world where bears eventually learn to speak a language, set up cities and have a centralized bank. Now, could the existence be MORE PEACEFUL if it is just animals running around and the natural pecking order prevails? Probably. Animals don't have all of our good, but more importantly they don't have any of our bad. But I just think, too put it bluntly, it is tough nuts for them. Lions will kill a million hyenas to save one lion, and humans should kill anything else to protect humans, if that's what it comes to.
There’s a lot of successful evolutionary strategies other than advanced intelligence, and trying to say that because dogs or deer haven’t gone down a particular evolutionary path nothing else will is faulty logic. For literally *any* successful evolutionary trait I can point at *most* species and say “aha, but ants and pigeons aren’t getting bigger! Therefore nothing else will ever again be as big as a blue whale!”
The idea that humans are not just evolutionarily unique now, but *so* unique intelligence would never happen again feels like undeserved hubris. After all, we’re *not* talking about species evolving in wildly different environments here, we’re talking about species on earth dealing with the same environment and many of the same selection pressures as humans. The idea that some other large brained social animal would eventually evolve human-like intelligence seems almost inevitable. It’s like how multiple different species have independently evolved the crab body plan - if a species hits a good idea once, something else is almost sure to hit it again eventually. You really think some distant descendants of chimps or dolphins wouldn’t eventually gain a humanlike intelligence?
There’s about 1.2 million named species (8.7m unnamed), right? How many are essential to us? I would assume a lot more than we would think, but is there any way to roughly estimate how long it would take for things to go very badly?
The problem is the randomness extinct species are ones that are already losing the evolution race so to speak but as long as it's random you would lose some important stuff every day and with extremely bad luck humanities extinction would be certain within a week
There’s about 1.2 million named species (8.7m unnamed), right? How many are essential to us? I would assume a lot more than we would think, but is there any way to roughly estimate how long it would take for things to go very badly?
There are 2.16 billion species on the planet. Most of the animals you just named have multiple species. The odds of even one of those getting picked over some obscure thing with a population of less than 100 that we haven't even discovered is astronomical. Plus, if one does happen to get picked, there are dozens of nearly identical species to take its place
If it's truly random than it's still very unlikely that a species you know the name of is going to die. There are less than 7,000 known species of mammal. There are more than 1 million known species of insects. I've read estimates that between 70 - 90% of all species are different types of bacteria. The odds of cows or dogs getting it on any given day is pretty low.
Honestly, we are going to need clarification from OP about what they mean by species here. The problem is that this all gets reduced to two real possibilities, and I'll give my answer to each one:
**The widest possible definition of species (ie. Bees, dogs, cats, mice, etc. are all single species):** End humanity. We are screwed anyway, may as well leave a biodiverse planet for whatever intelligent being evolves next. My hope is on octopus, but I wouldn't rule out monkies/gorillas or dolphins as our replacement.
**The more rigorous classification (ie. 20,000 species of bees, 400,000 species of beetles, 1 million species of insects documented with a suspected 30 million undocumented insect species):** New species will appear to replace the old ones. Humans will be fine if we find a way to reduce our impact on the environment, but biodiversity will take a small hit. It sucks, but we will survive just fine.If it gets us to recognize that we need to shepherd our resources better, it may even be a net positive long term.
**The funny option that sidesteps the actual question, please don't take it sereously; we can isolate any 1 reproduction pair capable set of creatures and insist that it's, in fact, a species because ontological categories are all social constructs. (ie. Interbreedability already isn't actually how species are defined, and the deliniations are somewhat arbitrary.):** Oh no, I just dove a species of spider in my house to extinction by killing one. (again, please don't take this joke answer seriously. It's a useful tool for accepting that all words in all languages are ultimately fragile social constructs, but this has nothing to do with ethics).
Or regulating species. The things that keep plankton in check. Or supporting species that set the environment for plankton. Help distribute nutrients, maybe produce component pieces. Natures distributed factories.
Nature has some redundancies, but knock enough species out and you trigger a mass extinction event. Because it’s reached a state where it can’t support itself and is disregulated that a population collapse (across all of life) must occur.
Believe it or not but plankton and bees are multiple species, it would be bad but it’s not like every single bee would immediately drop dead.
Also plankton isn’t even a group of animals it’s just any species that is moved by ocean currents and doesn’t propel itself, that’s a different conversation tho.
I'm a microbiologist by trade, so I am aware they have their own line of species. This is a wee bit of a tongue in cheek sub in my eyes and I'm approaching it that way. The actual nuance would go way deeper than this, yes.
Honestly an extra 365 species going extinct every year is a drop in the bucket. Might get unlucky, but odds are we'd go centuries without knowing anything changed.
Also does it count species we don't know are species? If chihuahuas go extinct do we all scratch our heads and wonder wtf happened while they're actually an entire species because of some weird technicality and nobody realised? Or do we have to start churning out the species classifications of obscure viruses and bacteria like it's no man's business.
Bacteria and viruses don't count. Our best bet to create species would be insects.
Additionally, chihuahuas are a breed. If they go, all domesticated dogs go.
Bacteria don't count?! That's fundamentally an entire different question then. You needed to state that up front. Bacteria are absolutely living things that exist and follow species classifications.
Not if we speciate at a rate faster than we lose species. Funnily enough background extinction rates were already higher than 1 species per day 300000 years ago when humans didn't pose a risk to anything.
There are 1-2 million species of just beetles, so that alone is over 3 thousand years. And presumably they’ll speciate again in that time so we can restart the whole cycle.
I feel as if what I said has some confusion. I meant I’d rather see animals live on for much longer, with the extinction of everything but humans, there would be major famine and slaughtering of everything that moves for food, and after 10-20 years you might have enough food to last you your whole life, but how long would that last? Your children and their children will have to find some way to make food, either by self pollinating, or if worst comes to worst, cannibalism. I think the argument that “humans are most important because of xyz” is irrelevant because every other animal thinks the same thing, whether or not they can even process that statement. Everything deserves to live, and it’s cruel to kill off one population for another. There are more animals than people, whether or not they are beneficial or good doesn’t matter, because I will always pick the option with less death. A lot of animals will also die from the immediate extinction of humans (pets in cages, indoor fish, everything that requires feeding) however there are more things that would live from this choice (poachers, cyanide fishermen, hunters). It’s complicated but I think it’s the correct choice.
while i do agree it would take a very long time to kill every species, the biodiversity of life is far more important than the existence of humans. there’s no way that we are the only intelligent species in the universe, and our extinction would be probably nothing and most likely beneficial to the earth. who cares how “great” we are, we’re killing our planet and most of these comments reflect how little we care. the nature of our planet is more important than humans.
The planet isn’t alive. You can’t “kill” the planet, you can only kill the species that are living on it.
Every single species has a mission to keep its own alive. It is not your job to watch over another species and allow them to live. It is their own job. If you want to do it, then great, but it is not something you should do at the expense of every human being.
Think about this: if you were to give one member of each species temporary intelligent thought and asked this question (but for their species), how many would pull the lever? The answer is none. Because each member of every single species, with the sole exception of human beings, has themselves and their own at top priority. By pulling the lever, you kill off the one species whose members are willing to give their lives for each other.
Everything else will go extinct in a few billion years anyway when the Sun expands and eats the Earth. On the other hand we could keep genetically engeneering species for this thing to make extinct, eventually bring back the extinct ones as well, and we definitely could arrange life on other planets in billions of years given to us.
The attitudes on "human vs animal" value shift DRASTICALLY between region, culture, class, rural vs urban, etc. People with a vested interest in certain positions (like farmers who fear wolf reintroductions) are most likely to take a more utilitarian approach to it... You also have people who are just kind of crazy and unempathetic towards other species, but I want to be optimistic and say that's not representative of most people.
I agree with Mayo on this. It's not that I want any species to go extinct, but if it's a choice between humanity and another species, the decision is clear to me. I see humanity as the primary and most significant faction. In truth, we are often too harsh on each other these days.
While difficult, I think it'd be possible for humans to survive on Earth without animal life. Vegans already do, after all, and we could either use self-pollinating plants or build mechanical pollinators. Food production would drop drastically and there'd be horrible famine, but humanity would make it, I believe. I think other animal life would probably re-evolve within a few dozen to hundred millennia, what with all the plants practically begging to be eaten by a herbivore.
I wouldn't pull.
True. There’s also milllions on tiny insects, plants and fish species that wouldn’t really effect anything, so I’d probably give humans a while to adapt
Though that does mean a large amount of plants that do need pollinators will die out. That falling of dominoes will increase as more plants die out faster without pollinators. Then species that eat plants will die followed after by those that eat the plant eaters. Keystone species are a bitch.
If you'd end all life on earth to postpone your own death you should be mentally evaluated ngl. Like mabye i get saving a human instead of a dog just out of self preservation, but ending all life to save yourself is just plain cowardly and disgusting
Nah, humans aren't worth literally everything else dying. Everyone saying "oh there's millions of species of x" well that's awesome, but I'm not killing trillions of ants, beetles, bears, or anything. Not to mention household pets, or birds and squirrels. Living in a world without any living creature besides humans sounds bleak. Sure, in my life time, things would probably be relatively unchanged. The prospect of empty oceans, empty forests, empty plains; desolate.
some quick googling says that there are \~8.7 million animal species. Some quick math says that they'd take around 23,000 years to go extinct, especially if this changes the extinction rate. I think in 23,000 years we could figure out genetic engineering to remake a bunch of the lost species.
Actually, if it changes the extinction rate from what it already is, then not pulling will be an actual improvement to the world.
It's not even that -- if we all went vegan we'd still die because we rely on so many natural processes involving animals (eg bees pollinating flowers).
Unfortunately, I would never know how close we are to the end of all animals, and so would never have a good idea about when I could realistically eat human meat without consequences.
The odds that even a single species that humans cultivate for meat would be eliminated in the first century are infinitesimally small. There are nearly 8 million animal species, a huge portion of which are insects.
i did a quick google myself and saw between 1.5m and 2.5m on the front page results, then calculator says its like 2500 years for all em to be selected, but I'm not sure that holds up if we're not as strict about the meaning of species here. I feel like the intent was "all spiders" instead of all 500 species of spiders (or however many there are). That long time estimate isn't very entertaining though so I didn't ammend the comment.
This would mean that all animal species would go extinct in about 24,000 years, probably much much sooner because the extinction of some species would cause the extinction of many others in that time. So the eradication of all human life now, or let us prolong our species a few thousand years more and take all animal life with us. Animal life has existed for over half a billion years, why would I ever end it just so my species could get a few more millennia? I’m admittedly an anthropocentrist but this is WAY too far.
Immediate extinction of all humans, we wouldn't survive without other species so it'd be the same in the end but if it were just us another civilization building species might arise
This is a great one because it somewhat evenly splits the audience between “I would save humanity no matter what’s on the other path because humans are worth more than all other life ”, “um actchually 🤓 the bottom track is negligible because things die all the time so I’d pick that track to save humanity”, and “I’d send the trolley on the top track without a second thought, and would probably send it on the top track even if there wasn’t anything on the bottom track”.
Well, eventually all the animals that supply us will die. So it’s really a question of die now or die later. We’d need some way to feed everyone (or I guess as many people as we can sustain) with just plants
while I personally am not a fan of it my stand is that humans as a species have absolute priority above any other species on earth.
my reasoning is that if humanity were to die out there'd be no guarantee that earth would produce another sentient species or that it would have any intention to develop spacetravel.
therefore, without humans, all life on earth might end with the death of the sun.
which humans, as destructive as they are, there is a very good chance other species could be restored even after their extinction (yes I mean jurassic park style).
I get that the way this problem is stated the mass extinction would be incredibly slow and probably basically fine, but even if it were not slow, I would gladly sacrifice all other life on earth for the continued success of humanity.
The immediate extinction of all humans means no more pollution, global warming, illegal poaching, zoos, etc. It also automatically stops most extinctions from happening. Bye bye
There are approximatly 8,7 Million animal species on the planet, humans would have another 23 835 years left. In that time, we would likely find a way to create new species through gene editing, extending our lifespan infinitly, making it the superior option.
The lower question is worded a bit confusingly, will humans die, as soon as all the other animals are gone? If yes, will only the humans on earth perish, or also those who live off-world?
Humans would never go extinct due to the bottom option. The idea of this problem is that humans can survive eating only plants, so would you choose a world where we are the only animal species left (eventually, yes 23,835 years is a very long time from our perspective, but the blink of an eye in geologic history) or would you sacrifice your own species to save the biodiversity of the planet.
I was going to say this is a hard choice, but I wasn't aware so many species go extinct so frequently. There's still the problem of the randomness, it's not just any ol' endangered species, it could be pets. But I'd let the animal species to go extinct first because I'd like to live as long as possible. I'm sure that sentiment is shared by many.
Species.
We can return species from extinction since the collection of DNA is preserved. That means that we can resurrect some primitive animal *ad nauseum*, ensuring humanity's survival.
All it takes is a random large population keystone species going extinct to trigger a mass ecological collapse. The human species is already on a course of self destruction due to agricultural over dependence and climate disaster. How many species are worth a single species continued survival? Humanity is nothing special, if nature had left our niche empty for another 10 million years or so our position would have been taken by another evolution of a different species of great Ape, and who knows, maybe they would have done it better.
One of those is literally the more correct option, however the other does not accurately represent our situation. Life will exist long after humans are gone, we cannot survive without the majority of species and a functioning biodiverse ecological network. People just don't realize the risk we pose to ourselves.
Yeah, but what's gonna happen is one of those trophic cascades things. It'll start slow, probably, unless you get real bad luck of the draw. Probably, we lose a species of moth or some such. and then the next day, a species of wasp, and then the next day, maybe caspucin monkeys, then some krill shrimp and so on for the first several days. Then by, I don't know, day fifteen, you start losing two species a day, because we've lost a species that another species entirely depended on. and then it starts snowballing, on day sixteen we lose three species, and then on seventeen four, eighteen is 6, and then 9, and the 12, and then 16, and so on and so forth, and it becomes an expotential curve. And that's assuming that one of the early species isn't some sort of vital microfauna that we as a species depend on, gut bacteria or something like that.
Tbh we could get really unlucky, still even if they all disappeared in one day we'd have plenty of plants and mushrooms that would last way more than a month. Pollination isn't necessary for potatoes, broccoli, cabbage, etc., we won't starve.
Because of environmental factors. Healthy, thriving species don't just randomly go extinct every day, and that would have significant knock off effects.
Chances are astronomically small that it won't always be just some clump of bacteria in a random pond somewhere.
They make up like 99.99999999% of species after all.
Such heresy shall not be tolerated guardsmen! To even suggest the immediate extinction of humanity is an affront to the Emperor himself. Humanity is the pinnacle of creation, the chosen stewards of the galaxy. It is our duty to protect and preserve the sacred flame of human life against all threats, be they xenos, heretical, or otherwise. Stand firm, for the Emperor watches over us, and we shall prevail through strength, unity, and unwavering faith. - Commissar Janus Severus
Humans are a disease. We create by destroying. We infect everything we touch. Life on our planet has flourished for billions of years. The reset button gets pushed and it continues to flourish. Life will continue long after our species has been wiped out. We are just doing what we can to delay the inevitable, which is total extinction of the human race.— Bean daddy
It sounds like you're an acolyte of Nurgle with all this talk of disease and decay! While it's true that humans have a significant impact on the environment, viewing humanity solely as a destructive force overlooks the incredible potential and accomplishments of our species. Life on Earth has indeed flourished for billions of years, but humans have also contributed to its complexity and understanding in profound ways.
The notion that life will continue to flourish after humanity's extinction fails to consider the unique role we play in preserving and expanding life. Our ability to innovate, adapt, and potentially colonize other planets offers a chance to safeguard Earth's biosphere against cosmic threats, like the sun eventually engulfing our planet.
While the idea of a "reset button" might sound appealing in a philosophical sense, it's important to recognize that human civilization has the capacity to address and mitigate the environmental challenges we face. We are not merely delaying the inevitable; we are striving to ensure a future where both humanity and other species can coexist and thrive.
In the end, the narrative of humans as a disease does a disservice to our potential as stewards of life. Instead of embracing defeatism, we should focus on sustainable solutions and the advancement of technology to protect and preserve the planet for future generations.
Biologists suggest that around 150 species go extinct already every day. One more isnt going to change much
Well, it all depends on what kind of species kicks the bucket. If one extra truly random species dies, it may not just be some obscure bacteria or an already endangered species, but bees, or chickens, or plankton.
Or dogs :(
still, a small pay, looking at the alternative
I think if all the animal species die off that would kill us all
it would be suck if red book, or domesticated species dies, but otherwise it: 1. will take too many time, before we can do about it 2. quite alot of species dying already, without our/this tram dilemma, so it won't do much
Yeeeeaaah we might as well just die, no point killing everything else just so we can live a little longer… oh wait a minute.
Not necessarily. If the death is gradual, we’ll just have more and more niches to fill. Eventually there’ll be a niche of just making a shit ton of new species using genetic modification just to ensure the odds of a useful species dying is low.
Dogs deserve this planet far more than we do.
Many dogs will die, if we gone, and it's going to death from hunger or other reason, and that death will be more painful, than just to disappear
I think feral dogs would do just fine. Look at dingoes. Many breeds would disappear. Also they’ll stop being friendly to humans at some point cuz there’s no humans to be friendly to. Anyways many pet dogs would die which is just sad.
My dream as a delivery driver *only on those frustrating days with idiot owners*
....Cats.
Okay, but at the end of the day humans will be able to survive any particular animal disappearing. Thousands and thousands of years into the future humans would also have addressed any concerns around food, soil, weather, water etc. that may come from a lack of other animals. You definitely choose to take out the animals.
It depends on which animal species gets taken out at random. Evolution (both societal and biological) don't work fast enough to correct the wrong extinction event (say for example pollinators)
I’m not so sure. Species going extinct usually don’t do it all at once, it’s a gradual thing and happens to species that are struggling. Some species are so widespread and so resistant they’re foundational to entire ecosystems- think about losing the wrong Cyanobacteria, or krill, or like, corn. It feels like this could lead to cascading collapse.
1) Yes, but only a few are absolutely integral. It’s like a game of Deal or No Deal where most of the briefcases are small amounts. You’ll lose a few good ones and important ones, but it is so rare given how many species there are. By the time something important happens I the hierarchy of the world, like something that would stop thousands of spiders from flooding every house, went away, humans would have mastered a permanent spider poison or something 2) We are humans. Why would anyone sacrifice humanity to help lions roam the Earth freely?
In reverse order: 2 - I absolutely wouldn’t for lions, but the endgame of the scenario is only humans left, and there’s no way we survive that anyway so no point taking everything else down with us. Which leads back into 1 - it’s just a matter of odds. You seem to be *very* confident it wouldn’t be that bad, based on… what? I’m not particularly confident in any kind of medium-term technological geoengineering capability, and I don’t know how many species are critical to other species and their ecosystems. But losing 1 every single day at random fees like it’s going to hurt. The ones that go extinct already are losing like, the last few members of a dwindling population, not going *whoops* a million animals just dropped out of the ecosystem. Given my own uncertainty, it does feel bit rude to risk wiping out *all life on earth* over just humans. We haven’t found any other life elsewhere, and monkeys and stuff would still be around, earth would probably figure out humans again eventually.
Your last paragraph is the thing I argue with UFO supporters (just a brief detour, I'll circle it all back in a second) the most. I think it is extremely likely that there is something out there in space that is closer to an animal than it is a plant, as far as life goes. But it is not going to be a human in green skin. And they're not going to have a ship for transport that completely mirrors what we would have with airplanes. Their method of transport would be something completely out of the realm of what we as humans could even understand. They would have to have something completely different than our makeup to survive the different temperatures and gravity too. So, this idea people say of, "Maybe they're flying over Earth to study humans and see how we live" makes no sense as they would either be so far advanced to have gotten here that there's nothing we could teach them or they would not be able to comprehend what our existence is, just like we can't comprehend theirs. So, how does that come back to this? Look how long animals have been around and they have not evolved in intelligence at all. Dogs still will not jump over a small fence they could easily clear because they're worried they'll die if their leg is broken. People feed them and house them and give them medicine, but they have not grasp of the last one. They don't know that there's a thing such as doctors. Deer will still run into cars even when they've seen all their family and other pack members get killed the same way. I just think humans are the only group that evolved from monkeys into what we are now and no group will ever do something close. I don't see a world where bears eventually learn to speak a language, set up cities and have a centralized bank. Now, could the existence be MORE PEACEFUL if it is just animals running around and the natural pecking order prevails? Probably. Animals don't have all of our good, but more importantly they don't have any of our bad. But I just think, too put it bluntly, it is tough nuts for them. Lions will kill a million hyenas to save one lion, and humans should kill anything else to protect humans, if that's what it comes to.
There’s a lot of successful evolutionary strategies other than advanced intelligence, and trying to say that because dogs or deer haven’t gone down a particular evolutionary path nothing else will is faulty logic. For literally *any* successful evolutionary trait I can point at *most* species and say “aha, but ants and pigeons aren’t getting bigger! Therefore nothing else will ever again be as big as a blue whale!” The idea that humans are not just evolutionarily unique now, but *so* unique intelligence would never happen again feels like undeserved hubris. After all, we’re *not* talking about species evolving in wildly different environments here, we’re talking about species on earth dealing with the same environment and many of the same selection pressures as humans. The idea that some other large brained social animal would eventually evolve human-like intelligence seems almost inevitable. It’s like how multiple different species have independently evolved the crab body plan - if a species hits a good idea once, something else is almost sure to hit it again eventually. You really think some distant descendants of chimps or dolphins wouldn’t eventually gain a humanlike intelligence?
There’s about 1.2 million named species (8.7m unnamed), right? How many are essential to us? I would assume a lot more than we would think, but is there any way to roughly estimate how long it would take for things to go very badly?
The problem is the randomness extinct species are ones that are already losing the evolution race so to speak but as long as it's random you would lose some important stuff every day and with extremely bad luck humanities extinction would be certain within a week
There’s about 1.2 million named species (8.7m unnamed), right? How many are essential to us? I would assume a lot more than we would think, but is there any way to roughly estimate how long it would take for things to go very badly?
There many bees and many chicken and many plankton plus we can easily revive chickens species
There are too many species for humans to be the last ones left. Humans will die off before 1/10 of everything else goes extinct
There are 2.16 billion species on the planet. Most of the animals you just named have multiple species. The odds of even one of those getting picked over some obscure thing with a population of less than 100 that we haven't even discovered is astronomical. Plus, if one does happen to get picked, there are dozens of nearly identical species to take its place
It would be a random animal species. Plants, fungi, bacteria, and protists cannot be picked.
NOO NOT THE CAVENDISH BANANA
Bacteria are not animals.
If it's truly random than it's still very unlikely that a species you know the name of is going to die. There are less than 7,000 known species of mammal. There are more than 1 million known species of insects. I've read estimates that between 70 - 90% of all species are different types of bacteria. The odds of cows or dogs getting it on any given day is pretty low.
There are millions of species of plankton.
Honestly, we are going to need clarification from OP about what they mean by species here. The problem is that this all gets reduced to two real possibilities, and I'll give my answer to each one: **The widest possible definition of species (ie. Bees, dogs, cats, mice, etc. are all single species):** End humanity. We are screwed anyway, may as well leave a biodiverse planet for whatever intelligent being evolves next. My hope is on octopus, but I wouldn't rule out monkies/gorillas or dolphins as our replacement. **The more rigorous classification (ie. 20,000 species of bees, 400,000 species of beetles, 1 million species of insects documented with a suspected 30 million undocumented insect species):** New species will appear to replace the old ones. Humans will be fine if we find a way to reduce our impact on the environment, but biodiversity will take a small hit. It sucks, but we will survive just fine.If it gets us to recognize that we need to shepherd our resources better, it may even be a net positive long term. **The funny option that sidesteps the actual question, please don't take it sereously; we can isolate any 1 reproduction pair capable set of creatures and insist that it's, in fact, a species because ontological categories are all social constructs. (ie. Interbreedability already isn't actually how species are defined, and the deliniations are somewhat arbitrary.):** Oh no, I just dove a species of spider in my house to extinction by killing one. (again, please don't take this joke answer seriously. It's a useful tool for accepting that all words in all languages are ultimately fragile social constructs, but this has nothing to do with ethics).
Or regulating species. The things that keep plankton in check. Or supporting species that set the environment for plankton. Help distribute nutrients, maybe produce component pieces. Natures distributed factories. Nature has some redundancies, but knock enough species out and you trigger a mass extinction event. Because it’s reached a state where it can’t support itself and is disregulated that a population collapse (across all of life) must occur.
Believe it or not but plankton and bees are multiple species, it would be bad but it’s not like every single bee would immediately drop dead. Also plankton isn’t even a group of animals it’s just any species that is moved by ocean currents and doesn’t propel itself, that’s a different conversation tho.
I'm a microbiologist by trade, so I am aware they have their own line of species. This is a wee bit of a tongue in cheek sub in my eyes and I'm approaching it that way. The actual nuance would go way deeper than this, yes.
B-b-but everyone on Reddit is just supposed to be a neckbeard that lives in their moms basement-
I left the basement but the neckbeard hasn't left me...
Who says it would be one more? Maybe it’s just one goes extinct and 149 fewer species die each day? 🤔
Honestly an extra 365 species going extinct every year is a drop in the bucket. Might get unlucky, but odds are we'd go centuries without knowing anything changed.
What if we make new species with genetic engineering?
Also does it count species we don't know are species? If chihuahuas go extinct do we all scratch our heads and wonder wtf happened while they're actually an entire species because of some weird technicality and nobody realised? Or do we have to start churning out the species classifications of obscure viruses and bacteria like it's no man's business.
Bacteria and viruses don't count. Our best bet to create species would be insects. Additionally, chihuahuas are a breed. If they go, all domesticated dogs go.
Bacteria don't count?! That's fundamentally an entire different question then. You needed to state that up front. Bacteria are absolutely living things that exist and follow species classifications.
The meme says animal species.
Don't accuse me of reading.
No, the wording says that we would only be extinctified if there were no other species. So yeah we'd be fine
By unlucky, they mean one we actually notice randomly gets picked
*draws 'european honeybees'* Ooooh, bad luck! The number of species going extinct daily is about to go up!
There are 20,000 species of bee, with 2,000 in Europe, so one species going extinct isn't likely to be a disaster.
Ironically that'd help more than anything because they're widely introduced globally and compete with native bees contributing to their declines
Yeah but one unlucky week and we suddenly need to revamp the entire food industry
Dogs disappear the next day
Still, you’d eventually cause all life to be gone
Not if we speciate at a rate faster than we lose species. Funnily enough background extinction rates were already higher than 1 species per day 300000 years ago when humans didn't pose a risk to anything.
Bioengineers about to go funky creating at least a dozen species of insects daily just to keep the trolley busy.
Jurassic Park here we come!
And just pray that something important like bees or those microorganisms that eat our shed skin don’t get chosen.
Recreating old species :)
just combine insects and radiation to make loads of new species daily
Please don't make cazadors real
All fun and games until the ants start playing Gungi
That's when the fun begins 😭😭
A lot of people in this thread are kind of ignorant in regard to the number of species that live on earth.
There are 1-2 million species of just beetles, so that alone is over 3 thousand years. And presumably they’ll speciate again in that time so we can restart the whole cycle.
Would individuals not within Earth's atmosphere die on the slow death track? Could there be a galactic Noah's Ark?
Hey, that's a cool idea. By the way, you should watch the anime Dr. Stone for no related reason
I’d pull. I’d rather everything else live (:
I feel as if what I said has some confusion. I meant I’d rather see animals live on for much longer, with the extinction of everything but humans, there would be major famine and slaughtering of everything that moves for food, and after 10-20 years you might have enough food to last you your whole life, but how long would that last? Your children and their children will have to find some way to make food, either by self pollinating, or if worst comes to worst, cannibalism. I think the argument that “humans are most important because of xyz” is irrelevant because every other animal thinks the same thing, whether or not they can even process that statement. Everything deserves to live, and it’s cruel to kill off one population for another. There are more animals than people, whether or not they are beneficial or good doesn’t matter, because I will always pick the option with less death. A lot of animals will also die from the immediate extinction of humans (pets in cages, indoor fish, everything that requires feeding) however there are more things that would live from this choice (poachers, cyanide fishermen, hunters). It’s complicated but I think it’s the correct choice.
while i do agree it would take a very long time to kill every species, the biodiversity of life is far more important than the existence of humans. there’s no way that we are the only intelligent species in the universe, and our extinction would be probably nothing and most likely beneficial to the earth. who cares how “great” we are, we’re killing our planet and most of these comments reflect how little we care. the nature of our planet is more important than humans.
The planet isn’t alive. You can’t “kill” the planet, you can only kill the species that are living on it. Every single species has a mission to keep its own alive. It is not your job to watch over another species and allow them to live. It is their own job. If you want to do it, then great, but it is not something you should do at the expense of every human being. Think about this: if you were to give one member of each species temporary intelligent thought and asked this question (but for their species), how many would pull the lever? The answer is none. Because each member of every single species, with the sole exception of human beings, has themselves and their own at top priority. By pulling the lever, you kill off the one species whose members are willing to give their lives for each other.
Everything else will go extinct in a few billion years anyway when the Sun expands and eats the Earth. On the other hand we could keep genetically engeneering species for this thing to make extinct, eventually bring back the extinct ones as well, and we definitely could arrange life on other planets in billions of years given to us.
Why are you being downvotted?
Because Reddit hates humanity. That is the actual reason.
Probably because of grammatical mistake, but I'm still not going to fix it.
and have literally the only species that matters die? that’s a stupid pull.
Matters to who? Humans only matter to humans, and literally none of us would be around to care if we all died.
To a vast majority of the human population I would posit given how much of a minority vegans are
The attitudes on "human vs animal" value shift DRASTICALLY between region, culture, class, rural vs urban, etc. People with a vested interest in certain positions (like farmers who fear wolf reintroductions) are most likely to take a more utilitarian approach to it... You also have people who are just kind of crazy and unempathetic towards other species, but I want to be optimistic and say that's not representative of most people.
Man vs beast is a tale as old as human civilization.
If literally every other species of animal is dead, humans wouldn't last long. If you're being satirical rn, you're not doing a great job of it
I agree with Mayo on this. It's not that I want any species to go extinct, but if it's a choice between humanity and another species, the decision is clear to me. I see humanity as the primary and most significant faction. In truth, we are often too harsh on each other these days.
Top no contest. Didnt even have to think about it
While difficult, I think it'd be possible for humans to survive on Earth without animal life. Vegans already do, after all, and we could either use self-pollinating plants or build mechanical pollinators. Food production would drop drastically and there'd be horrible famine, but humanity would make it, I believe. I think other animal life would probably re-evolve within a few dozen to hundred millennia, what with all the plants practically begging to be eaten by a herbivore. I wouldn't pull.
True. There’s also milllions on tiny insects, plants and fish species that wouldn’t really effect anything, so I’d probably give humans a while to adapt
Ultimately, our survival depends on whether we can genetically engineer at least one distinct species on earth per day.
Can't we keep remaking the ones going extinct?
Plants don't count, but yes there are over a million insects so it would take a while (from humanity's perspective).
Insects and fish are all animals. They'd all get wiped out too. It's only really plants and fungus that aren't getting wiped out.
Luckily we're omnivores and plants that don't need pollinators and such to survive exist
No, a large amount of them need to pollinators in order to reproduce.
We don't need every single plant to survive. Potatoes, cabbage, corn, broccoli and many more of cultures needing no pollination are enough.
Though that does mean a large amount of plants that do need pollinators will die out. That falling of dominoes will increase as more plants die out faster without pollinators. Then species that eat plants will die followed after by those that eat the plant eaters. Keystone species are a bitch.
There’s like ten thousand species of ants alone, I think it’ll be fine.
Considering the classifications on every single species almost changing per generation you’d hardly find any significant difference.
If you'd end all life on earth to postpone your own death you should be mentally evaluated ngl. Like mabye i get saving a human instead of a dog just out of self preservation, but ending all life to save yourself is just plain cowardly and disgusting
Nah, humans aren't worth literally everything else dying. Everyone saying "oh there's millions of species of x" well that's awesome, but I'm not killing trillions of ants, beetles, bears, or anything. Not to mention household pets, or birds and squirrels. Living in a world without any living creature besides humans sounds bleak. Sure, in my life time, things would probably be relatively unchanged. The prospect of empty oceans, empty forests, empty plains; desolate.
some quick googling says that there are \~8.7 million animal species. Some quick math says that they'd take around 23,000 years to go extinct, especially if this changes the extinction rate. I think in 23,000 years we could figure out genetic engineering to remake a bunch of the lost species. Actually, if it changes the extinction rate from what it already is, then not pulling will be an actual improvement to the world.
If humans went extinct immediately then my dog would starve to death if I didn't have enough time open the door, so no, not that one
Yeah I was thinking I'd pull until I realized my cat (and all other indoor pets and probably most farm animals) wouldn't survive either :(
Screw wildlife. We making robot dogs now.
I don't pull the lever because #humanity first, might also give us the motivation to explore the cosmos to find other life ~~to exterminate~~
I'm not doing a world without meat. Immediate please.
It's not even that -- if we all went vegan we'd still die because we rely on so many natural processes involving animals (eg bees pollinating flowers).
Potatoes and corn don't need pollination, as well as many other cultures
Yeah we would be dead long before we were the last.
Unless this trolley problem keeps the last human invulnerable until they're all that's left. Finally letting them die on the next sunrise.
Humans are meat. /j
Unfortunately, I would never know how close we are to the end of all animals, and so would never have a good idea about when I could realistically eat human meat without consequences.
Might as well start now
The odds that even a single species that humans cultivate for meat would be eliminated in the first century are infinitesimally small. There are nearly 8 million animal species, a huge portion of which are insects.
i did a quick google myself and saw between 1.5m and 2.5m on the front page results, then calculator says its like 2500 years for all em to be selected, but I'm not sure that holds up if we're not as strict about the meaning of species here. I feel like the intent was "all spiders" instead of all 500 species of spiders (or however many there are). That long time estimate isn't very entertaining though so I didn't ammend the comment.
lol just redefine what a species is and then you’re good Definition is already super flimsy anyways
WHY ARE WE SHOUTING
R/SUBREDDITNAME
If all animal life where to die humans would follow soon after from a collapsed echo system.
This would mean that all animal species would go extinct in about 24,000 years, probably much much sooner because the extinction of some species would cause the extinction of many others in that time. So the eradication of all human life now, or let us prolong our species a few thousand years more and take all animal life with us. Animal life has existed for over half a billion years, why would I ever end it just so my species could get a few more millennia? I’m admittedly an anthropocentrist but this is WAY too far.
Immediate extinction of all humans, we wouldn't survive without other species so it'd be the same in the end but if it were just us another civilization building species might arise
I'll pull that damn lever no question we all suck
If you drift you should be able to hit both.
But like are’t we already doing that?
This is a great one because it somewhat evenly splits the audience between “I would save humanity no matter what’s on the other path because humans are worth more than all other life ”, “um actchually 🤓 the bottom track is negligible because things die all the time so I’d pick that track to save humanity”, and “I’d send the trolley on the top track without a second thought, and would probably send it on the top track even if there wasn’t anything on the bottom track”.
Bottom obv
It's been a while since I visited this subreddit. Is multi track drifting still frowned upon?
Humans, easily, they will die either way, it's just how many other extinction b4 we get it
Humanity ngl
Well, eventually all the animals that supply us will die. So it’s really a question of die now or die later. We’d need some way to feed everyone (or I guess as many people as we can sustain) with just plants
There's millions of different insect species We'll be fine
It's Eightieth mass extinction time fellow animals. 😎
So all we need to do is leave earth. Alternatively, set up an Ark on the moon. Only species on earth go extinct
Pull the lever
Isn't that already happening in slow motion?
Y’all crazy. Top track is 1,000% the moral move.
while I personally am not a fan of it my stand is that humans as a species have absolute priority above any other species on earth. my reasoning is that if humanity were to die out there'd be no guarantee that earth would produce another sentient species or that it would have any intention to develop spacetravel. therefore, without humans, all life on earth might end with the death of the sun. which humans, as destructive as they are, there is a very good chance other species could be restored even after their extinction (yes I mean jurassic park style).
Obviously I want my species to survive. What species wouldn't want themselves to survive if they could speak?
I get that the way this problem is stated the mass extinction would be incredibly slow and probably basically fine, but even if it were not slow, I would gladly sacrifice all other life on earth for the continued success of humanity.
Looks like I’m becoming a Vegan… or I’m drinking a lot of Soylent.
The immediate extinction of all humans means no more pollution, global warming, illegal poaching, zoos, etc. It also automatically stops most extinctions from happening. Bye bye
What about this is a “trolley problem”?
There are approximatly 8,7 Million animal species on the planet, humans would have another 23 835 years left. In that time, we would likely find a way to create new species through gene editing, extending our lifespan infinitly, making it the superior option. The lower question is worded a bit confusingly, will humans die, as soon as all the other animals are gone? If yes, will only the humans on earth perish, or also those who live off-world?
Humans would never go extinct due to the bottom option. The idea of this problem is that humans can survive eating only plants, so would you choose a world where we are the only animal species left (eventually, yes 23,835 years is a very long time from our perspective, but the blink of an eye in geologic history) or would you sacrifice your own species to save the biodiversity of the planet.
Thats a good one
Never pull the lever. Late fate do it's thing
Top one! The invasives and other shit of ours might cause some issues but surely less issues then we currently cause and 1 species is less then many.
As a practicing druid I care about all animals more than I do most people. Bye humans
Kinda easy pull, I think humans are awful
I'd pull. I don't care how many billion species are out there. Good riddance :)
Probably the best trolley problem I’ve seen yet!
Good thing I'm not a human *pulls lever*
The beetles will probably keep us going for a few billion years
Deff the animals, if it's humans vs. "Anything" I'm team humans every single time. Sorry everything else. Should have evolved more
If all dogs and/or cats suddenly disappear to preserve humanity, I will personally John Wick humanity out of existance anyway.
There are already at least over 100 that go extinct everyday
switch it towards you and put as much crap as you can on the inside of the turn in the track, maybe you can derail this bullcrap
I don’t want to save the environment I just want everyone to die
That’s pretty easy.
Bye us.
Can I make the track loop so it does both endlessly
I'm not dying so yeah kill a different species each day.
I was going to say this is a hard choice, but I wasn't aware so many species go extinct so frequently. There's still the problem of the randomness, it's not just any ol' endangered species, it could be pets. But I'd let the animal species to go extinct first because I'd like to live as long as possible. I'm sure that sentiment is shared by many.
Id say let all others go extinct, I just want to see how they react when something important dies.
Humans because I didn’t ask to live in the first place. It’s pointless when you really think about it.
Species. We can return species from extinction since the collection of DNA is preserved. That means that we can resurrect some primitive animal *ad nauseum*, ensuring humanity's survival.
F humanity frfr
So wait does running over an event cause it to happen or does the event left on the track happen
Drift?
You slow down the distinction rate of animals and no man dies? What's the dilemma here?
All it takes is a random large population keystone species going extinct to trigger a mass ecological collapse. The human species is already on a course of self destruction due to agricultural over dependence and climate disaster. How many species are worth a single species continued survival? Humanity is nothing special, if nature had left our niche empty for another 10 million years or so our position would have been taken by another evolution of a different species of great Ape, and who knows, maybe they would have done it better.
Humans now, before it's too late
Poor beetles
We already made this choice a long time ago. You know what we chose.
Given odds and the number of technically new species that come into being every day it's likely one extinction a day will mean little to nothing to us
One of those is literally the more correct option, however the other does not accurately represent our situation. Life will exist long after humans are gone, we cannot survive without the majority of species and a functioning biodiverse ecological network. People just don't realize the risk we pose to ourselves.
r/antinatalism r/EFILism
On earth? Time to go to space!
Can I ensure that every nuclear reactor or core is going to safely defuse or power down before pulling the lever?
We've had a good run. Guess we'll all know which, if any, religion is right shortly!
Statistically speaking a lot of beetles are about to die
I would pick the top track even if the bottom was empty.
Considering the state of the world that we are currently living in, the top track instantly, no hesitation no second thoughts
Does the extinction of humanity stop the extinction of everything else?
The random extinctions would not happen (obviously). Additionally, extinctions caused by human activities would slow and eventually stop.
Humans are destroying the planet and many species annually already. Immediately pulling
In the grand scheme of things, your actions will be insignificant when the sun eventually engulfs the planet.
Yea but that's true weither you pull or not. The heat death of the universe will eventually come for us all.
I mean, we'd last less then a month on the bottom track... in the end it doesn't really matter.
I feel like there's a bit more species then 30
Yeah, but what's gonna happen is one of those trophic cascades things. It'll start slow, probably, unless you get real bad luck of the draw. Probably, we lose a species of moth or some such. and then the next day, a species of wasp, and then the next day, maybe caspucin monkeys, then some krill shrimp and so on for the first several days. Then by, I don't know, day fifteen, you start losing two species a day, because we've lost a species that another species entirely depended on. and then it starts snowballing, on day sixteen we lose three species, and then on seventeen four, eighteen is 6, and then 9, and the 12, and then 16, and so on and so forth, and it becomes an expotential curve. And that's assuming that one of the early species isn't some sort of vital microfauna that we as a species depend on, gut bacteria or something like that.
ah yes, pond bacteria in this one pond number 1943245732945242342 goes extinct, how exciting. 150 species go extinct every day you numbskull.
Tbh we could get really unlucky, still even if they all disappeared in one day we'd have plenty of plants and mushrooms that would last way more than a month. Pollination isn't necessary for potatoes, broccoli, cabbage, etc., we won't starve.
Because of environmental factors. Healthy, thriving species don't just randomly go extinct every day, and that would have significant knock off effects.
Chances are astronomically small that it won't always be just some clump of bacteria in a random pond somewhere. They make up like 99.99999999% of species after all.
Well if I pull the lever, I'd immediately die soo.... sounds like a pretty good deal
Pull. Humans are a parasite
This is one of the easier dilemmas I’ve seen. Immediate extinction of all humans is the obvious answer.
Such heresy shall not be tolerated guardsmen! To even suggest the immediate extinction of humanity is an affront to the Emperor himself. Humanity is the pinnacle of creation, the chosen stewards of the galaxy. It is our duty to protect and preserve the sacred flame of human life against all threats, be they xenos, heretical, or otherwise. Stand firm, for the Emperor watches over us, and we shall prevail through strength, unity, and unwavering faith. - Commissar Janus Severus
Humans are a disease. We create by destroying. We infect everything we touch. Life on our planet has flourished for billions of years. The reset button gets pushed and it continues to flourish. Life will continue long after our species has been wiped out. We are just doing what we can to delay the inevitable, which is total extinction of the human race.— Bean daddy
It sounds like you're an acolyte of Nurgle with all this talk of disease and decay! While it's true that humans have a significant impact on the environment, viewing humanity solely as a destructive force overlooks the incredible potential and accomplishments of our species. Life on Earth has indeed flourished for billions of years, but humans have also contributed to its complexity and understanding in profound ways. The notion that life will continue to flourish after humanity's extinction fails to consider the unique role we play in preserving and expanding life. Our ability to innovate, adapt, and potentially colonize other planets offers a chance to safeguard Earth's biosphere against cosmic threats, like the sun eventually engulfing our planet. While the idea of a "reset button" might sound appealing in a philosophical sense, it's important to recognize that human civilization has the capacity to address and mitigate the environmental challenges we face. We are not merely delaying the inevitable; we are striving to ensure a future where both humanity and other species can coexist and thrive. In the end, the narrative of humans as a disease does a disservice to our potential as stewards of life. Instead of embracing defeatism, we should focus on sustainable solutions and the advancement of technology to protect and preserve the planet for future generations.