What Is The Worst Possible Disaster That Could Befall Earth?

Pandemic Virus

How about a small black hole wandering into out solar system and swallowing up the planet. Is there anything worse than total destruction?

Pandemics are bad, but there's always a small portion of the population that develops and immunity and survives. A black hole could destroy the earth if it collided with, or even passed to close to, our planet. However, space is vast, and the odds of a close call with a black hole are very, very slim. If one did enter our solar system and come in contact with a major body, it most likely would be the sun (which still would be pretty bad for us), though it still would be more likely to just pass through without incident.

For my money, the worst natural disaster would be a close gamma ray burst. It would be brief, but it would completely sterilize whatever hemisphere of the earth was facing the blast, with most organic material down to bacterial being completely vaporized. The other hemisphere would have only a brief respite, since the gamma ray burst would demolish the ozone layer, letting UV rays from the sun kill off life on the other side of the planet within a day or so. Cave dwellers and some nocturnal scavengers might hang on for a while, but it would be a pretty bleak scenario for long-term survival of life on earth.

Humans, however, could also unleash something like run-away nanotechnology, self-reproducing molecular disassemblers that would break apart carbon from complex molecules to make copies of themselves. This is the so-called "gray goo" scenario, in which you have the not-so-pleasant prospect of being taken apart molecule by molecule, along with all other organic matter on the planet, until nothing is left but carbon and nanites with nothing to do.

Okay, pleasant dreams.

there is always the possibility that we wouldn't even notice a difference between regular space and the black whole stuff just could end. At least until we were recycled into some strange from of low frequency energy.

If this happens I'm making an enormous bomb shelter big enough for just enough people so the human race can survive. I'll also bring the DNA of every animal on the planet so when the dust clears I can repopulate our earth.
might take a while so i should get started now.

If you get one single super virus, developed by man obviously, it could wipe-out the world very very easily.

Able to live on surfaces for months, thrive in the atmosphere, able to survive extreme temperatures and radioactivity, adaptive to almost every toxin, and use it.

The technology to create such a bug is completely within budget, and there is probably even some already lurking around in Laboratories even by some self-funded; shadowed facilities.
One person with a mind so dark they could end the preciousness of life, decides to let it loose.

A Pandemic virus is so very powerful it could knock out all life on the planet, Now. Thats a hell of a lot Sooner then we encounter a Black Hole, Space Clouds, or even loose our Sun.

Not to mention the idea is already in peoples heads with movies like Dawn of the Dead.

I think im a little more worried about issues with the sun. A big flare with gamma rays that throws off our atmosphere, or just the fact that something happens with the gravity that is holding the earth in a perfect distance from the sun. A little less strength in the hold and we would eventually collide with something else or freeze. Closer, we all burn up or agian hit something. You can also look at the scare they are having anticipating a flare that will wipe out all communications on earth. At that point, we could nuke the world and no one would know what is going on, or that it even happened. I think that anything space related is too far off from happening that things like a pandemic or weapons of mass destruction are things we need to watch for.

Nothing.

The worst thing that could happen to the planet is nothing.

Man, left to his own devices, on the planet, slowly stripping away his own means of survival until he comes through with a technology to delay that end (like the green revolution).

Then, having been delayed, he merely begins again persuing that inevitible social colapse that merely dooms him to generational suffering before hasting again to further hights and crashes on his new global scale.

After all, man has been doing that from the beginning, and will likely continue to the end.

The What if Scenario is endless... Humans are in essence a biologically weak species. It is a precarious balance of many uncontrollable and/or unforseen existent conditions that span the entire breadth of our limited knowledge of science.

THe problem with the black hole is that we would have felt the blast from the supernova before we actually could find the hole. Also, WE would be hitting IT, not the other way around. I don't think it is affected by gravity, but I may be wrong.

I don't believe much in the pandemic virus for a couple reasons, for one because of solar radiation, I think it's pretty unlikely that any viral or bacterial substance could survive the rigors of space. I really laughed at Nicole Kidman's 2007 movie The Invasion, a remake along the lines of Invasion of the Body Snatchers. It's not the cold that you would have to worry about while traveling through space, it's the cosmic radiation that one would have to endure. Despite all the evidence that supports our visiting the moon, this is why I am skeptical about us actually having been there because I fail to see why what we could do forty years ago with pre-microprocessor technology can't be done today. The solar radiation in space pretty much negates in biological lifeform, and to avoid that possibility goes against every grain of science we have.

Not sure about people fearing a "drive-by" from a black hole. Last time I checked, Black Holes aren't rogue, they don't swim around in the universe in a Cadillac Escalade with Gold 22" Spinner Wheels and fire at you in some kind of space-aged drive-by.

The only thing that we would have to fear is the sun dying off, which is still by most estimates I've read longer than any trace of myself is going to be around, in other words several million years.

Several other people have mentioned it and I honestly think they're probably right, left to our own devices, mankind is the greatest evil that can happen to our planet. Our greed, our destructive nature, we will destroy this world long before any biblical or foreign object from another Universe visits us.

People need to stop watching movies like Armageddon, The Core, Day after Tomorrow, and realize that those worlds are purely fiction, and violate so many laws of physics and nature that it's laughable to imagine them ever really happening. I'm not saying it's impossible that the earth's core could stop rotating, or that a state sized chunk of rock would crash into the earth, I just think it's highly remote.

Despite his foul mouth, George Carlin said it best: (with corrections for foul language in brackets)
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"Besides, there is nothing wrong with the planet. Nothing wrong with the planet. The planet is fine. The PEOPLE are [screwed] Difference. Difference. The planet is fine. Compared to the people, the planet is doing great. Been here four and a half billion years. Did you ever think about the arithmetic? The planet has been here four and a half billion years. We've been here, what, a hundred thousand? Maybe two hundred thousand? And we've only been engaged in heavy industry for a little over two hundred years. Two hundred years versus four and a half billion. And we have the CONCEIT to think that somehow we're a threat? That somehow we're gonna put in jeopardy this beautiful little blue-green ball that's just a-floatin' around the sun?

The planet has been through a lot worse than us. Been through all kinds of things worse than us. Been through earthquakes, volcanoes, plate tectonics, continental drift, solar flares, sun spots, magnetic storms, the magnetic reversal of the poles...hundreds of thousands of years of bombardment by comets and asteroids and meteors, worldwide floods, tidal waves, worldwide fires, erosion, cosmic rays, recurring ice ages...And we think some plastic bags, and some aluminum cans are going to make a difference? The planet...the planet...the planet isn't going anywhere. WE ARE!"

I would have to acknowledge the fact that the Earth has been around for 4.5 billion years and the world is quite durable. However, only in recent history (~1 billion yrs?) has the Earth (and our solar system entire) really begun to take its current form. This means that the Earth has fully differentiated (i.e. somewhat resembled its current form of a solid crust, a mantle, and a liquid core). This facilitates life and ensures that we keep our magnetic field, trapping in our atmosphere and blocking us from harmful cosmic radiation.

This seemingly perfect cocktail for life as we know it is actually quite delicate. If humanity can survive its own devices and freak, dark-side scientists hell-bent on raining doom upon the world, time will still eventually doom the Earth. Jupiter may not always be able to repel large NEOs from the inner solar system (assuming we don't have the technology to repel them ourselves by then). The sun will definitely run out of fuel (albeit millions, perhaps billions of years in the future). Once the Earth fully cools and its core is no longer molten, we will lose our magnetic field, and that ultra-important sheath that prevents our faces from being melted off by intense stellar radiation. We will eventually encounter interstellar dust clouds many light years across.

I believe the answer to the indefinite continued existence of humanity lies in the discovery of habitable star systems and finding a way to get to them- presumably by folding space-time and "jumping" to another point in the universe. We would have to find a way to transport all people and perhaps colonize multiple systems. We would need the technology to terraform planets and somehow create and maintain atmospheres and magnetic fields. We would need to establish diverse flora and fauna populations. What we need is the time between now and one of these life-ending events to actually develop this advanced technology. The future of humanity may mean, in the long-run, that we are reduced back to nomadic ways as we were in the beginning- except this time we're jumping from star to star, every few million years.

Someone mentioned how vital our world's magnetic sphere is at keeping nasty charged ions out, especially those traveling at very high velocities. The problem with the magnetic field of our planet is that it unaccountably switches poles from time to time, and another flip-flop may be about due.

If the flip-flop is nearly instantaneous, things might be OK, because not too much harmful radiation might get through. But if the flip-flop takes months or years and we have an ineffective magnetic field shielding us during that time, that could be all the doomsday you will ever need right there.

The worst disaster that could befall Earth would be...us. Instead of worrying about Interplanetary Dust Particles, Intergalactic Meteors, Black Holes, bla, bla, bla that could make us extinct, shouldn't we worry about what's been happening to our planet lately? The only thing that's been damaging our eco-system which will lead us all into destruction is us humans.

As in the words of Klaatu, "If the earth dies, we die. If we die, the earth survives".

Kent, about the Polar shift being about due, is it not about third week of December 2012?

Hydrogen and dust from outer space??? Please. I think the solar wind would help clear our view of the sun from a thin dust cloud in passing. Free hydrogen would reacted with. Let's hope it's not with our atmosphere, or we'll look like Venus. Yeah, we should be vigilant...but most of the threats are something to watch right NOW. I don't want to spread doom, but some scenarios need to be considered.

Speaking of hydrogen clouds...we should look closer to home at methane clouds. Unthawed hydrogen compounds (methane) being released from the BOTTOM of our own oceans are a much greater threat with global warming...which is virtually imminent at this point. (The GW component.) There is also methane, a much more powerful greenhouse gas, locked in permafrost, and most of any locked-in gases (methane and CO2?) have already been released from the melting pole ice, which is clearing to open water at the north pole as you read this. That has yet to be calculated.

Some Canadians have mentioned usual atmospheric activity recently, so we should be concerned, like thunder with no clouds, etc. Just a thought.

If any loose hydrogen combines with organics (even CO2 to make carbonic acid like in your colas) in the atmosphere, you can get organic acids, this can KILL most of the sea life. Bleaching of coral reefs are already underway, and it could clear surface microbes or certain crops.

On top of that...methane is EXPLOSIVE...so if or WHEN a huge cloud drifts over a city, you'd witness nature's OWN answer to the weapons of mass destruction. The SMELL might WARN us first, if we're lucky...since hydrogen gas compounds will give off a very strong sewer smell...but will the warning be heeded??? Memories of Soddom and sodomy may be triggered, I'm sure, due to the smell. It's POSSIBLE the event in the Bible is exactly this type of event. So it's probably HAPPENED before.

Will they evacuate in time? Or will the news services just register that various callers are complaining about unusual nasty smells...then the station goes blank, and 3 mins. later the viewer is blown apart by a 300 mph "nuke" type wind, triggered by lightening? I'll bet the 1st time that happens...caves will be in short supply.

Let's get the CO2 sequestered and back in the ground NOW.

Sorry about some typos in my methane post...gotta move on, so I posted my comments before I could edit more carefully. Have a nice day.

For my money, the worst natural disaster would be a close gamma ray burst. It would be brief, but it would completely sterilize whatever hemisphere of the earth was facing the blast, with most organic material down to bacterial being completely vaporized. Here http://www.netvibes.com/buyreplicarolex I have found the many information in the Internet

Wow there are so much natural disasters that can happen. I try to not to think about them. Mike at http://learnhowtojumphigher.net guide.

I have no idea what kind of disaster could befall Earth but I hope I am not around when it happens.
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http://www.thetotaltransformation.com

There is a time for disaster and a time for peace. There'll be a big disaster in the not-so-distant future...followed by a long time of peace

I don't think this could happen. And if did what could we do. I try not to think about these things. If everybody worries to much about these things you wouldn't find time to live. I prefer to live a fearless, stress free life.

Mykhaelo from www.togetyourexback.org

I really don't think that this will ever happen, at least I hope it doesn't!
John at http://howtojumphigherplyometricexercises.com

this is why I am skeptical about us actually having been there because I fail to see why what we could do forty years ago with pre-microprocessor technology can't be done today.

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