A professor famous for predicting the imminent demise of the human race at regular intervals since the 1970s has predicted the imminent demise of the human race.
Paul Ehrlich, who is the Bing Professor of Population Studies at the Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment, says it's definitely on this time. In a tinned statement issued on Friday, the arm-waving prof lays it on the line:
There is no longer any doubt: We are entering a mass extinction that threatens humanity's existence ... the window of opportunity is rapidly closing ...
"[The study] shows without any significant doubt that we are now entering the sixth great mass extinction event," Ehrlich said ...
"If it is allowed to continue, life would take many millions of years to recover, and our species itself would likely disappear early on," said lead author Gerardo Ceballos.
The original article can be found at The Register, with coverage of the cited study coming from ScienceMag.org
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 24 2015, @08:58PM
...until someone hacks the binary bits that represent your wealth.
Now you're left with the land surrounding your residence (well, the amount of that that you can defend against interlopers) and what you can produce on that land.
In a system based on fiat currencies, "wealth" is only "wealth" as long as everybody agrees it is.
{Image of German child in the 1930s using bundles of reichsmarks to build a playhouse goes here}
-- gewg_
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Wednesday June 24 2015, @09:04PM
> ... and you don't expect the sheep to mount a revolution. [not a big fan of quoting myself]
As long as enough people have enough to lose, the rich can sleep comfortably on their fiat currency.
The perpetuating genius of the American Dream is to give almost everyone something tangible to lose.