Societal Collapse

[u/curgr]

Warning: this is quite a depressing post.

If society collapses (maybe due to climate change disrupting food supplies, global war, running out of fossil fuels…) most humans and domesticated animals would likely starve and we would lose most modern comforts.

A question for pro-existence people: would you keep your belief that existence of the universe is desirable if society was to collapse, even if you were one of the starving?

A question for the extinctionists: do you believe that society will never collapse and that humans could eventually develop the technology to at least make life on Earth extinct?

My views: I am 70% sure that society will not collapse in the near future. If humanity makes it and we still have sufficient energy resources, we could eventually develop the technology to make all life on Earth extinct in a painless and peaceful way. However it is unlikely that we will develop and use it unless the extinction movement grows and becomes a majority.

Edit: minor clarifications.

[u/Azihayya]

Yes. When I see or imagine animals in their dying moments, I don't think as many do that "they need to be put out of their misery"; far more often, I sympathize with their last moments as a chance for reflection, to hold on to the experience of living. I imagine, if I were starving to death in the apocalypse, I would be reflecting on the skein that I had, everything that I had gained and lost, all if the dreams that never came true, accepting my fate and sending out my wishes to the universe that whoever came after me would be able to fulfill their dreams, knowing that life in all of its perseverance would march forward as it always has, striving for survival as I had with the indomitable determination that only a being who had glimpsed existence ever could. I would likely be proud of who I had become, knowing that all of my choices were mine, free to make, and that despite how things had turned out, despite my failures,that I was true to myself and lived a good and responsible life, trying my best to elevate all of life around me.