Humanity is playing “Russian roulette” with its own survival, with experts warning that the odds of a total societal breakdown or even extinction within the next century are shockingly high.
Oxford University futurologist Toby Ord, an authority on existential threats, estimates there is a one-in-six chance that civilization will collapse within the next 75 years.
Notably, these are the same odds as putting a single bullet in a six-chamber revolver, spinning the cylinder, and pulling the trigger.
His colleague Nick Bostrom is even more dire, pegging the odds of human extinction within 100 years at one in four.
Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Jared Diamond suggests humanity’s survival beyond 2050 is no better than a coin toss.
These aren’t doomsday cult predictions.
They’re warnings from respected scientists and historians who point to nuclear weapons, engineered viruses, artificial intelligence, and other catastrophic risks as potential triggers for collapse.
In his new book, Cambridge researcher Luke Kemp lays out a grim pattern: every civilization in history has eventually collapsed.
He calls them “Goliaths,” powerful societies that appear indestructible but always fall.
The downfall, Kemp argues, begins with inequality as elites hoard wealth and power, rewriting rules for their own benefit while ordinary people suffer.
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