How long before Earth is uninhabitable?
“While we are predicting an uninhabitable planet in 250 million years, today we are already experiencing extreme heat that is detrimental to human health. This is why it is crucial to reach net-zero emissions as soon as possible,” Lo added.
Humans could be wiped out by the formation of a 'supercontinent' in the next 250 million years, according to a new study. The research, published in the scientific journal Nature Geoscience, offers the first ever supercomputer climate models of the distant future.
Roughly 1.3 billion years from now, "humans will not be able to physiologically survive, in nature, on Earth" due to sustained hot and humid conditions. In about 2 billion years, the oceans may evaporate when the sun's luminosity is nearly 20% more than it is now, Kopparapu said.
All continents will be affected
Even the majority of the world's warmest and wettest regions have a wet bulb of no more than 25 to 27°C. In 2050, scientists estimate that it will be very difficult to live in South Asia and the Persian Gulf, i.e. countries such as Iran, Kuwait and Oman.
In about 500 million years, the atmosphere will be so deficient in carbon dioxide that all plants will die, followed eventually by all life that depends on plants. "If we calculated correctly, Earth has been habitable for 4.5 billion years and only has a half-billion years left," Kasting said.
Depending on who is counting, by 2050, between 200 million and 1.2 billion people will face little option other than to flee across borders or be dislocated within them as withering heat waves and rising seas encroach and disrupt people's lives and livelihoods.
Based on known risks, the really cataclysmic ones, those that might exterminate us as a species, are fairly rare. Based on what we know today, it would be very unlikely that we wouldn't be around in the year 3000. There certainly would be bad times, but some of us would get through it. That leaves unknown risks.
Humans in the year 3000 will have a larger skull but, at the same time, a very small brain. "It's possible that we will develop thicker skulls, but if a scientific theory is to be believed, technology can also change the size of our brains," they write.
Mega-tall buildings – 100+ stories – will be the norm in major cities to accommodate the needs for accommodation. It's likely that no-one will drive vehicles – it will all be autonomous transportation. The world will run on systems, sensors, cameras, artificial intelligence, and autonomous infrastructure.
In short, the sun is getting farther away from Earth over time.
What parts of the US will be unlivable due to climate change?
Coastal states like Florida and South Carolina are most at risk of the impacts of climate change. Extreme heat, drought, inland flooding, wildfires, and coastal flooding are some of the most devastating effects of climate change.
The hotter bigger picture
Texas has warmed between 0.5-1F in the past century. "In the coming decades … summers are likely to become increasingly hot and dry, creating problems for agriculture and possibly human health," warns the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
It found that an estimated 4.3 million acres — an area nearly the size of Connecticut — will be underwater by 2050, including $35 billion worth of real estate.
By the year 3000, the warming range is 1.9°C to 5.6°C. While surface temperatures approach equilibrium relatively quickly, sea level continues to rise for many centuries.
In about 5 billion years, the sun will die. But as it ages, it will get brighter and hotter, and by about 500 million years from now, our star will have heated Earth beyond redemption.
Over several millions of years of continuous rain, oceans form. By about 3,900 million years ago (mya), Earth's environment has been transformed from a highly unstable state into a more hospitable place.
It is expected that by 2070 life expectancy at birth will increase to 89.8 years for women and 87.7 years for men – an increase of about 5 and 6.5 years for each sex, respectively.
Temperatures will be dangerously hot in more places and at more times than ever before. Less of Earth will be as agreeably habitable as in the past. Ecosystems and our relationships with ecosystems will continue to change, creating even more insecurity on the planet.
The world population could be too big to feed itself by 2050. By then, there will be almost 10 billion people on the planet and food demand will have increased by 70 percent compared to 2017. Scientists put the limit on how many people Earth can feed at 10 billion - max!
Perhaps we will have longer arms and legs. In a colder, Ice-Age type climate, could we even become even chubbier, with insulating body hair, like our Neanderthal relatives?
What will humans evolve to?
We will likely live longer and become taller, as well as more lightly built. We'll probably be less aggressive and more agreeable, but have smaller brains. A bit like a golden retriever, we'll be friendly and jolly, but maybe not that interesting. At least, that's one possible future.
A molecular biogerontology professor believes we've only started to move toward holding off aging, and that humans will eventually have the potential to live for 1,000 to 20,000 years. Technology not yet created would be key to extreme longevity, as we would need to be able to eliminate aging at the cellular level.
Humans looked essentially the same as they do today 10,000 years ago, with minor differences in height and build due to differences in diet and lifestyle. But in the next 10 millennia, we may well have refined genetic 'editing' techniques to allow our children to all be born beautiful and healthy.
We are now generally shorter, lighter and smaller boned than our ancestors were 100,000 years ago. The decrease has been gradual but has been most noticeable in the last 10,000 years. However, there has been some slight reversal to this trend in the last few centuries as the average height has started to increase.
Broadly speaking, evolution simply means the gradual change in the genetics of a population over time. From that standpoint, human beings are constantly evolving and will continue to do so long as we continue to successfully reproduce. What has changed, however, are the conditions through which that change occurs.
