A guide to the end of the world

The Earth is an extraordinarily fragile place, which is fraught with danger-a tiny rock hurtling through space, wracked by violent crustal movements and subject to dramatic climatic changes as the Earth's geophysical and orbital circumstances vary. Only 10,000 years after the end of the Ice Age, the planet is sweltering in some of the highest temperatures it has ever experienced. At the same time, overpopulation and exploitation are dramatically increasing the vulnerability of modern society to natural catastrophes such as earthquakes, floods and volcanic eruptions. Few people can even begin to imagine what life will be like on Earth in a million or even a thousand years time. The real question may be, however, will there be any human life here at all? This book focuses on the many potential catastrophes facing our planet and our race in the future and addresses both the probabilities of these events happening and our chances of survival. The breadth of the treatment extends from discussion of the likely consequences of the current global warming experiment to the inevitable destruction of the Earth in the far future, when it is enveloped by our giant, bloated sun. Other scenarios, including the new Ice Age, the asteroid and comet impact threat, supervolcanoes and their effects, and megatsunami, are also examined.