Threats that could wipe out the bulk of life on earth abound. Planetary catastrophe could come in the form of a killer asteroid impact, the eruption of massive supervolcanoes, a nearby gamma ray burst that sterilizes the earth, or by human-driven environmental collapse.
Yet life will endure, says Annalee Newitz, and so will humanity. In her new book, Scatter, Adapt, and Remember: How Humans Will Survive a Mass Extinction, Newitz surveys billions of years of history and five previous mass extinctions to draw lessons about how catastrophe comes and how – and why – life abides.
Humans will only survive if they expand society into space, as Stephen Hawking and others have advocated. To read more, click here.