What Are the Biggest Threats to the Future of Humanity?

Hollywood loves a good disaster movie, but are the catastrophes portrayed on the silver screen a genuine threat? According to a new report released by Oxford University and the Global Priorities Project, the answer is yes.

Published in April, the Global Catastrophic Risks report is a compiled a list of the biggest threats humanity is likely to face over the next few years. Some have the scope to wipe out up to 10% of the world’s population. Think global pandemics, artificial intelligence, super volcanoes, climate change, nuclear war and a handful of other chilling scenarios.

Ongoing vs unexpected

The threats were divided into two categories – ongoing risks, and events that could unexpectedly happen at any point.

“There are some things that are on the horizon, things that probably won't happen in any one year but could happen, which could completely reshape our world and do so in a really devastating and disastrous way,” explains Sebastian Farquhar, director of the Global Priorities Project. “History teaches us that many of these things are more likely than we intuitively think. Many of these risks are changing and growing as technologies change and grow and reshape our world. But there are also things we can do about the risks.”

Disease pegged as top destroyer

So what should we be worried about? According to the researchers, a Spanish Flu-esque pandemic is high on the risk list. Both a natural and an engineered outbreak have "higher likelihood" of occurrence over the next five years than a large scale asteroid impact, super volcano eruption and other indefinable “unknown risks.”

Could AI outwit humans?

Artificial Intelligence (AI) was also cited as a major threat, with researchers reinforcing concerns voiced by critics such as Elon Musk and Stephen Hawking.

“If its goals don't match with what humanity's values are” the report warns that AI could overpower humanity. Nuclear war, catastrophic climate change and geo-engineering failures are other keynote concerns, with technological advancements creating a host of genuine anthropogenic risks.

Disease is a very real risk to humanity, with the Hepatitis E Virus killing around 56,600 people a year. ‘Clinical Evaluation of a Multiplex Real-time PCR Assay for the Detection and Quantification of Hepatitis E Virus’ explores the liver disease in further detail, with a focus on how the overlapping of clinical signs, symptoms and laboratory findings with other etiologies can make diagnosis problematic.