As far as we know, humans are the only living species capable of developing superior intelligence, as well as wearing clothes, cooking your own food, among other unique features. This means that our species has made a considerable difference to existence on Earth. (both positive and very negative too, given all the pollution, deforestation, among others problems). But what about when we go extinct? Will other animals be able to stimulate intelligence to create large and complex societies like the ones we have? humans one day did?
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What will happen to the planet if humans become extinct?
North Carolina State University molecular ecologist Martha Reis Kind argues that humans are good at making short-term predictions. Therefore, it is more interesting to predict the hypotheses if they are extinct "suddenly tomorrow".
In view of this, it is possible to understand that current problems, such as climate change, would continue to happen. In this way, the cold weather would continue to be more intense, as many species need to be even more resilient to survive the drought.
In this regard, geologist Dougal Dixon mentions the concept of " convergence" . This is an evolutionary process in which two unrelated organisms end up developing similar characteristics in order to succeed in a specific niche.
An excellent characteristic of human beings is how good builders we are, in addition to excellent spatial reasoning. As a result, to fulfill the same ecological role as us humans, another species would need to develop a capacity similar to this one, that is, they need to opposable thumbs (or something equivalent to that).
So what is the conclusion reached?
Despite the maximum number of factors analyzed, it is still practically impossible to predict how evolution will develop on a geological time scale. Equally, it is also very difficult to predict whether another species will develop human-level intelligence or even the desire to build structures and communities. Even if that happens, it will take thousands of years.
