Ars Technica did a fascinating interview with astrodynamicist Moriba Jah to get a deep understanding of exactly when and how we might be getting brained with shuttle pieces, and it’s not going to make you feel any better about things. He compares it to the early days of air and maritime travel, before there were so many boats and planes that we figured out we needed to keep an eye on exactly where everything was going, and flatly says that it’s not sustainable. And in case you think this is all far-future hypothetical thought, he predicts a loss of human life from a large piece of this space debris impacting the earth within the current decade. The article also mentions that a softball-sized piece of the junk in question has the kinetic energy of a small bomb. So invest in helmets, I guess.
Related: Cracked’s Big Questions: 4 Ways We Ended Up With So Much Junk Food
All of Our Antibiotics Stop Working
We love to toot the horn of how far modern medicine has come, and it’s worth tooting. Nobody wants to go back to the days where amputation was usually no lower than Plan C. Our overconfidence in our medical advancements, however, might also be quietly breeding their own problems. One that’s gotten enough academic attention to prompt a U.N. report, as covered by Vox, is the proliferation of “superbugs,” or variants of common sicknesses that have evolved to be able to tolerate common antibiotics.
Bacteria, like any living creature, have the primary purpose of propagation. In order to survive, they evolve just like anything else. So it makes sense that as we close in on a century of penicillin usage, a couple bacteria have figured it out. Penicillin works well as a reference here too, because what’s making the problem worse is the comparatively sluggish advancement of new types of antibiotics compared to other fields of medicine. Chiefly because, as the pessimist in your head might be guessing, they don’t make a whole lot of money. It turns out that the already deeply icky, shareholder-friendly strategy of treat, not cure might have some long-term downside!