“Why do you think people are uneasy with what I'm saying these days?” I posed the question to my younger sister, who chuckled in response. “You’re essentially suggesting it’s the end of the world?”

It was eclipse night, a crimson moon casting its glow. Three hundred thousand years have passed since humanity first inhabited this planet, and now, nothing will be the same.

Allow me to explain how I've begun to perceive what I call the Event—the Cataclysm, Extinction, a fundamentally altered earth.

My friends from the Indian Subcontinent share tales that sound like fiction. The heatwave there is pushing the limits of survival. My other sister reports that in a once-beautiful city known for its artists and poets, eagles are plummeting from the sky, lifeless as they strike homes, monuments, and shops. They can no longer fly.

The streets are filled with lifeless bodies—dogs, cats, cows—everywhere you look, animals have succumbed to the relentless heat. They simply cannot endure.

People are fleeing, rushing indoors, spending their days submerged in canals, rivers, and lakes. Those unable to escape collapse on the streets, driven to their limits. These are impoverished nations, and we may never fully grasp the toll this heatwave has taken. Many will go uncounted.

Take a moment to truly reflect on this. Pause the routine motions of daily life and ponder it.

My friends in the West read about these events and then return to obsessing over celebrities or blockbuster films. They still don't grasp the severity of the situation. This reality surpasses what homo sapiens can genuinely comprehend—the Event is approaching them too.

The analogy of frogs in a boiling pot often illustrates "climate change." While useful, it has its limits. When the water reaches a boil, the frogs are removed and consumed. We find ourselves in that boiling pot, and we are on the brink of being taken out and eaten. This is when things begin to deteriorate rapidly.

What I envision as the Event—a species that has existed for 300,000 years dramatically altering the climate in unprecedented ways, triggering an Extinction Event—can be likened to a black hole. Humanity stands before it, forced to march through. Some reach the other side first; others remain at the back, perhaps still laughing and joking. Those who have crossed over are seldom heard from again, as it is a black hole, and on the other side, nothing will ever be the same.

This is our current reality. We stand at the brink of the Cataclysm. Some of us are crossing over into a new world, one destined to become uninhabitable. This isn't something that might happen; it is occurring right now.

My friends in the Subcontinent are witnessing it firsthand, where eagles fall from the sky and streets are littered with dead creatures.

Extinction. The Event. It is visibly unfolding there.

They are the first to traverse the Event Horizon, if you will—the edge of the black hole. They serve as early warning signs, my friends from India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh. They are experiencing the world within the Event, and that world is approaching us all.

I refrain from using the term “climate change” to describe this phenomenon, as it falls short of encapsulating the reality we face. The narratives we tell have fostered a sense of apathy and ignorance about our predicament. People read the science and think, “What's the big deal if temperatures rise by one or two degrees?” They fail to grasp the gravity of the situation. A more accurate narrative would explain that a one-degree increase can result in significant seasonal changes in equatorial regions. Currently, as we experience a rise of one to one point five degrees, summers are becoming ten to fifteen degrees Celsius hotter. At two degrees, we could see a rise of twenty; at three degrees, thirty.

We are on a trajectory toward three degrees.

Temperatures in the Subcontinent have already reached 50 degrees Celsius. Spain and Europe brace for extreme heatwaves of 40 degrees or more, and this is merely at one degree of global warming. At two degrees? The Subcontinent could experience 60 degrees Celsius, while Spain and Europe may reach 50. At three degrees? Equatorial regions could exceed 70 degrees Celsius, with Spain and Europe hitting 60.

I anticipate some will debate this interpretation, but it is largely irrelevant. At 50 degrees, the current state of the Subcontinent, life begins to perish. Birds fall from the sky, streets transform into mass graves, people flee in search of survival, and energy grids begin to falter. Economies grind to a halt.

Extinction occurs.

This is the threshold we are already approaching, and we can witness it in stark, unsettling detail. The Event is not a mere abstraction or forecast; extinction is now manifesting in plain sight across the globe, revealing the limits of our civilization's endurance. That threshold lies somewhere between 40 and 50 degrees. Beyond that point, life as we know it ceases to exist.

My friends in the West remain largely oblivious to this reality. They believe that as seasons become increasingly hot, they can simply turn up the air conditioning. Unfortunately, it doesn't work that way. Why? Not only because energy grids will fail or air conditioning systems will ultimately break down, but because of the interconnectedness of life.

My Western friends are not thinking critically these days. The fantasy of cranking up the air conditioning and retreating into their homes ignores the obvious signs around them. Birds are falling from the sky; lifeless bodies are scattered across the streets. Can they truly remain in their air-conditioned sanctuaries while the rest of life faces extinction?

It doesn’t work that way. Those beings—birds, cows, sheep, chickens—are essential to our existence as well. If they perish, so do we. Insects nourish our soil, birds consume insects, and so on. My Western friends fail to recognize that we are part of interconnected systems—ecosystems, in this case. As the foundations of these systems are eroded, our survival becomes increasingly tenuous. The notion that one can comfortably reside in an air-conditioned home while everything else faces extinction is a delusion. What will sustain us? Who will cultivate the soil? Who will ensure the health of our crops? Where will the essentials of life come from?

Our civilization will falter between fifty and sixty degrees Celsius. Bang, poof, gone. Nothing functions beyond that point. Everything begins to die—not just animals and humans, but the systems that rely on them. Economies collapse, inflation surges, and poverty escalates, leading to the emergence of fascism as a consequence. We can already observe the early signs of this happening globally, but this is only the beginning. Imagine the extent of inflation when extinction truly begins to take hold.

Everything fails at the threshold we are now nearing. Our civilization cannot endure it. Democracy is stifled by fascism and theocracy as fearful and desperate individuals turn to fundamentalist ideologies or authoritarian violence for answers—or even just sustenance. Economies transform into mechanisms for mere survival rather than opportunity or prosperity. Society and community disintegrate in the relentless struggle for self-preservation. This is the future we are heading toward, and we can see it unfolding from America to India to Europe and beyond.

What transpires in such a reality? Do people unite to salvage it? Likely not. Inequality spirals further, with the wealthy monopolizing the dwindling resources and profiting from them. The Covid pandemic provided a vivid illustration of this. Governments, paralyzed and captured by extremist factions, leave individuals without help in times of need. Covid, once again. Culture devolves into a battleground, pitting those who view death as a form of purification against those who do not. Consider the bitter “culture wars” in America. What occurs in such a world? Society becomes predatory, regressive, consuming itself—that is the essence of a collapsing civilization.

We are now crossing the threshold of extinction, of the Event. Until now, it has been largely invisible to us, and we have lived in blissful ignorance. Insects are vanishing—who cares! Did you catch what Kim Kardashian wore to the Met Gala? Fish are dying off—so what, let’s go watch a Marvel movie! The earth’s critical systems—like the Amazon rainforest, boreal forests, ocean currents, and polar regions—are all reaching their tipping points, reinforcing a hotter planet. What’s the issue? Tucker Carlson asserts we are the master race!

We are crossing the threshold now. Extinction is visible. The eagles plummet from the sky, gasping for breath as they descend toward a scorching planet. The streets are filled with death. We are no longer the frogs gradually boiling in the pot; we are being removed from the pot and are about to be consumed.

My friends in the West remain in denial about the impending reality. Ignorance is bliss. This world is coming for us all. There will be no escape. Those in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka are among the first to face the event horizon. But we will all cross it because we share this planet. Extinction affects the entire planet.

This does not imply—my usual caveat—that everything dies. It reflects the biological definition of mass extinction, where numerous species vanish, and life eventually resets itself in new forms. After us comes a new earth. Three hundred thousand years of humanity is merely a fleeting moment in time. Life will endure, but our civilization will not. The Event—the period between civilizations—will usher in a dark age. You can already see that darkness descending now.

It is evident in every bird that falls from the sky, every animal that succumbs to the heat, every democracy that is dismantled by fanatics, and in countless deaths that will never be recorded. Our systems—economic, social, political—are beginning to unravel.

Because, my friends, this is extinction.

Some of us just don’t know it yet.

Umair May 2022