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Hallowe'en mass extinction ball of fun

Let's all get together and kill outright
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The world human population will pass seven milliard around Hallowe'en. Assuming each person has a volume of about eighty cubic decimetres, this suggests an amusing way of wiping ourselves out as a species. The mean is of course much lower.

A pumpkin Hallowe'en head should be built in Monte Carlo equivalent to the total volume of the human race. Everyone should then travel to Monte Carlo and climb into the ball. Those on the outside should stick their legs out and perform a Mexican Wave like manoeuvre to skitter the ball around until it starts rolling down a slope, off a cliff and into the Med. Those not already crushed to death will drown, thereby solving all the problems of the world in one go. Also, everyone will be in one place - world unity.

We should organise this for next Monday.

Is this a let's all?

Actually, forget the suicide thing. Everyone just gets together in a giant Hallowe'en pumpkin head, nicely padded, and has fun skeetering it about in a show of peace and harmony, in Monte Carlo, with scuba equipment. Sorry about the earlier thing, which was a mite negative.

nineteenthly, Oct 28 2011

2-D version http://www.guardian...nzibar-john-brunner
[mouseposture, Oct 29 2011]

[link]






       Well, this is cheery. Clearly, this is an argument for the advantages of modern pharmacology.
MaxwellBuchanan, Oct 28 2011
  

       Or at least one fueled by it.
Alterother, Oct 28 2011
  

       //Actually, forget the suicide thing.// Good idea.
mouseposture, Oct 28 2011
  

       Why does everybody, but particularly nineteenthly, want to wipe out the species? Hopefully not because of some notion about preserving this moss covered rock in the middle of desolate space.   

       This is a rather unimaginative as far as mass suicide ideas go.
rcarty, Oct 29 2011
  

       <progressive> Whatever comes next will surely be better.   

       <reactionary> Evolution has gone downhill ever since cyanobacteria. It's time we rolled the clock back.   

       <[nineteenthly]> I'm looking forward to a post- apocalyptic future where I can build computers out of driftwood and baling wire.
mouseposture, Oct 29 2011
  

       If you had hair like Steven Pinker, wouldn't you, too, be an optimist who believed in progress?
mouseposture, Oct 29 2011
  

       I'd like to point out that i did change my mind about the extinction during the posting of the idea, and appealing though it is to succumb to the siren song of everybody being dead (Dave), i also entered an ephemeral mental condition where i preferred the notion of an orange sphere studded with millions of legs accompanied by billions of cries of "Whoah!" rolling around the streets of that particular casino state, and perhaps into the accompanying sea.   

       Also, as it happens my main motivation in thinking this up is to consider the volume of the entire human race. Exactly how large and massive would a sphere consisting of everyone be?
nineteenthly, Oct 29 2011
  

       diameter of 9km should do it. (based on 2009 population, humans being mostly water, and a guess of an average weight of 50kg)
FlyingToaster, Oct 29 2011
  

       I get a diameter of 874m, based on 7*10^9 lots of 50 litres.   

       On the Australian TV show 'Q and A' recently, Australia's population future was being discussed. One of the panelists mentioned something about looming resource shortages, and another said "That won't happen for a million years!". I calculated that in a million years, the population of Australia, at present growth rates, if each person were allowed to occupy the volume of a single proton, would require a volume a mind-boggling number of orders of magnitude larger than the observable universe.   

       Are these people who deny that overpopulation is a problem aware that their arguments are so imbecilic as to make creation scientists look rational?
spidermother, Oct 29 2011
  

       Australians are not known for their subatomic size.   

       Eight hundred and seventy-four metres sounds about right. I worked it out yesterday but forgot what i got. It's complicated by the number of babies, and considering famine and malnutrition leading to dimished stature, along with growing obesity and eating disorders elsewhere, the actual volume is probably hard even to estimate.
nineteenthly, Oct 29 2011
  

       Monday's not good for me, I got a thing.
tatterdemalion, Oct 29 2011
  

       I got a thing, too, but it stays attached every day. Mrs. RayfordSteele likes me that way.
RayfordSteele, Oct 29 2011
  

       We would prefer a cube, but then it wouldn't roll so well.   

       We are sure that your planet's cetaceans will be delighted by this. No more arrogant pink monkeys wandering around causing damage to the environment, and no nasty radioactivity. We understand they've been researching bioweapons, but this sounds much more entertaining.
8th of 7, Oct 29 2011
  

       Well that's that then.   

       In the first version, it might work as a replacement for dead whales on the ocean floor if instead of one ball in Monte Carlo, there were a couple of hundred of them rolling over the oceans, each with a few million people in them, who could then sink to the bottom and feed the hagfish.
nineteenthly, Oct 29 2011
  

       a bun to [nineteenthly] for thinking of the hagfish [+]
pertinax, Oct 30 2011
  

       I think the 7 billionth child and their nearest opposite sex should be left alive, with a big 'CONGRATULATIONS! YOU'RE OUR 7 BILLIONTH CUSTOMER! YOU'VE WON THE EARTH' recording, sign, and some party blowouts.
RayfordSteele, Oct 31 2011
  

       Well, now that the suicide option has been withdrawn, the occupants won't be drowning in the Med any more. They will, however, be drowning in vomit I suspect. I've also got a ticket to the thing.
DrBob, Oct 31 2011
  

       Suicide remains an option. tell you what: half get to die, half get to vomit.
nineteenthly, Oct 31 2011
  

       Some of the people who die will also vomit probably. That will have to be accounted for.
rcarty, Nov 01 2011
  
      
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