The Looming Filter

I see humanity’s story as a sprawling, bittersweet saga, etched in the bones of our ancestors and teetering on the edge of self-inflicted oblivion. Our evolutionary journey, marked by the rise and fall of species like Homo habilis, Homo erectus, Homo heidelbergensis, Neanderthals, Denisovans, and Homo sapiens, is a testament to our resilience and ingenuity. Yet, it is also a cautionary tale, for the same traits that propelled us to dominance—ambition, creativity, and a relentless drive for power—now threaten to drive us extinct. The Great Filter, that cosmic bottleneck hypothesized to thwart civilizations from reaching interstellar permanence, looms ahead, fueled by our selfishness and the pathological narcissism bred by exponentially advancing technology. We may go out with a bang, a whimper, or a choking sputter, but the psychological roots of our potential downfall are already visible in our past and present.

Our story begins over 6 million years ago, when humans and chimpanzees diverged from a common ancestor, setting the stage for the genus Homo to emerge around 2.8 million years ago in East Africa. Homo habilis, with their rudimentary tools, marked the first tentative steps toward a distinctly human psychology—one capable of problem-solving and foresight. By 2 million years ago, Homo erectus appeared, spreading across Africa, Asia, and Southern Europe. Standing 5 to 6 feet tall, weighing 40 to 68 kilograms, they had limb proportions like ours, with shoulders built for throwing projectiles. Their brains, ranging from 600 to 1100 cm³, supported a remarkable array of behaviors: they controlled fire, crafted hand axes, cleavers, and picks, and cared for their sick and elderly. These acts of empathy and ingenuity reveal a psyche already grappling with community, survival, and meaning, contributing roughly 20% of our modern genome.

Around 200,000-700,000 years ago, Homo heidelbergensis emerged, primarily in Africa and Western Europe, contributing about 80% of our genetic makeup. Stocky and muscular, they stood 5’2” to 6 feet tall, weighed 51-88 kilograms, and were adapted to colder climates. Their cranial capacity averaged 1250 cm³, housed in skulls with sloping foreheads, prominent brow ridges, and broad, projecting faces. Their large teeth and powerful molars suited a diet of tough plants and meat, while their toolkit—hand axes, scrapers, cleavers, wooden spears, and possibly bone tools—reflected a sophisticated understanding of their environment. Evidence of fire control, shelter-building, and complex social behaviors suggests a mind capable of planning and cooperation, laying the foundation for the modern human psyche.

A dramatic population bottleneck between 813,000-930,000 years ago, likely triggered by severe climate shifts during the Early to Middle Pleistocene Transition, reduced our ancestors to about 1,280 individuals for over 100,000 years, slashing genetic diversity by 98.7%. This scarcity of fossils from the period underscores the fragility of our lineage. Yet, post-bottleneck, populations rebounded, aided by milder climates and fire mastery. Around 600,000 years ago, Homo heidelbergensis gave rise to Neanderthals in Europe and Homo sapiens in Africa, with early Homo sapiens fossils from Morocco’s Jebel Irhoud dating to 300,000 years ago. Interbreeding between Homo erectus, Homo heidelbergensis, Neanderthals, Denisovans, and Homo sapiens around 50,000-300,000 years ago wove a complex genetic tapestry, with Neanderthal DNA accounting for 2% of non-African genomes and an unknown population contributing 20% of our DNA, possibly enhancing brain function.

This intricate history, reconstructed through DNA analysis like the “cobraa” model published in Nature Genetics on March 18, 2025, reveals a psyche shaped by adaptation, cooperation, and resilience. Yet, as I reflect on our ancestors’ journey, I see the seeds of our potential downfall sown alongside our triumphs. The same cognitive leaps that enabled tool-making and caregiving also birthed ambition and greed, traits now amplified by technology’s immense power.

The Great Filter hypothesis posits that at least one step in the evolutionary path from star formation to interstellar colonization is extraordinarily improbable, explaining the absence of intelligent life beyond Earth. The nine steps—right star system, reproductive molecules, simple single-cell life, complex single-cell life, sexual reproduction, multi-cell life, tool-using intelligence, advanced civilization, and colonization explosion—have all occurred on Earth up to step 8. If steps 1–7 are common, as finding complex life on Mars or Europa might suggest, then the Filter likely lies at step 8 or 9, dooming civilizations before they can colonize the stars. I suspect that this Filter is not merely technological or environmental but deeply psychological, rooted in the narcissism and selfishness that technology’s power breeds.

Our ancestors’ tools—stone axes, wooden spears, fire—were extensions of their will, amplifying their agency. Today, technology’s exponential growth—nuclear power, artificial intelligence, genetic engineering—grants unprecedented control over nature and society. Yet, this power concentrates in the hands of a few, fostering pathological narcissism. Those who wield it often exhibit traits of grandiosity, entitlement, and a lack of empathy, prioritizing personal gain over collective survival. This mirrors the elite of Easter Island, who, as Jared Diamond describes, felled their last trees to erect Moai statues, perhaps in a delusional bid for salvation, driving their society to collapse. Similarly, modern leaders, aware since the 1960s of fossil fuels’ catastrophic impact, have perpetuated disinformation to protect profits, pushing Earth toward uninhabitability.

This selfishness is not new but an exaggeration of traits present in Homo erectus and Homo heidelbergensis. Their caregiving and cooperation were balanced by competition and territoriality, instincts that served small groups but become lethal when amplified by technology’s scale. The psychological mechanisms that once ensured survival—status-seeking, resource hoarding—now manifest as corporate greed and geopolitical rivalries, driving resource exhaustion and environmental collapse. The 100-year fossil fuel age, despite known risks, exemplifies this, as does the collapse of civilizations like the Maya and Anasazi, who overexploited their environments at peak population and wealth.

Pathological narcissism, as seen in modern power structures, is a psychological byproduct of technological mastery. Those who rise to control vast resources—whether CEOs, politicians, or tech moguls—often exhibit traits that thrive in hierarchical systems: charm, manipulativeness, and a disregard for long-term consequences. This echoes Diamond’s observation that societal collapse often follows elite insulation from the impacts of their decisions.

Paleobiologist Olev Vinn’s theory of inherited behavior patterns (IBPs) suggests that intelligent species carry psychological traits—aggression, greed, tribalism—that clash with the demands of technological civilizations. These IBPs, evident in Homo erectus’s territoriality and Homo heidelbergensis’s hunting prowess, become fatal when paired with nuclear arsenals or resource-depleting industries. Our 100-year failure to curb fossil fuel use, despite clear warnings, reflects this mismatch, as does the rapid deforestation of Easter Island, where cultural obsession trumped survival.

The psychological allure of power exacerbates this. Technology’s promise of godlike control—over nature, over others—feeds narcissistic fantasies, blinding leaders to the collective good. This is not mere incompetence but a structural flaw in human psychology, amplified by systems that reward self-interest. As Diamond notes, societies collapse when they fail to plan long-term or reconsider core values. Our refusal to pivot from fossil fuels or regulate unchecked AI development mirrors the Maya’s overfarming or the Anasazi’s deforestation, suggesting a psychological inertia that could prove fatal.

If the Great Filter lies ahead, as I suspect, humanity’s extinction may stem from our inability to tame the psychological demons technology unleashes. Finding complex life on Europa would bolster this view, implying that intelligence is common but surviving step 8—advanced civilization—is not. Our history is littered with extinct species, from dinosaurs to the Anasazi, reminding us that dominance guarantees nothing. Like yeast in a fermenting brew, despite flourishing, we are also poisoning ourselves with our waste—be it carbon emissions, nuclear fallout—not to mention exhausting our resources and food supplies.

The collapses of Easter Island, the Maya, and others offer stark warnings. These societies, at their peak, succumbed to overpopulation, environmental damage, and elite myopia, driven by psychological traits we still exhibit. New York’s skyscrapers could one day stand as derelict as Angkor Wat, overgrown and silent, if we follow their path. The courage to plan long-term and rethink values, as Diamond suggests, is our only hope, yet our track record—100 years of fossil fuel denial, rising inequality, unchecked tech monopolies—suggests a grim outcome.

In our ancestors—Homo habilis’s curiosity, Homo erectus’s empathy, Homo heidelbergensis’s ingenuity, Neanderthals’ resilience—we see the building blocks of our psyche. But we also see the shadows of our flaws: competition, greed, denial. Technology’s immense power has turned these flaws into existential threats, breeding narcissists who steer us toward collapse. We may yet go out with a bang (nuclear war), a whimper (climate collapse), or a cough (pollution of air, water & soil), but the psychological roots of our doom are clear. Unless we confront our selfishness and rewire our values, the Great Filter will claim us, leaving Earth a silent monument to a species that dreamed too big and loved too little.

Image: 1975’s MAD Special Number 17 (back cover)

*The Roy Scheider character’s “last words” in MAD Magazine’s June 1977 satire of “Marathon Man”