May 30, 2004: The End of the World - Open Lines
May 30, 2004: The End of the World - Open Lines  
Podcast: The Art Bell Archive
Published On: Fri Aug 22 2025
Description: Art Bell poses a provocative question for open lines: how do you think the world will end? Callers respond from across the country, many reporting severe weather as over 160 tornadoes tear through the Midwest in a single weekend. Art notes the jet stream has shifted dramatically northward, pushing violent storms into regions that typically experience them weeks earlier in the season, a pattern consistent with the climate disruption discussed in recent broadcasts.Callers offer a range of predictions, from nuclear exchange and asteroid impact to genetic catastrophe and the biblical Rapture. A self-described former military technology retrieval operator claims that DARPA has its own projections for civilizational collapse involving ice age conditions, asteroid threats, and biological hazards from damaged facilities. A 17-year-old named Danny provides a counterpoint, arguing that humanity will evolve technologically and culturally fast enough to overcome any threat thrown at it.Art replays the controversial recording allegedly captured by Russian scientists who drilled the deepest hole ever bored into the Earth in Siberia. The chilling audio, which Reuters reportedly covered, prompted the scientists to abandon the project entirely. Art reflects on the many scenarios his program has explored over the years, observing that most callers believe humanity will ultimately destroy itself by its own hand.