A scientific prediction from the 1960s has resurfaced because it identified November 13, 2026, as a supposed doomsday. Created by Austrian physicist Heinz von Foerster, the theory suggested that humanity’s rapidly growing population could eventually reach an impossible limit. With concerns about climate change, artificial intelligence, and global conflicts continuing to make headlines, the prediction sounds particularly unsettling. But does it really mean the world is about to end?

Von Foerster developed his controversial “doomsday equation” by analyzing historical population estimates spanning thousands of years. He observed that population growth was accelerating and argued that, if the trend continued indefinitely, the time between successive doublings would eventually approach zero. In a 1960 paper titled Doomsday: Friday, 13 November AD 2026, he warned that humanity could eventually face catastrophic overcrowding.

Fortunately, the prediction was based on a growth pattern that did not continue as expected. Since the 1960s, the global population growth rate has slowed considerably. Although the world now has approximately 8.2 billion people, the United Nations projects that the population will peak at around 10.3 billion in the 2080s before gradually declining. November 13, 2026, is therefore not an established date for humanity’s extinction.

Looking much further into the future, research published in Nature Geoscience examined how the Sun’s evolution could eventually affect Earth’s atmosphere. Computer simulations suggested that Earth’s oxygen-rich atmosphere could disappear in roughly one billion years, making the planet unsuitable for complex life. However, this is a distant scientific projection, not a precise countdown. Von Foerster’s doomsday date is a mathematical extrapolation, not a credible prediction that the world will end this November.