Whereas many people express their concern of oil in most cases, there are more ressources we are running out of slowly or fast. They also include drinkable water, oxygen, compassion, cocoa, sand, and probably more. Some pose an existential threat, the others are not that necessary, but will require us to adapt to new circumstances.
I want to delegate this article to phosphates which are likely to be first of the major ressources we deplete, but let me speak in short about others as well.
Ressources
Water is necessary for life, nevertheless there is almost zero probability its reduced availability over the world will threaten our existence. We are able to filtrate salts from ocean or collect the rainwater. Even micro-plastics can be removed, although all technologies come at a price. Waters availability may decrease, but there will always be some.
Same can not be told about oxygen. We cut rainforests, poison coral reefs and still, manufactured photosynthesis or any other reaction making oxygen back out of carbon dioxide has not been invented yet. Still, I think we will manage to live somehow through that.
Cocoa and sand are both replaceable. To those who don't know about sand - yes, there is Sahara dessert. But no, its sand can not be used in architecture. Its bodies are of unfitting size and shape.
Compassion is seen as something the huge businessmans don't have and that it might be killing humanity in the end. It is true there were some armed raids on native people in Indonesia in order to take their land. However, if you know history, you should know we are in a better shape than 100+ years ago.
Oil is quite an issue as our industry seems to depend on it to a large extent. The price rise enforces development of new technologies, which are both cheaper or expected to be cheaper soon and not dependable on oil. So this is not a threat for me either.
Phosphates and Soil Depletion
I have warned of this issue one time before and I do it now. Manufactured fertilizers don't restore soil's natural content of minerals, which the fertilizers don't include in themselves. It means the iron, zinc, copper and some other minerals in soil deplete and more of that - some plants can use heavy metals in their enzymes if they don't have the right mineral (I am not sure if it works for them though). This is especially a danger, because we depend on the same minerals too and supplements are not the greatest source of them.
On top of that, we are running out of phosphates too, which are widely-used fertilizers. One may say, it is good for us as green ways of fertilizing the soil will start to be used a lot. I agree, but they only add nitrogen to the soil. Phosphorus is also essential and necessary. A professor at my chemistry school said at a lecture, that he is not aware of technologies, which could be used to harvest phosphates from the seas, where the human waste goes.
We should improve our preservation of food and stop wasting it. But we basically have to find a way, how to feed the population. I thought before that it is not gonna be a problem as our current food production greatly exceeds the needs (and is not delivered to all for business reasons). It will eventually start to be an issue soon.
Conclusion
The planet was not projected with human waste in mind. We slowly realize more and more ressources, which might soon be depleted at a current rate. There is solution to all issues, but it often feels more like a work around. Can the scarcity of the ressources bring us back to survival of the fittest state, where the cunning for how to get the ressources is the deciding factor? This would be the worst scenerio. But it might come to that if we prioritize fighting wars for spreading something, the given countries are not ready for or that their people don't even want. When we waste food just because of imperfect shape. And more.
What do you think? Can humankind survive next 200 years without terrible scars on its face?