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| - The events of the book begin about 200 years in the future; humanity has come to destroy the environment, probably because of excessive use of natural resources, overpopulation and many other pressures of anthropogenic origin. Due to this, some elite humans decide to begin the creation of a project of interstellar colonization in which 37 gigantic ships will make a trip to new habitable planets and to initiate a new civilization. During much of the project, the use of two human species artificially created through genetic engineering was begun to construct the necessary parts for the interstellar ships: the aquamorph, a species designed to inhabit underwater, and the vacuumorph, capable of existing in the vacuum of space. Several years later to the ships' (300-500 years) gone the earth has partially recovered from the catastrophe with a huge loss of terrestrial and marine fauna and the world population has been greatly reduced. Several of the human groups have stopped using technology, and have adopted a rural lifestyle that implements agriculture and the use of simple tools. However, there are still groups of humans with advanced technology; several of them began to be dependent on specialized machines to stay alive, becoming a subspecies of humans characterized by dependence on huge mechanical cradles which maintain their vital functions, the Hitek. The vacuumorph and aquamorphs, being designed as organisms without the capacity to reproduce, were extinguished in an irremediable way, although it is exposed that the aquatic forms continued improving, surviving in a new form better adapted to the aquatic life and able to reproduce. After contemplating what was lost by the human schism, the Hitek began to implement the use of genetic engineering to create new human species which would fill vacant ecological niches, creating about 4 different species, inhabitants of the tundra, Forests, grasslands and trees. Over time, this same manipulation began to be used in the improvement of artificial organs, thus creating an "organic cradle", and resulting in the birth of a new subspecies, the Tic, corpulent amorphous beings with different types of limbs that vary depending on what the individual wants. 1000 years in the future, huge changes in the climate and the earth's magnetic field caused by the inversion of the poles begin to take place, wreaking havoc on the remaining civilizations. TICs, despite their knowledge and advanced technology, are unable to deal with these changes that have affected their entire infrastructure, which causes their society to become destabilized and to fall into total anarchy, becoming quite violent against each other during this period. Like them, humans are not able to handle these changes, and in the end Homo sapiens is extinguished, however, several of the posthuman species created survive and in the following thousands and millions of years, begin to evolve and adapt to different environments and to adopt new ecological niches. After 5 million years of uninterrupted evolution, the descendants of modern humans that retreated into space have returned to Earth. Then the world changes dramatically. Earth was xenoformed and covered in vast alien-like cities. The humans and other life forms in this new Earth must breathe air with low oxygen content. Thus the "alien human invaders" use cyborg-technology to fuse the bodies of the few human species they find useful on the planet with air tanks and respiration systems. Genetic modification has also returned and giant human buildings and tiny connection humans were bred to aid city construction. Genetically created horse-like men serve as mounts for the "invaders". Some engineered human species even became farmed like pigs or cattle. As with all civilization, this new era of man fell apart once again. Eventually, the space-faring humans left, the Earth was in ruins. With barely any oxygen left in the Earth's atmosphere, all terrestrial life on the planet perished. At the bottom of the world's oceans, at the oases that were underwater hot springs, life continues. In the abyss, was Piscanthropus profundus, a deep-sea descendant of the now extinct Aquatic evolved. It is implied that Piscanthropus profundus would eventually recolonize Earth's surface.
- Man After Man: An Anthropology of the Future (1990) is a speculative evolution book written by Scottish geologist Dougal Dixon. The theme of the book is a science fiction-based exploration of the possibilities of the future evolution of humans. Unlike Dixon's previous two books, his story context focuses on individuals rather than entire species, even giving them human names. The main plot of book starts 200 years from now, which for the book's scale is almost the present day. Humanity begins to play around with its own Genetics, like a kid with LEGO blocks on a large scale, creating new Humanoid creatures known as aquamorphs and aquatics (or basically Fish People), and vacuumorph beings that have been engineered for life in the vacuum of space. Their skin and eyes carry shields of skin to keep its body stable even without pressure as living space probes. Unfortunately, a century later, environmental deterioration finally kills off most of the planet's fauna. Humanity is one of the only species left standing and so a faction of the survivors (a cybernetically enhanced offshoot known as the Hitek) begin to create new Biotech Human species for the next 500 years en masse to fill in some of critical ecosystemic niches left by the general absence of the Earth's now countless extinct animal species. Meanwhile some of the remnants of unaltered humans decide to leave the wrecked earth and return when it gets well...better, while others, without the benefit of technology, return to barbarism and later a form of civilization again. Unfortunately that doesn't happen when the Earth's magnetic field flips. The Hitek (and also the remaining normal humans) went extinct themselves, allowing the altered humans to naturally evolve for a few million years (which is the main point of the book). Ironically, the descendants of humanity that went to the stars and now return have themselves been altered - and possibly evolved - so much they no longer recognize their ancestral planet, let alone the animals on its surface, and exploit both to the point of eradication. Near the end of the book, most of the Earth's inhabitants either leave or die out, leaving only a species of deep-sea aquatics to eke out hand-to-mouth lives on the ocean floor, although someday (according to the book) they would eventually leave the water and become the new dominant species on the planet. The majority of tropes below might lead you to think that this is some sort of horror novel or film. However, this is far from the case. In fact, it's only a flight of fancy created as a fictional textbook Ya Know, for Kids!
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