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“Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.”
IT IS A WELL-ESTABLISHED Achilles’ heel of human civilization that individuals are more motivated by immediate private reward than by long-term, collective future benefits.
It has been subsequently theorized that our species’ seeming inability to focus on long-term existential threats will inexorably lead to the destruction of our environment, overpopulation, and resource exhaustion.
the mathematician Émile Borel never said such a thing. Instead, he proposed a law of large numbers, demonstrating that given a universe of infinite size, every event with nonzero probability will eventually occur. Or put another way—with enough chances, anything that can happen will happen.
“The instinct of the human being upon contact with a foreign civilization is to flee. If that is not possible, it is invariably to attack. Only after surviving first contact is there an overwhelming urge to learn more. But do not mistake this response for altruistic curiosity, rather it is simply a need to understand the other in order to protect oneself from it . . . or, more likely, to attempt to destroy it.”
Presidents and generals and all the important people in position to make the most important decisions are, by and large, the least equipped for making them. —MICHAEL CRICHTON
This is not meant to be an excuse, simply an explanation.
