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Don’t act without integrity.
Don’t despair.
Don’t ignore the positive.
The contraceptive pill, one of the most revolutionary inventions of the twentieth century, was made possible by a single philanthropist.
Katharine McCormick
Green Revolution,
Norman Borlaug,
This chapter is about potential, not prophecy. Not what we will achieve, but what is open for us to achieve if we play our cards right; if we are patient, prudent, compassionate, ambitious and wise.
Human history so far has seen 200,000 years of Homo sapiens and 10,000 years of civilisation.
Such a timescale is enough to repair the damage that we, in our immaturity, have inflicted upon the Earth.
only we could save the biosphere from the effects of the brightening Sun.
humanity’s instrumental value may yet be profound. For if we can last long enough, we will have a chance to literally save our world.
Perhaps, with ingenuity and commitment, we could extend the time allotted to complex life on Earth by billions of years, and, in doing so, more than redeem ourselves for the foolishness of our civilisation’s youth.
When I contemplate the expected timespan that Earth-based life may survive and flourish, the greatest contribution comes from the possibility of humanity turning from its destroyer, to its saviour.
The sunlight hitting Earth’s surface each day carries 5,000 times more energy than modern civilisation requires. It gives in two hours what we use in a year.
Earth intercepts less than one part in a billion;
if we were to find other life—especially intelligent life—it could profoundly change our future direction.
If we could travel just six light years at a time, then almost all the stars of our galaxy would be reachable.
a sphere around us extending out 46 billion light years in all directions, known as the observable universe.
Frank Ramsey,
I don’t feel the least humble before the vastness of the heavens. The stars may be large, but they cannot think or love; and these are qualities which impress me far more than size does. I take no credit for weighing nearly seventeen stone. My picture of the world is drawn in perspective, and not to scale. The foreground is occupied by human beings and the stars are all small as threepenny bits.
the matter of which we are comprised has been so delicately arranged as to allow us to think and love and create and dream.
the rest of the universe appears to lack such qualities.
in terms of value, the stars are as small as ...
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the potential quality of our future is also grand beyond imagining.
human life, for all its joys, could be dramatically better than it is today.
peak experiences.
What beauties are we blind to?
the space of possible experiences and modes of life, and the degree of flourishing they make available, may be similarly vast, and that everyday life may acquaint us with a similarly parochial proportion.
our investigations of flourishing thus far in history may be like astronomy before telescopes—with such limited vision, it is easy to think the universe small, and human-centred.
implants granting digital extensions to our minds, or developments in artificial intelligence allowing us to craft entirely new kinds of beings to join us or replace us.
we stand before something extraordinarily vast and valuable—
Moral philosophy has been focused on the more pressing issues of treating each other decently in a world of scarce resources. But there may come a time, not too far away, when we mostly have our house in order and can look in earnest at where we might go from here. Where we might address this vast question about our ultimate values. This is the Long Reflection.
ρ = ηg + δ
not in the shape of an exponential. They discount at high rates over the short term and low rates over the long term.
Nicholas Stern
He set pure time preference to zero and set δ to a catastrophe rate of 0.1 percent per annum
This values humanity’s future at about 1,000 times the value of the next year
If annual risks become low in the long term, then the expected value of the future is very great indeed.
population ethics.
Total View:
repugnant conclusion:
person-affecting views.
technological maturity—
Kardashev
There is effectively another book-worth of content tucked away in the notes for readers who are eager to know more.
I’ve tried to be disciplined in keeping the main text on a straight path to its destination, so the scenic detours are all hidden in the notes.
Maps of Time by David Christian
Foraging typically required about ten square miles of land to support each person
Francis Bacon’s Novum Organum (1620) is the canonical exposition of the scientific method,
