6 ms·

To my mind, these are the most important, unsolved problems: - environmental degradation is based on two exponential growth trends: human population and per-ca

To my mind, these are the most important, unsolved problems: - environmental degradation is based on two exponential growth trends: human population and per-capita consumption (driven by economic growth). Solving either could be, literally, a save the world scenario. The first is easiest technically, (healthcare, non-coercive birth control, education, economic opportunity for women) but a political minefield. (yes, population is still growing exponentially) - dealing with climate change. At a minimum, this means figuring out how to handle a significant rise in sea level in the next 100 years. Walls? Relocation? We need to think about response now, more so than avoidance. - actually doing geo-engineering to prevent/reverse the greenhouse effect - preventing a nuclear war - preventing a large asteroid collision - dealing with large-scale disruption of employment (for example retail continues to be hammered by online stores, self-driving trucks, etc.) Build a better Mechanical Turk might be a useful strategy. Obviously some of these are low-probability short-term events, but they have very high costs. In a sense, you would be taking advantage of people's tendency to systematically under-invest in problems of that kind.

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
atemerev 9y ago
Fun fact: not only population is no longer growing exponentially, it doesn't even grow linearly. The growth is now _sublinear_, and it looks like we'll have peak population around 2070. Problem solved. Let's do something more interesting.
- ljw1001 9y ago
  Frome wikipedia: "Global human population growth amounts to around 75 million annually, or 1.1% per year." 1.1% is exponential growth when the base is growing, just like 1.1% compound interest displays exponential growth. It is still growing exponentially, although the rate is declining.
  - atemerev 9y ago
    If the rate is declining, the growth is no longer exponential :)
    - ljw1001 9y ago
      picture two exponential growth curves, one steeper than the other, over time the a trend moves from the steeper curve to the less steep curve. The "population" whatever it is, is still growing exponentially at the less steep curve.
      - maxerickson 9y ago
        The idea is that an exponential curve is no longer the correct model for forecasting growth past 2070. Arguing about how to express that is sort of pointless.
        candiodari 9y ago
        Population growth in non-human species is quite well documented and is in fact not exponential, although the early stages look exponential. It is in fact a logistic sigmoid function. It is amazing, in that it is not what you'd expect : clearly the vast majority of species have the ability to correctly estimate the carrying capacity of a habitat and only overshoot by a little bit. So the Malthusian argument is incorrect, probably, if humans are like other animals (and since population growth curves in many localities do indeed look like S-curves I would say that this ought to be the default claim). Human population size will by itself stop just shy of the carrying capacity of the planet. Which is exactly what you'd want to happen. In all likelihood, this will happen without active measures from governments (which won't work anyway due to the global nature of the required policies), with or without popularizing contraceptives, with or without female labor participation, ... (not saying those aren't desirable, just that they aren't necessary) The alternative requires an assumption that humans are hugely different from the species that we evolved from, and since this certainly isn't true in the biological sense, why would our population growth be so very different ? Humans are not the first large animal to "conquer the planet", and reach population numbers in the billions, with some fish well on the way to trillions even today, and we aren't the biggest species in terms of total biomass by a very long way (amongst non-plants that honour likely goes to ants, but even pathetic species of bacteria dwarf their numbers). Will we be the last one ? Perhaps, but it seems unlikely. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logistic_function#In_ecology:_modeling_population_growth https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logistic_function#In_ecology:_...
- hutzlibu 9y ago
  "and it looks like we'll have peak population around 2070" So how do you factored in all the possible coming or not coming atomic/biological/chemical wars + new breakthroughs in medicine/agriculture? And since right now "More than 100 million people worldwide are facing acute malnutrition and risk starving to death" [0] I would call it a bit cynic to say "Problem solved". [0] http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/politics/number-of-people-starving-famine-un-food-agriculture-severe-hunger-worldwide-surpasses-100-million-a7611306.html http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/politics/number-of-p...
  - atemerev 9y ago
    The answer to solving world hunger is not necessarily reducing human population. Are you sure it is me who is cynical here? Additionally, more humans are expected to die from obesity than from hunger, as of now.
    - hutzlibu 9y ago
      "The answer to solving world hunger is not necessarily reducing human population" I did not say that. I just said that the problem is clearly not solved, when so many people are starving.
  - danielbarla 9y ago
    The items you mention are intellectually interesting, but somewhat counterintuitively, do not influence population growth in the way that one might expect. Case in point: breakthroughs in medicine and agriculture. One might expect that access to food and medicine leads to population growth, but in the long term, countries with the highest levels of access have the lowest population growth. It's quite a strange phenomenon, and it is basically this trend which leads statisticians to estimate 2070 as having a peak population.
    - hutzlibu 9y ago
      "It's quite a strange phenomenon, and it is basically this trend which leads statisticians to estimate 2070 as having a peak population." Yes, but it might be a missleading one. Because I think our society causes many people to consider children as expensive and time-consuming and therefore not wanting to have children. But that might change again. There were times when childrens were be seen as a luxery or as a necessity, a insurance for old age. I mean, I am not saying it will change to that or that direction, but I think you can't really predict the future on how the world is acting today as human society changed quite drastic in the last hundreds years. I would rather predict that human society will continue to change and therefore I am very cautious with any fixed predictions.
- soVeryTired 9y ago
  Are you talking about the west or the whole world? Because if you're talking about the whole world, I'm pretty sure you're incorrect.
  - xiaq 9y ago
    The trend is universal, although some developing countries have not reached that stage yet. Kurzgesagt has a good video on this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QsBT5EQt348 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QsBT5EQt348
    - ljw1001 9y ago
      The trend is towards low/no growth, but it's not there yet because of the current growth in some developing countries as you mention. People need to recognize that this is, currently, just a trend, and not yet a fact and certainly not a physical law. For example, large families are correlated with religious fundamentalism, which is rising. Could it rise to the point where the trend changes? It is possible.
      - dirtyaura 9y ago
        Family size is generally going down everywhere, also in religious countries. Population growth is mainly because we live longer. It's not a physical law, but still pretty well understood phenomenon: more likely your offsprings are going to survive, less likely you are going breed more of them. Rosling also claimed that population growth projections have been very accurate for decades.
        thanksgiving 9y ago
        As "we" have fewer children and "they" continue to have more children, I'm not sure where the future is headed. I'm not saying Idiocracy levels but you have to wonder if the video is correct. For example, what is erdogan thinking when he says Turks should have five or more children? I'd love to be able to read what's going on in people's heads. Personally, I couldn't give two (insert expletive) if my "culture and heritage" were to disappear or dissolve I to something new in fifty or a hundred years.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
nawitus 9y ago
"- environmental degradation is based on two exponential growth trends: human population and per-capita consumption (driven by economic growth)." You left out one detail: environmental degration per consumption. This is a really important factor, and is probably easist of th tree to minimize, and is being minimized every year. (Assuming that you didn't equate consumption and environmental degration).
- ljw1001 9y ago
  yeah, it's not a complete model. :)
m_fayer 9y ago
If you first instinct is to address these problems with some sort of startup, I think you've got a hammer-problem going on. These are societal problems that the market has shown no appetite for tackling or capacity for actually resolving.
- ljw1001 9y ago
  The original post was about frighteningly difficult problems. I think they meet that criterion.
- wolfgke 9y ago
  > If you first instinct is to address these problems with some sort of startup, I think you've got a hammer-problem going on. These are societal problems that the market has shown no appetite for tackling or capacity for actually resolving. I'm cautious with this: If you know what problems people/society has, you know what products to solve/mitigate these problems might be bought. This perfectly sound like startup opportunities to me.
lazyant 9y ago
add preventing epidemic that can wipe out humanity
gregatragenet3 9y ago
No, the biggest problem is how you monetize that. We already know how to solve these, but the short term cost/benefit for the averge person just isn't there. Figure out how you get average people to willingly spend their money for products that solve those problems.
downandout 9y ago
Unfortunately, all but the last item on your list have no or negative revenue potential. No one (save perhaps a few lefty billionaires) will pay you for the environmental stuff you mentioned, preventing a nuclear war, or preventing a large asteroid collision. I suppose there might be a small NASA contract in there for the asteroid issue, but the current budget for even tracking asteroids, much less stopping them, is small.
splittingTimes 9y ago
Wholeheartly agree. Let me extend your list. In 2004, the United Nations' "High-level Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change" analysed threats and challenges to international peace and security. Their top ten list in priority order: Poverty, Infectious disease, Environmental degradation, Inter-state war, Civil war, Genocide, Other atrocities (e.g., trade in women and children for sexual slavery, or kidnapping for body parts), Weapons of mass destruction (nuclear proliferation, chemical weapon proliferation, biological weapon proliferation), Terrorism, and Transnational organized crime. [1] Jean-francois Rischard's "High Noon: 20 Global Problems, 20 Years To Solve Them" also identifies 20 issues broken down into 3 groups [2]: Group one (sharing our planet) includes global warming; biodiversity and ecosystem losses, fisheries depletion, deforestation, water deficits, and maritime safety and pollution. Group two (sharing our humanity) includes massive step-up in the fight against poverty, peacekeeping-conflict prevention-combatting terrorism, education for all, global infectuous diseases, digital divide, and natural disaster prevention and mitigation. Group three (sharing our rule book) includes reinventing taxation for the 21st century, biotechnology rules, global financial architecture, illegal drugs, trade-investment-competition rules, intellectual property rights, e-commerce rules, and international labor and migration rules. edit: formatting. === [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-level_Panel_on_Threats,_Challenges_and_Change https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-level_Panel_on_Threats,_C... [2] https://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-reviews/R28KHPSYSQ7O6T/ref=cm_cr_dp_d_rvw_ttl?ie=UTF8&ASIN=0465070108 https://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-reviews/R28KHPSYSQ7O6T/re...

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

atemerev 9y ago

Fun fact: not only population is no longer growing exponentially, it doesn't even grow linearly. The growth is now _sublinear_, and it looks like we'll have peak population around 2070. Problem solved. Let's do something more interesting.

ljw1001 9y ago
Frome wikipedia: "Global human population growth amounts to around 75 million annually, or 1.1% per year." 1.1% is exponential growth when the base is growing, just like 1.1% compound interest displays exponential growth. It is still growing exponentially, although the rate is declining.
- atemerev 9y ago
  If the rate is declining, the growth is no longer exponential :)
  - ljw1001 9y ago
    picture two exponential growth curves, one steeper than the other, over time the a trend moves from the steeper curve to the less steep curve. The "population" whatever it is, is still growing exponentially at the less steep curve.
    - maxerickson 9y ago
      The idea is that an exponential curve is no longer the correct model for forecasting growth past 2070. Arguing about how to express that is sort of pointless.
      - candiodari 9y ago
        Population growth in non-human species is quite well documented and is in fact not exponential, although the early stages look exponential. It is in fact a logistic sigmoid function. It is amazing, in that it is not what you'd expect : clearly the vast majority of species have the ability to correctly estimate the carrying capacity of a habitat and only overshoot by a little bit. So the Malthusian argument is incorrect, probably, if humans are like other animals (and since population growth curves in many localities do indeed look like S-curves I would say that this ought to be the default claim). Human population size will by itself stop just shy of the carrying capacity of the planet. Which is exactly what you'd want to happen. In all likelihood, this will happen without active measures from governments (which won't work anyway due to the global nature of the required policies), with or without popularizing contraceptives, with or without female labor participation, ... (not saying those aren't desirable, just that they aren't necessary) The alternative requires an assumption that humans are hugely different from the species that we evolved from, and since this certainly isn't true in the biological sense, why would our population growth be so very different ? Humans are not the first large animal to "conquer the planet", and reach population numbers in the billions, with some fish well on the way to trillions even today, and we aren't the biggest species in terms of total biomass by a very long way (amongst non-plants that honour likely goes to ants, but even pathetic species of bacteria dwarf their numbers). Will we be the last one ? Perhaps, but it seems unlikely. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logistic_function#In_ecology:_modeling_population_growth https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logistic_function#In_ecology:_...
hutzlibu 9y ago
"and it looks like we'll have peak population around 2070" So how do you factored in all the possible coming or not coming atomic/biological/chemical wars + new breakthroughs in medicine/agriculture? And since right now "More than 100 million people worldwide are facing acute malnutrition and risk starving to death" [0] I would call it a bit cynic to say "Problem solved". [0] http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/politics/number-of-people-starving-famine-un-food-agriculture-severe-hunger-worldwide-surpasses-100-million-a7611306.html http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/politics/number-of-p...
- atemerev 9y ago
  The answer to solving world hunger is not necessarily reducing human population. Are you sure it is me who is cynical here? Additionally, more humans are expected to die from obesity than from hunger, as of now.
  - hutzlibu 9y ago
    "The answer to solving world hunger is not necessarily reducing human population" I did not say that. I just said that the problem is clearly not solved, when so many people are starving.
- danielbarla 9y ago
  The items you mention are intellectually interesting, but somewhat counterintuitively, do not influence population growth in the way that one might expect. Case in point: breakthroughs in medicine and agriculture. One might expect that access to food and medicine leads to population growth, but in the long term, countries with the highest levels of access have the lowest population growth. It's quite a strange phenomenon, and it is basically this trend which leads statisticians to estimate 2070 as having a peak population.
  - hutzlibu 9y ago
    "It's quite a strange phenomenon, and it is basically this trend which leads statisticians to estimate 2070 as having a peak population." Yes, but it might be a missleading one. Because I think our society causes many people to consider children as expensive and time-consuming and therefore not wanting to have children. But that might change again. There were times when childrens were be seen as a luxery or as a necessity, a insurance for old age. I mean, I am not saying it will change to that or that direction, but I think you can't really predict the future on how the world is acting today as human society changed quite drastic in the last hundreds years. I would rather predict that human society will continue to change and therefore I am very cautious with any fixed predictions.
soVeryTired 9y ago
Are you talking about the west or the whole world? Because if you're talking about the whole world, I'm pretty sure you're incorrect.
- xiaq 9y ago
  The trend is universal, although some developing countries have not reached that stage yet. Kurzgesagt has a good video on this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QsBT5EQt348 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QsBT5EQt348
  - ljw1001 9y ago
    The trend is towards low/no growth, but it's not there yet because of the current growth in some developing countries as you mention. People need to recognize that this is, currently, just a trend, and not yet a fact and certainly not a physical law. For example, large families are correlated with religious fundamentalism, which is rising. Could it rise to the point where the trend changes? It is possible.
    - dirtyaura 9y ago
      Family size is generally going down everywhere, also in religious countries. Population growth is mainly because we live longer. It's not a physical law, but still pretty well understood phenomenon: more likely your offsprings are going to survive, less likely you are going breed more of them. Rosling also claimed that population growth projections have been very accurate for decades.
      - thanksgiving 9y ago
        As "we" have fewer children and "they" continue to have more children, I'm not sure where the future is headed. I'm not saying Idiocracy levels but you have to wonder if the video is correct. For example, what is erdogan thinking when he says Turks should have five or more children? I'd love to be able to read what's going on in people's heads. Personally, I couldn't give two (insert expletive) if my "culture and heritage" were to disappear or dissolve I to something new in fifty or a hundred years.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]

nawitus 9y ago

"- environmental degradation is based on two exponential growth trends: human population and per-capita consumption (driven by economic growth)." You left out one detail: environmental degration per consumption. This is a really important factor, and is probably easist of th tree to minimize, and is being minimized every year. (Assuming that you didn't equate consumption and environmental degration).

ljw1001 9y ago
yeah, it's not a complete model. :)

m_fayer 9y ago

If you first instinct is to address these problems with some sort of startup, I think you've got a hammer-problem going on. These are societal problems that the market has shown no appetite for tackling or capacity for actually resolving.

ljw1001 9y ago
The original post was about frighteningly difficult problems. I think they meet that criterion.
wolfgke 9y ago
> If you first instinct is to address these problems with some sort of startup, I think you've got a hammer-problem going on. These are societal problems that the market has shown no appetite for tackling or capacity for actually resolving. I'm cautious with this: If you know what problems people/society has, you know what products to solve/mitigate these problems might be bought. This perfectly sound like startup opportunities to me.

lazyant 9y ago

add preventing epidemic that can wipe out humanity

gregatragenet3 9y ago

No, the biggest problem is how you monetize that. We already know how to solve these, but the short term cost/benefit for the averge person just isn't there. Figure out how you get average people to willingly spend their money for products that solve those problems.

downandout 9y ago

Unfortunately, all but the last item on your list have no or negative revenue potential. No one (save perhaps a few lefty billionaires) will pay you for the environmental stuff you mentioned, preventing a nuclear war, or preventing a large asteroid collision. I suppose there might be a small NASA contract in there for the asteroid issue, but the current budget for even tracking asteroids, much less stopping them, is small.

splittingTimes 9y ago

Wholeheartly agree. Let me extend your list. In 2004, the United Nations' "High-level Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change" analysed threats and challenges to international peace and security. Their top ten list in priority order: Poverty, Infectious disease, Environmental degradation, Inter-state war, Civil war, Genocide, Other atrocities (e.g., trade in women and children for sexual slavery, or kidnapping for body parts), Weapons of mass destruction (nuclear proliferation, chemical weapon proliferation, biological weapon proliferation), Terrorism, and Transnational organized crime. [1] Jean-francois Rischard's "High Noon: 20 Global Problems, 20 Years To Solve Them" also identifies 20 issues broken down into 3 groups [2]: Group one (sharing our planet) includes global warming; biodiversity and ecosystem losses, fisheries depletion, deforestation, water deficits, and maritime safety and pollution. Group two (sharing our humanity) includes massive step-up in the fight against poverty, peacekeeping-conflict prevention-combatting terrorism, education for all, global infectuous diseases, digital divide, and natural disaster prevention and mitigation. Group three (sharing our rule book) includes reinventing taxation for the 21st century, biotechnology rules, global financial architecture, illegal drugs, trade-investment-competition rules, intellectual property rights, e-commerce rules, and international labor and migration rules. edit: formatting. === [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-level_Panel_on_Threats,_Challenges_and_Change https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-level_Panel_on_Threats,_C... [2] https://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-reviews/R28KHPSYSQ7O6T/ref=cm_cr_dp_d_rvw_ttl?ie=UTF8&ASIN=0465070108 https://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-reviews/R28KHPSYSQ7O6T/re...