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People are mobile. What would actually happen would be the biggest refugee crisis the world has ever seen. Imagine tens of millions of climate refugees at the

People are mobile. What would actually happen would be the biggest refugee crisis the world has ever seen. Imagine tens of millions of climate refugees at the border of many different countries, and the choice is to let them in and take care of them or let them die right there. It's not a good situation to be in. Realistically speaking, with that many people, good luck keeping them out.

noir_lord 7y ago
I remember reading a sci-fi story back in the 80's (damn I wish I could remember the name) where that basically happened, Europe and the US fortified their borders (massive walls/fences, automated weapon systems, usual sci-fi fare) and left the rest of the world to it's own devices. I was only a kid and I remember thinking "I can't imagine that ever happening" then I look at the refugee camps in EU states (Greece particularly) and it doesn't seem so far fetched. Trump and his wall as well.
- CydeWeys 7y ago
  This has been a plot of quite a few novels, so I'm struggling to come up with that exact one (if I've even read it). Off the top of my head, Children of Men is similar.
  - noir_lord 7y ago
    It definitely wasn't Children of Men, I read so much pulp sci-fi back then it all blurred (except for the stand out stuff like Iain M Banks - I still remember exactly where I was when I read Consider Phlebas - At the caravan park near Pevensey Bay in 1989, book was a birthday present).
    - CydeWeys 7y ago
      Stand on Zanzibar deals with overpopulation too, but that's probably not it either (it's not a central plot point).
- wongarsu 7y ago
  If some of the worse projections become true and large stretches of land become uninhabitable or very inhospitable my money is on the US deploying semi-automated machine gun turrets along the border wall: the turrets will have automated target aquisition and tracking but a minimum-wage border patrol agent in an office in Austin will have to confirm the kill decision. It will be about as controversial as the drone program. Meanwhile in the EU the discussion will be around the coast guard shooting African refugee ships instead of rescuing them. The only real winner will be Russia: they can just absorb all the refugees from South Asia and use them to populate then-inhabitable Syberia.
  - noir_lord 7y ago
    Those automated machine guns already exist, a Korean company was developing them over a decade ago for the DMZ. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SGR-A1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SGR-A1
    - wongarsu 7y ago
      It even comes with full automation, the operator can get up and fetch coffee without worrying about anyone slipping through. How convenient. I just hope nobody tells Trump these exist.
      - noir_lord 7y ago
        Oh I'm sure he already knows. ...and really how hard would it be to build one of these, the level of CV required is already solved off the shelf, the rest is sensors, servos, a gun to strap to it and programming. I'd expect a none-trivial percentage of the HN could build one with the resources available.
        wongarsu 7y ago
        It would be quite a fun project. You could even use machine learning to predict the motion of the target to be most effective even when you reach 1-4 seconds bullet travel time (1 second at the range of the effective range, 4 seconds at maximum range). Reliably detecting humans sounds hard though. This is a highly adversarial scenario, they will do anything from carrying cardboard in front of them to disguising as wildlife and vegetation. I'm not sure this is even solvable without shooting down anything that moves and is unidentified.
- hedora 7y ago
  The Sheep Look Up was similar, and depressingly prescient.
Sharlin 7y ago
It's really interesting how this doesn't seem to occur to some people even in this HN discussion, even in the context of the recent refugee waves to Europe and the illegal immigration situation in the US. Boggles the mind that someone would think that entire populations would just… lay down and die or something!
ycgeu 7y ago
Unless they are armed, you can simply shoot at the air and they'll scram.
- TeMPOraL 7y ago
  Up until you run out of bullets.
- CydeWeys 7y ago
  This "solution" ignores the fallout of said actions. The British lost their highly profitable Indian colony because the citizens at home could not stomach the killings of hundreds of Indians. The average American would not be OK with seeing videos of millions of refugees being mowed down at the border. And that's ultimately what it would take. When you're dying of dehydration or starving to death, you aren't going to care too much about people shooting into the air.
  - ycgeu 7y ago
    >This "solution" ignores the fallout of said actions. The British lost their highly profitable Indian colony because the citizens at home could not stomach the killings of hundreds of Indians. The average American would not be OK with seeing videos of millions of refugees being mowed down at the border. When the alternative is living next to them, that perception might change. Time will tell.
    - CydeWeys 7y ago
      Most Americans are plenty willing to live next to immigrants. That's not a problem at all. Mmmmmm, tasty food.

noir_lord 7y ago

I remember reading a sci-fi story back in the 80's (damn I wish I could remember the name) where that basically happened, Europe and the US fortified their borders (massive walls/fences, automated weapon systems, usual sci-fi fare) and left the rest of the world to it's own devices. I was only a kid and I remember thinking "I can't imagine that ever happening" then I look at the refugee camps in EU states (Greece particularly) and it doesn't seem so far fetched. Trump and his wall as well.

CydeWeys 7y ago
This has been a plot of quite a few novels, so I'm struggling to come up with that exact one (if I've even read it). Off the top of my head, Children of Men is similar.
- noir_lord 7y ago
  It definitely wasn't Children of Men, I read so much pulp sci-fi back then it all blurred (except for the stand out stuff like Iain M Banks - I still remember exactly where I was when I read Consider Phlebas - At the caravan park near Pevensey Bay in 1989, book was a birthday present).
  - CydeWeys 7y ago
    Stand on Zanzibar deals with overpopulation too, but that's probably not it either (it's not a central plot point).
wongarsu 7y ago
If some of the worse projections become true and large stretches of land become uninhabitable or very inhospitable my money is on the US deploying semi-automated machine gun turrets along the border wall: the turrets will have automated target aquisition and tracking but a minimum-wage border patrol agent in an office in Austin will have to confirm the kill decision. It will be about as controversial as the drone program. Meanwhile in the EU the discussion will be around the coast guard shooting African refugee ships instead of rescuing them. The only real winner will be Russia: they can just absorb all the refugees from South Asia and use them to populate then-inhabitable Syberia.
- noir_lord 7y ago
  Those automated machine guns already exist, a Korean company was developing them over a decade ago for the DMZ. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SGR-A1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SGR-A1
  - wongarsu 7y ago
    It even comes with full automation, the operator can get up and fetch coffee without worrying about anyone slipping through. How convenient. I just hope nobody tells Trump these exist.
    - noir_lord 7y ago
      Oh I'm sure he already knows. ...and really how hard would it be to build one of these, the level of CV required is already solved off the shelf, the rest is sensors, servos, a gun to strap to it and programming. I'd expect a none-trivial percentage of the HN could build one with the resources available.
      - wongarsu 7y ago
        It would be quite a fun project. You could even use machine learning to predict the motion of the target to be most effective even when you reach 1-4 seconds bullet travel time (1 second at the range of the effective range, 4 seconds at maximum range). Reliably detecting humans sounds hard though. This is a highly adversarial scenario, they will do anything from carrying cardboard in front of them to disguising as wildlife and vegetation. I'm not sure this is even solvable without shooting down anything that moves and is unidentified.
hedora 7y ago
The Sheep Look Up was similar, and depressingly prescient.

Sharlin 7y ago

It's really interesting how this doesn't seem to occur to some people even in this HN discussion, even in the context of the recent refugee waves to Europe and the illegal immigration situation in the US. Boggles the mind that someone would think that entire populations would just… lay down and die or something!

ycgeu 7y ago

Unless they are armed, you can simply shoot at the air and they'll scram.

TeMPOraL 7y ago
Up until you run out of bullets.
CydeWeys 7y ago
This "solution" ignores the fallout of said actions. The British lost their highly profitable Indian colony because the citizens at home could not stomach the killings of hundreds of Indians. The average American would not be OK with seeing videos of millions of refugees being mowed down at the border. And that's ultimately what it would take. When you're dying of dehydration or starving to death, you aren't going to care too much about people shooting into the air.
- ycgeu 7y ago
  >This "solution" ignores the fallout of said actions. The British lost their highly profitable Indian colony because the citizens at home could not stomach the killings of hundreds of Indians. The average American would not be OK with seeing videos of millions of refugees being mowed down at the border. When the alternative is living next to them, that perception might change. Time will tell.
  - CydeWeys 7y ago
    Most Americans are plenty willing to live next to immigrants. That's not a problem at all. Mmmmmm, tasty food.