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Civilisation can be rebuilt. Focus on existential threats over far more likely civilisation collapse threats is done by those who view unrealised potential as l

Civilisation can be rebuilt. Focus on existential threats over far more likely civilisation collapse threats is done by those who view unrealised potential as loss. So it’s 7 billion humans vs the trillions that could exist if we keep spreading and growing and start colonising other planets. Here’s a good review/summary by a rationalist of a book on the topic by someone who if not a rationalist (I don’t actually know) was at least instrumental in starting the effective altruism movement which is rationalist adjacent. https://slatestarcodex.com/2020/04/01/book-review-the-precipice/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2020/04/01/book-review-the-precip...

codekilla 6y ago
> In my view, the greatest risk to humanity’s potential in the next hundred years comes from unaligned artificial intelligence, which I put at 1 in 10. One might be surprised to see such a high number for such a speculative risk, so it warrants some explanation. The above is from the article you link. Where.....oh where....are you getting the 1 in 10 number? This is pure, and I mean pure...uncut conjecture. This is why these types of 'intellectual' offerings are so irritating to me. There is absolutely no sound, or 'rational', way to back that number up.
- austhrow743 6y ago
  It’s a review of a book. Presumably it’s in the book. Even if you don’t care to read it and doubt his ability to estimate, add the amount of zeros in there that you think appropriate. If you think humanity has the potential to get in to the quintillions like Toby and friends, then the negative EV of it is still going to be far greater than any non existential threat. Then consider elsewhere where it’s mentioned that humanity spends more on ice cream than preventing existential threats. Maybe some of that ice cream money would help increase the accuracy of his statistics.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
monocasa 6y ago
You'd be surprised, there's a lot of advancement that we might not be able to replicate if our civilzation fully collapsed. For instance, so much of our early nuclear technology was dependent on the Shinkolobwe uranium mine in the DRC, and it's orders of magnitude better uranium purity than anything else we've found. > Our best source, the Shinkolobwe mine, represented a freak occurrence in nature. It contained a tremendously rich lode of uranium pitchblende. Nothing like it has ever again been found. The ore already in the United States contained 65 percent U3O8, while the pitchblende aboveground in the Congo amounted to a thousand tons of 65 percent ore, and the waste piles of ore contained two thousand tons of 20 percent U3O8. To illustrate the uniqueness of Sengier's stockpile, after the war the MED and the AEC considered ore containing three-tenths of 1 percent as a good find. Without Sengier’s foresight in stockpiling ore in the United States and aboveground in Africa, we simply would not have had the amounts of uranium needed to justify building the large separation plants and the plutonium reactors [for the Manhattan Project]. ~ Colonel Ken Nichols Additionally, without the very dense energy in the easily accessible fossil fuels we've very nearly mined out, restarting an industrial revolution would be at best extremely problematic. We've been OK so far with progress meaning we slam the door shut to independent replication of that progress in a lot of cases.
- pacificmint 6y ago
  > Additionally, without the very dense energy in the easily accessible fossil fuels we've very nearly mined out, restarting an industrial revolution would be at best extremely problematic. I feel like this is the more important of the two points you made. Even without Uranium, it's conceivable to have a second industrial revolution. We don't need nuclear power for that. But without easily accessible fossil fuels, it's much harder to envision the next civilization having an industrial revolution. They might indeed never rise to our level of technology again.
  - xxpor 6y ago
    Could we not bootstrap with coal? There's still plenty left. Oil would be an issue though.

codekilla 6y ago

> In my view, the greatest risk to humanity’s potential in the next hundred years comes from unaligned artificial intelligence, which I put at 1 in 10. One might be surprised to see such a high number for such a speculative risk, so it warrants some explanation. The above is from the article you link. Where.....oh where....are you getting the 1 in 10 number? This is pure, and I mean pure...uncut conjecture. This is why these types of 'intellectual' offerings are so irritating to me. There is absolutely no sound, or 'rational', way to back that number up.

austhrow743 6y ago
It’s a review of a book. Presumably it’s in the book. Even if you don’t care to read it and doubt his ability to estimate, add the amount of zeros in there that you think appropriate. If you think humanity has the potential to get in to the quintillions like Toby and friends, then the negative EV of it is still going to be far greater than any non existential threat. Then consider elsewhere where it’s mentioned that humanity spends more on ice cream than preventing existential threats. Maybe some of that ice cream money would help increase the accuracy of his statistics.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

monocasa 6y ago

You'd be surprised, there's a lot of advancement that we might not be able to replicate if our civilzation fully collapsed. For instance, so much of our early nuclear technology was dependent on the Shinkolobwe uranium mine in the DRC, and it's orders of magnitude better uranium purity than anything else we've found. > Our best source, the Shinkolobwe mine, represented a freak occurrence in nature. It contained a tremendously rich lode of uranium pitchblende. Nothing like it has ever again been found. The ore already in the United States contained 65 percent U3O8, while the pitchblende aboveground in the Congo amounted to a thousand tons of 65 percent ore, and the waste piles of ore contained two thousand tons of 20 percent U3O8. To illustrate the uniqueness of Sengier's stockpile, after the war the MED and the AEC considered ore containing three-tenths of 1 percent as a good find. Without Sengier’s foresight in stockpiling ore in the United States and aboveground in Africa, we simply would not have had the amounts of uranium needed to justify building the large separation plants and the plutonium reactors [for the Manhattan Project]. ~ Colonel Ken Nichols Additionally, without the very dense energy in the easily accessible fossil fuels we've very nearly mined out, restarting an industrial revolution would be at best extremely problematic. We've been OK so far with progress meaning we slam the door shut to independent replication of that progress in a lot of cases.

pacificmint 6y ago
> Additionally, without the very dense energy in the easily accessible fossil fuels we've very nearly mined out, restarting an industrial revolution would be at best extremely problematic. I feel like this is the more important of the two points you made. Even without Uranium, it's conceivable to have a second industrial revolution. We don't need nuclear power for that. But without easily accessible fossil fuels, it's much harder to envision the next civilization having an industrial revolution. They might indeed never rise to our level of technology again.
- xxpor 6y ago
  Could we not bootstrap with coal? There's still plenty left. Oil would be an issue though.