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You're not taking into account technological and industrial innovation. Presumably there will be new ideas iterated upon that get us closer to universal abundan

You're not taking into account technological and industrial innovation. Presumably there will be new ideas iterated upon that get us closer to universal abundance. My main concerns over the next few decades are cyberwar collapse (< 1% chance), runaway AI (10% chance), robotized world war (30% chance), and solar flare induced societal collapse (40% chance). Yeah, cereal is 20% more expensive but DeepMind just beat GPT3.

RealityVoid 5y ago
I wonder why solar flare societal collapse ranks so high on your list.
- xsarin 5y ago
  Society is so incredibly dependent on technology that is not EMP resistant and if a solar flare knocks out most of our electronics the bottom is going to fall out. No phones or internet to figure out what's going on, no cars since the onboard electronics are needed- same with trucks, trains etc. Can't go to the grocery store and buy food with your debit card, can't get cash from the bank, grocery store isn't going to get shipments anymore etc. Our dependence on it all puts us on really fragile ground given that we know there have been sun events in the last 150 years that would obliterate everything we have today
  - RealityVoid 5y ago
    I have read that the dangers of EMP's are greatly overstated and they could damage stuff, but mostly the power grid, since you need long lines to induce sufficient power for it to matter.
    - jacquesm 5y ago
      Exactly. At about 30V / km the potential to do damage to smaller electric circuits is limited, but anything connected to longer lines is at risk.
- kortex 5y ago
  Not GP but it's a cascade failure mode with theoretically no upper bound in how much chaos it could cause. A toilet paper shortage caused millions to lose their goddamn minds, what do you think having no refrigeration on a world scale for even a week would do? A CME could potentially fry enough equipment that we would be left in in the dark and unable to repair for months, just due to availability of parts. I believe those estimates are at current production rates, too. If the supply chain and global comms are compromised, it's even harder. It's definitely at the sweet spot of "terrifying" and "completely plausible."
  - nefitty 5y ago
    Yes, perfectly said. Here's in-depth info on solar flares. Major ones are considered "Carrington-level events", due to a flare that occurred in 1859: https://www.history.com/news/a-perfect-solar-superstorm-the-1859-carrington-event https://www.history.com/news/a-perfect-solar-superstorm-the-... Vox's 2014 breakdown of the systemic risks: https://www.vox.com/platform/amp/2014/7/30/5951263/a-catastrophic-solar-storm-just-barely-missed-earth-in-2012 https://www.vox.com/platform/amp/2014/7/30/5951263/a-catastr... NASA article on the prediction that there was a 12% chance a Carrington-level event would occur by 2022: https://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2014/23jul_superstorm/ https://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2014/2... My 40% is based on that information. I'm gut-extrapolating to the next few decades, with the understanding that large devastating flares occur every few hundred years.
baq 5y ago
resources are finite and technological innovation is finite, too. thermodynamics gives us very precise upper limits to efficiency increases and to the surprise of no one, low hanging fruit are all picked.
- cnlevy 5y ago
  Sure, African agriculture is already at max. efficency. Giant farms fully mechanized, of course /s
  - nefitty 5y ago
    Great point. I'm starting to look at Africa for that low hanging fruit.
  - snapcaster 5y ago
    Kind of unrelated but if you're interested in African agriculture you should look into Seeing Like a State. The book argues mechanized farms aren't necessarily the highest form of farming for maximum sustainable yield in many places (like many regions in Africa) and has many many hard to notice downsides. A lot of the pressure to consolidate and mechanize has to do with legibility for taxation purposes compared to true yield maximization
- cryptonector 5y ago
  Yes, but you're assuming indefinite growth. Again, in the real world we're already on a path to decreasing population.
- jstanley 5y ago
  You could have said the same thing 100 years ago.
  - CuriouslyC 5y ago
    You're making the same mistake all the star eyed futurists make, which is to not realize that in reality, all exponential curves are just early/mid stage sigmoidal curves. You can paradigm shift all you want, that's not going to make infinite progression a thing.

RealityVoid 5y ago

I wonder why solar flare societal collapse ranks so high on your list.

xsarin 5y ago
Society is so incredibly dependent on technology that is not EMP resistant and if a solar flare knocks out most of our electronics the bottom is going to fall out. No phones or internet to figure out what's going on, no cars since the onboard electronics are needed- same with trucks, trains etc. Can't go to the grocery store and buy food with your debit card, can't get cash from the bank, grocery store isn't going to get shipments anymore etc. Our dependence on it all puts us on really fragile ground given that we know there have been sun events in the last 150 years that would obliterate everything we have today
- RealityVoid 5y ago
  I have read that the dangers of EMP's are greatly overstated and they could damage stuff, but mostly the power grid, since you need long lines to induce sufficient power for it to matter.
  - jacquesm 5y ago
    Exactly. At about 30V / km the potential to do damage to smaller electric circuits is limited, but anything connected to longer lines is at risk.
kortex 5y ago
Not GP but it's a cascade failure mode with theoretically no upper bound in how much chaos it could cause. A toilet paper shortage caused millions to lose their goddamn minds, what do you think having no refrigeration on a world scale for even a week would do? A CME could potentially fry enough equipment that we would be left in in the dark and unable to repair for months, just due to availability of parts. I believe those estimates are at current production rates, too. If the supply chain and global comms are compromised, it's even harder. It's definitely at the sweet spot of "terrifying" and "completely plausible."
- nefitty 5y ago
  Yes, perfectly said. Here's in-depth info on solar flares. Major ones are considered "Carrington-level events", due to a flare that occurred in 1859: https://www.history.com/news/a-perfect-solar-superstorm-the-1859-carrington-event https://www.history.com/news/a-perfect-solar-superstorm-the-... Vox's 2014 breakdown of the systemic risks: https://www.vox.com/platform/amp/2014/7/30/5951263/a-catastrophic-solar-storm-just-barely-missed-earth-in-2012 https://www.vox.com/platform/amp/2014/7/30/5951263/a-catastr... NASA article on the prediction that there was a 12% chance a Carrington-level event would occur by 2022: https://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2014/23jul_superstorm/ https://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2014/2... My 40% is based on that information. I'm gut-extrapolating to the next few decades, with the understanding that large devastating flares occur every few hundred years.

baq 5y ago

resources are finite and technological innovation is finite, too. thermodynamics gives us very precise upper limits to efficiency increases and to the surprise of no one, low hanging fruit are all picked.

cnlevy 5y ago
Sure, African agriculture is already at max. efficency. Giant farms fully mechanized, of course /s
- nefitty 5y ago
  Great point. I'm starting to look at Africa for that low hanging fruit.
- snapcaster 5y ago
  Kind of unrelated but if you're interested in African agriculture you should look into Seeing Like a State. The book argues mechanized farms aren't necessarily the highest form of farming for maximum sustainable yield in many places (like many regions in Africa) and has many many hard to notice downsides. A lot of the pressure to consolidate and mechanize has to do with legibility for taxation purposes compared to true yield maximization
cryptonector 5y ago
Yes, but you're assuming indefinite growth. Again, in the real world we're already on a path to decreasing population.
jstanley 5y ago
You could have said the same thing 100 years ago.
- CuriouslyC 5y ago
  You're making the same mistake all the star eyed futurists make, which is to not realize that in reality, all exponential curves are just early/mid stage sigmoidal curves. You can paradigm shift all you want, that's not going to make infinite progression a thing.