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Why would you want to create a manual when we clearly failed in current form?

by lvl102 4y ago

klyrs 4y ago
That's a good consideration, and any such document must display ample humility. Today, we could fill several volumes with "This is what we know we got wrong, this is how we might have avoided it." Alternatively, hook the reader with the power of the nuclear weaponry, and write with an unironic lack of self awareness. Trust the reader to read between the lines. What could possibly go wrong?
- andrewla 4y ago
  Do we, though, know what we got wrong? In the hypothetical, our civilization has failed and a new group is trying to use this manual to start up civilization again. Who is to say that one of the things that we think we got wrong would, in fact, have saved our civilization? To put it differently [1]: > Who wants a how-to manual from a failed civilizations? [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32638385 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32638385
  - klyrs 4y ago
    We know some things that we got wrong. We saw climate change coming, generations ahead. Could a time traveller change a damned thing? Probably not! Unless they had some brilliant tech, say,chemistry for excellent batteries and solar panels that could have been made with 50s tech -- that might have put us on a different trajectory altogether.
throw0101a 4y ago
> Why would you want to create a manual when we clearly failed in current form? Because it could be not-failed at Time F but failed at Time X, and somewhere between the two a bad decision was made. If you know what the previous civ did, you can perhaps learn from their mistakes and bootstrap yourself until the bad branch point and take a different path at that point.
giantg2 4y ago
If you read the article, it's basically what knowledge via books we would want to pass on if civilization was restarting. Hopefully that would mean we select to correct for our current failing for the hypothetical next civilization.
towaway15463 4y ago
The fact that you didn’t die when you were 2 months old begs to differ.
Cthulhu_ 4y ago
Except... we haven't failed? We're still around. Sure, there's imperfections and we know how to solve or prevent them from happening again - which is what should be preserved, rough edges and all. Like, "we tried democracy but these are the downsides and here's some situations where the imperfect system was abused", or "here is a super effective source of energy, but here's some situations where it went wrong and we irradiated large areas" "we clearly failed" is catastrophising the current situation and is a defeatist attitude.
- tablespoon 4y ago
  > Except... we haven't failed? We're still around. The use case for a "Manual for Civilization" is a scenario where we have failed, so it's a valid assumption when considering something like this. It might be pretty unwise to create such a manual, because it would almost certainly be a manual for repeating the last set of mistakes.
andrewla 4y ago
A lot of comments disparaging this, but it is fundamentally correct. If our civilization as it is survives and does not collapse, then this "manual" is unnecessary. It is only useful if our civilization has clearly failed. Maybe sanitation was a huge mistake. Maybe antibiotics were a huge mistake. Maybe the remnants of humanity that survive the apocalypse will look back on a humanity all but wiped out by superbugs of their own making. Maybe agriculture was a huge mistake. Maybe the march towards monocultures is inevitable, and the remnants of humanity that survive the apocalypse will look back on a humanity all but wiped out by blights or the total depletion of fertile topsoil. For anything that we wish to impart to these remnants, there's a scenario where that is why we failed, because we must assume that we did fail to justify the attempt at the manual at all.
- JoeAltmaier 4y ago
  Who wants a how-to manual from a failed civilizations?
mbg721 4y ago
Defeating the failure of civilization entirely is a really high bar; the thing we're trying to prevent is failing faster and more painfully. This is like asking "Why would people who are going to die anyway bother having hospitals?"

Why would you want to create a manual when we clearly failed in current form?

by lvl102 4y ago

Why would you want to create a manual when we clearly failed in current form?

That's a good consideration, and any such document must display ample humility. Today, we could fill several volumes with "This is what we know we got wrong, this is how we might have avoided it." Alternatively, hook the reader with the power of the nuclear weaponry, and write with an unironic lack of self awareness. Trust the reader to read between the lines. What could possibly go wrong?

andrewla 4y ago
Do we, though, know what we got wrong? In the hypothetical, our civilization has failed and a new group is trying to use this manual to start up civilization again. Who is to say that one of the things that we think we got wrong would, in fact, have saved our civilization? To put it differently [1]: > Who wants a how-to manual from a failed civilizations? [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32638385 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32638385
- klyrs 4y ago
  We know some things that we got wrong. We saw climate change coming, generations ahead. Could a time traveller change a damned thing? Probably not! Unless they had some brilliant tech, say,chemistry for excellent batteries and solar panels that could have been made with 50s tech -- that might have put us on a different trajectory altogether.

throw0101a 4y ago

> Why would you want to create a manual when we clearly failed in current form? Because it could be not-failed at Time F but failed at Time X, and somewhere between the two a bad decision was made. If you know what the previous civ did, you can perhaps learn from their mistakes and bootstrap yourself until the bad branch point and take a different path at that point.

giantg2 4y ago

If you read the article, it's basically what knowledge via books we would want to pass on if civilization was restarting. Hopefully that would mean we select to correct for our current failing for the hypothetical next civilization.

towaway15463 4y ago

The fact that you didn’t die when you were 2 months old begs to differ.

Cthulhu_ 4y ago

Except... we haven't failed? We're still around. Sure, there's imperfections and we know how to solve or prevent them from happening again - which is what should be preserved, rough edges and all. Like, "we tried democracy but these are the downsides and here's some situations where the imperfect system was abused", or "here is a super effective source of energy, but here's some situations where it went wrong and we irradiated large areas" "we clearly failed" is catastrophising the current situation and is a defeatist attitude.

tablespoon 4y ago
> Except... we haven't failed? We're still around. The use case for a "Manual for Civilization" is a scenario where we have failed, so it's a valid assumption when considering something like this. It might be pretty unwise to create such a manual, because it would almost certainly be a manual for repeating the last set of mistakes.

andrewla 4y ago

A lot of comments disparaging this, but it is fundamentally correct. If our civilization as it is survives and does not collapse, then this "manual" is unnecessary. It is only useful if our civilization has clearly failed. Maybe sanitation was a huge mistake. Maybe antibiotics were a huge mistake. Maybe the remnants of humanity that survive the apocalypse will look back on a humanity all but wiped out by superbugs of their own making. Maybe agriculture was a huge mistake. Maybe the march towards monocultures is inevitable, and the remnants of humanity that survive the apocalypse will look back on a humanity all but wiped out by blights or the total depletion of fertile topsoil. For anything that we wish to impart to these remnants, there's a scenario where that is why we failed, because we must assume that we did fail to justify the attempt at the manual at all.

JoeAltmaier 4y ago
Who wants a how-to manual from a failed civilizations?

mbg721 4y ago

Defeating the failure of civilization entirely is a really high bar; the thing we're trying to prevent is failing faster and more painfully. This is like asking "Why would people who are going to die anyway bother having hospitals?"