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Comment by sage_joch | Hacker News Reader

"In my comic, our civilization is long gone. Every civilization with written records has existed for less than 5,000 years; it seems optimistic to hope that the current one will last for 10,000 more," Munroe told WIRED.

It's an unfortunate reality that a thoughtful person could come to this conclusion. But I feel compelled to disagree. We're on the verge of becoming a spacefaring species. And people like Elon Musk give me hope that we could very well still make it, despite everything.

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Yes, it's possible we'll become spacefaring someday, but right now today, things don't look so good.

Any one of a dozen sociopaths around the world could wipe out every living human in a couple hours by setting off a global nuclear war. It could be done on a whim; it could happen as a result of a stroke; it could be a bad ham sandwich that went down wrong.

We're in the age of global instant destruction right now today. Sustainable spacefaring is decades away at best, probably still centuries. The odds don't really look so good.

The Fermi Paradox is a pretty discouraging data point on the lifetime of technological societies, too.

I have thought about the unsettling possibility that we are presently navigating The Great Filter. It may ultimately be a question of whether our philosophy can keep pace with our technology (and right now it is quickly falling behind). But things have looked bleak in the past, and we have found a way to overcome them. The Fermi Paradox doesn't necessarily imply spacefaring civilizations are as rare as they appear to be. It's possible that the vast majority of spacefaring species became spacefaring because they found a way to keep their philosophical understanding on par with their technological understanding. And given that possibility, it might not be a huge leap to assume a Prime Directive-like policy is at play. (There are a number of ways to explain the Fermi Paradox, but this is probably the one I most subscribe to.)

I'm worried less about the malice of a dozen psychopaths than the hungry and unwashed billions, the consumerist millions, and the power-hungry tens of thousands.

Any system of government which must listen to its citizens is uniquely unsuited to becoming a spacefaring nation.

And of these, which are you?

Different category--bootstrapped maker.

>Every civilization with written records has existed for less than 5,000 years

Uh, writing is only approximately 5,000 years old, so, yeah, I agree with parent that Munro's argument is silly.

It always amazes me to see how much people don't realise that we are unlike any other society that has existed on this planet before us. Globally connected and scientifically advanced in the most important ways makes the past a terrible prediction of the future. Exciting times.

Not to mention, free in many ways, protected in many ways, and with a whole lot more leisure than our ancestors ever got. Though these things seem to be dwindling ...

Those things always seem to be dwindling.

And yet arrogant enough to think that we're so much smarter and more advanced than those that came before or all other life forms we share this planet with.

BTW, not saying I disagree with you - just a counterpoint that can be made.

We might not be much smarter than those that came before us, but the shoulders we are standing on are much larger.

I think the key is to have the humility to realize that we haven't had another Euclid or Archimedes in modern times. Possibly Decartes or Tesla compare, but it's arguable. We've come so far and have such promise, and yet we have so much to lose. I would argue that far from being being doomed to repeating history because we forget, we have the possibility of being the first to wipe out our own race, either through inaction or brazenness.

I think we live in an age of such people. It was easy to stand out as a brilliant polymath when we didn't know ANYTHING. I think we have more geniuses than ever today, but there are so many of them that it no longer feels special. We are advancing our knowledge and technology with dizzying speeds, but we are so accustomed to it that we sit around and go, "Meh, there are no geniuses anymore".

Might want to rethink your heroes. Save Archimedes.

responding to sibling:

Another Euclid? Euclid is famous for compiling other people's research into an accessible textbook.

It's true I've seen complaints that universities don't consider compilation and explication of math important enough to count towards tenure anymore, but we're not exactly short on the personality type or the actual project.

Every society is unlike any other society. Most of them consider their particular way of life to be superior to their neighbors or predecessors. In some cases they have a very good case for thinking so, too: they are a vast empire, scientifically advanced, culturally sophisticated, prosperous to a level unheard of before - for example, the Islamic world in the middle ages, or the Roman empire.

But on a larger scale, I think it's equally likely that we will either become spacefaring species, or destroy ourselves - just because we are not at a brink of a Nuclear War, as long as the stockpiles of nukes exist there is always a chance of that happening. Or that we will deplete our resources before reaching deep-space travel.

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