at risk of being boorish, may i humbly request voiced disagreement in this case? i’d like to understand where i am wrong.
to expand on my view, and offer footholds for disagreement:
human civilization—restricted to one planet, with a population that varied only by a few orders of magnitude—looks radically different than it did say ~1000 years ago, to the point where it can be hard to fully understand the past. we can imagine a hyperrational monk who is given divine prophesy of the year 2000. we can grant them plenty of spare time to reflect on this potential. and we assume they don’t fall into any tropey mistakes, such as burning their reputation on rants and raves about the incomprehensible year-to-come. nonetheless, how are they supposed to care about those descendants, practically speaking?
and the situation outlined here is much worse. i can give the outlined future vastly lower credence than our inspired monk could give his. as well, i just don’t know how to picture a society of even 100 billion people, let alone one that spans a scientific notation number of stars, and let alone one that isn’t even physical.
in short, what is the normative claim? what am i asked to do, here, other than marvel at some large-ish numbers, and enjoy a bit of worldbuilding? invest in aerospace?
apologies for the rhetoric. stepping out of the discussion a bit: i honestly do not mean to pooh-pooh. i feel like a child in this discussion; the irreverence is the only way i know to participate.
at risk of being boorish, may i humbly request voiced disagreement in this case? i’d like to understand where i am wrong.
to expand on my view, and offer footholds for disagreement:
human civilization—restricted to one planet, with a population that varied only by a few orders of magnitude—looks radically different than it did say ~1000 years ago, to the point where it can be hard to fully understand the past. we can imagine a hyperrational monk who is given divine prophesy of the year 2000. we can grant them plenty of spare time to reflect on this potential. and we assume they don’t fall into any tropey mistakes, such as burning their reputation on rants and raves about the incomprehensible year-to-come. nonetheless, how are they supposed to care about those descendants, practically speaking?
and the situation outlined here is much worse. i can give the outlined future vastly lower credence than our inspired monk could give his. as well, i just don’t know how to picture a society of even 100 billion people, let alone one that spans a scientific notation number of stars, and let alone one that isn’t even physical.
in short, what is the normative claim? what am i asked to do, here, other than marvel at some large-ish numbers, and enjoy a bit of worldbuilding? invest in aerospace?
apologies for the rhetoric. stepping out of the discussion a bit: i honestly do not mean to pooh-pooh. i feel like a child in this discussion; the irreverence is the only way i know to participate.
You could think of these two essays as Will MacAskill’s answer to your question, sort of.