Humans can adjust their beliefs based on the entrails of slaughtered animals, or the indifferent motions of the heavens. Adjusting them in the direction of reality takes more than that.
A future with 4000-year-olds is at least 4000 years away. We know nothing about what society will look like then. Will there even be such a thing as “work”? Or “40-year-olds”? Or “society”? How big a target in possibility space even is a future society with 4000-year-olds in it?
Humans can adjust their beliefs based on the entrails of slaughtered animals, or the indifferent motions of the heavens.
Yes
Adjusting them in the direction of reality takes more than that.
Probably
A future with 4000-year-olds is at least 4000 years away.
Perhaps
We know nothing about what society will look like then.
No. We almost certainly do for some basic parameters. Such as:
Lifeforms will continue to generate entropy.
Lifeforms will continue to agglomerate into larger and more complex entities. i.e. large multicellular organisms such as humans.
Such organisms will seek to acquire competitive advantages over others.
In this process they will self organize into larger groups.
etc…
And that’s with near certainty, assuming there hasn’t been some catastrophic event like a pulsar burst sterilizing this planet.
Some aspects of the universe we can even know with certainty will be the case even 4000 years from now.
e.g. Stars will continue to provide EM radiation peaking in certain wavelengths which lifeforms will continue to adapt to if they exist. i.e. leaves will remain green.
etc…
A superhuman intelligence should be able to derive from such a basis likely projections for the most probable appearances of society. And act accordingly based on those projections.
An ordinary human may likewise depending on how prescient and perceptive they are, along with their willingness to expend the effort.
Whether or not anyone currently existing is capable of doing that is unknown, but unknown != impossible.
Will there even be such a thing as “work”? Or “40-year-olds”?
Perhaps
Or “society”?
Probably
How big a target in possibility space even is a future society with 4000-year-olds in it?
Finite. Very large if you include the tails of the distribution, smaller if you consider only the most likely outcomes.
If you don’t believe it possible for humans to make such projections you could have just wrote that. If you didn’t want to directly answer that’s fine as well, I put this up incase a passing reader got confused.
Humans can adjust their beliefs based on the entrails of slaughtered animals, or the indifferent motions of the heavens. Adjusting them in the direction of reality takes more than that.
A future with 4000-year-olds is at least 4000 years away. We know nothing about what society will look like then. Will there even be such a thing as “work”? Or “40-year-olds”? Or “society”? How big a target in possibility space even is a future society with 4000-year-olds in it?
Yes
Probably
Perhaps
No. We almost certainly do for some basic parameters. Such as:
Lifeforms will continue to generate entropy.
Lifeforms will continue to agglomerate into larger and more complex entities. i.e. large multicellular organisms such as humans.
Such organisms will seek to acquire competitive advantages over others.
In this process they will self organize into larger groups.
etc…
And that’s with near certainty, assuming there hasn’t been some catastrophic event like a pulsar burst sterilizing this planet.
Some aspects of the universe we can even know with certainty will be the case even 4000 years from now.
e.g. Stars will continue to provide EM radiation peaking in certain wavelengths which lifeforms will continue to adapt to if they exist. i.e. leaves will remain green.
etc…
A superhuman intelligence should be able to derive from such a basis likely projections for the most probable appearances of society. And act accordingly based on those projections.
An ordinary human may likewise depending on how prescient and perceptive they are, along with their willingness to expend the effort.
Whether or not anyone currently existing is capable of doing that is unknown, but unknown != impossible.
Perhaps
Probably
Finite. Very large if you include the tails of the distribution, smaller if you consider only the most likely outcomes.
If you don’t believe it possible for humans to make such projections you could have just wrote that. If you didn’t want to directly answer that’s fine as well, I put this up incase a passing reader got confused.