{"items": [{"author": "Miles", "source_link": "https://plus.google.com/112411876916401693118", "anchor": "gp-1319470681519", "service": "gp", "text": "There was a Foreign Policy magazine a few years back that projected a peak of 9 billion by 2050, based on the rate at which societies were modernizing and thus reaching negative birth-rates. I wonder what the impact of global warming / rising sea-levels would have on that figure -- Bangladesh / Myanmar / etc. have huge populations that are under major threat.", "timestamp": 1319470681}, {"author": "George", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/253143164738682?comment_id=253165981403067", "anchor": "fb-253165981403067", "service": "fb", "text": "At some point in the future, there is just too much uncertainty. Even if you think, for some peculiar reason, that it is your moral duty to try and maximize the happiness of all hypothetical people you must have some uncertainty in who will exist later and what they will need. This uncertainty should grow the more distant the future you contemplate is from our time. I would argue the needs of future people should be discounted by your uncertainty about who they will be and what they will need.", "timestamp": "1319472456"}, {"author": "George", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/253143164738682?comment_id=253169288069403", "anchor": "fb-253169288069403", "service": "fb", "text": "Personally, I think that most, if not all, humans that live will live on the earth 400 years from now and that no humans will live outside the solar system in the next 400 years. Beyond that time scale, I am not comfortable making predictions. Although I have fundamental philosophical problems with your utilitarian way of thinking, I think you should focus your efforts on preventing the human race from being wiped off the earth (or sent back into a new dark ages) by our own actions during your lifetime and you should also influence any offspring you might have to continue your work in their lifetimes. To maintain things like modern medicine we might need to stop squandering our energy inheritance (saved over 100s of millions of years) and possibly even transition to a steady-state economy to avoid a painful crash as resources run out/make the earth less habitable.", "timestamp": "1319472996"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://plus.google.com/103013777355236494008", "anchor": "gp-1319473474484", "service": "gp", "text": "@Miles\n \n
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\nTogether Bangladesh and Myanmar are about 2% of the world population. So, large, but probably not large enough to majorly affect the 2050 population even if global warming and sea level rise bring their populations down 50%.\n
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\nThe carrying capacity of the earth isn't that big, but the carrying capacity of the universe is enormous. So if some people leave earth and spread widely, we might have billions of times as many people as that 2050 estimate.", "timestamp": 1319473474}, {"author": "Miles", "source_link": "https://plus.google.com/112411876916401693118", "anchor": "gp-1319473883248", "service": "gp", "text": "They are small ... but I when you add together the populations of all the countries threatened by climate change (Indonesia, southern China, Pakistan, large tracts of India, most of South-East Asia) the population figures start to add up. I think climate change could reduce their total 2050 population pretty significantly -- one death now could equal ~10 (? guesstimate) fewer people in 2050, I'd imagine. And there'd likely be increased infant mortality / decreased fertility if climate change caused massive population moves.\n
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\nOff-earth colonization is clearly a big question. I'm dubious it'll occur in any significant way by 2050 ... at least not be humans. But if we get over the technical hurdles (and the various private space companies are clearing them at an impressive rate, or such is my impression), perhaps my pessimism on this front is unwarranted.", "timestamp": 1319473883}, {"author": "Alex", "source_link": "https://plus.google.com/100936518160252317727", "anchor": "gp-1319474463043", "service": "gp", "text": "There was a New Yorker article about this in last week's issue. We can say with some certainty what will happen in the next 20 years. But a change in average fertility by, say, 0.5 children per mother could make a difference of billions within a few decades. And anything more than 100 years out is pure speculation.\n
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\nAs for off-planet colonization as a solution: I feel like keeping people on Earth but bringing down our number is a far, far cheaper way to solve this problem. Space fuel is expensive, and even if it gets cheap you need a phenomenal amount of it to carry a person and her myriad support systems to, say, Mars. It would be a whole lot cheaper to just give everyone condoms. Besides, colonization would probably look something like this: ark flies off to distant planet with a handful of people, those people reproduce on new planet, everyone at home is still toast. There is no way on earth (ha) you're going to move all 7 (or 10, or 15, or 40) billion of us somewhere new. But maybe I'll be proven wrong -- I sure hope so!", "timestamp": 1319474463}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://plus.google.com/103013777355236494008", "anchor": "gp-1319475501058", "service": "gp", "text": "@Miles\n \"I'm dubious it'll occur in any significant way by 2050\"\n
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\nI think that's probably right. But what I want to know is how likely it is to happen ever. The heat death of the universe is a very long way off, so if people manage to become self sustaining off earth and spread through the universe, the eventual population might be enormous. Whereas if we stay on earth, it's probably not going to be anywhere near as large.", "timestamp": 1319475501}, {"author": "David Chudzicki", "source_link": "https://plus.google.com/106120852580068301475", "anchor": "gp-1319475734630", "service": "gp", "text": "Alex, I think you and Jeff are coming at this from very different places. I think Jeff is thinking of space colonization more as an \nopportunity\n to increase population levels (rather than a way to deal with our current population levels). Based on previous posts, Jeff is the sort of utilitarian that wants to increase total happiness (so with twice as many people, they only net to be slightly more than half as happy to consider that a net win).", "timestamp": 1319475734}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://plus.google.com/103013777355236494008", "anchor": "gp-1319475817811", "service": "gp", "text": "@Alex\n \"keeping people on Earth but bringing down our number is a far, far cheaper way to solve this problem\"\n
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\nI think we're trying to solve different problems. I'm not sure what your values are, but I would count the \"ark flies off to distant planet with a handful of people, those people reproduce on new planet, everyone at home is still toast\" situation as a huge improvement over \"everyone at home is toast\". Much better if there are multiple arks and so people spread to multiple other planets.\n
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\nI think expansion is much cheaper and more practical in a future where we figure out how to run people on computer hardware.", "timestamp": 1319475817}, {"author": "David Chudzicki", "source_link": "https://plus.google.com/106120852580068301475", "anchor": "gp-1319476029003", "service": "gp", "text": "Maybe figuring out how to run people on computer hardware should be your top (moral) priority? (Rather than earning money to give away.) Your skills may be reasonably well-suited to it.", "timestamp": 1319476029}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://plus.google.com/103013777355236494008", "anchor": "gp-1319476252900", "service": "gp", "text": "@David Chudzicki\n if running people as software is possible and practical, I'm not sure it's that far off. Trying to reduce the chances that we all die or that society collapses badly might be better.", "timestamp": 1319476252}, {"author": "Miles", "source_link": "https://plus.google.com/112411876916401693118", "anchor": "gp-1319476730226", "service": "gp", "text": "@David Chudzicki\n \n@Jeff Kaufman\n -- Calling Ray Kurzweil!", "timestamp": 1319476730}, {"author": "Alex", "source_link": "https://plus.google.com/100936518160252317727", "anchor": "gp-1319477278867", "service": "gp", "text": "I guess I was mostly responding to the \"making sure we don't wipe ourselves out\" part. I think the best of all worlds is one in which those who are alive are happiest, even if that means there are relatively few of us (and obviously assuming nobody was hurt in order to achieve that state). But I think that's a completely separate discussion.", "timestamp": 1319477278}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://plus.google.com/103013777355236494008", "anchor": "gp-1319477440419", "service": "gp", "text": "@Miles\n I don't have a high opinion of kurzweil's views on the future. I mostly agree with this post: \nhttp://chronopause.com/index.php/2011/08/11/the-kurzwild-man-in-the-night/\n
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\nI like the hofstadter quote: \"It\u2019s as if you took a lot of very good food and some dog excrement and blended it all up so that you can\u2019t possibly figure out what\u2019s good or bad. It\u2019s an intimate mixture of rubbish and good ideas, and it\u2019s very hard to disentangle the two\"", "timestamp": 1319477440}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://plus.google.com/103013777355236494008", "anchor": "gp-1319477772926", "service": "gp", "text": "(\n@Alex\n Separate, but still interesting discussion. Imagine two universes: one is our current one. Another is very similar to our current one, except there is another planet very similar to earth somewhere else with a similar culture and people. That one is a bit less happy than ours, on average. You would say that the first universe was better, because the people who were actually alive are happier?)", "timestamp": 1319477772}, {"author": "Alex", "source_link": "https://plus.google.com/100936518160252317727", "anchor": "gp-1319477978159", "service": "gp", "text": "(\n@Jeff Kaufman\n Maybe. Happiness is nonlinear and hysteretic.)", "timestamp": 1319477978}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://plus.google.com/103013777355236494008", "anchor": "gp-1319478595613", "service": "gp", "text": "(\n@Alex\n I'm not sure what you mean. If I understand the terms properly, happiness is nonlinear and hysteretic within individuals, but we're talking about a one earth universe vs a two earth one.)", "timestamp": 1319478595}, {"author": "Alex", "source_link": "https://plus.google.com/100936518160252317727", "anchor": "gp-1319479537253", "service": "gp", "text": "(\n@Jeff Kaufman\n I would say that you cannot generally quantify and compare happiness between different individuals, especially when the difference is only slight. Perhaps self-reported happiness of earth one is slightly higher than self-reported happiness of earth two, and assuming you could somehow control for the complexities of subtle differences in cultures, histories, expectations, etc., then yes, I would say the first universe is generally ever so slightly better.)", "timestamp": 1319479537}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/253143164738682?comment_id=253214891398176", "anchor": "fb-253214891398176", "service": "fb", "text": "@George: \"I think you should focus your efforts on preventing the human race from being wiped off the earth\"
I think you may be right, but this is very hard to weigh against helping people now.", "timestamp": "1319479767"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://plus.google.com/103013777355236494008", "anchor": "gp-1319479895519", "service": "gp", "text": "(\n@Alex\n Then it sounds like we're not going to agree on this, because we have incompatible values. I think the second universe is very much better.)", "timestamp": 1319479895}, {"author": "David German", "source_link": "https://plus.google.com/111229345142780712481", "anchor": "gp-1319504242273", "service": "gp", "text": "Here's a useful source on population change, although it doesn't address space travel or transcendence.\n
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\nhttp://www.un.org/esa/population/publications/longrange2/WorldPop2300final.pdf", "timestamp": 1319504242}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://plus.google.com/103013777355236494008", "anchor": "gp-1319508453648", "service": "gp", "text": "@David German\n They also seem to not talk about technological or social changes, which in 300 years seems like it should be significant.", "timestamp": 1319508453}, {"author": "Rick", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/253143164738682?comment_id=254483694604629", "anchor": "fb-254483694604629", "service": "fb", "text": "Jeff, some random thoughts after reading the above comments: Lack of misery and happiness are not the same thing. Lack of misery (such as pain, hunger, being cold and wet, grief, fear) are a pre-requisites for happiness, but often people are quite comfortable physically, and not suffering a major emotional loss, and still not happy.
This also was discussed by Abraham Maslow in his hierarchy of needs. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abraham_Maslow)
Your thoughts about 'people' eventually existing in some kind of electronic form is interesting as well. It is impossible for us to know what this would be like. I agree with you that it is probably preferable to ceasing to exist, and could possibly turn out to be much better. I think we have no way of knowing what the virtual equivalents are for misery and happiness if one were in electronic form. Perhaps misery might be things like a computer virus, a slow processor, unreliable electricity. It's very hard to know what would constitute happiness. I think it is possible that some of the things that cause flesh-and-blood humans to feel misery and happiness would still do so if we were in virtual form. These might include caring about what happened to others, interacting with others, etc. In our current form, the body plays a big role in both misery and happiness. Things like eating, skiing, making love, etc. might not bring much pleasure to a computer. I don't know, it's interesting to think about.", "timestamp": "1319719856"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/253143164738682?comment_id=254504324602566", "anchor": "fb-254504324602566", "service": "fb", "text": "@Rick:
\"Lack of misery and happiness are not the same thing. Lack of misery (such as pain, hunger, being cold and wet, grief, fear) are a pre-requisites for happiness, but often people are quite comfortable physically, and not suffering a major emotional loss, and still not happy.\"
Sure. If you want to increase happiness, though, decreasing misery works pretty well. My understanding is that people have a happiness set point, which is mostly fixed, and determines how happy they are \"by default\". Misery pulls happiness down from there. Short term, lots of other things can move you up or down, but long term, in the absence of misery, people tend to be pretty close to their set point. Some activities (meditation, physical activity, social involvement) can bring people up, but it's very difficult to improve over someone's natural happiness level once you've removed sources of misery. I haven't studied this very much, though, so if this is contrary to your understanding (and experience as a therapist) I would be interested to hear.
Or is your objection to the idea of a single happiness continuum, accounting for both happiness and misery, on which each person has a current (and average) position?
\"I think we have no way of knowing what the virtual equivalents are for misery and happiness if one were in electronic form.\"
In the case of \"uploaded\" people, where your brain is scanned (destructively, probably, so when you're near or at death) and then loaded into a computer simulation as a program, happiness is probably quite similar to where it is now. For some sort of fully artificial intelligence, yes, it's very hard to say. Whether these are possible or not is also hard to say.", "timestamp": "1319723758"}]}