1 HN user recommended this explainer1 month2022–2023score 1
Years with an HN recommendation, 2007–2026
HN uses it as a reference for the scale of future human population and long-term thinking.
A Kurzgesagt animation on longtermism, arguing that because the future could hold trillions of people, our actions' effect on future generations may be what matters most.
“Kurzgesagt has some interesting videos on human population” (HN, 2023)
It's survivorship bias—where bias means skewed from the full distribution of choices people and societies made, not bias as in discrimination. Most of the families and societies that didn't prioritize population growth (by reproduction or immigration) aren't around to advocate for that approach's merits, whereas those that did are. Fun fact: for each human alive today there've been 15 deceased humans ever. As zombie apocalypses go, 15:1 doesn't sound too bad. Kurzgesagt has some interesting videos on human population if that's your style: [this video] [link]
Take a look at the recent Kurzgesagt video: [this video] If humanity plays its cards right, there will be trillions and trillions of humans living in the future, all over the galaxy. Everyone who lives right now, or has ever lived, is barely noticeable compared to that. Take a look at the recent Less Wrong post: [link] I don't see any flaws in this argument, we all are on a fast-track to getting killed by AI, and the smartest people on the planet don't have a plan on how to fix it. "Build an AI that burns all GPUs to prevent all the future AIs, and hopefully doesn't kill us all in the process" is the best idea they've got. If you believe that we're about to kill trillions and trillions of potential future human beings, these priorities make sense.
Argues future humans vastly outnumber everyone alive now
After seeing The last human - Kurzgesagt [this video] and realizing that for all Of human history we have though it was the end - and actually it’s more likely that as the first few billion humans we will be the source of fascination for many generations to come. Our digital record will be preserved and relentlessly studied. Maybe our thread here will be a footnote in a hologram in a few millennia.
Prompted reflection that we are among the first few billion humans
A line in a Kurzgesagt video ( [this video] ) a while back caught my attention. “Every generation assumes they’re important enough to witness the apocalypse.” I don’t think that’s the only factor in people wishing for collapse, but I think it’s one of them.
A line about each generation expecting the apocalypse
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