1969 Dec. 6
Editor, Science

This letter is a response to John Platt's article "What We Must Do" in the 69 Nov. 28 issue of Science.    The urgency of mankind's survival predicament is stated in unusually clear terms, and I believe that Platt's appeal for a large-scale mobilization of scientists to solve our crisis problems is an appropriate response.    However, I believe the profound character of what is at stake in the coming decades was not fully developed, that mankind's situation requires more urgent actions, and I propose that in consequence the solutions offered by Platt should be ammended to reflect a different set of priorities.

Table 1 in Platt's article shows quite effectively the overwhelming relative importance of some potential crises (thermonuclear war, ecology imbalances, large-scale social upheavals, etc) in relation to areas where research money is being spent (cancer research, heart transplants, and most of basic science).  It is understandable that Platt did not assign an "estimated crisis intensity" to the most important crisis of "total annihilation," though it is implied that any such estimate would be at least 109 on his scale - or not much greater than his estimates for the other crises.  If the sun can be counted on to provide another
5 billion years of life-giving radiant energy, then the prospect of total annihilation must necessarily affect a possible 109 generations of unborn humanity, or 1019 people.  With this line of reasoning we might be justified in filling-in that important blank in Platt's Table 1 with the number 1019.  The staggering profundity of the annihilation prospect in relation to the other crises could be enhanced even further by making adjustments for differences in the value of categories of life conditions.

My purpose in calling attention to this perhaps intentional omission in Platt's article is the following:  If the prospect of mankind's unintentional suicide is recognized as THE problem confronting this generation, then the appropriate response in reordering our priorities for action will take on a completely different character than for the case where merely the quality of life of those belonging to a few generations needs to be uplifted.  The solutions which Platt offered must surely have value in our attack on averting crises which threaten the present and near-future generations; but we should not let our pursuit of them jeopardize our solution of what I identify to be an orders-of-magnitude more important problem.  I submit that the solution to the annihilation problem will be easier than the solution of the other crises.  To demonstrate this it will be necessary to consider briefly one imoortant aspect of the annihilation predicament.

The Earth is shrinking, figuratively, and there is a tendency for the world's cultures to become homogenized in ways which cause them to resemble the dominant culture.    The same factors which homogenize the world are making our planet a precarious place in which to place trust that after any global catastrophy a band of genetically undamaged survivors could in any way regain dominance or even preserve their precious heritage.    Only af'ter the establishment of several self-sustaining colonies on the moon or Mars can we enjoy any large degree of assurance of species survival.  This little appreciated aspect of space exploration seems to be an unavoidable conclusion to me.

But what precautions could mankind take during the transitional century or so when our species, unprotected by space colonization, will be facing its most dangerous survival test? This, I contend, has an easy solution also.  We need only construct several self-sufficient dwellings deep underground.
The inhabitants could be paid for their time, and a large turnover of residents could minimize the inconveniences caused them.

Some dwellings, perhaps, could be reserved for carefully screened prisoners (their genetics being little different than that of others for the purposes we are considering).  I do not want to discuss the many interesting details of such underground dwellings; it is the rationale for their creation that I want to establish.  As regards their cost, they might be judged tne greatest single endeavor in the history of Man from a cost/effectiveness standpoint.

Pursuit of the space program and related technologies should not be slowed by the presence of survival communities deep underground; such dwellings are not foolproof (literally) and should only be thought of' as a temporary solution.  This is where I disagree with Platt's article.  I accept his statement of the problem as far as it was developed, but because the more profound aspects of today's crises were not developed fully, and because the solutions he offered did not reflect this, I must disagree with the priorities represented by his solutions. Thus, I would remove "man in space" from the "overstudied" category at the bottom of Table 1 and incorporate it as the principal element in a package of solutions to attack the "total annihilation" problem at the top of his table.  In addition, of course, the underground dwellings should be incorporated as a temporary component in any solution package.

Quite apart from the considerations related to the need for space colonies and underground dwellings, I want to point out that a case can be made for a reordering of foreign policies.  For example, if our involvement in a war in Vietnam [this was written in 1969] is weakening our country in a way which is making us more vulnerable to the rough times in the decades ahead, then we might be letting the interests of a small country jeopardize the strength of a much larger country at a time when the fate of mankind may very well be resting on the ability of that country to weather unprecedented global upheavals.  Thus, I propose that until we as a country feel secure about the coming decades we should limit our foreign involvement to things which will strengthen ourselves and the other developed countries.  My justification is that we have an obligation to the billions of potential future generations.

 There might be some appropriateness in the analogy of shipwrecked survivors afloat in a raft which cannot continue to support everyone aboard.    One type of moralist might reject the option of sacrificing the required number, and end up doing nothing; a more common moralist might elect the sacrifice option, but favor the women, children, and the weak for staying in the raft; while a more sane moralist, in my opinion, would elect the sacrifice option but give priority to the strongest, who are the best candidates for long-term survival.  We may discount the first moralist as being hopelessly out of touch with reality, but what about the second, more common moralist?  Could that moralist possibly be suffering from the moral disease wherein the victim maintains that it is possible for there to be equity in life, that throughout the world when all things are considered there is equity?  Such a naive attitude may have been consoling for our ancestors, and so might their willingness to submit to the inevitable without becoming aroused.  These attitudes may have been genetically useful to our ancestors, who actually were a more helpless part of Nature with little vote over their fate.  To accompany mankind's increasing control over nature we have progressed through the phase of blaming events on alleged gods of nature, but the tendency of believing in, and resigning oneself to, an equitable universe characterizes the outlook of many contemporaries.  These attitudes may also be encouraged by the expedience it offers in raising children.  Whatever the cause, it can be said that there is a strong motive in people to react to present domestic and world problems with the attitude that whatever is wrong can be solved by redistributing equity as if it were a democratic right.  Equity is a wonderful thing to seek, but we should be wary of solutions which seem to be redressing inequities at the expense of the attainment of more important goals as viewed in the greater perspective.  I can think of no more important goal than the survival of' the human race.

Granting that domestic and foreign matters is not a zero-sum game (wherein one person's gain is another person's loss), it is possible that pursuit of one goal can jeopardize pursuit of another.  Thus, taking funds from the space program and related technologies in order to uplift the standard of living of a small portion of the undeveloped world, or to fight a war on behalf of a helpless country, could act to jeopardize the more important goal of assuring survival for mankind.  Since all factors seem to interact, the best we can strive for is a program for the future with a proper mix.  Any program that might be decided on should incorporate much of what Platt has presented; but a proper mix, in my opinion, should be based on different priorities and should incorporate active support of the space program and the construction of underground, self-sustaining survival communities.

Let us not forget, that for every person who shall inhabit the Earth during the next 100 years there exists the prospect of a billion others who should be allowed to take-up their rightful place after us.  It would be the height of "temporal provincialism" for this generation to ignore these people merely because they aren't here to appeal their case.  Because we cannot hear their voices provides no excuse for an irresponsibility which might result in our denying them their existence.

Bruce L. Gary
795 N. Catalina Ave.
Pasadena, Calif. 91104

So I circulated my "letter" among several writers interested in the subject, and achieved one amusing outcome.  In a letter from Garrett Hardin he agreed with my placing value on unborn generations, and suggested I polish the writing and submit it for publication in another magazine.  A year later, Garrett Hardin published his book The Voyage of the Spaceship Beagle: Exploring New Ethics for Survival, the first chapter of which is a mocking rendition of a future NASA spaceship meant to safeguard the human germplasm.  When I read that chapter I "knew" that my letter had inspired it, so when I ran into Hardin at a recent book signing I questioned him about the conenction.  He professed innocence.  But I know better!

I have argued elsewhere that statistically there's a 50% chance humanity will be extinguished between 2160 AD and 2600 AD, with a most probable date of approximately 2400 AD.  The argument rests upon the questionable assumption, the Random Location Principle, that people alive today are at the approximate 50% point in the entire sequence of human existences, ordered by date of birth.  It also rests upon the idea that because of the deterministic nature of the universe (the laws of physics) the future is "inherent" in the present, and there already "exists" in some sense.  I recognize that most readers will object to both assumptions.
 

Is Humanity destined to share the fate of this "abandoned trestle"?
 

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