Ask HN: What super projects could unite humanity?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1742738

by mathgladiator • 16 years ago

30 78 16 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

For context, http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1742606

What kind of world changing super project could humanity solve that would unite us towards a common goal?

zacharypinter• 16 years ago

Not exactly inspiring, but an alien enemy would be a pretty good way of uniting the planet towards a common goal.

arethuza8• 16 years ago

If we have to invent an enemy alien civilization can I suggest we decide to go to war with the Culture?

Think of it: godless, drug-using communists in space!!!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Culture

[NB I've always suspected that Iain M. Banks is a Special Circumstances agent - installing an author to write "fiction" about themselves is exactly the kind of sneaky thing the Culture would do]. ;-)

arethuza8• 16 years ago

And if they do exist, which of course they don't, quite a lot of people might just decide they rather like the idea of the Culture and immediately defect/surrender.

I know what I would do given the choice!

tomjen3• 16 years ago

There doesn't seem to be much reason to go to war with them though - wouldn't it be more likely that the entire earth would unite to convince them to let us join?

mindcreek• 16 years ago

I believe an extra terrestrial threat that we can visualize and also threatens whole humanity can unite us other than i doubt any worldly issues will unite anybody.

borism3• 16 years ago

the problem is that aliens who would be able to reach Earth to threaten it will be so much more technologically advanced that any resistance will be quite futile.

what I think should unite us is the understanding that this tiny blue dot in the middle of Milky Way is the only thing that keps us alive, so we need to strive to keep it so for as long as possible while searching for other ways to survive in space on a large scale.

prawn• 16 years ago

We both think that should happen, but for most people the need just isn't pressing enough and the scales of time are just too big to be appealing. People, generally, just respond to basic instincts (wanting to be entertained, titillated, make easy money, stuff their faces on the couch, etc) and short term, easy goals.

And unfortunately, it's unlikely to become a popular political position either.

Imagine a chance to route defense spending to space research and exploration - it's the geek dream!

khafra2• 16 years ago

I agree; if current levels of existential risk aren't enough to unite humanity, I don't think anything survivable will do so.

scrrr5• 16 years ago

I suppose that is because of the evolutionary mechanism to keep the species alive. There's something in place that will unite us when extinction is a possibility (I believe this could be part of reason why wars eventually end..).

vibragiel• 16 years ago

There's no such thing as an evolutionary mechanism that keep species alive.

rrc2• 16 years ago

I think hostile aliens are a specific example of a more general unifier: non-human common enemies. This might include hostile AI (think SkyNet), solar radiation, or perhaps even a terrestrial worldwide pandemic (bacterial or viral).

I think that enemies you can see and anthropomorphise are more powerful, however, so I imagine a humanoid alien or terminator would be a better unifier than an invisible bacteria or global warming, even though all could be considered a common threat to humanity.

teyc• 16 years ago

The aliens are going to get their a@@@@ kicked... in Afghanistan.

slater• 16 years ago

Making all data collected by gov't agencies, institutes, universities etc. available, for free, in a standardized format.

noverloop• 16 years ago

this would make a big difference in the fight against rare diseases, I know someone who has an illness that is not adequately researched because it is too rare.

Vargas• 16 years ago

ITER

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITER

_b8r0• 16 years ago

Maybe not ITER (or even DEMO), but specifically nuclear fusion becoming a viable practical energy source.

I went to JET last year, which was amazing to see, but I couldn't help but get the nagging feeling that we won't see tritium/deuterium fusion hit mainstream within our lifetimes.

Mind you, once it does reach mainstream that will change everything. Hopefully there won't be a race to mine helium 3 from the moon.

scrrr5• 16 years ago

The Internet will provided it stays free and open. Through freely available information eventually we will resolve our petty differences, overcome destructive behavior and start fixing big problems like illness and space flight. Perhaps.

retube5• 16 years ago

Ha. I get the feeling your comment is a little tongue in cheek. I have a pet theory that precisely the opposite will happen. That the internet will give rise to increased differences and destructive behaviour. Why? Because the internet allows people to be exposed to widely opposing views, to trolling by groups with opposing views, allows people to "meet" and argue, allows even the most extreme of viewpoints to build an audience, and allows disparate groups to rally together. E.g just look at Atheism vs Religion. I could see that coming to blows at some point.

scrrr5• 16 years ago

So you say less/more difficult communication and perhaps even censorship is better in order to prevent conflict?

jcroberts2• 16 years ago

"Meanwhile, the poor Babel fish, by effectively removing all barriers to communication between different races and cultures, has caused more and bloodier wars than anything else in the history of creation." --Douglas Adams

davidw• 16 years ago

You haven't been following the Zed Shaw rant threads here have you?

suprgeek• 16 years ago

A Killer Asteroid (one that is big enough to wipe out all humanity) on a guaranteed course to collide with Earth within the next 10 years unless we do something about it. If basic self preservation against a visible and quantifiable threat will not unite humanity - I have very little hope for anything else.

arethuza8• 16 years ago

The problem with a Killer Asteroid for the purposes of this discussion is that the solution would have to be extremely high tech (presumably large H-bombs on large rockets). Apart from paying larger taxes I'm not sure what most of us could do to contribute to such a project, so as far as "uniting humanity" goes I suspect we would see fracturing along lines of:

- It's a government plot to get us to pay more taxes and remove personal freedoms

- It is God's will and trying to do anything to stop it is evil

- I'll be OK if I dig a deep enough hole and take enough food, guns and ammo

- Who cares, I'm going to make sure I enjoy the next ten years

zeemonkee3• 16 years ago

> extremely high tech (presumably large H-bombs on large rockets)

How is 40s/50s technology high tech ?

retube5• 16 years ago

Manned trip to Mars

Moon base

Space Elevator

zeemonkee3• 16 years ago

More likely to lead to increased competition between nations/corporations (see the dash for colonization in 19c, leading up to WW1).

retube5• 16 years ago

Possibly. My reasoning is that, unlike colonization, these projects are so big as to be impossible by one nation. They can only be attempted through co-operation by many.

philwelch• 16 years ago

Competition is just parallelization.

z92• 16 years ago

As history is witness, "united towards" doesn't work in large scale. It should be "united against". Human need an enemy to get united against. Alien invasion, asteroid collusion might be such thing. Otherwise no matter what, humanity will find one reason or another to form groups to fight one another.

Therefore humans are unlikely to get united to colonize a new planet few light years away. That's not in human nature.

Also check Monkey Sphere: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunbars_number

jcroberts2• 16 years ago

  > asteroid collusion

I mean no offense, but that was one of the most hilariously accurate typos I've ever seen.

bsaunder• 16 years ago

Fully automated food production, shelter construction, power production, and transportation.

rrc2• 16 years ago

I thought about immortality, but I suspect you'd fail to enlist the (massive) religious populations of Earth since you'd be competing directly with their existing power structure and investment.

It's odd to think that it's already a saturated market.

mathgladiator• 16 years ago

It's not just odd, its kinda depressing

Tichy• 16 years ago

Has there ever in history been an example of a super project uniting people?

arethuza8• 16 years ago

Unfortunately the only proven technique for unifying large populations towards a single cause seems to be warfare.

cturner2• 16 years ago

I thought of many attempts. They grow rapidly into mass slaugher. Forcing a particular religion onto people, forcing people to fund great mausoleums to the glory of their leaders, autocracy done in the name of socialism, "super-races" states from Sparta forward.

In fairness, I did think of one that could qualify, the vaccination of Polio.

icegreentea• 16 years ago

If Polio counts, then small pox MUST count. We did an even better job with small pox than polio.

zoomzoom• 16 years ago

The space elevator is the most game-changing investment we can make. The cost of getting into and out of orbit is the main barrier to any grand space scheme like mars, moon bases, or asteroid mining. It would also become a target of extremist anger and ignite divisions about tech. Runner-up might be a serious global scale geothermal plant for renewable power.

jsn5• 16 years ago

I refuse to be united with humanity. And it's not just me.

Differences are good, disagreements are good, and diversity is good. Including differences in goals, values, priorities and everything else.

If you have some serious differences and if you want to avoid conflicts, you probably shouldn't keep pushing to unite. You probably should separate. Like, you know, if a family can't agree on some important set of issues, they probably shouldn't always try to find a compromise (which might as well be bad for all sides), or apply force to silence the weakest side. They would probably be much better off if they get divorced, and let each side to form a family with someone who shares their views.

I think the same logic applies to countries, and to disagreements about any serious issue -- like, i don't know, taxes, global warming, foreign affairs, gay marriage, controlled substances, etc etc.

So, tldr: I'd rather look for something to separate humanity, it tries too hard to get united.

yummyfajitas3• 16 years ago

I generally agree with you, but concerning an issue like global warming specifically, you are wrong.

For issues like global warming/pollution, it doesn't help to separate. If the US pollutes less and China picks up the slack, the earth will be just as warm (including the US). Separation is a great solution to some problems, but it doesn't solve the problem of how to pay for global public goods (it deals with local ones nicely, however).

jsn5• 16 years ago

There are people who will refuse to care about global warming (or asteroid, or anything else), no matter what arguments you are going to provide. From here, you have to choices: A) suck it up, and B) force them.

I refuse to choose B, and I'm going to fight back if anyone chooses B wrt me.

djcjr• 16 years ago

Tesla Wardenclyffe Project

transphenomenal• 16 years ago

Changing everyones genes so we are all a lot more tolerant of each other and so bigotry is wiped out.

Also we need much, much faster transportation, like trains that can travel around the world in 3-4 hours. This way we can see our "neighbors" much more often and no longer have a sub-concious fear of the unknown.

zdw• 16 years ago

Selfishness.

Oh wait, we recently achieved that...

khafra2• 16 years ago

Divinely delivered message of abandonment and invasion from hell?

http://bbs.stardestroyer.net/viewtopic.php?t=118769&high...

zuggywugg• 16 years ago

what a stupid topic...

lookACamel• 16 years ago

Zombie apocalypse, for obvious reasons. The number of people considered a part of humanity is greatly reduced, making unification easier, and the goal is clear and simple - survival.

So keep up the work on that zombie-creating parasite!

HeyLaughingBoy• 16 years ago

How much of humanity? 10%? 40? 99?

I doubt you will get much more than about 20% of humanity to agree to anything at any given time. Extraterrestrial invasion? Nope, a bunch will just see them as gods and their own death as a journey to heaven? Another bunch will try to negotiate, another bunch will try to blast them into nonexistence?

Global catastrophe? See above.

And then there's the problem of who you're talking about. You can't e.g., reach everyone in every little town in India, Central Africa and South America. So if their "leaders" agree, does that mean that they agree? Look at all the disagreement that happens with people and their elected officials in the US all the time.

Sorry dude, we're doomed to all die alone.

skowmunk• 16 years ago

Would like to add in another factor into this question -

How long do you want that unity to last? the moment the question of commercialising the output of the project comes up, the competition will come out in the open and the unity will break.

Also, is it really required for the whole humanity to unite to take up a project that can affect humanity? Most of technologies and resources that can enable such a project are in the hands of a very few nations.

rblion• 16 years ago

Universal Consciousness --- Realizing we are all made of the same atoms, cells, and revolve the same star. Also, seeing that we are all looking for the same things: Freedom, Wealth, and Love. The meaning of each is subjective but, we have biochemical need for all three to reach universal consoiousness.

126• 16 years ago

Define: humanity?

sleepingbot• 16 years ago

Libertarian accountability for all. Individual democracies of 1 person. All human beings becoming literate craft-tech-open-source-hardwate tech people. Pantheism. Gaia.

michaelhalligan• 16 years ago

Very clear and indisputable impending global destruction with a short window before the event. (Think Asteroids or Aliens). Also, children who fall into wells or survive airliner crashes. Nothing else will work.

seltzered• 16 years ago

Redesign more of the things we use to meet cradle-to-cradle standards (this includes changing laws/restrictions).

Granted, there's many things that can't be made this way, but it's also an approach that doesn't lead us down a malthusian path of wanting nothing either.

Ask HN: What super projects could unite humanity?

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