[A-List] Existential Risks

["Charles Brown" <cbrown@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

________________________________

Existential Risks


Analyzing Human Extinction Scenarios and Related
Hazards

 

Nick Bostrom, PhD

Faculty of Philosophy, Oxford University
www.nickbostrom.com

[Published in the Journal of Evolution and Technology,
Vol. 9, March 2002. First version: 2001]


<snip>


1.2 Existential risks

In this paper we shall discuss risks of the sixth
category, the one marked with an X. This is the
category of global, terminal risks. I shall call these
existential risks.

Existential risks are distinct from global endurable
risks. Examples of the latter kind include: threats to
the biodiversity of Earth's ecosphere, moderate global
warming, global economic recessions (even major ones),
and possibly stifling cultural or religious eras such
as the "dark ages", even if they encompass the whole
global community, provided they are transitory (though
see the section on "Shrieks" below). To say that a
particular global risk is endurable is evidently not
to say that it is acceptable or not very serious. A
world war fought with conventional weapons or a
Nazi-style Reich lasting for a decade would be
extremely horrible events even though they would fall
under the rubric of endurable global risks since
humanity could eventually recover. (On the other hand,
they could be a local terminal risk for many
individuals and for persecuted ethnic groups.)

I shall use the following definition of existential
risks:

Existential risk - One where an adverse outcome would
either annihilate Earth-originating intelligent life
or permanently and drastically curtail its potential.

An existential risk is one where humankind as a whole
is imperiled. Existential disasters have major adverse
consequences for the course of human civilization for
all time to come.


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link -

<http://www.nickbostrom.com/existential/risks.html>