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0 pointsfasterik6h ago0 comments

Relevant philosophy paper: "The Vulnerable World Hypothesis" by Nick Bostrom [0].

In that paper, Bostrom floats the idea that it might be in humanity's best interest to have a strong global government with mass surveillance to prevent technological catastrophes. It's more of a thought experiment than a "we should definitely do this" kind of argument, but it's worth taking the idea seriously and thinking hard about what alternatives we have for maintaining global stability.

[0] https://nickbostrom.com/papers/vulnerable.pdf

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Barrin926h ago

Cheap hypersonics don't threaten global stability, they threaten global hegemony. Which is really what I suspect irks most people afraid of them.

We've seen a shift towards cheap offensive capacity that gives middle powers or even smaller actors the capacity to hit hegemons where it hurts, very visible in Ukraine and the Middle East now. This leads to instability only temporarily until you end up in a new equilibrium where smaller players will have significantly more say and capacity to retaliate, effectively a MAD strategy on a budget for everyone.

fasterikOP3h ago

GP's point was broader than that, it was about technological progress and the possibility of terrorist groups or mentally ill individuals getting their hands on weapons that can easily kill millions of people. That's also what the paper I linked is about.

Consider a future where individuals can relatively easily engineer a pathogen or manufacture a nuclear weapon. It's not hard to imagine how that would threaten global stability.

denkmoon6h ago

History would seem to show that hegemony is stability? Pax Romana etc

vkou5h ago

Nothing about that time period was stable for Rome's neighbours and targets.

Nothing about it was stable for the Romans either, with 10 major civil wars, and ~100 'minor' ones.

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