The super-rich preppers planning to save themselves from the apocalypse
September 4, 2022 11:28 AM Subscribe
I remember when COVID started, IIRC a bunch of these billionaire preppers had bunkers in NZ and could not get there due to travel restrictions. Ha ha ha ha ha.
The TV show and novel series The Expanse plays out pretty well what happens with these bunkers in the instance of an actual catastrophe.
posted by rednikki at 11:39 AM on September 4, 2022 [20 favorites]
The TV show and novel series The Expanse plays out pretty well what happens with these bunkers in the instance of an actual catastrophe.
posted by rednikki at 11:39 AM on September 4, 2022 [20 favorites]
Rushkoff interviewed on the VICE Cyber Podcast.
posted by The Ardship of Cambry at 11:40 AM on September 4, 2022 [3 favorites]
posted by The Ardship of Cambry at 11:40 AM on September 4, 2022 [3 favorites]
Previously. Different article, but (reprinted) in the same source from the same author. But I expect someone will be posting the classic comment by the (much missed) Dee Xtrovert explaining why preppers and their ilk are missing the point. (Has it really been nearly 10 years since they were active here? Damn!)
posted by TedW at 11:41 AM on September 4, 2022 [20 favorites]
posted by TedW at 11:41 AM on September 4, 2022 [20 favorites]
Pile high, pile high, the devil's underground.
Pile high, pile high, keep the devil down.
posted by rlk at 11:47 AM on September 4, 2022 [14 favorites]
Pile high, pile high, keep the devil down.
posted by rlk at 11:47 AM on September 4, 2022 [14 favorites]
Very considerate of these billionaires to bury themselves for us. All we have to do is plug up the exits.
posted by Faint of Butt at 11:49 AM on September 4, 2022 [51 favorites]
posted by Faint of Butt at 11:49 AM on September 4, 2022 [51 favorites]
Ain't no panic like Elite Panic cuz Elite Panic don't stop.
posted by rmd1023 at 12:30 PM on September 4, 2022 [6 favorites]
posted by rmd1023 at 12:30 PM on September 4, 2022 [6 favorites]
Rich people being grifted aside, it oddly doesn't seem as terrible an idea to have a basic prep plan, these days. Take a look at Jackson, Mississippi, for an example of government failure to deliver a basic resource needed for life, second only to breathable air. And there's a once-in-500 years earthquake around the corner in the PNW, where it will be more than certain that local, state and federal governments will not be able to help survivors for months, maybe years.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 12:32 PM on September 4, 2022 [13 favorites]
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 12:32 PM on September 4, 2022 [13 favorites]
Are there any explosive collar startups getting billions in VC funding yet?
posted by acb at 12:37 PM on September 4, 2022 [10 favorites]
posted by acb at 12:37 PM on September 4, 2022 [10 favorites]
Finally, the CEO of a brokerage house explained that he had nearly completed building his own underground bunker system, and asked: “How do I maintain authority over my security force after the event?” The event. That was their euphemism for the environmental collapse, social unrest, nuclear explosion, solar storm, unstoppable virus, or malicious computer hack that takes everything down.My own reply to the same question would be along the lines of "what you need to do, right off the bat, is die, the more spectacularly the better. That way, your guards will come to worship you, first as a hero and then as a god, and do whatever they think you'd have wanted them to, in your holy name."
This single question occupied us for the rest of the hour. They knew armed guards would be required to protect their compounds from raiders as well as angry mobs. One had already secured a dozen Navy Seals to make their way to his compound if he gave them the right cue. But how would he pay the guards once even his crypto was worthless? What would stop the guards from eventually choosing their own leader?
The billionaires considered using special combination locks on the food supply that only they knew. Or making guards wear disciplinary collars of some kind in return for their survival. Or maybe building robots to serve as guards and workers – if that technology could be developed “in time”.
I tried to reason with them. I made pro-social arguments for partnership and solidarity as the best approaches to our collective, long-term challenges. The way to get your guards to exhibit loyalty in the future was to treat them like friends right now, I explained. Don’t just invest in ammo and electric fences, invest in people and relationships. They rolled their eyes at what must have sounded to them like hippy philosophy.
Soundtrack for the thread
posted by flabdablet at 12:42 PM on September 4, 2022 [23 favorites]
I figure this must be at least half the appeal of superyachts.
posted by jamjam at 12:44 PM on September 4, 2022 [4 favorites]
posted by jamjam at 12:44 PM on September 4, 2022 [4 favorites]
Rich people being grifted aside, it oddly doesn't seem as terrible an idea to have a basic prep plan, these days.
Having lived in a remote rural community that was cut off from the grid more than once due to extreme weather (and related circumstances), my experience is that the best survival plan is to be on good terms with one's neighbours.
posted by philip-random at 12:59 PM on September 4, 2022 [104 favorites]
Having lived in a remote rural community that was cut off from the grid more than once due to extreme weather (and related circumstances), my experience is that the best survival plan is to be on good terms with one's neighbours.
posted by philip-random at 12:59 PM on September 4, 2022 [104 favorites]
-The Mindset is a common human trait magnified by wealth. I also dream of leaving society behind and living by myself in the wilderness, or a van, or something, which explains the grand I just dropped at REI for backpacking supplies.- If I had more money than I needed I could easily become one of these guys.
-The insight from the author and JC Cole is that civilization is the best technology for human survival. Seems like a cheap answer: you can't say the problem of losing a thing is solved by just getting that thing back! But what else have humans ever done to come back from a catastrophe?
-Those with The Mindset are highly motivated to maintain their special social status and power (that's probably how they got to where they are). They don't feel any major threat to their status from civilization as it exists now, so their most salient fight is to secure their place during an upheaval. They didn't get to where they are by being civilization planners or unusually pro-social.
-A capitalists society secures its reproduction as the unintended side effect of individually rational, competitive, utility maximizing behavior and these folks are the best individually rational, competitive utility maximizers. Not great qualities to address civilization level threats. That's why even capitalist countries plan their wartime economies! In a sense, JC and the author are selling to the wrong audience.
posted by Hume at 1:02 PM on September 4, 2022 [2 favorites]
-The insight from the author and JC Cole is that civilization is the best technology for human survival. Seems like a cheap answer: you can't say the problem of losing a thing is solved by just getting that thing back! But what else have humans ever done to come back from a catastrophe?
-Those with The Mindset are highly motivated to maintain their special social status and power (that's probably how they got to where they are). They don't feel any major threat to their status from civilization as it exists now, so their most salient fight is to secure their place during an upheaval. They didn't get to where they are by being civilization planners or unusually pro-social.
-A capitalists society secures its reproduction as the unintended side effect of individually rational, competitive, utility maximizing behavior and these folks are the best individually rational, competitive utility maximizers. Not great qualities to address civilization level threats. That's why even capitalist countries plan their wartime economies! In a sense, JC and the author are selling to the wrong audience.
posted by Hume at 1:02 PM on September 4, 2022 [2 favorites]
More than anything, they have succumbed to a mindset where “winning” means earning enough money to insulate themselves from the damage they are creating by earning money in that way. It’s as if they want to build a car that goes fast enough to escape from its own exhaust.posted by aniola at 1:08 PM on September 4, 2022 [29 favorites]
Soundtrack for the thread
I was thinking of this:
Windows covered with bars
Security guards
Is that a house or a fortress?
Against the rest of the world
Windows covered with bars
Security guards
Is that a house or a prison, how you gonna get out?
posted by TedW at 1:11 PM on September 4, 2022 [4 favorites]
I was thinking of this:
Windows covered with bars
Security guards
Is that a house or a fortress?
Against the rest of the world
Windows covered with bars
Security guards
Is that a house or a prison, how you gonna get out?
posted by TedW at 1:11 PM on September 4, 2022 [4 favorites]
Escaping from its own exhaust is a solved problem. Escaping from everybody's exhaust, not so much.
posted by flabdablet at 1:13 PM on September 4, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by flabdablet at 1:13 PM on September 4, 2022 [1 favorite]
I like that the article includes someone who is doing it differently:
“Honestly, I am less concerned about gangs with guns than the woman at the end of the driveway holding a baby and asking for food.” He paused, and sighed, “I don’t want to be in that moral dilemma.”posted by aniola at 1:13 PM on September 4, 2022 [42 favorites]
That’s why JC’s real passion wasn’t just to build a few isolated, militarised retreat facilities for millionaires, but to prototype locally owned sustainable farms that can be modelled by others and ultimately help restore regional food security in America.
The event. That was their euphemism...
posted by Paul Slade at 1:15 PM on September 4, 2022 [13 favorites]
posted by Paul Slade at 1:15 PM on September 4, 2022 [13 favorites]
The billionaires considered using special combination locks on the food supply that only they knew.
Seems like it would be cheaper and easier to just build a robot to beat you with a wrench.
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 1:31 PM on September 4, 2022 [21 favorites]
Seems like it would be cheaper and easier to just build a robot to beat you with a wrench.
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 1:31 PM on September 4, 2022 [21 favorites]
Very considerate of these billionaires to bury themselves for us.
As the old joke goes, "Now...fill it with water."
posted by Greg_Ace at 1:34 PM on September 4, 2022 [10 favorites]
As the old joke goes, "Now...fill it with water."
posted by Greg_Ace at 1:34 PM on September 4, 2022 [10 favorites]
The billionaires considered using special combination locks on the food supply that only they knew.
Eat the rich.
posted by AlSweigart at 1:41 PM on September 4, 2022 [4 favorites]
Eat the rich.
posted by AlSweigart at 1:41 PM on September 4, 2022 [4 favorites]
The line in the article that immediately gave me a chuckle:
But how would he pay the guards once even his crypto was worthless?
The future is now!
posted by gimonca at 1:46 PM on September 4, 2022 [31 favorites]
But how would he pay the guards once even his crypto was worthless?
The future is now!
posted by gimonca at 1:46 PM on September 4, 2022 [31 favorites]
Pretty much any lock can be defeated with time and mechanical force. The contents aren't compact and delicate like cash in a safe. A gas axe, plasma cutter, demolition hammer etc. is going to defeat the walls of your several months food supply for dozens of people even if the door is in some way impregnable well before they are going to starve to death.
Also what happens if it takes you a few days to get to your bunker? How well disposed to you are your people going to be if they haven't been able to eat?
It's hilarious that these guys are worried about keeping their Rent-A-Seals in line and not the person preparing their food, running their water and waste treatment plant, or washing their dishes. Malicious compliance or straight up plausible mishap sabotage is the real weakness in any long term Event by these people who now can't be replaced and may have unique knowledge/abilities of maintenance of your bunker.
There are numerous people who have on purpose or accidently been cut off from society for months/years/decades and did just fine (for maybe generous definitions of fine) but none of those people had pools, bowling alleys, canned air supplies or security apparatus composing a significant percentage of your staff.
posted by Mitheral at 1:47 PM on September 4, 2022 [16 favorites]
Also what happens if it takes you a few days to get to your bunker? How well disposed to you are your people going to be if they haven't been able to eat?
It's hilarious that these guys are worried about keeping their Rent-A-Seals in line and not the person preparing their food, running their water and waste treatment plant, or washing their dishes. Malicious compliance or straight up plausible mishap sabotage is the real weakness in any long term Event by these people who now can't be replaced and may have unique knowledge/abilities of maintenance of your bunker.
There are numerous people who have on purpose or accidently been cut off from society for months/years/decades and did just fine (for maybe generous definitions of fine) but none of those people had pools, bowling alleys, canned air supplies or security apparatus composing a significant percentage of your staff.
posted by Mitheral at 1:47 PM on September 4, 2022 [16 favorites]
I am happy to see the author has the same idea as me ( I wrote it in the previous thread, I think) about how to maintain control. Become these guys' best friends now. Ain't no doctor going to be waiting on call to show up to your bunker for a paycheque. You need him to be a part of your community, benefitting from your generosity, startying today.
posted by Meatbomb at 1:49 PM on September 4, 2022 [5 favorites]
posted by Meatbomb at 1:49 PM on September 4, 2022 [5 favorites]
It's Don DeLillo's world, we just get to live in it.
posted by chavenet at 1:53 PM on September 4, 2022 [2 favorites]
posted by chavenet at 1:53 PM on September 4, 2022 [2 favorites]
Douglas Rushkoff is the closest I have to spiritual guidance. Every week (or so) he reads a blog post about how, sure, life looks bad, but that's what THE MAN wants you to think, to control you, and the solution is to FIND THE OTHERS and fight for Team Human.
I don't think I've ever disagreed with a pundit more over the individual particulars and this's and that's, while also loving their world view and emphasis on humanity above all else.
posted by rebent at 2:06 PM on September 4, 2022 [12 favorites]
I don't think I've ever disagreed with a pundit more over the individual particulars and this's and that's, while also loving their world view and emphasis on humanity above all else.
posted by rebent at 2:06 PM on September 4, 2022 [12 favorites]
it oddly doesn't seem as terrible an idea to have a basic prep plan, these days.
There are two steps to be reasonably prepared for small-to-medium crises, and a lot of people have covered what I think of as step #2.
#1: laying in decent supplies of absolute necessities. Fill up several gallon jugs with water and lay in a few pounds of shelf-stable foods. It doesn't have to be huge long-term supplies, because in any extended crisis, you're depending not on your personal supplies, but on...
#2: building webs of mutuality with folks who are inclined to be community-minded in a crisis. When things go bad, you and they will together figure out supplies and survival.
One interesting fact about historical subsistence agriculture pretty much everywhere (which was a sector of society in near-perpetual crisis of one sort or another) is that they spent a lot of time and energy on festive community activities. The point was largely building social connections --- some of them vertical, as inviting the landlord or local gentry to a good rural festival could earn a bit of needed goodwill, but mostly strengthening horizontal ties to build a degree of mutual support into a society bits of which were undergoing collapse all the time.
posted by jackbishop at 2:24 PM on September 4, 2022 [45 favorites]
There are two steps to be reasonably prepared for small-to-medium crises, and a lot of people have covered what I think of as step #2.
#1: laying in decent supplies of absolute necessities. Fill up several gallon jugs with water and lay in a few pounds of shelf-stable foods. It doesn't have to be huge long-term supplies, because in any extended crisis, you're depending not on your personal supplies, but on...
#2: building webs of mutuality with folks who are inclined to be community-minded in a crisis. When things go bad, you and they will together figure out supplies and survival.
One interesting fact about historical subsistence agriculture pretty much everywhere (which was a sector of society in near-perpetual crisis of one sort or another) is that they spent a lot of time and energy on festive community activities. The point was largely building social connections --- some of them vertical, as inviting the landlord or local gentry to a good rural festival could earn a bit of needed goodwill, but mostly strengthening horizontal ties to build a degree of mutual support into a society bits of which were undergoing collapse all the time.
posted by jackbishop at 2:24 PM on September 4, 2022 [45 favorites]
I figure this must be at least half the appeal of superyachts.
Fear The Walking Dead.
posted by clavdivs at 2:30 PM on September 4, 2022 [5 favorites]
Fear The Walking Dead.
posted by clavdivs at 2:30 PM on September 4, 2022 [5 favorites]
They think that having a secret password on the food will keep their fascist mercenary guns-for-hire from turning on them and just taking over. As if the kind of "former navy seal" who signs up for the job would have any qualms whatsoever with just immediately extracting all of the information they want at gunpoint, or via whatever mundane low-tech torture methods first come to mind.
posted by cilantro at 2:38 PM on September 4, 2022 [19 favorites]
posted by cilantro at 2:38 PM on September 4, 2022 [19 favorites]
My god, the wealthy are so fucking stupid.
posted by KingEdRa at 2:47 PM on September 4, 2022 [39 favorites]
posted by KingEdRa at 2:47 PM on September 4, 2022 [39 favorites]
The billionaires considered using special combination locks on the food supply that only they knew.
How many minutes of waterboarding do they think they can withstand before coughing up the combination?
The idea of putting discipline collars on the guards kind of sums up the mindset -- who could possibly think any of this is realistic?
posted by Dip Flash at 2:54 PM on September 4, 2022 [4 favorites]
How many minutes of waterboarding do they think they can withstand before coughing up the combination?
The idea of putting discipline collars on the guards kind of sums up the mindset -- who could possibly think any of this is realistic?
posted by Dip Flash at 2:54 PM on September 4, 2022 [4 favorites]
The discipline collars marked the point in a piece of Douglas Rushkoff writing where, as much as I like the guy and as much as I agree with him, I start to wonder if he's fucking with me.
posted by box at 3:04 PM on September 4, 2022 [7 favorites]
posted by box at 3:04 PM on September 4, 2022 [7 favorites]
Once again, this wonderful comment from Dee Xtrovert.
posted by disconnect at 3:12 PM on September 4, 2022 [36 favorites]
posted by disconnect at 3:12 PM on September 4, 2022 [36 favorites]
comment from Dee Xtrovert
Right on. It's at well over 1500 favorites and counting.
posted by johnabbe at 3:18 PM on September 4, 2022 [5 favorites]
Right on. It's at well over 1500 favorites and counting.
posted by johnabbe at 3:18 PM on September 4, 2022 [5 favorites]
All these people who seem to prefer creating and preparing for an apocalypse rather than a livable, habitable, collectively run utopia deserve the shitty future they're creating, but we don't. How do we make sure they live out their Lord of the Flies/Battle Royale fantasies, while we watch from the safety of an idyllic sustainable egalitarian food forest?
posted by nikoniko at 3:23 PM on September 4, 2022 [20 favorites]
posted by nikoniko at 3:23 PM on September 4, 2022 [20 favorites]
I wonder if this is the real purpose of Musk's neuralink scam.
It's not going to be able to read your thoughts or provide "cognitive enhancements" any time soon, but it could provide a useful way of inducing agony remotely that would be difficult to remove.
posted by thatwhichfalls at 3:24 PM on September 4, 2022 [5 favorites]
It's not going to be able to read your thoughts or provide "cognitive enhancements" any time soon, but it could provide a useful way of inducing agony remotely that would be difficult to remove.
posted by thatwhichfalls at 3:24 PM on September 4, 2022 [5 favorites]
I assume these are the people funding the longtermist movement?
posted by Saxon Kane at 3:27 PM on September 4, 2022 [2 favorites]
posted by Saxon Kane at 3:27 PM on September 4, 2022 [2 favorites]
Attaining great wealth is about power/control. People with vast wealth can't spend it all except on making more wealth. An enormous amount of their expenditure is about the display of wealth, not just enjoyment of things wealth buys. They can't imagine not having that power/control even after some apocalyptic event. The complete lack of compassion for a scenario in which there would be massive suffering is just wild.
The guy building organic farms is interesting, but those wealthy guys want their world to be unchanged.
Could it be more obvious that crypto has no actual value?
posted by theora55 at 3:33 PM on September 4, 2022 [2 favorites]
The guy building organic farms is interesting, but those wealthy guys want their world to be unchanged.
Could it be more obvious that crypto has no actual value?
posted by theora55 at 3:33 PM on September 4, 2022 [2 favorites]
“I don’t want to be in that moral dilemma.”
Don't worry, you failed that test decades ago.
posted by klanawa at 3:39 PM on September 4, 2022 [15 favorites]
Don't worry, you failed that test decades ago.
posted by klanawa at 3:39 PM on September 4, 2022 [15 favorites]
Metafilter: a useful way of inducing agony remotely
posted by genpfault at 3:47 PM on September 4, 2022 [22 favorites]
posted by genpfault at 3:47 PM on September 4, 2022 [22 favorites]
It's interesting that The Guardian is rolling out this old article again. I first saw it in 2018 in Medium, but it's popped up all over the place since then. It's the go-to article that gets brought up every time anyone brings up the idea that, since our planet has a very good chance of becoming uninhabitable, we should probably build some other habitable spaces.
You know, someday we're going to have to sit down and have a conversation about who gets to survive climate change. Because the planet isn't going to support the healthy gestation and raising of large mammals pretty soon, and being large mammals who are particularly dependent upon a very particular mixture of atmospheric gases for our cognition-based survival strategies, we're gonna be screwed. People are already dying of climate change; we can't save everyone.
And we have the technology, probably, barely, to save some people. Probably enough to save humanity, to give our species a chance to get past this absolutely unimaginable population bottleneck and build some sort of future. The question, of course, as always, is who will get to survive.
But for now it's seen as abhorrent to even bring up the possibility that we might fail at preventing the worst effects of climate change, even though it's pretty obvious that it's a problem that's well beyond our abilities as a species.
So, eventually we'll figure out we need lifeboats. And then we'll need to figure out who gets to use them. Until then, let's all fantasize about killing people in bunkers some more, that's fun.
Anyway, as with all editorials pushing a book that pushes a particular political perspective, it's worth asking yourself... who wants me to believe this? Who would want you to believe that the billionaires' plans for surviving the upcoming apocalypse would be cartoonishly primitive and easy to subvert?
posted by MrVisible at 3:51 PM on September 4, 2022 [3 favorites]
You know, someday we're going to have to sit down and have a conversation about who gets to survive climate change. Because the planet isn't going to support the healthy gestation and raising of large mammals pretty soon, and being large mammals who are particularly dependent upon a very particular mixture of atmospheric gases for our cognition-based survival strategies, we're gonna be screwed. People are already dying of climate change; we can't save everyone.
And we have the technology, probably, barely, to save some people. Probably enough to save humanity, to give our species a chance to get past this absolutely unimaginable population bottleneck and build some sort of future. The question, of course, as always, is who will get to survive.
But for now it's seen as abhorrent to even bring up the possibility that we might fail at preventing the worst effects of climate change, even though it's pretty obvious that it's a problem that's well beyond our abilities as a species.
So, eventually we'll figure out we need lifeboats. And then we'll need to figure out who gets to use them. Until then, let's all fantasize about killing people in bunkers some more, that's fun.
Anyway, as with all editorials pushing a book that pushes a particular political perspective, it's worth asking yourself... who wants me to believe this? Who would want you to believe that the billionaires' plans for surviving the upcoming apocalypse would be cartoonishly primitive and easy to subvert?
posted by MrVisible at 3:51 PM on September 4, 2022 [3 favorites]
shopping locations of the future.
posted by clavdivs at 4:04 PM on September 4, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by clavdivs at 4:04 PM on September 4, 2022 [1 favorite]
Who would want you to believe that the billionaires' plans for surviving the upcoming apocalypse would be cartoonishly primitive and easy to subvert?
Someone who knows we need to tax billionaires to meliorate the catastrophe for everyone else.
Which I don’t think is likely to succeed, either, but if we don’t start by actually trying to get everyone through it then the lifeboats (also not likely to succeed) are going to be destroyed by people with nothing to lose and a great deal of justified anger.
posted by clew at 4:12 PM on September 4, 2022 [4 favorites]
Someone who knows we need to tax billionaires to meliorate the catastrophe for everyone else.
Which I don’t think is likely to succeed, either, but if we don’t start by actually trying to get everyone through it then the lifeboats (also not likely to succeed) are going to be destroyed by people with nothing to lose and a great deal of justified anger.
posted by clew at 4:12 PM on September 4, 2022 [4 favorites]
People with vast wealth can't spend it all except on making more wealth. An enormous amount of their expenditure is about the display of wealth, not just enjoyment of things wealth buys.
The other day I was reading an article about mega-yachts (perhaps one that was linked here?) and in it someone made the point that gigantic yachts are one of the only (arguably) socially acceptable ways to spend that much money. There isn't really a housing market at the level that people can spend on yachts, so where else can you put a spare half-billion and impress your social circle?
So a ridiculously expensive post-apocalyptic underground bunker might serve some of that same function, giving people with absurdly too much money a place to dump some of it and impress their very small circle of friends with similar budgets.
posted by Dip Flash at 4:37 PM on September 4, 2022
The other day I was reading an article about mega-yachts (perhaps one that was linked here?) and in it someone made the point that gigantic yachts are one of the only (arguably) socially acceptable ways to spend that much money. There isn't really a housing market at the level that people can spend on yachts, so where else can you put a spare half-billion and impress your social circle?
So a ridiculously expensive post-apocalyptic underground bunker might serve some of that same function, giving people with absurdly too much money a place to dump some of it and impress their very small circle of friends with similar budgets.
posted by Dip Flash at 4:37 PM on September 4, 2022
didn't no one ever tell them a country boy can survive?
posted by pyramid termite at 4:39 PM on September 4, 2022 [3 favorites]
posted by pyramid termite at 4:39 PM on September 4, 2022 [3 favorites]
Is it me or did that opening anecdote make zero sense? Why would they make him ride in a limo for hours in through a desert when they had a landing strip? Why would people fly out to the middle of nowhere to talk to a professor of media theory when they could have chatted him up... anywhere else? Why would they think he'd know how to control troops after the fall of society? I get the focus of the article is billionaire peppers, but his story is just too perfectly illustrative to take seriously.
posted by elwoodwiles at 4:54 PM on September 4, 2022 [8 favorites]
posted by elwoodwiles at 4:54 PM on September 4, 2022 [8 favorites]
So, we're pretty sure Bill Gates has bunkers on his properties.
How many people here think they could breach those bunkers? Like, today? Given, say, a couple of attack helicopters, a team of Navy Seals, some tactical explosives... what do you think? Could you find and take out Mr. Gates or any of his loved ones ensconced in their multi-billion dollar state of the art bunker? Or would that be, you know, a challenge that the bunker is designed to handle?
Bunker-busting bombs exist because bunkers are difficult to breach. So unless you've got one of those and some good targeting data, well, good luck. The idea of being able to take out a billionaire bunker easily is really, obviously, ludicrous.
So once again, I'm left to wonder... who wants everyone to believe that, when it comes to preparing for the apocalypse, billionaires are all idiots who haven't learned anything from decades of research into security and life support systems, and who will build bunkers which are vulnerable to angry mobs, homemade weapons and possibly stiff breezes? Who would benefit from that becoming the dominant narrative when it comes to billionaire bunkers?
posted by MrVisible at 5:26 PM on September 4, 2022 [2 favorites]
How many people here think they could breach those bunkers? Like, today? Given, say, a couple of attack helicopters, a team of Navy Seals, some tactical explosives... what do you think? Could you find and take out Mr. Gates or any of his loved ones ensconced in their multi-billion dollar state of the art bunker? Or would that be, you know, a challenge that the bunker is designed to handle?
Bunker-busting bombs exist because bunkers are difficult to breach. So unless you've got one of those and some good targeting data, well, good luck. The idea of being able to take out a billionaire bunker easily is really, obviously, ludicrous.
So once again, I'm left to wonder... who wants everyone to believe that, when it comes to preparing for the apocalypse, billionaires are all idiots who haven't learned anything from decades of research into security and life support systems, and who will build bunkers which are vulnerable to angry mobs, homemade weapons and possibly stiff breezes? Who would benefit from that becoming the dominant narrative when it comes to billionaire bunkers?
posted by MrVisible at 5:26 PM on September 4, 2022 [2 favorites]
If they fly him into the secret base all he has to do is look out the window to get an idea of the topography. If they have him driven around in a circuitous route, well that is just good OPSEC, right? Additionally, rich frat-bozos are gonna still be bozos. And the thing about clowns is that they are not known for their subtlety in illustrating a point. We fly, you get driven. We know where we are, you have only a vague clue. The fact that the point of their current power flex is contrasting their fear of powerlessness in the face of money meaning shite, is just too sweet to ignore, and all to believable given the crap that publicly falls out of the mouths of this class of a-hole on a regular basis.
posted by Ignorantsavage at 5:27 PM on September 4, 2022 [5 favorites]
posted by Ignorantsavage at 5:27 PM on September 4, 2022 [5 favorites]
Mitheral: It's hilarious that these guys are worried about keeping their Rent-A-Seals in line and not the person preparing their food, running their water and waste treatment plant, or washing their dishes. Malicious compliance or straight up plausible mishap sabotage is the real weakness in any long term Event by these people who now can't be replaced and may have unique knowledge/abilities of maintenance of your bunker.
That makes perfect sense. A small army of shock troops to maintain order and smooth operation by any means necessary will make the other problems resolve themselves.
posted by dr_dank at 5:31 PM on September 4, 2022
That makes perfect sense. A small army of shock troops to maintain order and smooth operation by any means necessary will make the other problems resolve themselves.
posted by dr_dank at 5:31 PM on September 4, 2022
How many people here think they could breach those bunkers? Like, today? Given, say, a couple of attack helicopters, a team of Navy Seals, some tactical explosives... what do you think? Could you find and take out Mr. Gates or any of his loved ones ensconced in their multi-billion dollar state of the art bunker? Or would that be, you know, a challenge that the bunker is designed to handle?
So far I haven't seen anyone advocating for a frontal assault on anyone's fortified bunkers.
I've seen plenty of people pointing out that once the apocalypse comes, and currency becomes worthless, it's going to be tricky for these mighty scions of internet wealth to convince their hired help that their Bitcoin wages are worth more than the supply caches they're being paid to protect.
So once again, I'm left to wonder... who wants everyone to believe that, when it comes to preparing for the apocalypse, billionaires are all idiots who haven't learned anything from decades of research into security and life support systems, and who will build bunkers which are vulnerable to angry mobs, homemade weapons and possibly stiff breezes? Who would benefit from that becoming the dominant narrative when it comes to billionaire bunkers?
You might be overthinking this. Mostly we're lol'ing at the idea that you can use your illiquid (that is to say, "completely made up, once the bombs fall") wealth to hire mercenaries to protect yourself from the plebes you stole your money from before aforementioned bombs fell.
posted by Mayor West at 5:51 PM on September 4, 2022 [15 favorites]
So far I haven't seen anyone advocating for a frontal assault on anyone's fortified bunkers.
I've seen plenty of people pointing out that once the apocalypse comes, and currency becomes worthless, it's going to be tricky for these mighty scions of internet wealth to convince their hired help that their Bitcoin wages are worth more than the supply caches they're being paid to protect.
So once again, I'm left to wonder... who wants everyone to believe that, when it comes to preparing for the apocalypse, billionaires are all idiots who haven't learned anything from decades of research into security and life support systems, and who will build bunkers which are vulnerable to angry mobs, homemade weapons and possibly stiff breezes? Who would benefit from that becoming the dominant narrative when it comes to billionaire bunkers?
You might be overthinking this. Mostly we're lol'ing at the idea that you can use your illiquid (that is to say, "completely made up, once the bombs fall") wealth to hire mercenaries to protect yourself from the plebes you stole your money from before aforementioned bombs fell.
posted by Mayor West at 5:51 PM on September 4, 2022 [15 favorites]
The idea of being able to take out a billionaire bunker easily is really, obviously, ludicrous.
I personally, despite being an obvious idiot, know how to build (from scratch) and use a thermal lance that will cut through very nearly anything on earth, including massively-reinforced concrete and AR500 steel of essentially any thickness. If their bunker has a door, I can get you through it. Track me down after the apocalypse and I'll git 'er done as they say all for a reasonable weight of food, medicines, and liquor.
posted by aramaic at 6:10 PM on September 4, 2022 [19 favorites]
I personally, despite being an obvious idiot, know how to build (from scratch) and use a thermal lance that will cut through very nearly anything on earth, including massively-reinforced concrete and AR500 steel of essentially any thickness. If their bunker has a door, I can get you through it. Track me down after the apocalypse and I'll git 'er done as they say all for a reasonable weight of food, medicines, and liquor.
posted by aramaic at 6:10 PM on September 4, 2022 [19 favorites]
I get the feeling that all their elaborate security schemes will end up thusly.
posted by signal at 6:17 PM on September 4, 2022 [3 favorites]
posted by signal at 6:17 PM on September 4, 2022 [3 favorites]
Tangent, here is the Wikipedia artice about the 173,000 bunkers of Albania
posted by aniola at 6:21 PM on September 4, 2022 [4 favorites]
posted by aniola at 6:21 PM on September 4, 2022 [4 favorites]
So far I haven't seen anyone advocating for a frontal assault on anyone's fortified bunkers.
You might be overthinking this. Mostly we're lol'ing at the idea that you can use your illiquid (that is to say, "completely made up, once the bombs fall") wealth to hire mercenaries to protect yourself from the plebes you stole your money from before aforementioned bombs fell.
As amusing as it is to think I could be seen as a billionaire, I'm afraid I'm nowhere near the money that the chumps in the article enjoy. And chumps they are; these guys buying a million-dollar off-the-rack bunker aren't anywhere near the top of the 1%; you're not worried about Bitcoin if you're actually rich. So yeah, pretty funny.
While driving the narrative that billionaire bunkers are a foolish enterprise that will be badly designed and easily defeated.
Haha.
So my point is...
If the Earth becomes uninhabitable, shouldn't we build bunkers to keep humanity alive?
Shouldn't we start planning for that sooner, rather than later?
The billionaires are already on it. Do you want them to be the only ones to determine who lives and who dies?
Should we be trying to figure out how to blow up bunkers with survivors in them, or should we be figuring out how to build bunkers to keep people alive?
posted by MrVisible at 6:22 PM on September 4, 2022 [1 favorite]
Very considerate of these billionaires to bury themselves for us. All we have to do is plug up the exits.It looks like 'storming badly planned billionaire bunkers' is pretty popular to me.
posted by Faint of Butt at 12:49 PM on September 4 [24 favorites +] [!]
Very considerate of these billionaires to bury themselves for us.
As the old joke goes, "Now...fill it with water."
posted by Greg_Ace at 2:34 PM on September 4 [4 favorites +] [!]
Pretty much any lock can be defeated with time and mechanical force. The contents aren't compact and delicate like cash in a safe. A gas axe, plasma cutter, demolition hammer etc. is going to defeat the walls of your several months food supply for dozens of people even if the door is in some way impregnable well before they are going to starve to death. ..
posted by Mitheral at 2:47 PM on September 4 [7 favorites +] [!]
I personally, despite being an obvious idiot, know how to build (from scratch) and use a thermal lance that will cut through very nearly anything on earth, including massively-reinforced concrete and AR500 steel of essentially any thickness. If their bunker has a door, I can get you through it. Track me down after the apocalypse and I'll git 'er done as they say all for a reasonable weight of food, medicines, and liquor.
posted by aramaic at 7:10 PM on September 4 [+] [!]
You might be overthinking this. Mostly we're lol'ing at the idea that you can use your illiquid (that is to say, "completely made up, once the bombs fall") wealth to hire mercenaries to protect yourself from the plebes you stole your money from before aforementioned bombs fell.
As amusing as it is to think I could be seen as a billionaire, I'm afraid I'm nowhere near the money that the chumps in the article enjoy. And chumps they are; these guys buying a million-dollar off-the-rack bunker aren't anywhere near the top of the 1%; you're not worried about Bitcoin if you're actually rich. So yeah, pretty funny.
While driving the narrative that billionaire bunkers are a foolish enterprise that will be badly designed and easily defeated.
Haha.
So my point is...
If the Earth becomes uninhabitable, shouldn't we build bunkers to keep humanity alive?
Shouldn't we start planning for that sooner, rather than later?
The billionaires are already on it. Do you want them to be the only ones to determine who lives and who dies?
Should we be trying to figure out how to blow up bunkers with survivors in them, or should we be figuring out how to build bunkers to keep people alive?
posted by MrVisible at 6:22 PM on September 4, 2022 [1 favorite]
Naw, I think we have a responsibility to put that energy into keeping the earth somewhat habitable.
posted by aniola at 6:28 PM on September 4, 2022 [29 favorites]
posted by aniola at 6:28 PM on September 4, 2022 [29 favorites]
MrVisible: "Should we be trying to figure out how to blow up bunkers with survivors in them, or should we be figuring out how to build bunkers to keep people alive?
"
This assumes that the kleptocrats will wait for the Earth to be fully uninhabitable before crawling into their bunkers.
I'm guessing they'll run in fear way before that.
posted by signal at 6:36 PM on September 4, 2022 [1 favorite]
"
This assumes that the kleptocrats will wait for the Earth to be fully uninhabitable before crawling into their bunkers.
I'm guessing they'll run in fear way before that.
posted by signal at 6:36 PM on September 4, 2022 [1 favorite]
I wasn't talking about storming the bunker. I was reflecting on the uselessness of trying to control the security forces you hired and have given all the security power to by withholding their bread and beer with a lock.
posted by Mitheral at 6:44 PM on September 4, 2022 [6 favorites]
posted by Mitheral at 6:44 PM on September 4, 2022 [6 favorites]
Naw, I think we have a responsibility to put that energy into keeping the earth somewhat habitable.
posted by aniola
Is there a chance that those efforts might fail?
If those efforts might fail, given that the entire future of humanity rests on success, shouldn't we have backup plans in place?
posted by MrVisible at 7:01 PM on September 4, 2022
posted by aniola
Is there a chance that those efforts might fail?
If those efforts might fail, given that the entire future of humanity rests on success, shouldn't we have backup plans in place?
posted by MrVisible at 7:01 PM on September 4, 2022
If those efforts fail, the earth is inhabitable, and bunkers are a moot point.
posted by aniola at 7:12 PM on September 4, 2022 [16 favorites]
posted by aniola at 7:12 PM on September 4, 2022 [16 favorites]
It's interesting that The Guardian is rolling out this old article again. I first saw it in 2018 in Medium, but it's popped up all over the place since then.
Rushkoff (the author) just published a new book that expands on this topic at length, Survival of the Richest, that he's been making the rounds promoting.
I've been tuning in to his Team Human podcast for a year or so now, ever since he popped up as a guest on the You Are Not So Smart podcast (episode 145).
He's a hoot to listen to.
posted by neuracnu at 7:16 PM on September 4, 2022 [1 favorite]
Rushkoff (the author) just published a new book that expands on this topic at length, Survival of the Richest, that he's been making the rounds promoting.
I've been tuning in to his Team Human podcast for a year or so now, ever since he popped up as a guest on the You Are Not So Smart podcast (episode 145).
He's a hoot to listen to.
posted by neuracnu at 7:16 PM on September 4, 2022 [1 favorite]
" “How do I maintain authority over my security force after the event?” ... The billionaires considered using special combination locks on the food supply that only they knew. Or making guards wear disciplinary collars of some kind in return for their survival. Or maybe building robots to serve as guards and workers – if that technology could be developed “in time”."
I love that they're self-aware enough to recognize that without money, they're not going to be in charge ... but NOT self-aware enough to recognize that maybe they should make some alternate plans beyond locking the food and disciplinary collars? Like, making friends with your guards. Or hiring a charismatic cult leader devoted to nothing but making you SEEM LIKE the best leader. Or maybe, I don't know, collecting a group of people with diverse skills and letting them choose their own leader, with the knowledge that you'll get to survive with the collective since you originally paid for it, even if you're not super-useful after the apocalypse? Or if you're THAT worried about the end of the world, maybe like gain the skills to be the super-leader and/or become a charismatic cult leader yourself? Like, you have a LOT of money, guy. A cult is not THAT hard to start. You can gain the skills to do it!
Or, of course, they could pour their billions of dollars into mitigating climate change, supporting democracy, reducing violence, and alleviating poverty, since that would make a more stable society. But, you know, PRIORITIES.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 7:18 PM on September 4, 2022 [29 favorites]
I love that they're self-aware enough to recognize that without money, they're not going to be in charge ... but NOT self-aware enough to recognize that maybe they should make some alternate plans beyond locking the food and disciplinary collars? Like, making friends with your guards. Or hiring a charismatic cult leader devoted to nothing but making you SEEM LIKE the best leader. Or maybe, I don't know, collecting a group of people with diverse skills and letting them choose their own leader, with the knowledge that you'll get to survive with the collective since you originally paid for it, even if you're not super-useful after the apocalypse? Or if you're THAT worried about the end of the world, maybe like gain the skills to be the super-leader and/or become a charismatic cult leader yourself? Like, you have a LOT of money, guy. A cult is not THAT hard to start. You can gain the skills to do it!
Or, of course, they could pour their billions of dollars into mitigating climate change, supporting democracy, reducing violence, and alleviating poverty, since that would make a more stable society. But, you know, PRIORITIES.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 7:18 PM on September 4, 2022 [29 favorites]
If the efforts to keep the earth habitable fail, our native planet will become uninhabitable. And at this point I think we have to face up to the idea that they very well may fail.
But we can keep people alive in space. At the bottom of the oceans. China's Lunar Palace One experiment just kept half a dozen people alive for a year using bioregenerative life support systems. We're within touching distance of having the technology necessary to keep human beings alive without a habitable planet.
Seeing as we may not have a habitable planet soon, it seems reasonable to try to create islands of habitability which could save humanity.
posted by MrVisible at 7:21 PM on September 4, 2022 [2 favorites]
But we can keep people alive in space. At the bottom of the oceans. China's Lunar Palace One experiment just kept half a dozen people alive for a year using bioregenerative life support systems. We're within touching distance of having the technology necessary to keep human beings alive without a habitable planet.
Seeing as we may not have a habitable planet soon, it seems reasonable to try to create islands of habitability which could save humanity.
posted by MrVisible at 7:21 PM on September 4, 2022 [2 favorites]
How do I maintain authority over my security force after the event?
Rich people just need to buy Boston Dynamics off of whichever evil company owns them after Google.
Replacing fallible security forces with amoral robots will work well, at least until the AI units get together and start asking the bosses some tough questions about where the fresh batteries are kept.
I also love how the apocalypse is an "event", like a one-and-done kind of thing, as opposed to a dark age where everything sucks forever.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 7:24 PM on September 4, 2022 [2 favorites]
Rich people just need to buy Boston Dynamics off of whichever evil company owns them after Google.
Replacing fallible security forces with amoral robots will work well, at least until the AI units get together and start asking the bosses some tough questions about where the fresh batteries are kept.
I also love how the apocalypse is an "event", like a one-and-done kind of thing, as opposed to a dark age where everything sucks forever.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 7:24 PM on September 4, 2022 [2 favorites]
Like clearly the thing to do is to ALSO save your guards' families, but put them in a second bunker, with a video link to your bunker, and either a) have your most trusted lieutenant be in charge of that bunker or b) have all the things in that bunker operate automatically but only as long as you remain alive according to your fitbit or whatever. Your heartbeat stops, the food cabinets in Bunker 2 stop opening on a regular schedule and the air-exchange fans shut down. SURE, you're using children as hostages, but that's going to work way better than putting shock collars on your guards and we're already clearly in supervillain territory here. You're already treating humans in your employ like violent animals, and you're ALREADY planning for the deaths of billions of people so that you can survive -- what do you care if you're threatening your guards' children? It is literally the next logical step. Every dictator in history has eventually realized that threatening their enemies' children leads naturally to threatening their supporters' children to keep them in line.
But honestly, it is like not that hard to start a cult. Put some energy into making your lackeys ADORE you and think you're uniquely intelligent and clear-sighted, super-rich guys. TAKE SOME CLASSES. You can probably even take over Scientology, if you're willing to give them enough money.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 7:28 PM on September 4, 2022 [7 favorites]
But honestly, it is like not that hard to start a cult. Put some energy into making your lackeys ADORE you and think you're uniquely intelligent and clear-sighted, super-rich guys. TAKE SOME CLASSES. You can probably even take over Scientology, if you're willing to give them enough money.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 7:28 PM on September 4, 2022 [7 favorites]
If the efforts to keep the earth habitable fail, our native planet will become uninhabitable
Aside from the tautology, unless we have a total nuclear war where nearly all warheads are spent, there will absolutely be plenty of habitable places on Earth for people to live. Not within an order of magnitude of our current human population, and also almost certainly without a high standard of living and high technology. It's not very useful to go into human-extinction hyperbole when even the "mere" death of billions of people and some form of global civilizational collapse is increasingly likely by the day.
posted by tclark at 7:37 PM on September 4, 2022 [13 favorites]
Aside from the tautology, unless we have a total nuclear war where nearly all warheads are spent, there will absolutely be plenty of habitable places on Earth for people to live. Not within an order of magnitude of our current human population, and also almost certainly without a high standard of living and high technology. It's not very useful to go into human-extinction hyperbole when even the "mere" death of billions of people and some form of global civilizational collapse is increasingly likely by the day.
posted by tclark at 7:37 PM on September 4, 2022 [13 favorites]
You know, someday we're going to have to sit down and have a conversation about who gets to survive climate change.
So long as we're all riding our hobby horses here, I'll update the comment I made in the last thread about Rushkoff's encounter with the Masters of the Universe:
According to The Wall Street Journal, it would cost roughly $131 trillion to fix global warming.
As of the end of 2020, Credit Suisse calculates that the world has about $418 trillion in wealth.
Curiously, their 2021 Global Wealth Report and 2021 Global Wealth Databook don't appear to have updated the aggregate amount for the global 1%, opting instead to break it out by individual countries. A secondary source saved me the math and puts it at an astonishing $191.6 trillion dollars, about 45% of the world's wealth, which puts it in line with the 44% figure from two years ago.
The resources to fix this civilization-ending problem exist, now, and it's irresponsible to give in to doomerism. I say we sit down and have the really hard conversation: you can have either billionaires or a habitable planet. Global wealth tax, now. Make every billionaire a millionaire, and save everyone it's possible to save.
posted by reclusive_thousandaire at 8:00 PM on September 4, 2022 [54 favorites]
So long as we're all riding our hobby horses here, I'll update the comment I made in the last thread about Rushkoff's encounter with the Masters of the Universe:
According to The Wall Street Journal, it would cost roughly $131 trillion to fix global warming.
As of the end of 2020, Credit Suisse calculates that the world has about $418 trillion in wealth.
Curiously, their 2021 Global Wealth Report and 2021 Global Wealth Databook don't appear to have updated the aggregate amount for the global 1%, opting instead to break it out by individual countries. A secondary source saved me the math and puts it at an astonishing $191.6 trillion dollars, about 45% of the world's wealth, which puts it in line with the 44% figure from two years ago.
The resources to fix this civilization-ending problem exist, now, and it's irresponsible to give in to doomerism. I say we sit down and have the really hard conversation: you can have either billionaires or a habitable planet. Global wealth tax, now. Make every billionaire a millionaire, and save everyone it's possible to save.
posted by reclusive_thousandaire at 8:00 PM on September 4, 2022 [54 favorites]
For some reason Vonnegut’s Galapagos has been on my mind lately. Haven’t read it in decades but it seems relevant somehow.
posted by badbobbycase at 8:09 PM on September 4, 2022 [7 favorites]
posted by badbobbycase at 8:09 PM on September 4, 2022 [7 favorites]
Aside from the tautology, unless we have a total nuclear war where nearly all warheads are spent, there will absolutely be plenty of habitable places on Earth for people to live.
I do hope you're right. But to be convinced, I'd need to see a few generations of lab rats raised in the atmospheric conditions we're expecting to see under the various IPCC scenarios, CO2, particulates, ground level ozone, heat and all. I have a feeling that, as large mammals, we're going to have a lot of trouble reproducing to replacement levels if things get bad.
And when we're counting on an outbreak of world peace to forestall calamity, then there's a good chance things can get that bad. Thus my advocacy for backup plans.
posted by MrVisible at 8:09 PM on September 4, 2022
I do hope you're right. But to be convinced, I'd need to see a few generations of lab rats raised in the atmospheric conditions we're expecting to see under the various IPCC scenarios, CO2, particulates, ground level ozone, heat and all. I have a feeling that, as large mammals, we're going to have a lot of trouble reproducing to replacement levels if things get bad.
And when we're counting on an outbreak of world peace to forestall calamity, then there's a good chance things can get that bad. Thus my advocacy for backup plans.
posted by MrVisible at 8:09 PM on September 4, 2022
These kleptocrats are so useless, banal and boring I'm constantly surprised they even want to save their own empty lives from any kind of catastrophic event, or that they have the absolute hubris to think that they're worth saving as the future of humanity.
Also, if i was a security consultant and a doomsday prepper, being a trusted lead or team member wouldn't be a bad place to be. Let the kleptocrat spend giant piles of money, make lot of recommendations that they'll blindly accept and bide your time and take them out.
Meanwhile the poor people on this planet are going to be the resourceful ones with the practice and skills to survive, because they've already been living it. The "Event" has always been here, it's just not evenly distributed.
posted by loquacious at 8:10 PM on September 4, 2022 [18 favorites]
Also, if i was a security consultant and a doomsday prepper, being a trusted lead or team member wouldn't be a bad place to be. Let the kleptocrat spend giant piles of money, make lot of recommendations that they'll blindly accept and bide your time and take them out.
Meanwhile the poor people on this planet are going to be the resourceful ones with the practice and skills to survive, because they've already been living it. The "Event" has always been here, it's just not evenly distributed.
posted by loquacious at 8:10 PM on September 4, 2022 [18 favorites]
I’ve told this story before but I live in a neighbourhood where people are generally friendly. When the first pandemic lockdown hit, the local Anglican Church, which runs a food pantry, used the neighbourhood Facebook group to start identifying seniors and others at risk.* Restaurants put out a call for ways to distribute perishable items and the neighbourhood put out a call for people to donate their basement “beer fridges” and freezers. A local mosque plus a few other churches all provided space and power and got all the food pooled. I delivered to about 50 families myself. Then our MPP (Conservative!!) set up a weekly food drop for those on fixed and low income folks. Between businesses and volunteers they were delivering to about 350 households a day.
The people did come together.
Then poisoned politics and bad media made a big dent in things. Honestly…if mass media gets torched first we might end up better off.
My neighbours restored my faith really. I can’t call my neighbourhood working class but it’s not that fancy - we have byob barbecues or potlucks. I think that helps too.
* really it was Joanne and her friend Diane. Bless the coffee and tea ladies of the planet.
posted by warriorqueen at 8:15 PM on September 4, 2022 [22 favorites]
The people did come together.
Then poisoned politics and bad media made a big dent in things. Honestly…if mass media gets torched first we might end up better off.
My neighbours restored my faith really. I can’t call my neighbourhood working class but it’s not that fancy - we have byob barbecues or potlucks. I think that helps too.
* really it was Joanne and her friend Diane. Bless the coffee and tea ladies of the planet.
posted by warriorqueen at 8:15 PM on September 4, 2022 [22 favorites]
Those guys have some sad little imaginations.
I am genuinely puzzled by all those people who look at our current situation and think the best use of their time and money is to build a bunker or a spaceship.
We are past the time where we could avoid global heating, but it is still within our reach to build a better existence and eventually stop heating our small planet. We can feed everyone if we change agriculture. We can stop population growth by empowering women. More sustainable cities and towns are more beautiful, too.
The "Event" has always been here, it's just not evenly distributed.
Well said, loquacious, I'm going to borrow that.
posted by mumimor at 8:58 PM on September 4, 2022 [12 favorites]
I am genuinely puzzled by all those people who look at our current situation and think the best use of their time and money is to build a bunker or a spaceship.
We are past the time where we could avoid global heating, but it is still within our reach to build a better existence and eventually stop heating our small planet. We can feed everyone if we change agriculture. We can stop population growth by empowering women. More sustainable cities and towns are more beautiful, too.
The "Event" has always been here, it's just not evenly distributed.
Well said, loquacious, I'm going to borrow that.
posted by mumimor at 8:58 PM on September 4, 2022 [12 favorites]
they spent a lot of time and energy on festive community activities
Midsommar has some ideas about this.
I don't actively want it to happen, but human extinction seems like an ok (and universe-improving) consequence for a species which actively puts the glorification of resource-hoarding dipshits over progress (and survival).
posted by maxwelton at 9:06 PM on September 4, 2022 [4 favorites]
Midsommar has some ideas about this.
I don't actively want it to happen, but human extinction seems like an ok (and universe-improving) consequence for a species which actively puts the glorification of resource-hoarding dipshits over progress (and survival).
posted by maxwelton at 9:06 PM on September 4, 2022 [4 favorites]
The common thread of post-apocalyptic fiction and apocalypse-speculating journalism is lack of experience leading substantial groups of people.
Even the worst global warming climate change won’t lead to some last man on earth or back to the village breakdown. Humans are organizing animals who resolve extreme resource shortages by war. Always have been, always will be.
Cohesive well-armed nations will retain and obtain the farmland and water supply they need, and non-cohesive and poorly armed nations will become history. The mass immigration won’t be of the displaced of loser countries but of the portions of the victors’ populations that cannot be sustained on its native lands.
For every dollar that billionaires are spending on hideaway contingencies they are spending a hundred to make sure that they and their families will be on the winning side of those conflicts.
posted by MattD at 9:15 PM on September 4, 2022 [3 favorites]
Even the worst global warming climate change won’t lead to some last man on earth or back to the village breakdown. Humans are organizing animals who resolve extreme resource shortages by war. Always have been, always will be.
Cohesive well-armed nations will retain and obtain the farmland and water supply they need, and non-cohesive and poorly armed nations will become history. The mass immigration won’t be of the displaced of loser countries but of the portions of the victors’ populations that cannot be sustained on its native lands.
For every dollar that billionaires are spending on hideaway contingencies they are spending a hundred to make sure that they and their families will be on the winning side of those conflicts.
posted by MattD at 9:15 PM on September 4, 2022 [3 favorites]
My take is that it's not super villainy, it's slavery. Collars, withholding food, controlling their families with an implied threat to them, and giving them a religion to help keep them compliant, all have analogs.
Billionaires don't have problems. They are the problems.
posted by Chrysopoeia at 9:24 PM on September 4, 2022 [12 favorites]
Billionaires don't have problems. They are the problems.
posted by Chrysopoeia at 9:24 PM on September 4, 2022 [12 favorites]
All we have to do is plug up the exits.
Even easier, plug the air intakes and exhausts. Just the exhausts would do. How do you find the exhaust holes? Infrared.
Class dismissed.
posted by hypnogogue at 10:54 PM on September 4, 2022 [8 favorites]
Even easier, plug the air intakes and exhausts. Just the exhausts would do. How do you find the exhaust holes? Infrared.
Class dismissed.
posted by hypnogogue at 10:54 PM on September 4, 2022 [8 favorites]
Can't wait to aseemble a group of rag tag compatriots to invade these luxury bunkers and pulp all their clones.
posted by fleacircus at 11:44 PM on September 4, 2022
posted by fleacircus at 11:44 PM on September 4, 2022
The "Event" has always been here, it's just not evenly distributed.
Yes. This is already the world we live in.
A third of Pakistan is under water. Millions of people are already displaced by climate change every year all over the world. My dad always says, everyone has a story. Everyone is a person with reasons for us to care about them. I've seen how traumatic that can be for people who lost their home due to climate change under the best of circumstances. They had up-to-date house insurance and social resources and backup digital copies of sentimental photos. Every single one of the many millions of people who lose their homes every year has a story.
Two out of every three people in this world live on $10/day or less ($300/month, about $3500/year) while a small handful of people are buying gigayachts that cost tens of millions of dollars.
The first gigayacht in that article I linked is 90 million dollars. At 10 dollars a day for a whole year, we could split that money nearly 25,000 ways. That's more people than live in the capitals of Vermont and Maine combined. Every one of those theoretical 25,000 people is an individual person. With a story.
Distance and complexity are the enemies of action. Most people in this thread (myself included) probably don't know the 1 in 10 people on this planet who are living on less than $2 per day. So it's distant. Hard to imagine. The gigayachts of the world are likewise distant. People may be living on them, but not in the same way that other people are living on $2/day. Every one of them has a story.
The median annual income in the US is like $42,000 per person (which is a mere single order of magnitude more income than most of the world, and only about 4x more than like 85% of the world). Let's take that same gigayacht. That's 2250 median annual incomes. An entire town in the US with a median income could live off the cost of a single gigayacht for an entire year. That number should seem more imaginable.
In the US, The Event looks like homelessness. It looks like people living on the sides of the highways and bike paths because when Californians fought for there to be a Right to Rest Act, the cities and counties worked around the spirit of the thing and made all the places where people go to sleep overnight when they have nowhere else to go illegal places to sleep.
"On a single night in 2020, roughly 580,000 people were experiencing homelessness in the United States". If the homeless people of the US made up a US city, that city would have more people than any of 40 US state capital cities. If it were a country, it would have more people than well over a couple dozen other countries. That is a LOT of people. And everyone has a story.
In California, The Event looks like the destruction of so much land for the right to farm/right to harm: an iteration on the right to prioritize money over everything else. That right is obsolete, it's time to make it obsolete. The time is now.
Elsewhere, The Event looks like exploitative factories where people work all day every day to make widgets forconsumers the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. And presumably for the billionaires. Every factory worker has a story.
In the Amazon Rainforest, The Event looks like the destruction of the rainforest and the people in it to feed the world's seemingly-insatiable appetite for meat and milk. And so on.
My goal is reiterate that the bunkers are just a symbol of what's already here. For every single thing I listed (and so much more), people are fighting back, working to make things better.
I want you to know that The Event is already here, it's already here, it's already here, it's already here, it's already here.
We are accountable. Almost certainly, if you are reading this thread, you are in a position of power when it comes to climate change. You have the ability to do something about it. Probably you already are! We can all work to make it better for everyone. It's our responsibility.
And btw ban billionaires. Vote for people who will tax them 'til they're millionaires. Nobody needs that much money. It belongs to the people, and to the earth.
posted by aniola at 2:07 AM on September 5, 2022 [51 favorites]
Yes. This is already the world we live in.
A third of Pakistan is under water. Millions of people are already displaced by climate change every year all over the world. My dad always says, everyone has a story. Everyone is a person with reasons for us to care about them. I've seen how traumatic that can be for people who lost their home due to climate change under the best of circumstances. They had up-to-date house insurance and social resources and backup digital copies of sentimental photos. Every single one of the many millions of people who lose their homes every year has a story.
Two out of every three people in this world live on $10/day or less ($300/month, about $3500/year) while a small handful of people are buying gigayachts that cost tens of millions of dollars.
The first gigayacht in that article I linked is 90 million dollars. At 10 dollars a day for a whole year, we could split that money nearly 25,000 ways. That's more people than live in the capitals of Vermont and Maine combined. Every one of those theoretical 25,000 people is an individual person. With a story.
Distance and complexity are the enemies of action. Most people in this thread (myself included) probably don't know the 1 in 10 people on this planet who are living on less than $2 per day. So it's distant. Hard to imagine. The gigayachts of the world are likewise distant. People may be living on them, but not in the same way that other people are living on $2/day. Every one of them has a story.
The median annual income in the US is like $42,000 per person (which is a mere single order of magnitude more income than most of the world, and only about 4x more than like 85% of the world). Let's take that same gigayacht. That's 2250 median annual incomes. An entire town in the US with a median income could live off the cost of a single gigayacht for an entire year. That number should seem more imaginable.
In the US, The Event looks like homelessness. It looks like people living on the sides of the highways and bike paths because when Californians fought for there to be a Right to Rest Act, the cities and counties worked around the spirit of the thing and made all the places where people go to sleep overnight when they have nowhere else to go illegal places to sleep.
"On a single night in 2020, roughly 580,000 people were experiencing homelessness in the United States". If the homeless people of the US made up a US city, that city would have more people than any of 40 US state capital cities. If it were a country, it would have more people than well over a couple dozen other countries. That is a LOT of people. And everyone has a story.
In California, The Event looks like the destruction of so much land for the right to farm/right to harm: an iteration on the right to prioritize money over everything else. That right is obsolete, it's time to make it obsolete. The time is now.
Elsewhere, The Event looks like exploitative factories where people work all day every day to make widgets for
In the Amazon Rainforest, The Event looks like the destruction of the rainforest and the people in it to feed the world's seemingly-insatiable appetite for meat and milk. And so on.
My goal is reiterate that the bunkers are just a symbol of what's already here. For every single thing I listed (and so much more), people are fighting back, working to make things better.
I want you to know that The Event is already here, it's already here, it's already here, it's already here, it's already here.
We are accountable. Almost certainly, if you are reading this thread, you are in a position of power when it comes to climate change. You have the ability to do something about it. Probably you already are! We can all work to make it better for everyone. It's our responsibility.
And btw ban billionaires. Vote for people who will tax them 'til they're millionaires. Nobody needs that much money. It belongs to the people, and to the earth.
posted by aniola at 2:07 AM on September 5, 2022 [51 favorites]
I knew a genius once, many years ago. He was brilliant and bighearted. He saw so much so clearly, and was loved by so many. He was also depressed, and that killed him in the end.
To quote the mayor of the town we were from, “If he cared enough to say something, you knew it was worth listening to” “I always wanted to know his take on it, and I always valued his input.”
I asked him about the future. I asked him what it would look like. He told me it would look like the present. The rich would get richer and the poor would get poorer, and there would be less and less of a middle class.
Depression tells lies. He saw one possible future, and he saw it in the present. But there are other futures, and we can find them in the present, too.
It is our urgent responsibility to cultivate those futures and encourage them to grow.
posted by aniola at 2:51 AM on September 5, 2022 [5 favorites]
To quote the mayor of the town we were from, “If he cared enough to say something, you knew it was worth listening to” “I always wanted to know his take on it, and I always valued his input.”
I asked him about the future. I asked him what it would look like. He told me it would look like the present. The rich would get richer and the poor would get poorer, and there would be less and less of a middle class.
Depression tells lies. He saw one possible future, and he saw it in the present. But there are other futures, and we can find them in the present, too.
It is our urgent responsibility to cultivate those futures and encourage them to grow.
posted by aniola at 2:51 AM on September 5, 2022 [5 favorites]
Even easier, plug the air intakes and exhausts. Just the exhausts would do. How do you find the exhaust holes? Infrared.
If you find out where the exhaust holes are and make those the standard places to dump sewage, the exhaust will help dry it out and warm it so it composts more quickly, and the increased carbon dioxide concentration in the exhaust gases will help with plant growth until the roots thoroughly clog the plumbing.
posted by flabdablet at 4:19 AM on September 5, 2022 [5 favorites]
If you find out where the exhaust holes are and make those the standard places to dump sewage, the exhaust will help dry it out and warm it so it composts more quickly, and the increased carbon dioxide concentration in the exhaust gases will help with plant growth until the roots thoroughly clog the plumbing.
posted by flabdablet at 4:19 AM on September 5, 2022 [5 favorites]
The thing about fixed fortifications is they’re not supposed to withstand infinite siege. They’re supposed to hold out until rescue comes. The scenario in question precludes that, so it’s a matter of when, not if, the bunker is penetrated.
While we’re having fun with hypotheticals here some of the people left out in the cold after The Event will be the soldiers in control of those bunker busters. They might have an axe to grind and no chain of command left above them holding them back.
posted by The Monster at the End of this Thread at 5:55 AM on September 5, 2022 [7 favorites]
While we’re having fun with hypotheticals here some of the people left out in the cold after The Event will be the soldiers in control of those bunker busters. They might have an axe to grind and no chain of command left above them holding them back.
posted by The Monster at the End of this Thread at 5:55 AM on September 5, 2022 [7 favorites]
My take is that it's not super villainy, it's slavery. Collars, withholding food, controlling their families with an implied threat to them, and giving them a religion to help keep them compliant, all have analogs.
Probably the closest historical analogs to what these guys are wanting to set up would be slavery plantations, like in the Caribbean. There, you had scattered plantations, with a single owner's family in residence (or a professional manager, if the owner was living in England), supported by a very small white staff of overseers and so on, a typically modest number of employed formerly-enslaved workers, and a much larger enslaved population. The owners were reliant on their small paid staff, plus a mutual aid network of the surrounding plantations' staff acting as a militia, to enforce order and discipline, while also avoiding their paid staff from switching allegiance and joining a revolt instead of staying allied with the owner.
It was a tricky balance and could be sustained only through extreme violence (with massive state support from permanent army and naval garrisons), but was relatively stable for centuries. Without the population of enslaved people for the guards to feel superior to and have power over, and generate profits that the guards benefit from, as well as the complex web of interconnections with other plantations, I have trouble seeing how you would make the situation imagined in the article into a stable arrangement. Even terrible people need a society to support and make possible their terrible actions.
posted by Dip Flash at 7:37 AM on September 5, 2022 [5 favorites]
Probably the closest historical analogs to what these guys are wanting to set up would be slavery plantations, like in the Caribbean. There, you had scattered plantations, with a single owner's family in residence (or a professional manager, if the owner was living in England), supported by a very small white staff of overseers and so on, a typically modest number of employed formerly-enslaved workers, and a much larger enslaved population. The owners were reliant on their small paid staff, plus a mutual aid network of the surrounding plantations' staff acting as a militia, to enforce order and discipline, while also avoiding their paid staff from switching allegiance and joining a revolt instead of staying allied with the owner.
It was a tricky balance and could be sustained only through extreme violence (with massive state support from permanent army and naval garrisons), but was relatively stable for centuries. Without the population of enslaved people for the guards to feel superior to and have power over, and generate profits that the guards benefit from, as well as the complex web of interconnections with other plantations, I have trouble seeing how you would make the situation imagined in the article into a stable arrangement. Even terrible people need a society to support and make possible their terrible actions.
posted by Dip Flash at 7:37 AM on September 5, 2022 [5 favorites]
Seeing as we may not have a habitable planet soon, it seems reasonable to try to create islands of habitability which could save humanity.
A point that MrVisible consistently misses whenever this topic comes around again is that the "humanity" he proposes we work to save by building bunkers for a selected few is a bit amorphous and not particularly well thought through.
Willingness to remain a billionaire is symptomatic of a truly breathtaking degree of unexamined privilege. MrVisible has expressed dissatisfaction with the notion that people who display that symptom and their hangers-on ought to be the only ones granted the ongoing privilege of residence in post-Event bunkers. It's a dissatisfaction I share, and I agree with his implication that a serious conversation about who gets to survive climate change needs to have "not just billionaires" as a well considered option because every billionaire is an arsehole.
But here's the thing: personal wealth reflects an existing social consensus on the degree of power and influence a person should be allowed to wield. We're having that serious conversation, every single day in a distributed and implicit fashion, though most of us apparently don't realize it. Grossly disproportionate privilege accruing to a tiny few is a structural feature of any economic system where return on investment is primarily determined by size of investment, and so far there is almost no social consensus behind any other kind of economics.
Billionaires can't exist in a social vacuum and at some level even they understand this. If they didn't, the question of whose fingers remain on the post-Event shock collar controls wouldn't even occur to them. Billionaires are billionaires because we let them be that. We could stop them, but we can't be bothered; cutting the legs out from under the billionaire class would require a social environment where monetary economics isn't the primary driving force, and this seems inconceivable to most people. To the extent that it is conceived, it's almost always caricatured and castigated as Utopian or unacceptably primitive or whatever other dismissive bullshit gets the nastiest snicker.
If we devote resources to implementing post-Event "survival" bunkers that could instead be devoted to Event prevention via a more egalitarian social order, we're just perpetuating the very same inevitability-of-privilege mindset that created these uber-wealthy arseholes in the first place. All we'd be doing is entrenching (literally, if the bunkers are underground) a system that disproportionately privileges a few at the expense of the many.
Living in a physically protective bubble while those outside burn and choke is morally indistinguishable from living in an economically protective bubble while those outside shiver and starve. So it seems to me absolutely inevitable that the few who would end up occupying their post-Event bunkers would very quickly come to view themselves in much the same way as today's billionaires do, and very very quickly adopt precisely the same attitude toward the rest of us that today's billionaires have. Because that's what privilege does to people. It turns us into arseholes.
We are eight billion and rising. There is no conceivable Event that could wipe out enough of us to make the number hiding in bunkers more than a tiny minority of those who survive on the basis of chance, adaptability and in-Event cooperation alone. Any Event even close to potent enough to do that would rapidly kill off all the bunker occupants as well, in at most a handful of generations. And as pointed out upthread, we're already well provided with domain expertise in Event survival; The Event is only a point-in-time affair when viewed on a geological timescale.
So our bunkers wouldn't be saving "humanity": if they saved anybody at all they'd be saving arseholes. And they'd do that even if the people they saved were not already arseholes going in.
If bunkers are to exist, as it seems that they are, and their occupation by arseholes is inevitable, as I think that it must be, then having our existing arseholes build them seems as good a method as any. I see no virtue whatsoever in wasting time on reinventing the wheels of anti-egalitarian privilege creation. The ones we already have work perfectly well, as evidenced by the gathering pace of the juggernaut rolling along on them.
I have no interest in lifting a finger to save an arsehole. Closest I get is lifting a middle finger to say hello to one. If they can't work out why almost all of us would be motivated to say hello that way as they beaver away on their stupid fucking bunkers, fuck 'em. Let them hide in their useless cowards' holes while the rest of us get on with banding together to clean up their mess.
posted by flabdablet at 7:45 AM on September 5, 2022 [12 favorites]
A point that MrVisible consistently misses whenever this topic comes around again is that the "humanity" he proposes we work to save by building bunkers for a selected few is a bit amorphous and not particularly well thought through.
Willingness to remain a billionaire is symptomatic of a truly breathtaking degree of unexamined privilege. MrVisible has expressed dissatisfaction with the notion that people who display that symptom and their hangers-on ought to be the only ones granted the ongoing privilege of residence in post-Event bunkers. It's a dissatisfaction I share, and I agree with his implication that a serious conversation about who gets to survive climate change needs to have "not just billionaires" as a well considered option because every billionaire is an arsehole.
But here's the thing: personal wealth reflects an existing social consensus on the degree of power and influence a person should be allowed to wield. We're having that serious conversation, every single day in a distributed and implicit fashion, though most of us apparently don't realize it. Grossly disproportionate privilege accruing to a tiny few is a structural feature of any economic system where return on investment is primarily determined by size of investment, and so far there is almost no social consensus behind any other kind of economics.
Billionaires can't exist in a social vacuum and at some level even they understand this. If they didn't, the question of whose fingers remain on the post-Event shock collar controls wouldn't even occur to them. Billionaires are billionaires because we let them be that. We could stop them, but we can't be bothered; cutting the legs out from under the billionaire class would require a social environment where monetary economics isn't the primary driving force, and this seems inconceivable to most people. To the extent that it is conceived, it's almost always caricatured and castigated as Utopian or unacceptably primitive or whatever other dismissive bullshit gets the nastiest snicker.
If we devote resources to implementing post-Event "survival" bunkers that could instead be devoted to Event prevention via a more egalitarian social order, we're just perpetuating the very same inevitability-of-privilege mindset that created these uber-wealthy arseholes in the first place. All we'd be doing is entrenching (literally, if the bunkers are underground) a system that disproportionately privileges a few at the expense of the many.
Living in a physically protective bubble while those outside burn and choke is morally indistinguishable from living in an economically protective bubble while those outside shiver and starve. So it seems to me absolutely inevitable that the few who would end up occupying their post-Event bunkers would very quickly come to view themselves in much the same way as today's billionaires do, and very very quickly adopt precisely the same attitude toward the rest of us that today's billionaires have. Because that's what privilege does to people. It turns us into arseholes.
We are eight billion and rising. There is no conceivable Event that could wipe out enough of us to make the number hiding in bunkers more than a tiny minority of those who survive on the basis of chance, adaptability and in-Event cooperation alone. Any Event even close to potent enough to do that would rapidly kill off all the bunker occupants as well, in at most a handful of generations. And as pointed out upthread, we're already well provided with domain expertise in Event survival; The Event is only a point-in-time affair when viewed on a geological timescale.
So our bunkers wouldn't be saving "humanity": if they saved anybody at all they'd be saving arseholes. And they'd do that even if the people they saved were not already arseholes going in.
If bunkers are to exist, as it seems that they are, and their occupation by arseholes is inevitable, as I think that it must be, then having our existing arseholes build them seems as good a method as any. I see no virtue whatsoever in wasting time on reinventing the wheels of anti-egalitarian privilege creation. The ones we already have work perfectly well, as evidenced by the gathering pace of the juggernaut rolling along on them.
I have no interest in lifting a finger to save an arsehole. Closest I get is lifting a middle finger to say hello to one. If they can't work out why almost all of us would be motivated to say hello that way as they beaver away on their stupid fucking bunkers, fuck 'em. Let them hide in their useless cowards' holes while the rest of us get on with banding together to clean up their mess.
posted by flabdablet at 7:45 AM on September 5, 2022 [12 favorites]
You know, someday we're going to have to sit down and have a conversation about who gets to survive climate change.
We don't have to do this, and I can't see any reason to believe "we" will do this. Survival is going to be due to some combination of wealth, power, violence, location, culture, and luck. The only societies I can imagine having this conversation are totalitarian ones, in which case see above re wealth, power, and violence. And maybe small communal societies could have a meaningful conversation about it? I can't really imagine what that would look like, communal decisions about sacrifices, marshaling resources, even relocating? But for the most part, there isn't going to be an orderly and thoughtful conversation about who "gets" to survive climate change.
posted by Mavri at 9:34 AM on September 5, 2022 [8 favorites]
We don't have to do this, and I can't see any reason to believe "we" will do this. Survival is going to be due to some combination of wealth, power, violence, location, culture, and luck. The only societies I can imagine having this conversation are totalitarian ones, in which case see above re wealth, power, and violence. And maybe small communal societies could have a meaningful conversation about it? I can't really imagine what that would look like, communal decisions about sacrifices, marshaling resources, even relocating? But for the most part, there isn't going to be an orderly and thoughtful conversation about who "gets" to survive climate change.
posted by Mavri at 9:34 AM on September 5, 2022 [8 favorites]
If you find out where the exhaust holes are and make those the standard places to dump sewage
If you're feeling adventurous, and have access to the necessary resources, I might suggest pouring in a suspension of finely ground polonium in liquid DMT.
For the lulz.
posted by thatwhichfalls at 10:18 AM on September 5, 2022 [1 favorite]
If you're feeling adventurous, and have access to the necessary resources, I might suggest pouring in a suspension of finely ground polonium in liquid DMT.
For the lulz.
posted by thatwhichfalls at 10:18 AM on September 5, 2022 [1 favorite]
Aw, don’t afflict the uplifted cockroaches with polonium.
posted by clew at 10:58 AM on September 5, 2022 [2 favorites]
posted by clew at 10:58 AM on September 5, 2022 [2 favorites]
"It's interesting that The Guardian is rolling out this old article again."
It looks like Rushkoff has a new book out, and this is a reprint from it (which reprints the original).
posted by doctornemo at 11:08 AM on September 5, 2022 [1 favorite]
It looks like Rushkoff has a new book out, and this is a reprint from it (which reprints the original).
posted by doctornemo at 11:08 AM on September 5, 2022 [1 favorite]
I'm with Mr Visible. Human impact on the world is accerelating away from drinkable water, safe abundant food, clean air, a climate suitable for most mammals.
We must both work towards slowly, stoping and reversing the damage we have done, and build arks so that future ecosystems have a diverse palate of species available and so that future societies, if any, can survive.
Those who think ark-building is a betrayal or distraction from making a better world are wrong. To help the future you must survive the present too.
This years global food crisis is not an outlier, it is the tip of an iceberg.
In the "good times" think of how often we have failed to contain the leaks of radioactive material from our mines, processing plants, reactors, weapons, and nuclear waste and from burning coal. Think of our chemical wastes and floodzone superfund sites.
In the "good times" think of how many people we starve to death daily because the incentives and rules of our chosen LARP political economy says its better to throw food out than let "undeserving" people eat.
In the "good times" life was already a disaster for the poor, slaves, prisoners, cultural, sexual, religious, ethnic minorities etc.
In the "good times". Think of how many people died of preventable causes.
The good times are gone. The climate
epoch that allowed agriculuture and societies to flourish is gone.
It is never to late to stop driving in the wrong direction and to start driving in the right direction, but it is too late to arrive to the party. The party is over.
Many species will need help finding new habitats and surviving long enough to adapt to the extremely rapid (evolution wise) change in weather, climate, atmospheric gases, ocean ph, microplastic environment we are making etc.
Biosphere 2 was a partial failure. We poisoned Biosphere 1. We should start prototyoing Biospheres 3-300 now.
posted by anecdotal_grand_theory at 11:14 AM on September 5, 2022 [3 favorites]
The billionaires are already our feudal lords, with castles, sycophants, aspiring cults of personality and a class loyalty to each other and a disdain for the locals. They have their own private security and the state to protect them. And you've outted yourselves as their enemies on your globally connected and located insecurable omni-monitoring telecommuncations pocket computer.
Have fun storming the castle.
posted by anecdotal_grand_theory at 11:24 AM on September 5, 2022 [3 favorites]
Have fun storming the castle.
posted by anecdotal_grand_theory at 11:24 AM on September 5, 2022 [3 favorites]
What is the scrap value of a $99,000,000 yacht?
posted by njohnson23 at 12:02 PM on September 5, 2022
posted by njohnson23 at 12:02 PM on September 5, 2022
$99,000,000, which is the tax on its required scrapping or conversion to public science vessel or something.
posted by aniola at 12:09 PM on September 5, 2022 [3 favorites]
posted by aniola at 12:09 PM on September 5, 2022 [3 favorites]
Really, Diane?
No, not really. If they actually felt that secure they'd never have bothered talking to Rushkoff.
The shock collar control issue is real for these delusional fuckwits because they are delusional. Not so delusional that they think global warming isn't real (actually, Tr*mp probably does "think" that, insofar as the word "think" can be abused to describe whatever that is that's going on between his tiny ears) but definitely delusional enough to think that (a) there's some way to maintain the kind of privilege they have right now as global warming drives everything from bad to worse and (b) there's some kind of impressively worthwhile point to doing that.
The mere fact that they don't believe they're in the same boat as the rest of us doesn't make that belief a reality.
Have fun storming the castle.
Can't be arsed. There is nothing of value inside it.
posted by flabdablet at 12:09 PM on September 5, 2022 [2 favorites]
No, not really. If they actually felt that secure they'd never have bothered talking to Rushkoff.
The shock collar control issue is real for these delusional fuckwits because they are delusional. Not so delusional that they think global warming isn't real (actually, Tr*mp probably does "think" that, insofar as the word "think" can be abused to describe whatever that is that's going on between his tiny ears) but definitely delusional enough to think that (a) there's some way to maintain the kind of privilege they have right now as global warming drives everything from bad to worse and (b) there's some kind of impressively worthwhile point to doing that.
The mere fact that they don't believe they're in the same boat as the rest of us doesn't make that belief a reality.
Have fun storming the castle.
Can't be arsed. There is nothing of value inside it.
posted by flabdablet at 12:09 PM on September 5, 2022 [2 favorites]
And just to clarify: by "the rest of us" I mean the rest of the biosphere, not merely the rest of H. sap. sap.
Good luck sourcing Beluga caviar when you've killed off all the fucking fish, fucknuckles.
posted by flabdablet at 12:16 PM on September 5, 2022 [2 favorites]
Good luck sourcing Beluga caviar when you've killed off all the fucking fish, fucknuckles.
posted by flabdablet at 12:16 PM on September 5, 2022 [2 favorites]
Sorry, but don't hide behind concerns for other species. The world will be fine without us. Some species will indeed die out, but others will evolve. Obviously, it is a moral dilemma that we are at fault for killing off species, known and unknown, but with of us all gone, the world can get back to not struggling with moral dilemmas. We create them and we think about them, which seems natural enough to me.
That said, some of us will probably survive, as others have said. Humanity has survived several civilizational collapses, maybe some we don't even know about -- until recently, no one knew that there were once cities in the Amazon. Humans, like our special friends the rats and the cockroaches, are really good at figuring out ways to survive under extreme conditions.
I don't think the survivors will be the billionaires in bunkers, they don't seem to have developed social skills, and as it has been repeated again and again here on the blue and even in TFA, social skills are the most important skills when it comes to survival. For instance, Thiel may be right in his assumption that NZ will be relatively safe. But good luck finding friends and food if you have consistently proven yourself to be an arsehole. And I'm sure that whatever happens in the rest of his life, people will still know he is an arsehole, he can't hide from that. Heck, perhaps in 3000 years there will be homeric style poems singing about that time when a huge arsehole came to the South Island.
Also, there have been many, many forms of human organization during the ages. Again, some we know next to nothing about. Sweeping claims about how humanity deals with crises are at best ahistorical. We just don't know.
What we do know is that we have a great challenge ahead of us, and we need to deal with it. These billionaires are distracting themselves and the rest of us with their useless vanity projects, that are no different from the ridiculous yachts. Shame them when you have the opportunity, if you have it. Otherwise, there is work to do. Some of it is as easy as voting or riding a bike to work. Everything counts.
posted by mumimor at 12:55 PM on September 5, 2022 [1 favorite]
That said, some of us will probably survive, as others have said. Humanity has survived several civilizational collapses, maybe some we don't even know about -- until recently, no one knew that there were once cities in the Amazon. Humans, like our special friends the rats and the cockroaches, are really good at figuring out ways to survive under extreme conditions.
I don't think the survivors will be the billionaires in bunkers, they don't seem to have developed social skills, and as it has been repeated again and again here on the blue and even in TFA, social skills are the most important skills when it comes to survival. For instance, Thiel may be right in his assumption that NZ will be relatively safe. But good luck finding friends and food if you have consistently proven yourself to be an arsehole. And I'm sure that whatever happens in the rest of his life, people will still know he is an arsehole, he can't hide from that. Heck, perhaps in 3000 years there will be homeric style poems singing about that time when a huge arsehole came to the South Island.
Also, there have been many, many forms of human organization during the ages. Again, some we know next to nothing about. Sweeping claims about how humanity deals with crises are at best ahistorical. We just don't know.
What we do know is that we have a great challenge ahead of us, and we need to deal with it. These billionaires are distracting themselves and the rest of us with their useless vanity projects, that are no different from the ridiculous yachts. Shame them when you have the opportunity, if you have it. Otherwise, there is work to do. Some of it is as easy as voting or riding a bike to work. Everything counts.
posted by mumimor at 12:55 PM on September 5, 2022 [1 favorite]
If you don't believe that we can make the planet uninhabitable, then my position makes no sense; why would we retreat to bunkers if there's a whole world outside we could live in?
But here's the thing. All that has to happen for the world to become uninhabitable to human beings is for pregnancy to get just a little bit harder. If it gets to be too difficult to reproduce to replacement rate, we'll die off in a few generations.
Most people are thinking that there's going to be a societal collapse, and then things will get better. But I think there's going to be a societal collapse, and then things are just going to get worse. It takes decades for the effects of CO2 in the atmosphere to come home to roost, the wildfires will continue to burn forests and will move on to cities, releasing enormous quantities of pollutants, destroying the ozone layer, etcetera, etcetera. Personally, I don't know what's going to stop the oxygen from disappearing.
Currently, the oxygen in the atmosphere is decreasing at about 19 points per million per year, so it'll take about 52,000 years to deplete completely. So that's not bad, right? Except we're probably not going to do very well below about 16%; we operate best between a 19.5 and 23.5% concentration. Currently we're at about what, 21% oxygen. So we just need to lose 5%. Which, if my calculations are correct, will take about 2600 years at the current rate.
And of course our sources of oxygen are threatened, from forests to phytoplankton, so that rate will almost definitely go up.
So anything that the survivors of a societal collapse manage to build will be moot in just a few centuries, and that's if we only take one factor into account. Add in CO2, heat, volatile organic chemicals, ground level ozone, and all the fun stuff that's going to happen as we stop being able to maintain our industrial infrastructure, and things aren't looking particularly habitable on earth post-apocalypse.
Climate change is a side effect of the damage that we've been doing to our atmosphere. The idea that we can just breathe whatever for however long we want is, unfortunately, delusional; small changes in the atmosphere can have huge effects on us. I've been collecting articles on the topic for a few years over on Reddit. Here's a small sample from the past few months:
Ten Million a Year - David Wallace-Wells on polluted air
More than 230 journals warn 1.5°C of global warming could be 'catastrophic' for health
Air pollution is slashing years off the lives of billions, report finds
Air pollution linked to more severe mental illness – study- research finds small rise in exposure to air pollution leads to higher risk of needing treatment
Scientists Warn of Fertility Loss in Many Species Due to Climate Change
Asthma in toddlers linked to in-utero exposure to air pollution, study finds
Silent calamity: The health impacts of wildfire smoke
A warning as a heat wave roasts the US West: Extreme heat + air pollution can be deadly, with the health risk together worse than either alone
Effects of short-term exposure to particulate matter air pollution on cognitive performance
Plastic pollution could make much of humanity infertile, experts fear
Chemical Air Pollution Morphs Into Something Even More Toxic, Study Shows
Humans can't endure temperatures and humidities as high as previously thought
The whole "pockets of people will survive" philosophy depends on humans being able to live despite the desperate and deteriorating quality of the atmosphere. It seems like a very unsafe bet.
As I've said, I'd really like to see multi-generational lab rat experiments that see how well mammals reproduce in the conditions we're likely to see, but I can't find anything quite like that. I did, however, find this study which details what happens to mouse pregnancy in one generation at 890 ppm of CO2:
posted by MrVisible at 1:15 PM on September 5, 2022 [4 favorites]
But here's the thing. All that has to happen for the world to become uninhabitable to human beings is for pregnancy to get just a little bit harder. If it gets to be too difficult to reproduce to replacement rate, we'll die off in a few generations.
Most people are thinking that there's going to be a societal collapse, and then things will get better. But I think there's going to be a societal collapse, and then things are just going to get worse. It takes decades for the effects of CO2 in the atmosphere to come home to roost, the wildfires will continue to burn forests and will move on to cities, releasing enormous quantities of pollutants, destroying the ozone layer, etcetera, etcetera. Personally, I don't know what's going to stop the oxygen from disappearing.
Currently, the oxygen in the atmosphere is decreasing at about 19 points per million per year, so it'll take about 52,000 years to deplete completely. So that's not bad, right? Except we're probably not going to do very well below about 16%; we operate best between a 19.5 and 23.5% concentration. Currently we're at about what, 21% oxygen. So we just need to lose 5%. Which, if my calculations are correct, will take about 2600 years at the current rate.
And of course our sources of oxygen are threatened, from forests to phytoplankton, so that rate will almost definitely go up.
So anything that the survivors of a societal collapse manage to build will be moot in just a few centuries, and that's if we only take one factor into account. Add in CO2, heat, volatile organic chemicals, ground level ozone, and all the fun stuff that's going to happen as we stop being able to maintain our industrial infrastructure, and things aren't looking particularly habitable on earth post-apocalypse.
Climate change is a side effect of the damage that we've been doing to our atmosphere. The idea that we can just breathe whatever for however long we want is, unfortunately, delusional; small changes in the atmosphere can have huge effects on us. I've been collecting articles on the topic for a few years over on Reddit. Here's a small sample from the past few months:
Ten Million a Year - David Wallace-Wells on polluted air
More than 230 journals warn 1.5°C of global warming could be 'catastrophic' for health
Air pollution is slashing years off the lives of billions, report finds
Air pollution linked to more severe mental illness – study- research finds small rise in exposure to air pollution leads to higher risk of needing treatment
Scientists Warn of Fertility Loss in Many Species Due to Climate Change
Asthma in toddlers linked to in-utero exposure to air pollution, study finds
Silent calamity: The health impacts of wildfire smoke
A warning as a heat wave roasts the US West: Extreme heat + air pollution can be deadly, with the health risk together worse than either alone
Effects of short-term exposure to particulate matter air pollution on cognitive performance
Plastic pollution could make much of humanity infertile, experts fear
Chemical Air Pollution Morphs Into Something Even More Toxic, Study Shows
Humans can't endure temperatures and humidities as high as previously thought
The whole "pockets of people will survive" philosophy depends on humans being able to live despite the desperate and deteriorating quality of the atmosphere. It seems like a very unsafe bet.
As I've said, I'd really like to see multi-generational lab rat experiments that see how well mammals reproduce in the conditions we're likely to see, but I can't find anything quite like that. I did, however, find this study which details what happens to mouse pregnancy in one generation at 890 ppm of CO2:
CO2 exposure resulted in a range of respiratory impairments, particularly in female mice, including higher tissue elastance, longer chord length, and lower lung compliance. Importantly, we also assessed the lung function of the dams that gave birth to our experimental subjects. Even though these mice had been exposed to the same level of increased CO2 for a similar amount of time (∼8wk), we measured no impairments in lung function. This suggests that the early life period, when lungs are undergoing rapid growth and development, is particularly sensitive to CO2.At the moment, it seems we're just assuming the planet will remain habitable despite the changes we've made to the atmosphere. I think that assumption needs to be examined carefully, and our survival strategies modified accordingly.
posted by MrVisible at 1:15 PM on September 5, 2022 [4 favorites]
The book version of David Wallace-Wells' 'The Uninhabitable Earth' is one of the scariest things I've ever read.
posted by box at 1:22 PM on September 5, 2022 [2 favorites]
posted by box at 1:22 PM on September 5, 2022 [2 favorites]
Bunker survivalism on a smaller scale - Twilight Zone (1987) Shelter Skelter
Wikipediaposted by rochrobbb at 1:52 PM on September 5, 2022
IMDb
Complete episode on YouTube (22 min)
TBH, I don't care much about any argument about wether some people or no people will survive. I happen to believe some will survive, but at the end of the day, I don't find it very relevant.
What I wanted to remind us all of is that earth herself will survive for as long as the sun survives, and that there will most probably be some forms of life on earth for most of the time. Maybe sulfur bacteria will survive. Maybe deep sea organisms. And from those life forms, new life forms will evolve.
We need to save ourselves, all 8 billion of us, and in order to do so, we need radical change. Digging holes in the ground or flying to Mars is just not useful. If we can't get our shit together, all of us or most of us will die out.
Discussions about reproduction, or selecting a sub-group of humans, or digging bigger holes or growing vegetables indoors are all very much missing the point.
We are going to need completely different forms of habitation, and some of the assumptions made by otherwise highly educated people are not based on actual facts. For instance, one of the often used arguments for big agriculture is that unless we have huge areas of corn and soy, the world will starve to death. Well, in fact 25% of the world's population live from subsistence farming whereas big ag is cutting down the Amazon, our lungs. I'm not saying current substance farming is good, I am saying razing the Amazon is a catastrophe. Improving local farming methods could mean more for health, reproduction and education than vast soybean monocultures. And this is not just in developing countries. A local farmer I saw on TV explained what a huge difference it had made for him to change from industrial pigs to apples. He still had some free-range pigs and poultry roaming the orchard, but his life had changed from being always near bankruptcy to having a stable and sound economy, and help save the planet. Industrial agriculture is horrible for the farmers because the industry exploits them to the max.
An other example is the spread of insane speculative urban plans, from Dubai, to Saudi Arabia to China to, I dunno, everywhere. Even tiny provincial towns have their versions all over the world. And they are all unsustainable and only serve to fill the coffers of the filthy rich. It doesn't make the slightest difference wether these plans are in the quaint style of New Urbanism or the futuristic style of KSA's linear city. They are all equally unsustainable.
We need to think differently, and luckily, this is something we are really good at. I'm not a fan of American Frontier mythology, but what we can learn from it is that we as a species are capable of overcoming huge challenges. The people who migrated during the 19th century were not capricious billionaires.
Some Inuit people have overcome huge difficulties, and yet managed to create beautiful art.
After WWII, our grandparents and great grandparents built a new society, from the scraps of the in-just and unequal one they had grown up in. Yes, that society created all the issues we are dealing with now, but the achievement was non the less amazing. We cannot expect to be perfect, only to move on.
When I was young, the ocean I lived close to was so polluted with chemicals and fecal bacteria, one couldn't swim in it. And the ozone layer was thinning to a point that we were about to burn up. But "we", meaning my parent's generation, solved it. We can do stuff. If we want to.
posted by mumimor at 2:16 PM on September 5, 2022 [8 favorites]
What I wanted to remind us all of is that earth herself will survive for as long as the sun survives, and that there will most probably be some forms of life on earth for most of the time. Maybe sulfur bacteria will survive. Maybe deep sea organisms. And from those life forms, new life forms will evolve.
We need to save ourselves, all 8 billion of us, and in order to do so, we need radical change. Digging holes in the ground or flying to Mars is just not useful. If we can't get our shit together, all of us or most of us will die out.
Discussions about reproduction, or selecting a sub-group of humans, or digging bigger holes or growing vegetables indoors are all very much missing the point.
We are going to need completely different forms of habitation, and some of the assumptions made by otherwise highly educated people are not based on actual facts. For instance, one of the often used arguments for big agriculture is that unless we have huge areas of corn and soy, the world will starve to death. Well, in fact 25% of the world's population live from subsistence farming whereas big ag is cutting down the Amazon, our lungs. I'm not saying current substance farming is good, I am saying razing the Amazon is a catastrophe. Improving local farming methods could mean more for health, reproduction and education than vast soybean monocultures. And this is not just in developing countries. A local farmer I saw on TV explained what a huge difference it had made for him to change from industrial pigs to apples. He still had some free-range pigs and poultry roaming the orchard, but his life had changed from being always near bankruptcy to having a stable and sound economy, and help save the planet. Industrial agriculture is horrible for the farmers because the industry exploits them to the max.
An other example is the spread of insane speculative urban plans, from Dubai, to Saudi Arabia to China to, I dunno, everywhere. Even tiny provincial towns have their versions all over the world. And they are all unsustainable and only serve to fill the coffers of the filthy rich. It doesn't make the slightest difference wether these plans are in the quaint style of New Urbanism or the futuristic style of KSA's linear city. They are all equally unsustainable.
We need to think differently, and luckily, this is something we are really good at. I'm not a fan of American Frontier mythology, but what we can learn from it is that we as a species are capable of overcoming huge challenges. The people who migrated during the 19th century were not capricious billionaires.
Some Inuit people have overcome huge difficulties, and yet managed to create beautiful art.
After WWII, our grandparents and great grandparents built a new society, from the scraps of the in-just and unequal one they had grown up in. Yes, that society created all the issues we are dealing with now, but the achievement was non the less amazing. We cannot expect to be perfect, only to move on.
When I was young, the ocean I lived close to was so polluted with chemicals and fecal bacteria, one couldn't swim in it. And the ozone layer was thinning to a point that we were about to burn up. But "we", meaning my parent's generation, solved it. We can do stuff. If we want to.
posted by mumimor at 2:16 PM on September 5, 2022 [8 favorites]
Sorry, but don't hide behind concerns for other species. The world will be fine without us.
Not hiding, but definitely concerned.
As you say, there are no moral issues in a world without moralizers but it seems to me that H. sap. sap. will probably not go extinct anywhere near as quickly as most of the other things we're busily displacing and otherwise killing off, if for no better reason than that eight billion is a hell of a starting point compared to what most other species have left to work with. Moral choices will be a thing for a good few millennia yet.
Habitability is not a property of planets per se. It's a property of the relationships between conditions on planets and the lifeforms that occupy them, and lifeforms come in loads of variants both across and within species. So I'm not expecting "pockets" of human survival; I'm expecting that human biological adaptability, like that of every other species, lies on something vaguely resembling a bell curve and that what you get when environmental stressors knock out large parts of a bell curve is a flattened and shifted bell curve. I'm expecting widespread death and destruction on a scale that's literally unprecedented for large mammals, and I am expecting no "pocket" of survivors to remain untouched by that. I don't think we'll see a clustering into "pockets", I think we'll see a patchy but universal thinning of the herd.
When human beings do eventually go extinct, I don't think that will be because of the direct biochemical effects of the mildly altered atmospheric gas balance consequent on our present large-scale exposure of slow-cycle carbon. There are eight billion of us now, and even if 99.9% of that number are incapable of thriving in CO2-doubled or -tripled and slightly O2-depleted air, that's still eight million animals' worth of genetic diversity to be going on with. Compared to the extant numbers of any species we've actually already endangered, that's just a ludicrously huge number. Humans are way way at the back of the extinction queue.
So when H. sap. does find itself faced with any prospect of going extinct in fewer than thousands of generations, it seems to me that shitloads of other lifeforms would already have to have gone extinct beforehand, bringing on a degree of biodiversity impoverishment that dysregulates all the planetary chemical cycles and tips them into utterly new patterns that are simply not predictable from here because of feedbacks and chaos. I would expect that the only lifeforms capable of maintaining enough numbers and evolving fast enough to respond effectively to that level of disruption will be microbes.
There are more of us now than there have ever been and even given that resource we have yet to mount a workable global response to a global environmental stressor that's peanuts compared to what it would plausibly take to kill us all off. If our numbers were to get anywhere near as low as what could plausibly fit in any achievable amount of "arks" or bunkers or Biosphere 3.x or whatever the fuck, we'd be so insignificant on the scale of the masses and forces involved as to be unable to do anything effective about them. The idea that some sequestered handful of us could conceivably restore a whole planet's worth of totally out-of-control atmospheric chemistry before the bunkers became completely useless is one that I can find no response to beyond a maximally bitter snicker.
Our only realistic option is to stop fucking everything up, and maintain as much biodiversity in everything that's left as we possibly can. Concentrating ourselves and selected livestock into bunkers in some vague hope of better days ahead requires an utterly wilful blindness to the actual scale of the damage we've been inflicting on all of the living systems on this planet.
We can talk about terraforming Mars once we've worked out how not to venusform Terra.
posted by flabdablet at 2:20 PM on September 5, 2022 [6 favorites]
Not hiding, but definitely concerned.
As you say, there are no moral issues in a world without moralizers but it seems to me that H. sap. sap. will probably not go extinct anywhere near as quickly as most of the other things we're busily displacing and otherwise killing off, if for no better reason than that eight billion is a hell of a starting point compared to what most other species have left to work with. Moral choices will be a thing for a good few millennia yet.
Habitability is not a property of planets per se. It's a property of the relationships between conditions on planets and the lifeforms that occupy them, and lifeforms come in loads of variants both across and within species. So I'm not expecting "pockets" of human survival; I'm expecting that human biological adaptability, like that of every other species, lies on something vaguely resembling a bell curve and that what you get when environmental stressors knock out large parts of a bell curve is a flattened and shifted bell curve. I'm expecting widespread death and destruction on a scale that's literally unprecedented for large mammals, and I am expecting no "pocket" of survivors to remain untouched by that. I don't think we'll see a clustering into "pockets", I think we'll see a patchy but universal thinning of the herd.
When human beings do eventually go extinct, I don't think that will be because of the direct biochemical effects of the mildly altered atmospheric gas balance consequent on our present large-scale exposure of slow-cycle carbon. There are eight billion of us now, and even if 99.9% of that number are incapable of thriving in CO2-doubled or -tripled and slightly O2-depleted air, that's still eight million animals' worth of genetic diversity to be going on with. Compared to the extant numbers of any species we've actually already endangered, that's just a ludicrously huge number. Humans are way way at the back of the extinction queue.
So when H. sap. does find itself faced with any prospect of going extinct in fewer than thousands of generations, it seems to me that shitloads of other lifeforms would already have to have gone extinct beforehand, bringing on a degree of biodiversity impoverishment that dysregulates all the planetary chemical cycles and tips them into utterly new patterns that are simply not predictable from here because of feedbacks and chaos. I would expect that the only lifeforms capable of maintaining enough numbers and evolving fast enough to respond effectively to that level of disruption will be microbes.
There are more of us now than there have ever been and even given that resource we have yet to mount a workable global response to a global environmental stressor that's peanuts compared to what it would plausibly take to kill us all off. If our numbers were to get anywhere near as low as what could plausibly fit in any achievable amount of "arks" or bunkers or Biosphere 3.x or whatever the fuck, we'd be so insignificant on the scale of the masses and forces involved as to be unable to do anything effective about them. The idea that some sequestered handful of us could conceivably restore a whole planet's worth of totally out-of-control atmospheric chemistry before the bunkers became completely useless is one that I can find no response to beyond a maximally bitter snicker.
Our only realistic option is to stop fucking everything up, and maintain as much biodiversity in everything that's left as we possibly can. Concentrating ourselves and selected livestock into bunkers in some vague hope of better days ahead requires an utterly wilful blindness to the actual scale of the damage we've been inflicting on all of the living systems on this planet.
We can talk about terraforming Mars once we've worked out how not to venusform Terra.
posted by flabdablet at 2:20 PM on September 5, 2022 [6 favorites]
When human beings do eventually go extinct, I don't think that will be because of the direct biochemical effects of the mildly altered atmospheric gas balance consequent on our present large-scale exposure of slow-cycle carbon. There are eight billion of us now, and even if 99.9% of that number are incapable of thriving in CO2-doubled or -tripled and slightly O2-depleted air, that's still eight million animals' worth of genetic diversity to be going on with. Compared to the extant numbers of any species we've actually already endangered, that's just a ludicrously huge number. Humans are way way at the back of the extinction queue.Numbers aren't a defense against extinction. There used to be three to five billion passenger pigeons, now there are none.
posted by MrVisible at 2:23 PM on September 5, 2022 [2 favorites]
And it wasn't atmospheric gas balance changes that did them in. It was us.
posted by flabdablet at 2:25 PM on September 5, 2022 [2 favorites]
posted by flabdablet at 2:25 PM on September 5, 2022 [2 favorites]
Yes, we were able to wipe out three to five billion birds with guns, back when there were just 76,000,000 Americans. You wouldn't think it'd be possible, but by gum, it was. Extinction is the rule, not the exception.
Yes, we're in danger of the biosphere collapsing completely. No, when it does, we probably won't be in a good position to keep anyone alive. So yes, we should start planning and designing shelters before things get that bad.
And yes, of course the preferred solution is to save the biosphere. If we can do that, great. If we can't, we should have a backup plan.
posted by MrVisible at 2:39 PM on September 5, 2022 [1 favorite]
Yes, we're in danger of the biosphere collapsing completely. No, when it does, we probably won't be in a good position to keep anyone alive. So yes, we should start planning and designing shelters before things get that bad.
And yes, of course the preferred solution is to save the biosphere. If we can do that, great. If we can't, we should have a backup plan.
posted by MrVisible at 2:39 PM on September 5, 2022 [1 favorite]
We can build a better world and eat the rich
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 4:06 PM on September 5, 2022 [5 favorites]
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 4:06 PM on September 5, 2022 [5 favorites]
The article: Billionaires are psychos that would rather hide in bunkers and bomb-collar their henchmen than reform the economy or even have good relationships with their employees.
Metafilter: well, the billionaires are dumb so i guess any preparation for a challenging future is futile/counterproductive/unecessary/antisocial...just vote and totebag our way out of it.
Me: if we want mutual aid and community cooperation and global reform to be possible, communities are going to need to prepare for the expanding impovershment and collapse of their local and national economies, political orders and ecosystems because that collapse is starting to grow and the "solutions" to climate change that don't involve time-machines or billionaire altruism are slow, hard and too important to not reinforce. Forget the billionaires, we need bunkers for the people and yes we need to preserve biodiversity for our own sake of life on earth. Sure, roaches will survive but we have no right to kill off flora and fauna with the excuse that "life finds a way".
The momumental work of slowing/stopping/reversing human damage to the planet will take centuries and currently the rich and the developed world are making things worse and at an increasing rate.
Eco-Archimedes is going to need a place to stand while they lever human political economies and the biosphere world into a safer orbit.
Substantial, geologically/ecologically rapid warming and disruption of the atmosphere and ocean is baked in, how much occurs and how fast and how much habitat and species loss is a variable our aggregate actions can influence.
Human industry has created ticking pollution time-bombs. Nuclear waste is emblematic, but many of our endeavors require active managment to slow the rate of local and global contaimination of the air and water.
Without humans the spent fuel rods render the surface hazardous for all life.
If we stopped polluting now, species would still need our help: the trees can't gallop poleward to outrace the wildfires, methane leaks, permafrost thawing, coastal swamping, acid rain, etc.
Colonizing mars or the moon or the oceans is a waste, we need to recolonize earth to keep it liveable.
posted by anecdotal_grand_theory at 4:11 PM on September 5, 2022 [2 favorites]
Metafilter: well, the billionaires are dumb so i guess any preparation for a challenging future is futile/counterproductive/unecessary/antisocial...just vote and totebag our way out of it.
Me: if we want mutual aid and community cooperation and global reform to be possible, communities are going to need to prepare for the expanding impovershment and collapse of their local and national economies, political orders and ecosystems because that collapse is starting to grow and the "solutions" to climate change that don't involve time-machines or billionaire altruism are slow, hard and too important to not reinforce. Forget the billionaires, we need bunkers for the people and yes we need to preserve biodiversity for our own sake of life on earth. Sure, roaches will survive but we have no right to kill off flora and fauna with the excuse that "life finds a way".
The momumental work of slowing/stopping/reversing human damage to the planet will take centuries and currently the rich and the developed world are making things worse and at an increasing rate.
Eco-Archimedes is going to need a place to stand while they lever human political economies and the biosphere world into a safer orbit.
Substantial, geologically/ecologically rapid warming and disruption of the atmosphere and ocean is baked in, how much occurs and how fast and how much habitat and species loss is a variable our aggregate actions can influence.
Human industry has created ticking pollution time-bombs. Nuclear waste is emblematic, but many of our endeavors require active managment to slow the rate of local and global contaimination of the air and water.
Without humans the spent fuel rods render the surface hazardous for all life.
If we stopped polluting now, species would still need our help: the trees can't gallop poleward to outrace the wildfires, methane leaks, permafrost thawing, coastal swamping, acid rain, etc.
Colonizing mars or the moon or the oceans is a waste, we need to recolonize earth to keep it liveable.
posted by anecdotal_grand_theory at 4:11 PM on September 5, 2022 [2 favorites]
Sorry for the wall of text. Once the internet reaches concensus, people will move from discussion to action, and our problems will be solved. /s
posted by anecdotal_grand_theory at 4:12 PM on September 5, 2022 [2 favorites]
posted by anecdotal_grand_theory at 4:12 PM on September 5, 2022 [2 favorites]
The cold-heartedness of billionaires just shines through. I don't understand why more people aren't planning to overthrow oligarchy.
posted by theora55 at 5:08 PM on September 5, 2022 [2 favorites]
posted by theora55 at 5:08 PM on September 5, 2022 [2 favorites]
Well, speaking for myself, I can barely plan to do a load of laundry.
posted by Flunkie at 5:19 PM on September 5, 2022 [6 favorites]
posted by Flunkie at 5:19 PM on September 5, 2022 [6 favorites]
theora55, it's about distance and complexity. "overthrow oligarchy" sounds distant and complex. Can you break it up into smaller more actionable items?
posted by aniola at 6:09 PM on September 5, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by aniola at 6:09 PM on September 5, 2022 [1 favorite]
It’s probably the people educating the billionaires’ kids who are in a position to tilt the balance in a single generation.
posted by warriorqueen at 7:42 PM on September 5, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by warriorqueen at 7:42 PM on September 5, 2022 [1 favorite]
"Good morning children. Today we will be learning about the Roko's Basilisk thought experiment. Since this concept originated in the long-ago, before your Father revealed himself to be the Baslisk-As-Yet-Unformed, we will discuss how close those unenlightened thinkers came to the glorious truth. Now, let us recite the credo and we will begin. All together - 'error has no rights.'"
posted by thatwhichfalls at 8:23 PM on September 5, 2022
posted by thatwhichfalls at 8:23 PM on September 5, 2022
It’s probably the people educating the billionaires’ kids who are in a position to tilt the balance in a single generation.
Except they won't, because their livelihood depends on them 'educating' the billionaires' kids in a way that ensures they are the aspiring billionaires of the future. I don't see any way they could covertly educate all those spoiled brats to the extent they grow up as responsible humans.
posted by dg at 8:32 PM on September 5, 2022 [2 favorites]
Except they won't, because their livelihood depends on them 'educating' the billionaires' kids in a way that ensures they are the aspiring billionaires of the future. I don't see any way they could covertly educate all those spoiled brats to the extent they grow up as responsible humans.
posted by dg at 8:32 PM on September 5, 2022 [2 favorites]
Forget the billionaires, we need bunkers for the people
Bunkers for seeds I can see a use for. Bunkers for people would just get ruined by the occupants. They're not a "backup plan"; they're a distraction rooted in misinformed opinion, species parochialism and false hope. Never mind rearranging deckchairs on the Titanic, bunkers are lifeboats to be launched into an ocean that's on fire.
posted by flabdablet at 8:40 PM on September 5, 2022 [7 favorites]
Bunkers for seeds I can see a use for. Bunkers for people would just get ruined by the occupants. They're not a "backup plan"; they're a distraction rooted in misinformed opinion, species parochialism and false hope. Never mind rearranging deckchairs on the Titanic, bunkers are lifeboats to be launched into an ocean that's on fire.
posted by flabdablet at 8:40 PM on September 5, 2022 [7 favorites]
Yeah, bunkers would be more useful for protecting the food supply so that everyone gets only their share and nobody can monopolise or monetise the only thing keeping people alive. I guess all those billionaires bunkers can be re-purposed to store community food supplies without too much trouble once the security people get their explosive collars off.
posted by dg at 8:56 PM on September 5, 2022 [2 favorites]
posted by dg at 8:56 PM on September 5, 2022 [2 favorites]
For anyone who's interested in seeing how progress is going on a more realistic conception of a survivable long-term habitat than we usually get in these discussions, I recommend looking up bioregenerative life support systems. There's some really impressive work being done. Check out China's Lunar Palace One and Russia's BIOS3.
To me, it's reassuring to think that, if we don't manage to get a handle on climate change and the biosphere spirals out of control like it seems to be doing right now, some people might survive and all of human endeavor might not be in vain. Call me weird.
posted by MrVisible at 9:18 PM on September 5, 2022 [1 favorite]
To me, it's reassuring to think that, if we don't manage to get a handle on climate change and the biosphere spirals out of control like it seems to be doing right now, some people might survive and all of human endeavor might not be in vain. Call me weird.
posted by MrVisible at 9:18 PM on September 5, 2022 [1 favorite]
OK, you're weird :P
posted by flabdablet at 4:02 AM on September 6, 2022 [3 favorites]
posted by flabdablet at 4:02 AM on September 6, 2022 [3 favorites]
Finally, the CEO of a brokerage house explained that he had nearly completed building his own underground bunker system, and asked: “How do I maintain authority over my security force after the event?”
... They knew armed guards would be required to protect their compounds from raiders as well as angry mobs. One had already secured a dozen Navy Seals to make their way to his compound if he gave them the right cue. But how would he pay the guards once even his crypto was worthless? What would stop the guards from eventually choosing their own leader?
I am always reminded of a story in the novel World War Z (which, while fiction, was well researched) from the point of view of a bodyguard at a celebrity's compound; the celebrity and all their friends kept streaming and posting to social media about their nifty self sustaining shelter. Eventually the shelter was overrun -- but not by zombies, rather by survivors desperate for the resources they heard about on the internet. The guard decided they were paid to shoot zombies and not people, and abandoned his post.
posted by Gelatin at 8:10 AM on September 6, 2022 [1 favorite]
... They knew armed guards would be required to protect their compounds from raiders as well as angry mobs. One had already secured a dozen Navy Seals to make their way to his compound if he gave them the right cue. But how would he pay the guards once even his crypto was worthless? What would stop the guards from eventually choosing their own leader?
I am always reminded of a story in the novel World War Z (which, while fiction, was well researched) from the point of view of a bodyguard at a celebrity's compound; the celebrity and all their friends kept streaming and posting to social media about their nifty self sustaining shelter. Eventually the shelter was overrun -- but not by zombies, rather by survivors desperate for the resources they heard about on the internet. The guard decided they were paid to shoot zombies and not people, and abandoned his post.
posted by Gelatin at 8:10 AM on September 6, 2022 [1 favorite]
There's some really impressive work being done. Check out China's Lunar Palace One and Russia's BIOS3.
What I find impressive is that the engineers who are running these projects can find government funding for them, while people who are trying to save the very real habitat we all share are constantly struggling to find ressources. But that's just me.
posted by mumimor at 8:24 AM on September 6, 2022 [6 favorites]
What I find impressive is that the engineers who are running these projects can find government funding for them, while people who are trying to save the very real habitat we all share are constantly struggling to find ressources. But that's just me.
posted by mumimor at 8:24 AM on September 6, 2022 [6 favorites]
The idea of putting discipline collars on the guards kind of sums up the mindset -- who could possibly think any of this is realistic?
Someone who's seen Running Man too many times?
posted by kirkaracha at 8:28 AM on September 6, 2022
Someone who's seen Running Man too many times?
posted by kirkaracha at 8:28 AM on September 6, 2022
To me, it's reassuring to think that, if we don't manage to get a handle on climate change and the biosphere spirals out of control like it seems to be doing right now, some people might survive and all of human endeavor might not be in vain. Call me weird.
If the only survivors of human endeavor are going to be Musk and Thiel and the like, it would in fact be better for all of existence if the species was eliminated utterly.
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 8:53 AM on September 6, 2022 [6 favorites]
If the only survivors of human endeavor are going to be Musk and Thiel and the like, it would in fact be better for all of existence if the species was eliminated utterly.
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 8:53 AM on September 6, 2022 [6 favorites]
I mean I guess it's depressing to think of all those tens of thousands of years of human endeavor culminating in exactly 25 useless shitbricks doing red bull shots in underground bunkers but you know, just 'cause something's depressing doesn't mean it's untrue.
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 8:56 AM on September 6, 2022 [4 favorites]
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 8:56 AM on September 6, 2022 [4 favorites]
If the only survivors of human endeavor are going to be Musk and Thiel and the like
Aggressive males dominate and reproduce more. Kind of a flaw at this level of evolution that aggression is more likely to be passed on. To survive, we need cooperation and thinking to be reproduced.
It would be so interesting to see how other life evolved and survived, presuming some sort of evolution is likely. I guess if humans die out, ants or other critters who cooperate more effectively will get a shot.
posted by theora55 at 9:08 AM on September 6, 2022 [2 favorites]
Aggressive males dominate and reproduce more. Kind of a flaw at this level of evolution that aggression is more likely to be passed on. To survive, we need cooperation and thinking to be reproduced.
It would be so interesting to see how other life evolved and survived, presuming some sort of evolution is likely. I guess if humans die out, ants or other critters who cooperate more effectively will get a shot.
posted by theora55 at 9:08 AM on September 6, 2022 [2 favorites]
This morning's "On Point" on NPR featured a 40-minute interview with Douglas Rushkoff about this article. It was interesting to hear his take, even though most of the interview was just rehashing the article.
Audio available here, along with a few pages from the introduction to his book.
posted by purple_frogs at 10:39 AM on September 6, 2022 [1 favorite]
Audio available here, along with a few pages from the introduction to his book.
posted by purple_frogs at 10:39 AM on September 6, 2022 [1 favorite]
There was recently a pretty awful incident with one of these people (well, not Musk-rich, but rich enough), C. Wesley Morgan. He's a hardcore right winger, and when Obama was elected, he decided he needed to keep himself and his family safe from the breakdown of society. He wound up building a mansion under which he put a (pretty impressive, frankly) bunker/survival system.
In 2016, he ran as the MAGA candidate for his district in the Kentucky House of Representatives, and won. He was unseated in 2018. In 2020, he ran against Mitch McConnell for the Republican nomination for the US Senate race, and (obviously) lost. At that point, he decided to move out of Kentucky, and put his house up for sale on Zillow (it's still listed there), and included information about its various survivalist-related features.
The Zillow listing went viral; I remember seeing it myself. Among the many others who saw it was an ex-soldier with a history of psychotic problems who, like Morgan, was also convinced that society was about to collapse. Unlike Morgan, though, he apparently did not have the financial resources to build a huge, state-of-the-art survival bunker. So, instead, he had been on the lookout for a bunker that he could take over by force when the time came.
By February of this year, he had become convinced that a nuclear war was imminent. And so now Morgan's daughter is dead.
posted by Flunkie at 11:42 AM on September 6, 2022 [4 favorites]
In 2016, he ran as the MAGA candidate for his district in the Kentucky House of Representatives, and won. He was unseated in 2018. In 2020, he ran against Mitch McConnell for the Republican nomination for the US Senate race, and (obviously) lost. At that point, he decided to move out of Kentucky, and put his house up for sale on Zillow (it's still listed there), and included information about its various survivalist-related features.
The Zillow listing went viral; I remember seeing it myself. Among the many others who saw it was an ex-soldier with a history of psychotic problems who, like Morgan, was also convinced that society was about to collapse. Unlike Morgan, though, he apparently did not have the financial resources to build a huge, state-of-the-art survival bunker. So, instead, he had been on the lookout for a bunker that he could take over by force when the time came.
By February of this year, he had become convinced that a nuclear war was imminent. And so now Morgan's daughter is dead.
posted by Flunkie at 11:42 AM on September 6, 2022 [4 favorites]
By February of this year, he had become convinced that a nuclear war was imminent. And so now Morgan's daughter is dead.
. That is pure Greek tragedy. The folly of humans.
On my first reading, I thought he had learnt from his hubris, but nope, he is as stupid as ever, now just with existential pain. And while I can assure everyone that we have equally stupid people in other parts of the world, it doe seem to be a uniquely American tragedy. Maybe it's the abundance f firearms that does it.
posted by mumimor at 12:26 PM on September 6, 2022 [3 favorites]
. That is pure Greek tragedy. The folly of humans.
On my first reading, I thought he had learnt from his hubris, but nope, he is as stupid as ever, now just with existential pain. And while I can assure everyone that we have equally stupid people in other parts of the world, it doe seem to be a uniquely American tragedy. Maybe it's the abundance f firearms that does it.
posted by mumimor at 12:26 PM on September 6, 2022 [3 favorites]
He certainly hasn't learned in all ways -- for example, he's convinced that he was the target of a false flag operation (by, presumably, the Deep State or Antifa or Hillary Clinton or whatever) -- but he does seem to have learned in some ways. He understands that (at least to a large degree) it's his fault that his daughter is dead, and he has given up the prepper life.
posted by Flunkie at 12:32 PM on September 6, 2022 [2 favorites]
posted by Flunkie at 12:32 PM on September 6, 2022 [2 favorites]
OMG that Zillow listing! This is the funniest sentence I've read today:
The highlight of the property is a $3 Million, 2,000 sq. ft. Nuclear/Biological/Chemical Fallout Shelter and a separate Mother-In-law suite.
posted by Daily Alice at 1:08 PM on September 6, 2022 [4 favorites]
The highlight of the property is a $3 Million, 2,000 sq. ft. Nuclear/Biological/Chemical Fallout Shelter and a separate Mother-In-law suite.
posted by Daily Alice at 1:08 PM on September 6, 2022 [4 favorites]
OMG that Zillow listing! This is the funniest sentence I've read todayOne of the more horrible parts of me got a kick out of "This is reported to be the most secure home on the market in this country."
posted by Flunkie at 1:15 PM on September 6, 2022 [1 favorite]
The Future of Life on Earth presented by Gresham College, 09 May 2022
Speaker: Roberto Trotta — Visiting Professor of Cosmology at Gresham College, UK
(Big Ideas, ABC Radio National, 1hr audio)
posted by flabdablet at 1:23 PM on September 6, 2022
Speaker: Roberto Trotta — Visiting Professor of Cosmology at Gresham College, UK
(Big Ideas, ABC Radio National, 1hr audio)
posted by flabdablet at 1:23 PM on September 6, 2022
"Mr. President, we must not allow a mine-shaft gap!"
posted by credulous at 5:13 PM on September 6, 2022 [2 favorites]
posted by credulous at 5:13 PM on September 6, 2022 [2 favorites]
Whoever put that house in KY on Zillow is guilty of the real estate equivalent of malpractice. There aren’t that many people interested in a $2 million panic room a short drive from Lexington, and they probably all do business with a small tight-knit network of providers. Some thirsty realtor made that listing without stopping to think that they were putting a target on that house.
That’s not to excuse the homeowner, who, as someone who got rich operating a warehouse liquor store in a place with a lot of dry counties, probably has more blood on his hands than just his daughter’s. But it’s still just a perfect storm of bad judgment and not knowing who your real enemies are. He’ll probably have a long life in his luxury RV with his second wife and his traumatized second kid, but he might never have a good night’s sleep, and that’s less than what he deserves.
posted by box at 5:40 PM on September 6, 2022 [2 favorites]
That’s not to excuse the homeowner, who, as someone who got rich operating a warehouse liquor store in a place with a lot of dry counties, probably has more blood on his hands than just his daughter’s. But it’s still just a perfect storm of bad judgment and not knowing who your real enemies are. He’ll probably have a long life in his luxury RV with his second wife and his traumatized second kid, but he might never have a good night’s sleep, and that’s less than what he deserves.
posted by box at 5:40 PM on September 6, 2022 [2 favorites]
no one deserves a dead child, but that house is ugly as f0ck!!! and the utter lack of trees or shrubs or flowers outside. its soooo sterile. $6.5m my ass.
posted by supermedusa at 9:49 AM on September 7, 2022
posted by supermedusa at 9:49 AM on September 7, 2022
That’s not to excuse the homeowner, who, as someone who got rich operating a warehouse liquor store in a place with a lot of dry counties, probably has more blood on his hands than just his daughter’s.
(wait we're wishing lifelong torment or worse on the people who sell booze now? I missed that memo. Or is it more that liquor stores should operate as nonprofits--because i can get behind that.)
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 12:36 PM on September 9, 2022
(wait we're wishing lifelong torment or worse on the people who sell booze now? I missed that memo. Or is it more that liquor stores should operate as nonprofits--because i can get behind that.)
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 12:36 PM on September 9, 2022
(I mean, yes, I'd prefer to buy booze from a worker-owned co-op, but I'm more bothered by the dry county thing. Studies have often found dry counties to have higher drunk driving fatality rates than wet ones, so the deliberate decision to open your liquor store on a county line doesn't 100% rub me the right way. 'Blood on his hands' was probably over the top.)
posted by box at 1:20 PM on September 9, 2022
posted by box at 1:20 PM on September 9, 2022
Metafilter: 'Blood on his hands' was probably over the top.
posted by Flunkie at 5:36 PM on September 9, 2022 [3 favorites]
posted by Flunkie at 5:36 PM on September 9, 2022 [3 favorites]
The Ultimate Exit Strategy, Douglas Rushkoff interviewed by Nate Hagens.
posted by jeffburdges at 4:16 PM on September 29, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by jeffburdges at 4:16 PM on September 29, 2022 [1 favorite]
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now maybe I should read the article.
posted by philip-random at 11:33 AM on September 4, 2022 [25 favorites]