#toby ord

[lilbluntworld]

“To the hundred billion people before us,

who fashioned our civilization;

To the seven billion now alive,

whose actions may determine its fate;

To the trillions to come,

whose existence lies in the balance.”

The Precipice - Toby Ord

[gfsolar]

Within crisis lies opportunity. I should know - my ancestors were Chinese. The proverb is ours.

[luxe-pauvre]

Threats to humanity, and how we address them, define our time. The advent of nuclear weapons posed a real risk of human extinction in the 20th century. There is strong reason to believe the risk will be higher this century, and increasing with each century that technological progress continues. Because these anthropogenic risks outstrip all natural risks combined, they set the clock on how long humanity has left to pull back from the brink. I am not claiming that extinction is the inevitable conclusion of scientific progress, or even the most likely outcome. What I am claiming is that there has been a robust trend towards increases in the power of humanity, which has reached a point where we pose a serious risk to our own existence. How we react to this risk is up to us. Nor am I arguing against technology. Technology has proved itself immensely valuable in improving the human condition. The problem is not so much an excess of technology as a lack of wisdom. Carl Sagan put this especially well: “Many of the dangers we face indeed arise from science and technology – but, more fundamentally, because we have become powerful without becoming commensurately wise. The world-altering powers that technology has delivered into our hands now require a degree of consideration and foresight that has never before been asked of us.” Because we cannot come back from extinction, we cannot wait until a threat strikes before acting – we must be proactive. And because gaining wisdom takes time, we need to start now. I think that we are likely to make it through this period. Not because the challenges are small, but because we will rise to them. The very fact that these risks stem from human action shows us that human action can address them. Defeatism would be both unwarranted and counterproductive – a self-fulfilling prophecy. Instead, we must address these challenges head-on with clear and rigorous thinking, guided by a positive vision of the longterm future we are trying to protect.

Toby Ord, Why we need worst-case thinking to prevent pandemics

[christianfrederiksen]

Sisyphus on the Other Side I've been using podcast episodes as inspiration for illustrations. This was a response to Making Sense episode 208 with Toby Ord, where he talks about humanity being at a critical juncture in history because of our increasing technological power.

[gfsolar]

[gfsolar]

Got this in the mail yesterday.

The big book in front of you... Not the other stuff. The book by Toby Ord. Yes. That one.

[mappingthemoon]

Apollo 12

Listed in the official logs as 'Camera malfunction', a close examination of the mission transcripts shows that this was an attempt at capturing the total eclipse of the Sun by the Earth with a long exposure. Looking carefully, we can see that the glowing ring of atmosphere—half sunset, half dawn—extends all the way around the Earth, but the thin circle has been blurred by hand shake during the exposure and some kind of camera malfunction has indeed spread the light vertically across the image.

A true image of what the astronauts saw would have been breathtaking. And yet this strange distorted image has an unearthly beauty of its own.

Date – ~17:00 UTC, 24 Nov 1969

Toby Ord: Earth Restored

[metastable1]

Earth Restored — Toby Ord

The most beautiful photographs of Earth — iconic images and unknown gems — digitally restored to their full glory.

https://twitter.com/tobyordoxford/status/1385156215735521281

Only 24 people have journeyed far enough to see the whole Earth against the black of space. The images they brought back changed our world. I've painstakingly restored 50 of these breathtaking photos and am releasing them all today, for free