• An average mammalian species could exist for 1,000,000 years.
  • We are not a usual mammal.
  • But assuming we exist for this length of time, and never leave earth, and population becomes stable at 10.4B people, and with ~115B people having ever existed, this means that we are currently in the first 0.1% of humans to exist.
    • This reminds me of a cosmological fact, that the universe is extremely young.
  • 101T future people.
• Humans have existed for 200,000 years.
  • Assuming a generation every 25 years, that’s only 8,000 generations of human. Your family tree is only 8,000 mothers tall.de
  • With the above numbers and assumptions, there are 32,000 generations to come.
• But the 1M species lifespan is based on a typical mammalian species. What if we’re not typical?
  • We have technology.
  • We do long term time-binding (passing knowledge and wisdom through time, via our technology.)
  • We are taking our first foray into space.
• Then we’re even earlier, basically. All the numbers just get more extreme.
  • If we survive until the sun dies in 5B years, 127Q future people, we’re in the first 0.0001% of humans.
• Do we owe it to the future, to that vast majority of people, to make the Earth a better place?
  • We believe in democracy in the west, right? If those trillions of people had a vote too, do you think they’d vote to exist?
  • We should do everything in our power to ensure the future of humanity is supported, in the long-term.
• The history of humanity is just beginning.
  • To the majority of humans that will ever exist, We are an ancient civilisation. So vastly ancient that we will be the myths and legends of the future.
  • We are a species in infancy still. And yet we have achieved so much in such a short time. We are yet to step out from the cradle of Earth. Maybe one day, we will.

What We Owe The Future by Will MacAskill
How many people might ever exist, calculated - YouTube