Entering.
Not only for future generations, but also for us now.

Part 1.
Long-Termism: Why Changing the Future Matters

Chapter 0.
The Big Future Ahead of You: From a 5-Month-Old's Perspective
Chapter 1.
Why a Long-Term Perspective Matters: Responsible for 500 Million Years or More
Chapter 2.
Criteria for Measuring Future Value: Materiality, Durability, and Contingency

Part 2.
Millions of Choices: Have We Evolved Morally?

Chapter 3.
A Significant but Accidental Change: The History of the Abolition of Slavery
Chapter 4.
A Change That May Last Forever: The World of Artificial Intelligence

Part 3.
Destructive Scenarios: How to Lead to Destruction

Chapter 5.
The Risk of Human Extinction: The Possibility of Genetically Modified Infectious Diseases
Chapter 6.
The Risks of Civilization Collapse: The Potential of Nuclear War and Climate Change
Chapter 7.
The risk of technological stagnation: the possibility that progress will stall.

Part 4.
The future we can imagine

Chapter 8.
Is it good to make people happy?
Chapter 9.
Will the future be good or bad?

Part 5.
What we need to do now

Chapter 10.
The great future behind you

Going out.
There's so much to do

Acknowledgements
supplement
Image source
main
Search

William MacAskill's new book, "The Cold-Blooded Altruist"
Recommended by Professor Choi Jae-cheon
New York Times bestseller

Why a 'long-term' perspective is necessary
William MacAskill's Long Reflections on More Happiness for More People

William MacAskill, a professor of philosophy at Oxford University, revolutionized philanthropy and donation culture by demonstrating that altruistic acts based solely on passion can be ineffective and even harmful.
His "effective altruism" movement, which advocates rationally considering how many people will benefit and how much benefit will be returned before performing a good deed, has created a huge stir.
His new book, What We Owe The Future, which is his first in seven years, goes a step further than effective altruism and adopts the philosophy of 'longtermism' to examine what issues we should focus on and what actions we should take immediately.

With the recent rise of ChatGPT, discussions on the direction of artificial intelligence system development are heating up.
There are also growing calls for a temporary halt to development of AI systems until safeguards are in place to manage the risk of AI systems derailing, as AI threatens to harm humans, threatens to hack into them, and boasts of obtaining nuclear weapon access codes.
The basis of this voice is the long-term perspective.
Long-termism is the idea that positively influencing the future is morally paramount, the belief that the fate of the world depends on the choices we make now.

One common criticism of long-termism is that it overstates the risks by envisioning a distant, science-fiction-like future while neglecting the immediate and pressing issues.
Is the rush of artificial intelligence really something that will happen in the distant future?
Experts predict that we will soon be able to reach human-level artificial intelligence.
It means that it will happen in our lifetime.
The urgency of addressing these threats is so great that there is no need to weigh short-term and long-term concerns.


The idea that we should do things whose benefits will be realized only after a long period of time, and that we should consider the welfare of future generations, is not an empty notion.
Long-term behavior also has short-term advantages.
Even if that is not the case, the author argues that “protecting future generations must become the most crucial priority of our time.”

The path for future generations is the path for us.
Why it's important to change the future for the better

· Future people matter: Abolitionists dedicated their lives to a mission that would only succeed decades after their deaths, and we are free because of them.
When worrying about climate change or environmental pollution, no one thinks only of the current generation.


· The future is huge: If you can save one person from a fire or a hundred, you should save the hundred.
No matter how you calculate it, the future is longer than you can imagine, and the number of people who will live through that period is dizzyingly large.
How many lives are in our hands?

· We can make the future better: We live in an era of exceptionally rapid economic, scientific, moral, and environmental change.
There has never been anyone before our time, nor will there ever be, who has the power to change the trajectory of the future as profoundly as we do.
We need to seriously consider what we will leave behind for future generations.

To support this long-term argument, the author uses three metaphors throughout the book.


· First, today's humanity is a 'reckless teenager': Humans are behaving like teenagers who drink alcohol, don't wear seatbelts, and speed around blind corners.
If you make a rash choice, you could die right now or suffer for the rest of your life.
We face a choice that will determine the life of humanity.

· Second, society today is in a state of 'molten glass': while glass is hot, it can be shaped into any shape, but once it cools, it becomes untouchable.
We are now living in a time of molten glass, which can be likened to the Hundred Schools of Thought.
Various values ​​are competing, and no single value has emerged victorious.
Once a value is decided upon, it can become 'stuck' for a long time.
Even if it is a bad value.

· Third, humanity has embarked on a 'dangerous expedition': we are exploring a dark and foggy land, uncharted.
You may not know what dangers you'll face or even where you're going, but there are ways to prepare.
You should always carry something that will help you, such as a fire starter, matches, a sharp knife, and first aid supplies, and you should be open to various options and even do some scouting from time to time.


If not now, when, if not you, who?
What We Must Do Now for the Most Optimistic Future

What kind of future awaits us when we act like reckless teenagers, let our mushy Yuri days slip away, and set off on expeditions empty-handed?
The author hypothesizes a doomsday scenario and proposes solutions.


· A scenario in which civilization collapses due to climate change and nuclear war.
We already know that reducing carbon dioxide emissions can slow climate change, and the more we can reduce emissions, the better.
Developing clean energy technologies and alternative fuels could reduce deaths from air pollution in the short term, and in the long term, delay the depletion of fossil fuels, increasing the likelihood of recovery even after civilization collapses.

As conflicts between the great powers intensify, the risk of nuclear war continues to grow.
Nuclear war would be a devastating force, causing irreversible damage.
Arms control agreements and crisis management processes must keep pace with these changes.

· A scenario in which humanity goes extinct due to a genetically engineered infectious disease
Genetically engineered pathogens are easier to manufacture than nuclear weapons, making it possible to create hundreds of strains and spread them to thousands of locations around the world.
The coronavirus has shown us how unprepared we are for a pandemic.
It's tragic that it took a disaster like the coronavirus pandemic to convince the world to pay more attention to infectious diseases.
But the coronavirus pandemic pales in comparison to the horrors that a new genetically engineered pathogen could pose.
We must develop equipment that can ensure survival even in extreme danger, while also establishing proactive response plans, including vaccine development.


· A scenario where development stagnates and leads to destruction
There are reasons to expect that artificial intelligence will advance even faster than it is now.
But the opposite is also likely.
Even without citing data, the fact that progress in physics today is much more difficult than it was in Einstein's time suggests that progress is slowing.
Technological progress is like climbing a steep rock face.
If you push forward with explosive energy, you can reach the top safely.
But the climber is getting more and more tired.
It's only a matter of time before it falls.
The author warns that if we fail to develop innovative technologies in a timely manner, the likelihood of a long-term global recession will increase, bringing us closer to the extinction of humanity and the collapse of civilization.

“It’s easy to treat the limits of what we can see as the limits of the world.” But just as the world doesn’t end at our doorstep or our borders, it won’t end with our generation.
We live in an age where thousands of nuclear warheads are ready to be launched, an age where we burn fossil fuels and create pollutants that will last for hundreds of thousands of years, an age where a pandemic has swept the globe, an age where we fear artificial intelligence will go off the rails—yet, at the same time, an age where we can respond to all of these and change the course of the future.
Long-termism provides a perspective on the problems humanity faces and a clue to solving them.
We need to think long-term and act now.
Both a wonderful future and a terrible future are in our hands.

“Every page contains questions to think about.
“A heartfelt exhortation to future generations to do the right thing.”
- [Kirkus]

“MacAskill deftly navigates the intersection of technology, science, and politics, analyzing the broad risks facing modern society while simultaneously offering a glimpse into humanity’s potential future.
“It’s both inspiring and unsettling.”
- [Publisher's Weekly]

“An educational and intellectual book.
“It speaks volumes about history and the future, about the dangers of being pushed to the back burner and about moral myopia.”
- [Boston Review]