Slides (PDF) for 100YSS 2012 session on Vessel Archives

Existential Risk, Human Survival,
and the Future of Life in the Universe:
Interstellar Civilization through Vessel Archives

Heath Rezabek, MLIS
heath.rezabek@gmail.com

100 Year Starship Symposium
September 13-‐16, 2012. Houston, Texas.

ORIGINS / © Lucy West 2012 / Used by Permission

Session slides available.

slideshare.net/heathrezabek

biota.cc/vessel-slides.pdf


Exploring further...
Brief highlights
Only a few key ideas could be covered in this 20
minute session. To save time, topics in
breakout slides will not be explored in depth.

Refer to paper for details
The working Paper is 50 pages, and covers all
key elements of this proposal. References are
also cited there.

Contact
Inquiries and collaboration welcomed.

biota.cc/vessel.pdf
ORIGINS (Detail)
© Lucy West 2012 / Used by Permission

EXOPLANET TRANSIT / ESA / Illustration by AOES Medialab 2003

The Fermi Paradox and The Great Silence

Are we alone?



Kepler and 0ther observations tell us that
there is no shortage of worlds to be
detected.

Billions of years for worlds to develop.
Radiant life or von Neumann probes would need < 1 million years.
Where are they?

This is the Fermi Paradox.
The quiet in place of any other signs of life: the Great Silence.


Possible answers to the Fermi
Paradox

Responsibility to strive,
regardless of the unknown
status of other life

biota.cc/vessel.pdf
EXOPLANET TRANSIT
ESA / Illustration by AOES Medialab 2003


Is life widespread, or as uncommon
as we seem to be?

Learning the truth through interstellar travel will take time.

We must foster a supporting—and surviving—interstellar civilization.

EXOPLANET TRANSIT / ESA 2003 / Illustration by AOES Medialab

MASSIVE TERRESTRIAL STRIKE / Don Davis / NASA

Existential Risk

Will we endure?


Existential Risk

100 years to achieve our primary goal.
Our endeavor could be cut short before that
time has passed.

The risk that we may not endure is termed Existential Risk.

An existential risk is one that threatens the premature
extinction of Earth-‐originating intelligent life or the permanent
and drastic destruction of its potential for desirable future
development.

-‐ Nick Bostrom
Existential Risk Prevention as the Most Important Task for Humanity (2011)


Existential Risk

“... the permanent and drastic destruction of its
potential for desirable future development.”

Survival alone is not enough.

In some cases, a surviving society may be brutalized, stagnant, or
diminished irreparably. Bostrom’s 2011 classiﬁcation sets aside
discussion of particular causes.

Strict focus on outcomes helps us envision possible recovery scenarios.


Existential Risk

Classiﬁcation of Existential Risk
Human Extinction
Humanity goes extinct prematurely, i.e., before reaching technological maturity.

Permanent Stagnation
Humanity survives but never reaches technological maturity.
Subclasses: Unrecovered Collapse, Plateauing, Recurrent Collapse

Flawed Realization
Humanity reaches technological maturity but in a way that is dismally and irremediably ﬂawed.
Subclasses: Unconsummated Realization, Ephemeral Realization

Subsequent Ruination
Humanity reaches technological maturity in a way that gives good future prospects, yet
subsequent developments cause the permanent ruination of those prospects.

-‐ Nick Bostrom


Existential Risk

Imperative

To achieve an interstellar civilization while
addressing existential risk, we must do more than
survive: we must preserve our aspirations, our
capabilities, our cultural resources, and our
biodiversity.


What type of archive would answer to
Permanent Stagnation or Flawed
Realization?
Gregory Benford suggested one example in 1992, addressing
catastrophic loss of biodiversity.

DIATOM 1 (Sarah Parker-Eaton & Louise Hibbert)
Photo via Bradbury J: Nature's Nanotechnologists: Unveiling the Secrets of Diatoms. PLoS Biol 2/10/2004: e306. (CC-BY-2.5) 2004

The Library of Life


The Library of Life

The Library of Life: A thought experiment
on avoiding irreversible loss of biodiversity.
A broad program of freezing species in threatened ecospheres could
preserve biodiversity for eventual use by future generations. Sampling
without studying can lower costs dramatically. […] Much more
information than species DNA will be saved, allowing future
biotechnology to derive high information content and perhaps even
resurrect then-‐extinct species.

-‐ Gregory Benford
Abstract for “Saving the Library of Life” (1992)


The Library of Life

Controversial, but galvanizing.
My main concern is that people will conclude that scientists have
given up on preserving living biodiversity, or that future species
extinctions are not so worrisome because we can always reconstitute
the species and genera that we render extinct. But […] these potential
obstacles can be circumvented: by stressing [...] that the very fact that
such steps are being taken is an indication of how serious the problem
is.

-‐ Carl Sagan
Letter to Benford in Deep Time (1999)

The Library of Life proposal was one of the deepest and earliest
inﬂuences on my Vessel Archives proposal. It taught: We cannot be
afraid to galvanize our eﬀorts, when confronting existential risk.


The Library of Life

What type of facility would be needed to
carry a Library of Life, or house a cultural
equivalent, over the very-‐long-‐term?
Cultural archives would require diﬀerent methods, and the facility
itself could take on as many diﬀerent forms as there are cultures...


Vessel Archives

Architect © Vincent Callebaut Architectures 2008
LILYPAD / Floating Ecopolis Visualization Used by Permission and © Philippe Steels 2008

Vessel Archives

A Vessel Archive is a self-‐contained, sustainable habitat,
which harbors the traces of Earth's cultures and biomes.

These installations would serve in the near-‐term as examples
of sustainability and as ambassadors for society's
understanding of the 100 Year Starship Mission, and would
serve in the long-‐term as protective vessels for humanity's
aspirations, knowledge, and the traces of life itself.

Vessel Archives would be dedicated to their twin goals of
education, and preservation.


Vessel Archives

Vessel (noun.)
The term vessel describes our focused-‐purpose arcology in
part through its several meanings.

A vessel is a ship; a vehicle meant to ply the waters (on Earth),
or the space between the stars.

A vessel is a container into which is poured something meant
to be stored or carried.

A vessel is a conduit or a medium for transmission.


Vessel Archives

The installation as a whole should be designed as self-‐
suﬃcient, sustainable, and resilient in case of existential
catastrophe.

Each Vessel Archive should be designed to harbor a diverse
and interdisciplinary crew and staﬀ of just a few thousand, per
archive.

They would be colonies on Earth, dedicated to the legacy of
life.


Vessel Archives

One habitat for a few thousand will not solve our societal
challenges or safeguard life on Earth. Connected communities
of hundreds or thousands of Vessel Archives around the
world, each sharing concrete methods for sustainable design
with society at large, may do better...


Vessel Archives

A Vessel Archive’s outer exhibits, clearly visible to a curious
public, would house resources and environments introducing
the 100 Year Starship Mission.

At the heart of a Vessel Archive would be labs for research and
development, core collections, and sample banks of the
cultural and biological records.

This core archive (like a Library of Life) could be replicated,
and transferred in whole or in part to a 100 Year Starship, to
serve as its memory of Earth.


Vessel Archives

The Vessel Archive, carried out in many forms, would address
the debilitating outcomes of existential risk:

Permanent Stagnation; (Unrecovered Collapse;
Plateauing; Recurrent Collapse)

Flawed Realization; (Unconsummated Realization;
Ephemeral Realization)

Vessel Archives would also address the other two outcome
classes.


Many other approaches inform the Vessel
Archive proposal, starting with the need
to encourage hybrid vigor through an
open speciﬁcation...

biota.cc/vessel.pdf

STAR MAP / © Debra Joiner 2012 / Used by Permission

Creative Commons
Seed several instances of open speciﬁcation and
resource sites to explore, detail, and document
the creation of Vessel Archives, encouraging
hybrid vigor.

biota.cc/vessel.pdf

The 100 Year Starship: Inviting Humanity

Given the time, I’d explore how we could
inspire the public with the 100 Year
Starship Mission, through interactive
exhibits at existing, familiar institutions:
Museums, Planetariums, Arboretums,
Observatories, Universities, Libraries...

DAEDALUS ARRIVES / © Adrian Mann 2012 / Used by Permission

Many Forms and Formats
possible for conveying the
100YSS Mission Story

Scenario-‐Gaming, Simulations,
and Role-‐Play

biota.cc/vessel.pdf
DAEDALUS SEPARATED
© Adrian Mann 2012 / Used by Permission

Becoming an Interstellar
Civilization

Redeﬁning our Cosmology

biota.cc/vessel.pdf
STAR MAP
© Debra Joiner 2012 / Used by Permission

Biophilia and Biophilic Design: A Pattern Language

I’d detail architectural approaches we
could use to build Vessel Archives as
dedicated, multipurpose facilities.

EDEN PROJECT: TROPICAL BIOME / Photo via Steve Keiretsu (CC-BY-1.0) 2001

Binary DNA Data Sequencing
Recent work (Church/Gao/Kosuri 2012) is
discussed, along with possible applications.

biota.cc/vessel.pdf
Photo via Bradbury J: Nature's Nanotechnologists: Unveiling the Secrets
of Diatoms. PLoS Biol 2/10/2004: e306. (CC-BY-2.5) 2004

In the Paper...
Arcology (Paolo Soleri, 1969)
Compact and integrated installations as self-‐
contained cities.

biota.cc/vessel.pdf
From ARCOLOGY: The City in the Image of Man
© Paolo Soleri 1969 / Used by Permission

The Biophilia Hypothesis and
Biophilic Design

Pattern Languages (Christopher
Alexander)

biota.cc/vessel.pdf
THORNCROWN CHAPEL (E. Fay Jones)
Photo via Bobak (CC-BY-SA-2.5) 2006

100YSS: Icarus Interstellar
Project Hyperion
Research on very-‐long-‐term habitat design
factors.

100YSS: Icarus Interstellar
Project Persephone
Research on evolving architecture for very-‐long-‐
term and extrasolar habitat design.

(Biophilic Design, Pattern Languages,
Arcology / habitats: All applicable.)

LILYPAD / biota.cc/vessel.pdf
Visualization © Philippe Steels 2008
Visualization Used by Permission

Preservation of Cultural
Architecture and Vernacular
Pattern Languages
Case study: Traditional Japanese architectural
solutions and patterns.
Photo via Alijava (CC-BY-SA-2.5) 2010

biota.cc/vessel.pdf
BAMBOO

The Long Now Foundation
10,000 Year Clock to encourage very-‐long-‐term
thinking.

Deep Archival
Bruce Sterling on very-‐long-‐term archival.

biota.cc/vessel.pdf
CLOCK OF THE LONG NOW (Long Now Foundation)

Mission launch capability as
deep design goal

Core Vessel Archives as cargo on
100YSS ships

biota.cc/vessel.pdf

biota.cc/vessel.pdf


But none of these things matter,
in the absence of a 100 year answer

to this:


PALE BLUE DOT / NASA / JPL 1990

James Webb Space Telescope Mirror 37 / NASA / MSFC / David Higginbotham / Emmett Given 2010

The Great Filter


The Great Filter

We began with the Great Silence, and end by
considering the Great Filter.
The Great Silence implies that one or more of these steps [from
organic stellar material to expansive interstellar life and colonization]
are very improbable; there is a “Great Filter” along the path between
simple dead stuﬀ and explosive life. The vast majority of stuﬀ that
starts along this path never makes it. [...] The fact that our universe
seems basically dead suggests that it is very hard for advanced
explosive lasting life to arise.

-‐ Robin Hanson
The Great Filter -‐ Are We Almost Past It? (1998)


Countless Generations to Come


Countless Generations to Come

The stakes are high, but the potential future benefits of undertaking this
work are also vast, when considering the long-‐term potential of our
interstellar civilization.

To calculate the loss associated with an existential catastrophe, we
must consider how much value would come to exist in its absence. It
turns out that the ultimate potential for Earth-‐originating intelligent
life is literally astronomical. […] The relevant figure is not how many
people could live on Earth but how many descendants we could have in
total. ... Even if we use the most conservative of […] estimates, […] we
find that the expected loss of an existential catastrophe is greater than
the value of 1018 human lives. This implies that the expected value of
reducing existential risk by a mere one millionth of one percentage
point is at least ten times the value of a billion human lives.

-‐ Nick Bostrom


“The most astounding fact ... is the knowledge that the atoms that comprise life on
Earth, the atoms that make up the human body, are traceable to the crucibles that
cooked light elements into heavy elements in their core ... under extreme temperatures
and pressures. These stars ... went unstable in their later years. They collapsed and
then exploded, scattering their enriched guts across the galaxy. Guts made of carbon,
nitrogen, oxygen, and all the fundamental ingredients of life itself. These
ingredients become part of gas clouds that condense, collapse, form the next
generation of solar systems—stars with orbiting planets—and those planets
now have the ingredients for life itself. So that when I look up at the night
sky, and I know that—yes—we are part of this universe, we are in this
universe... But perhaps more important than both of those facts, is
that the universe is in us. When I reﬂect on that fact, I look up—
many people feel small, because they're small and the universe
is big; but I feel big. Because my atoms came from
those stars.”

-‐ Neil deGrasse Tyson
TIME: 10 Questions for
Neil deGrasse
Tyson.



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