The structure of the global catastrophe

Средства превентивного удара

Мало иметь систему тотального контроля – нужно обладать возможностью предотвратить риск. Сейчас обычно в качестве крайней меры рассматривается удар ракетно-ядерными силами по точке источника риска.

Здесь наблюдается любопытное противоречие с программами строительства бункеров для выживания – если такие бункера будут секретны и неуязвимы, то их будет трудно уничтожить. Более того, они должны содержать в себе полностью оборудованные лабораторAI и учёных на случай катастрофы. Поэтому возможна ситуация, когда «сверхоружие» будет создаваться в таком бункере (например, в СССР создавались подземные ядерные заводы для продолжения производства ядерного оружия в случае затяжной ядерной войны.) Люди, которые уже находятся в неуязвимом бункере, могут быть более психологически склонны к созданию сверхоружия для удара по поверхности. Следовательно, либо бункеры будут представлять угрозу человеческому выживанию, либо средства превентивного удара уничтожат все бункеры, которые могли бы использоваться для выживания людей после некой катастрофы.

Однако удар по одной точке в пространстве не действует ни против системного кризиса, ни против некой информационной угрозы. Компьютерный вирус не вылечишь ядерным ударом. Как не избавишь людей от привязанности к сверхнаркотику. Далее, удар возможен, пока некий риск не вышел из точки. Если рецепт супервируса попал в интернет, обратно его не выловишь. Уже сейчас современная военная машина бессильна против сетевых угроз, вроде террористических сетей, дающих метастазы по всей планете. Точно также в будущем компьютерный вирус будет не просто информационной угрозой данным на диске: он может заставлять компьютерно управляемые фабрики по всему миру незаметно производить некие свои материальные носители (скажем, в виде микроскопических роботов или программных закладок в обычных продуктах), а через них снова уходить в сеть (например, подключаясь к радиоканалу).

Наконец, сам удар (или даже его возможность) создаст ситуацию стратегической нестабильности. Например, сейчас удар баллистической ракетой с обычной боеголовкой по террористам может вызвать срабатывание системы предупрежденAI о ракетном нападенAI вероятного противника и привести к войне.

Наконец, удар требует определённого времени. Это время должно быть меньше времени от обнаружения развития угрозы до времени её перехода в необратимую фазу (например, в случае появления «серой слизи» важно уничтожить её до того, как она сумела размножиться в миллиардах копий и распространится по всей Земле). Сейчас время от обнаружения до удара по любой точке Земли меньше 2 часов, и может быть уменьшено до минут с помощью спутникового оружия. (Однако время принятия решения больше.) Если бы от момента принятия решения о написанAI кода опасного вируса до его запуска проходило бы только 15 минут, то этой скорости было бы недостаточно. И этой скорости очевидно недостаточно, если в некоем месте началось распыление опасных nanorobots по воздуху.

Efficiency of blow on a point will essentially change after the basis of space colonies (at least purely робототехнических - there too there can be a failure which will transform a colony in "cancer" - that is inclined to unlimited self-reproduction and distribution of "toxins": dangerous nanorobots, superbombs and other; namely the outer space exploration by means of the self-breeding robots using local materials, is most perspective). In time, while the signal about danger will pass, say, from the companion of Jupiter to the Earth, and then from the earth fighting "fleet" (that is rockets with nuclear warheads there will arrive and fighting nanorobotами) to put things in order (to burn down all successively), will be already late. Certainly, it is possible to hold "fleet" in an orbit of each companion of a planet or an asteroid where is capable to self-reproduction робототехнические colonies, but what if mutiny will occur on the fleet? Then the fleet which supervises other fleet is necessary, and floats between companions of planets. And then one more interplanetary fleet for the control over them. More shortly, the situation does not look strategically stable, - that is above certain level of the monitoring system start to stir each other. Probably, inability to supervise remote colonies leads to that to civilisations is favourable to become isolated on a parent planet - here one more decision of paradox of Fermi.

Removal of sources of risks on considerable distance from the Earth

It is theoretically possible to remove sources of risks from the Earth, first of all it concerns dangerous physical experiments. The problems connected with this approach:

Having received in hands means to create powerful experimental installations far from the Earth, we also will have possibilities quickly to deliver results of experiments back.

It cannot stop some people from similar experiences on the Earth, especially if they are simple.

It will not protect us from creation of dangerous strong AI as it can extend is information.

Even behind orbit Плутона dangerous experiments which will affect the Earth are possible.

it is difficult to know in advance, which experiments should be spent «behind orbit Плутона».

There are no technical possibilities to deliver an equipment large quantity for orbit Плутона during the nearest tens years, especially without use of dangerous technologies in the form of self-reproduced robots.

Creation of independent settlements in the remote corners of the Earth

Creation of such settlements, no less than skills of a survival in the wild nature, hardly will help with a case of really global catastrophe as it should mention all surface of the Earth (if it is a certain unintelligent agent), or to find out all people (if it is the intelligent agent). The independent settlement is vulnerable both to the first, and to the second - if only it is not armed confidential base but then it passes, more likely, under the column "bunkers".

If it is a question of a survival after very big, but not definitive catastrophe it is necessary to recollect experience продразвёрстки and collective farms in Russia, - the city force dominates over village and selects at it surpluses. In case of system crisis the main danger will be represented by other people. Not without reason in the fantastic novel «the Underground 2033» the basic coin is a cartridge from Kalashnikov's automatic machine. And until cartridges will be more than peasants, it will be more favourable to plunder, instead of to grow up. Probably also full dissolution of human in the nature in the spirit of Маугли. However it is improbable, that thus at least some representatives of kind Homo sapiens can go through really global catastrophe.

Creation of the file on global risks and growth of public understanding of the problematics connected with them

The publication of books and articles on a theme of global risks leads to growth of comprehension of a problem in a society and to drawing up of more exact list of global risks. The interdisciplinary approach allows to compare different risks and to consider possibility of their difficult interaction. Complexities of the given approach:

it is not clear, to whom exactly any such texts are addressed.

terrorists, the countries derelicts and regular armies can take advantage of ideas about creation of global risks from the published texts that will result to большему to increase in risks, than to their prevention.

wrong and premature capital investments can lead to disappointment in struggle against risks - just when this struggle actually is required.

Refuges and bunkers

Different sort of a refuge and bunkers can increase chances of survival of mankind in case of global catastrophe, however the situation with them is not simple. Separate independent refuges can exist tens years, but the they are more independent and долговременнее, the more efforts it is necessary on their preparation in advance. Refuges should provide ability of mankind to the further self-reproduction. Hence, they should contain not only enough of capable people to reproduction, but also a stock of technologies which will allow to survive and breed in territory which is planned to render habitable after an exit from a refuge. The this territory will be more difficult polluted, the больший level of technologies is required for a reliable survival.

Very big bunker will appear capable to continue in itself development of technologies and after catastrophe. However in this case it will be vulnerable to the same risks, as all terrestrial civilisation - in it there can be internal terrorists, AI, nanorobotы, leaks and т д. If the bunker is not capable to continue itself development of technologies he, more likely, is doomed to degradation.

Further, the bunker can be or «цивилизационным», that is keep the majority of cultural and technological achievements of a civilisation, or "specific", that is keep only a human life. Before "long" (that is calculated on long-term stay) the problem of formation and education of children and risks of degradation will rise bunkers. The bunker can or live for the account of the resources which have been saved up before catastrophe, or be engaged in own manufacture. In that case it will be simply underground civilisation on the infected planet.

The in большей to a measure the bunker constructed on modern technologies. It is independent cultural and technically, the more there should live people (but in the future it will be not so: the bunker on the basis of advanced nanotechnologyй can be even at all deserted, - only with the frozen human embryos). To provide simple reproduction by means of training to the basic human trades, thousand people are required. These people should be selected and be in the bunker before definitive catastrophe, it is desirable, on a constant basis. However it is improbable, that thousand intellectually and physically excellent people would want to sit in the bunker "just in case". In this case they can be in the bunker in two or three changes and receive for it the salary. (Now in Russia experiment «Mars 500» in which 6 humans will be in completely independent - on water, to meal, air - space of 500 days begins. Possibly, it is the best result which we now have. In the early nineties in the USA there was also a project «Биосфера-2» in which people should live two years on full self-maintenance under a dome in desert. The project has ended with partial failure as oxygen level in system began to fall because of unforeseen reproduction of microorganisms and insects.) as additional risk for bunkers it is necessary to note fact of psychology of the small groups closed in one premise widely known on the Antarctic expeditions - namely, the increase of animosities fraught with destructive actions, reducing survival rate.

The bunker can be either unique, or one of many. In the first case it is vulnerable to different catastrophes, and in the second struggle between different bunkers for the resources which have remained outside is possible. Or war continuation if catastrophe has resulted from war is possible. The bunker, most likely, will be either underground, or sea, or space. Thus the space bunker too can be заглублён in a ground of asteroids or the Moon. For the space bunker it will be more difficult to use the rests of resources on the Earth. The bunker can be completely isolated, or to allow "excursion" in the external hostile environment.

As model of the sea bunker the nuclear submarine possessing high reserve, autonomy, manoeuvrability and stability to negative influences can serve. Besides, it can easily be cooled at ocean (the problem of cooling of the underground closed bunkers is not simple), to extract from it water, oxygen and even food. Besides, already there are ready boats and technical decisions. The boat is capable to sustain shock and radiating influence. However the resource of independent swimming of modern submarines makes at the best year, and in them there is no place for storage of stocks.

Modern space station MKS could support independently a life of several humans within approximately year though there are problems of independent planting and adaptation. Not clearly, whether the certain dangerous agent, capable to get into all cracks on the earth can, to dissipate for so short term.

There is a difference between gazo - and bio - refuges which can be on a surface, but are divided into many sections for maintenance of a mode of quarantine, and refuges which are intended for shelter from in the slightest degree intelligent opponent (including from other people who did not manage a place in a refuge). In case of biodanger of island with rigid quarantine the refuge if illness is not transferred by air can represent itself as.

The bunker can possess different уязвимостями. For example, in case of biological threat, enough insignificant penetration. Completely the hi-tech bunker can be the independent only. Energy and oxygen are necessary to the bunker. The system on a nuclear reactor can give energy, but modern cars hardly can possess durability more than 30-50 years. The bunker cannot be universal - he should assume protection against the certain kinds of threats known in advance - radiating, biological and т д.

The укреплённее the bunker, the smaller number of bunkers can prepare mankind, and it will be more difficult to that to hide such bunker. If after a certain catastrophe there was a final number of the bunkers which site is known secondary nuclear war can finish mankind through final number of blows in known places.

The more largely the bunker, the less than such bunkers it is possible to construct. However any bunker is vulnerable to casual destruction or contamination. Therefore the final number of bunkers with certain probability of contamination unequivocally defines the maximum survival time of mankind. If bunkers are connected among themselves by trade and an other material exchange the not which distribution of an contamination between them is more probable. If bunkers are not connected, they will faster degrade. The more powerfully and more expensively the bunker, the is more difficult to create it imperceptibly for the probable opponent and that it becomes faster the attack purpose. The more cheaply the bunker, the less it is durable.

Casual shelters - the people who have escaped in the underground, mines, submarines are possible. They will suffer from absence of the central power and struggle for resources. The people, the exhausted resources in one bunker, can undertake the armed attempts to break in other next bunker. Also the people who have escaped casually (or under the threat of the hung catastrophe), can attack those who was locked in the bunker.

Bunkers I will suffer from necessity of an exchange of heat, energy, water and air with an external world. The more independently the bunker, the less it can exist in full isolation. Bunkers being in the earth will deeply suffer from an overheat. Any nuclear reactors and other difficult cars will demand external cooling. Cooling by external water will be демаскировывать them, and to have energy sources lost-free in the form of heat - it is impossible, as on depth and so always a heat. Temperature growth, in process of deepening in the earth, limits limiting depth залегания bunkers. (The geothermal gradient on the average makes 30 degrees/kilometers. It means, that bunkers on depth there is more than 1 kilometre are impossible - or demand huge cooling installations on a surface, as gold mines in the republic of South Africa. There can be deeper bunkers in ices of Antarctica.)

The is more durable, the bunker is more universal and more effective, the before it it is necessary to start to build. But in this case it is difficult to foresee the future risks. For example, in 1930th years have constructed much противогазовых bombproof shelters which have appeared are useless and vulnerable to bombardments by heavy demolition bombs.

Efficiency of the bunker which the civilisation can create, corresponds to a technological level of development of this civilisation. But it means, that it possesses and corresponding removers. So, its especially powerful bunker is necessary. The more independently and more absolutely the bunker (for example, equipped AI, nanorobotами and biotechnologies), the is easier it can do without, eventually, people, having given rise purely computer a civilisation. People from different bunkers will compete for the one who the first leaves on a surface and who, accordingly, will own it - therefore at them the temptation will develop still the infected sites of the earth.

Are possible automatic робототизированные bunkers: in them the frozen human embryos are stored in a certain artificial uterus and through hundreds or thousand years start to be grown up. (Technology frosts of embryos already are, and works on an artificial uterus are forbidden for bioethics reasons, but basically such device is possible.) with embryos it is possible to send such installations in travel to other planets. However, if such bunkers are possible, the earth hardly remains empty - most likely it will be populated with robots. Besides, if the human cub who has been brought up by wolves, considers itself as a wolf as whom human who has been brought up by robots will consider itself?

So, the idea about a survival in bunkers contains many reefs which reduce to it utility and probability of success. It is necessary to build long-term bunkers many years, but they can become outdated for this time as the situation will change and it is not known to what prepares. Probably, that there is a number of powerful bunkers which have been constructed in days of cold war. A limit of modern technical possibilities the bunker of an order of a 30-year-old autonomy sees, however it it is necessary to build years ten, and it will demand billions dollars of investments.

Independently there are information bunkers, which are intended to inform to the possible escaped descendants our knowledge, technologies and achievements. For example, in Norway, on Spitsbergen have created a stock of samples of seeds grain with these purposes. Variants with preservation of a genetic variety of people by means of the frozen sperm are possible. Digital carriers steady against long storage, for example, compact discs on which the text which can be read through a magnifier is etched are discussed. This knowledge can be crucial not to repeat our errors.

Advancing moving in space

There is an assumption, that the mankind will escape, if is divided into parts which quickly will occupy space separately. For example, known physicist S.Hoking agitates for creation of the spare earth to avoid the risks menacing to a planet. At advancing moving any influence which has been carried out in one place, cannot catch up with all mankind. Alas, there are no technological preconditions for the accelerated moving of mankind in space: we have rather vague representations how to create starprobe vehicles and, possibly, we can not construct them without the aid of AI and робототизированного manufacture. So, the mankind can start to occupy space only after will overcome all risks connected with AI and nanotechnologyями and consequently space settlements cannot serve as protection against these risks. Besides, space settlements in the nearest space, within Solar system, will be extremely dependent on terrestrial deliveries and are vulnerable for usual rocket attack. Even if the mankind will start to escape with the earth with околосветовой in the speed on superfast starprobe vehicles, it all the same will not secure it. First, because the information all the same extends faster, with a velocity of light and if there will be hostile AI it can get on computer networks even into quickly leaving starprobe vehicle. Secondly, how the starprobe vehicle was fast, the pilotless device can catch up with it easier, fast and made (as it will be created later). At last, any starprobe vehicle takes away with itself all terrestrial supertechnologies both all human lacks and the problems connected with them.

«All somehow will manage»

This position on prevention of global risks is based on belief in congenital stability of systems and on the irrational concept of the decision of problems in process of their receipt. It comprises some obvious and implicit assumptions and logic errors, in the spirit of «perhaps, will carry by». Actually, to this position the government of the different countries which solve problems only also adhere after they became obvious. If to formulate this position in the spirit of the military doctrine of the USA, it will sound so: analyzing and preventing all risks in process of their receipt, we will create the monitoring system of each concrete risk giving qualitative and quantitative prevalence over each source of risk on each phase of its existence.

However already today in a modern technological situation we cannot consider risks «in process of their receipt», as we do not know where to search and as risks can faster be staticized, than we will have time to consider and prepare them for them. For this reason I try to expand forecast horizon, considering hypothetical and probable technologies which are not created yet, but can be quite created, proceeding from current tendencies.

Other variant - the future picture, named "sustainable development" (sustainable development). However it not the forecast, and the project. It is based on the assumption, that technologies will enough develop to help us to overcome power and other crises, but nevertheless thus technologies will not generate new improbable and risky possibilities. The probability of such outcome of events is insignificant.

Degradation of a civilisation to level of a steady condition

Some hope, that threats of global catastrophes will resolve by itself when the mankind, because of shortage of resources or the previous catastrophes to some extent degrades. Such degradation is interfaced to difficulties because all stocks which have remained from a civilisation are not plundered yet, and all weapon is not spent, there is no benefit to be engaged in primitive agriculture - much easier to plunder neighbours. The competition between the escaped societies will inevitably result in new growth of the weapon and technologies, as though it ideologically choked, and through some hundreds years the civilisation will return on modern level so, will revive also all problems. Or on the contrary, degrades in a direction to even more primitive forms and will die out.

Prevention of one catastrophe by means of another

Following examples of mutual neutralisation of dangerous technologies and catastrophes are theoretically possible:

1. Nuclear war stops development of technologies in general.

2. Total AI prevents bioterrorism.

3. The bioterrorism does impossible AI development

4. The nuclear winter prevents global warming.

Essence in that large catastrophe does impossible global, rejecting mankind on some evolutionary steps back. It is possible in the event that we enter into the long period of high probability of large catastrophes, but small probability of global catastrophes. Somewhat with second half of XX-th century we are in this period. Nevertheless, it has not prevented us will successfully come nearer to that moment when before creation of many means of global general destruction remained, probably, tens years.

In any sense it would be pleasant"to prove the theorem, that global catastrophe is impossible, because very large catastrophes will not allow to come nearer to it. However this theorem would have exclusively likelihood character as some dangerous supertechnologies can appear at any moment, especially AI.

Besides, any big failure (but smaller catastrophe rejecting back) raises sensibleness of people concerning risks. Though here there is a certain stereotype: expectation of repetition of precisely same risk.