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The End of the World: the Science and Ethics of Human Extinction John Leslie

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The End of the World: the Science and Ethics of Human Extinction John Leslie THE END OF THE WORLD ‘If you want to know what the philosophy professors have got to say, John Leslie’s The End of the World is the book to buy. His willingness to grasp the nettles makes me admire philosophers for tackling the big questions.’ THE OBSERVER ‘Leslie’s message is bleak but his touch is light. Wit, after all, is preferable to the desperation which, in the circumstances, seems the only other response.’ THE TIMES ‘John Leslie is one of a very small group of philosophers thoroughly conversant with the latest ideas in physics and cosmology. Moreover, Leslie is able to write about these ideas with wit, clarity and penetrating insight. He has established himself as a thinker who is unafraid to tackle the great issues of existence, and able to sift discerningly through the competing— and frequently bizarre—concepts emanating from fundamental research in the physical sciences. Leslie is undoubtedly the world’s expert on Brandon Carter’s so-called Doomsday Argument—a philosophical poser that is startling yet informative, seemingly outrageous yet intriguing, and ultimately both disturbing and illuminating. With his distinctive and highly readable style, combined with a bold and punchy treatment, Leslie offers a fascinating glimpse of the power of human reasoning to deduce our place in the universe.’ PAUL DAVIES, PROFESSOR OF NATURAL PHILOSOPHY, UNIVERSITY OF ADELAIDE, AUTHOR OF THE LAST THREE MINUTES ‘This book is vintage John Leslie: it presents a bold and provocative thesis supported by a battery of arguments and references to the most recent advances in science. Leslie is one of the most original and interesting thinkers today. The subject matter of the book (the probability of the extinction of the human species in the near future) and Leslie’s accessible writing style make this book of interest to readers in all academic fields as well as to the general public.’ QUENTIN SMITH, PROFESSOR OF PHILOSOPHY, WESTERN MICHIGAN UNIVERSITY ‘Leslie gathers together a frightening catalogue of potential catastrophes and details numerous now-familiar risks including global warming, warfare, diseases, and overpopulation, as well as unfamiliar or often overlooked risks ranging from asteroid strikes to nanotechnology run amok and universe annihilation resulting from misadventures in the physics lab.’ JOURNAL OF SOCIAL AND EVOLUTIONARY SYSTEMS ‘This is a book of a kind that we will see quite a few examples of in the years to come if humanity survives the millennium…. However, I doubt that we will see an example written with more wit, knowledge, and comprehension.’ INQUIRY ‘Leslie’s graceful style and humour enliven this grim assessment of the odds against human survival, and the effort and restraint that will be needed to beat the odds.’ WERNER ISRAEL FRS, PROFESSOR OF PHYSICS, UNIVERSITY OF ALBERTA ‘John Leslie has written a marvellously provocative book. His arguments— ranging widely over science and philosophy—are always stimulating, never obscure, and enlivened by well-chosen analogy. He brings zest and clarity to the gloomiest of themes.’ SIR MARTIN REES FRS, PROFESSOR OF ASTRONOMY, UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE, AND ASTRONOMER ROYAL ‘Everyone should take the argument presented here very seriously indeed. Leslie’s writing is excellent; he makes the case with a series of compelling and imaginative examples…. If the results are disturbing, it’s only because what we observe is disturbing. Being born into a species that has not been around very long is a dangerous situation to find oneself in! Not appreciating that danger, and therefore failing to act against it, may be the biggest danger we face.’ J.RICHARD GOTT, PROFESSOR OF ASTROPHYSICS, PRINCETON UNIVERSITY ‘John Leslie details a large number of possible causes of extinction which may chill the reader’s blood, but may even be enjoyed by cheerful pessimists. Optimists might try to get the powers that be to do something about it. His argument does not imply fatalism, since our efforts can change the probabilities. Leslie’s book is of urgent practical as well as theoretical importance: it could well be the most important book of the year.’ J.J.C.SMART, PROFESSOR OF PHILOSOPHY, AUSTRALIAN NATIONAL UNIVERSITY ‘The End of the World is a truly important book, opening the way to a whole series of crucially significant debates. It will be a great success, although— you can be sure of it—its ideas will be hotly disputed.’ JEAN-PAUL DELAHAYE, PROFESSOR OF COMPUTING SCIENCE, LILLE UNIVERSITY OF SCIENCES AND TECHNOLOGIES ‘John Leslie is a philosopher with an unusual flair for writing on deep and original topics. He goes where others fear to tread and brings back pure gold.’ NICHOLAS RESCHER, PROFESSOR OF PHILOSOPHY, UNIVERSITY OF PITTSBURGH ‘Quietly filled with fire and brimstone but couched in technological terms.’ NEW YORK TIMES ‘A startling work that is sure to rile and beguile professional philosophers and lay readers alike.’ THE TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT ‘…well written and enjoyably frightening. Top people ought to read it.’ FINANCIAL TIMES ‘This is a book that belongs alongside Jonathan Schell’s The Fate of the Earth and Bill McKibben’s The End of Nature as an ethical cri de coeur.’ THE AUSTRALIAN JOHN LESLIE THE END OF THE WORLD The SCIENCE and ETHICS of HUMAN EXTINCTION LONDON and NEW YORK First published 1996 by Routledge 11 New Fetter Lane, London EC4P 4EE This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2003. Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada by Routledge 29 West 35th Street, New York, NY 10001 First published in paperback 1998 © 1996 John Leslie All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Leslie, John, 1940– The end of the world: the science and ethics of human extinction John Leslie. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. 1. End of the world—Moral and ethical aspects. 2. Extinction (Biology) 3. Man—Influence on nature. I. Title. QB638.8.L47 1996 304.2–dc20 95–38891 ISBN 0-203-00772-7 Master e-book ISBN ISBN 0-203-20508-1 (Adobe eReader Format) ISBN 0-415-14043-9 (hbk) ISBN 0-415-18447-9 (pbk) CONTENTS Acknowledgments viii Preface to the paperback edition x INTRODUCTION: THE RISK OF EXTINCTION 1 1 WAR, POLLUTION, DISEASE 25 2 OTHER DANGERS 81 3 JUDGING THE RISKS 133 4 WHY PROLONG HUMAN HISTORY? 155 5 THE DOOMSDAY ARGUMENT 187 6 TESTING THE ARGUMENT 237 7 PRISONER’S DILEMMA AND NUCLEAR REVENGE 267 Notes 276 Bibliography 289 Index 306 vii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Thanks are due to the editors of nine books and of the American Philosophical Quarterly, the Bulletin of the Canadian Nuclear Society, Interchange, the Journal of Applied Philosophy, The Mathematical Intelligencer, Mind, Philosophia, The Philosophical Quarterly, Philosophy, Religious Studies and other journals, for making space available for testing this book’s ideas. Also to my wife Jill, for constant encouragement; to the Research School of Social Sciences of the Australian National University for a visiting fellowship during which work was begun on the central theme; to the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada for a research grant, and for airfares allowing me to attend conferences in Leningrad, Tartu and San Francisco; to various departments of philosophy, physics, astrophysics and applied mathematics, for inviting lectures and paying travel and other costs; to Belgium’s Fonds National de la Recherche Scientifique for funding a term’s visitorship at the Institut d’Astrophysique, Université de Liège; and to everyone at Routledge, particularly Adrian Driscoll, Pauline Marsh and Michael Leiser, for their enthusiasm, professionalism and speediness. Over a hundred people wrote useful letters—often very long ones—discussing the book’s arguments and above all the Carter- Leslie ‘doomsday argument’. I am particularly grateful for the letters and encouragement of J.D.Barrow, A.H.Batten, B.J.Carr, B.Carter, S.R.L.Clark, P.C.W.Davies, C.Davis, J.-P.Delahaye and all those who wrote to me in reaction to his discussion of my ideas in Pour la science (the French version of Scientific American), J.Demaret, G.F.R.Ellis, J.Ellis, G.Gale, J.R.Gott, A.Grünbaum, viii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS W.Israel, R.L.Jaffe, D.Lewis, A.D. Linde, M.Lockwood, B.McCusker, D.Mosey, G.Nerlich, C. Normore, D.Page, D.Parfit, P.J.E.Peebles, J.C.Polkinghorne, M.J.Rees, N.Rescher, J.J.C.Smart, R.Sylvan, F.J.Tipler, S.Weinberg and P.S.Wesson. Several of these also helped in the writing of my Universes, in which the doomsday argument appeared briefly (on p. 214). None of them can be held responsible for the defects of the present book. With any luck, the human race will exist for at least a few more years so that a hundred better ones will be covering the same wide ground. Richard Gott’s article in Nature, May 27, 1993, ‘Implications of the Copernican principle for our future prospects’, argues that, prima facie, humankind would seem unlikely to survive for very long, for if it did then you and I would have been very extraordinarily early in human population history. This disturbing theme, first developed by Brandon Carter, casts its shadow over all my pages, which warn of what may well happen unless we make strenuous efforts. Paul Davies defends the theme in his recently published About Time, also describing the lecture in which Carter first introduced it (to the Royal Society in 1983, with the comment that nuclear submarine commanders should reflect on it).
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