One of the things I’m trying to teach my students this year is to think more creatively about the next 50 to 100 years of human civilization.  I’m doing this because one of my jobs is to think about alien civilizations and what might be universal about their trajectories. Do all technological civilizations like ours burn out after a couple hundred years? What does it take for a technological civilization to last for thousands, if not millions of years? I am also raising this question for them because it does seem like we are heading towards a period of instability a’la climate change, AI etc.  I want them to be prepared.

But the end of the world as we know it, is not the same thing as the end of the world. Looking at the long run of human beings and their societies, you can see the rise and fall of many different kinds of political and economic arrangements.  The trick right now might be to understand what emerges from instability and get ahead of the curve.  That’s why I have been enjoying a new book by Luke Kemp called “Goliath’s Curse. The History and Future of Societal Collapse.”  Despite the title, there’s quite a bit of hopeful news in the book. 

That’s what I want to touch on today.

For Kemp a “Goliath” is an empire or a large-scale human society e.g. the Roman Empire.  The story we usually get is that without a large scale, hierarchical society it’s nothing but the war of “all against all”. That’s because, we are told, human beings by their nature are war-like and bloody.  According to Kemp, however, this is simply not true.  Based on the archaeological record and studies of modern Hunter-Gatherer societies, the level of violence in early human societies was far less than we usually imagine. 

As Kemp puts it, “The scenario of prehistory is a war zone ... doesn’t fit with the presence of fluid civilizations”. According to Kemp the Paleolithic, (which was the time before farming began), was “about as safe as the modern world and far safer than other historical periods”. As he says “small scale war may have existed, but we simply have no evidence for it”

So, human beings are not built for war.  Large scale conflict may be an artifact of the kinds of civilizations that were created after the advent of farming.  That, for me, seems like some good news.

Another surprising point Kemp makes is that during periods of instability people don’t necessarily revert to a kind of Mad Max brutality.  Instead, evidence shows that people often come together and cooperate during difficult times or crisis. In fact, it’s our ability to cooperate and work together which really defines us as a species. 

All of this adds up to the fact that should we have instability ahead of us, there might be a whole new set of options for how we arrange ourselves politically and economically that don’t involve turning into cannibals driving around the desert in souped-up death machines (another Mad Max reference).

I will probably do more posts on Kemp’s book because I find it beautifully written and full of insight. I highly recommend it as we move into the “interesting times” ahead of us. 

— Adam Frank 🚀