Fluent Essays

371 HUMAN EXTINCTION AND THE VALUE OF OUR EFFORTS BROOKE ALAN TRISEL THE PHILOSOPHICAL FORUM Volume XXXV, No. 3, Fall 2004 Discussions about nuclear weapons, the depletion of the ozone layer, and the possibility that a massive asteroid could crash into Earth, prompt us to reflect on our own individual mortality and on human extinction. And when we think about the end of humanity, it raises questions about whether our efforts have value because, if human extinction does occur, the things that we have created will decay and eventually vanish. Some claim that our efforts are pointless if humanity will cease to exist. This claim will be examined and disputed in this essay. In recent years, there has been extensive debate regarding the question of whether we have obligations to future generations, such as an obligation to pre- serve the environment. To a far lesser extent, there has also been discussion about the more basic question of whether it matters how long humanity will persist. The related question of whether our efforts have value if humanity will end has received even less attention. The human species could become extinct abruptly, with all of us dying at once or within a short time of each other. Extinction could also occur gradually. For example, if people would immediately stop having children, then we would live out our lives in a world without future generations. Humanity would become extinct over a period of 110 to 120 years—the maximum life span of someone currently alive. If we knew that humanity would become extinct within the next few months, then we would be justified in feeling distressed about this because it would cut short our expected life span, thereby depriving us of many potential experiences. However, should we feel anguish about the possibility that humankind will become extinct long after we and our loved ones have died? I would like to thank an anonymous referee for valuable comments and suggestions. It is understandable why we want those that we love, including our children and friends, to continue living after we have died. Because we love them, relate to them as one existent individual to another, and empathize with their feelings and aspira- tions, we desire for them to live on so that they can realize their goals and experience fulfilling lives. But why should it matter whether remote future generations— faceless, abstract persons who only potentially exist and whom we will never know—will be born after we have died and will persist for as long as possible? Ernest Partridge contends that people have a “basic need” to care for the future beyond their own lifetimes, a need that he refers to as “self transcendence.”1 He writes: By claiming that there is a basic human need for “self transcendence,” I am proposing that, as a result of the psychodevelopmental sources of the self and the fundamental dynamics of social expe- rience, well-functioning human beings identify with, and seek to further, the well-being, preser- vation, and endurance of communities, locations, causes, artifacts, institutions, ideals, and so on, that are outside themselves and that they hope will flourish beyond their own lifetimes.2 In attempting to support his claim, Partridge argues that there is a “desire to extend the term of one’s influence and significance well beyond the term of one’s lifetime—a desire evident in arrangements for posthumous publications, in bequests and wills, in perpetual trusts (such as the Nobel Prize), and so forth.”3 Partridge concludes by asserting: To be sure, posterity does not actually exist now. Even so, in a strangely abstract and metaphori- cal sense, posterity may extend profound favors for the living. For posterity exists as an idea, a potentiality, and a valid object of transpersonal devotion, concern, purpose, and commitment. Without this idea and potentiality, our lives would be confined, empty, bleak, pointless, and morally impoverished.4 Allen Tough makes a similar argument to Partridge when he states: “If our future is highly negative [referring to the end of humanity], then most other values and goals will lose their point.”5 In this essay, an attempt will be made to demonstrate that the claim that our lives would be empty and pointless without future generations is greatly exag- BROOKE ALAN TRISEL 372 1 Partridge uses the term “self transcendence” to mean extending one’s influence beyond one’s life- time. Others use this word in a broader sense to mean extending one’s influence or help to other people, regardless of whether they are future persons and so, to avoid confusion, this word will not be used. 2 Ernest Partridge, “Why Care About the Future?” in Responsibilities to Future Generations: Environmental Ethics, ed. Ernest Partridge (Buffalo: Prometheus Books, 1981), 204. 3 Ibid., 209. 4 Ibid., 217–218. 5 Allen Tough, Crucial Questions About the Future (New York: UP of America, 1991), 12. gerated. Second, it will be argued that, if we adopt a reasonable standard for judging whether our efforts are “significant,” it then will not matter whether humanity will persist for an extended time. BACKGROUND ON THE DEBATE Many people have expressed a longing for humanity to persist for as long as possible. Wilhelm Ostwald, for example, argues that the continuation of a species is a way of mitigating the death of an individual member of that species. In the context of discussing the propagation of biological organisms, he writes: “Death has here lost much of his power; many individuals may perish, but the organism as such remains alive. Only when the very last of all the offspring perishes may death be regarded as the victor.”6 Avner de-Shalit expresses a similar view insofar as he argues that the idea of future generations helps people overcome the fear of death. He writes: “We can, to a certain extent, and should immortalize the creative part of us. True, this is not a total victory over the fear [of death], nor is it a full answer. Nevertheless, if we follow this course of action, it will provide us with a certain victory.”7 In writing about “traces,” as they are now called, Ostwald indicates: “Every man leaves after his death certain things in the world changed by his influence. He may have built a house, or gained a fortune, or written a book, or begotten children.”8 He goes on to argue: “There is a very general desire in mankind to leave such impressions” and “we are not fully satisfied with the mere existence of such objective souvenirs [referring to the pyramids], but want other people to see them and realize their meaning.”9 The principal argument advanced by those who believe that it matters how long humanity will persist is as follows: People desire to leave an enduring trace of their existence and would not be satisfied in just leaving a physical trace. People want their trace (e.g., piece of artwork) to be appreciated by other people—not just to sit on a desolate planet for countless years. Leaving an appreciable, endur- ing trace is dependent on the existence of future generations. Therefore, it matters, they conclude, how long humanity will continue to exist. HUMAN EXTINCTION AND THE VALUE OF OUR EFFORTS 373 6 Wilhelm Ostwald, Individuality and Immortality (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1906), 14. A scholar from various disciplines is invited each year to deliver the “Ingersoll Lecture on the Immortality of Man.” At the time of his lecture, which was published in the book, Ostwald was a Professor of Physical Chemistry at the University of Leipzig and a Temporary Professor at Harvard University, where he delivered the lecture. 7 Avner de-Shalit, Why Posterity Matters: Environmental Policies and Future Generations (London: Routledge, 1995), 38. 8 Ostwald, op. cit., 53. 9 Ibid., 54–55. James Lenman convincingly argues that, from an impersonal standpoint, it does not matter whether humanity will become extinct sooner rather than later.10 However, he does believe that this matters from a “generation-centered” per- spective for reasons similar to those advanced by Partridge and de-Shalit. It is true, as Partridge maintains, that some people do adopt goals that extend beyond the end of their lives. For example, in response to a question regarding the goal of a writer, William Faulkner remarks: It’s—I think that a writer wants to make something that he knows that a hundred or two hundred or five hundred, a thousand years later will make people feel what they feel when they read Homer, or read Dickens or Balzac, Tolstoy . . . he knows he has a short span of life, that the day will come when he must pass through the wall of oblivion, and he wants to leave a scratch on that wall— Kilroy was here—that somebody a hundred, a thousand years later will see.11 Granted, if one’s goal is to influence people for thousands of years through one’s writings, then this goal could not be accomplished without the continued existence of humanity. However, the goal of leaving an enduring, appreciable trace is not important, as will be shown in a later section. Furthermore, adopting such a grandiose goal is unrealistic, especially considering the vast quantity of writings that are being produced and amassed by humanity. Although future persons may have more sophisticated technology than we do to sift through these writings, they (like us) will be limited in how much they can read. Therefore, it will be difficult for a contemporary writer to achieve the goal of influencing future persons for thousands of years. Partridge argues that it should matter to us how long humanity will persist, but clearly this does not matter to everyone. For example, in response to the com- ments of an earlier presenter at a symposium, who had equated the 4.5 billion years of earth’s history to once around the world in a plane, the economist Lester Thurow responded: “Do I care what happens a thousand years from now? Do I care when man gets off the airplane? And I think I basically came to the conclu- sion that I don’t care whether man is on the airplane for another eight feet, or if man is on the airplane another three times around the earth.”12 Thurow does not expound on why he does not care how long humanity will persist. However, for some people, a pessimistic outlook on life explains why they do not embrace the goal of achieving human immortality. According to the BROOKE ALAN TRISEL 374 10 James Lenman, “On Becoming Extinct,” Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 83 (2002), 253–69. 11 William Faulkner, Faulkner in the University: Class Conferences at the University of Virginia, 1957–1958, ed. Frederick L. Gwynn & Joseph L. Blotner (New York: Vintage Books, 1959), 61. 12 Lester Thurow, “Zero Economic Growth and the Distribution of Income,” The Economic Growth Controversy, eds. Andrew Weintraub, Eli Schwartz, & J. Richard Aronson (White Plains: Inter- national Arts and Sciences Press, Inc., 1973), 141–2. noted pessimist Schopenhauer: “You can also look upon our life as an episode unprofitably disturbing the blessed calm of nothingness.”13 To those who believe that nonexistence is preferable to existence or that evil outweighs the good in the world, the goal that humanity will persist for billions of years undoubtedly seems irrational and perhaps even ridiculous. From their perspective, it is unlikely that this goal could be achieved considering the destructive behavior of humankind and, even if it could be achieved, we would never know it because we would no longer be alive then. Furthermore, achieving this goal would only prolong human suffering and misery and postpone the inevitable extinction of humankind. For example, Schopenhauer writes: If the act of procreation were neither the outcome of a desire nor accompanied by feelings of plea- sure, but a matter to be decided on the basis of purely rational considerations, is it likely the human race would still exist? Would each of us not rather have felt so much pity for the coming genera- tion as to prefer to spare it the burden of existence, or at least not wish to take it upon himself to impose that burden upon it in cold blood?14 If one is miserable with one’s life, then this person may wish that he or she had never been born, may assume that others also wish they had never been born, and thus may see themselves as doing future persons a favor by sparing them the “burden of existence.” However, the assumption that everyone desires not to have been born must be false, because, if it were true, then there would be many more suicides than there are and people would not seek, as they do, to live as long as possible—some even wanting to live forever. As extreme pessimism is uncommon, there must be other reasons explaining why it does not matter to some people, such as Thurow, whether humanity will endure for a long time. These reasons will become evident in the next section, where it will be demonstrated that the claim that our efforts would be pointless without future generations is an exaggeration. LIFE WITHOUT FUTURE GENERATIONS One can lead a meaningful life without personal immortality or a superior being, as many have argued.15 If living forever, as an individual, is unnecessary for one’s life to be meaningful, then this immediately raises doubt about whether HUMAN EXTINCTION AND THE VALUE OF OUR EFFORTS 375 13 Arthur Schopenhauer, “On the Suffering of the World,” Essays and Aphorisms, trans. R.J. Hollingdale (London: Penguin Books, 1970), 47. 14 Ibid., 47–48. 15 See, for example, Kurt Baier, “The Meaning of Life,” The Meaning of Life, ed. E. D. Klemke (New York: Oxford UP, 2000), 101–132. Inaugural Lecture delivered at Canberra University College, 1957. it is necessary for humanity to live forever, or for a long time, for one’s life to be meaningful, as some claim. It will be useful, however, to examine their argu- ments in more detail. Would our lives be “pointless” without future generations as Partridge claims? “Pointless” is a vague word and Partridge does not elaborate on what he means in using this word. Therefore, before addressing the question, it is important to attain a clear understanding of the meanings of this word. “Pointless” can mean the same as “purposeless,” which signifies the absence of a goal or purpose. Clearly, living without the prospect of future generations is not pointless, in this sense of the word, because people alive today can have and pursue goals regard- less of whether there will be future generations. “Pointless” can also mean that one has a goal, but that it no longer makes sense to continue striving to achieve this goal because conditions have changed that have made the goal irrelevant or unachievable. In this sense of the word, “point- less” has a meaning very similar to “futile.” Declaring that an action or activity will be futile means that it will be impossible or highly improbable that the action, no matter how often it will be repeated, will bring about one’s envisioned goal. Therefore, whether or not an effort is considered futile or pointless will depend, in large part, on the nature of one’s goals.16 A few of the goals that some people have would be pointless without future generations. For example, if one’s goal is to write a book that will be read by and influence others for thousands of years, then, if it becomes known that humankind will perish within six months, this individual would consider the writing of this book pointless because the envisioned goal has become unachievable. Although the goal would be pointless, it is unrealistic to adopt such a goal in the first place. Our lives, as a whole, would be pointless without future generations only if all of our efforts were devoted to achieving goals directed at future persons and this is not true. Most of peoples’ goals can be accomplished within their lifetimes. If all of our goals extended well beyond our lifetimes, then we would not fully realize any of our goals until long after we have died. But people do accomplish many of their goals: they graduate from college, they get married, they pursue various careers, they write books, they travel, and so on—all without future generations. Animals preceded human life by millions of years and may continue to exist for millions of years after humanity has become extinct. Some people have goals directed at assuring that other forms of life, especially animals, will survive and flourish, regardless of how long humanity will persist. Arne Naess argues that one BROOKE ALAN TRISEL 376 16 For a more detailed analysis and discussion of the concept of futility, see Brooke Alan Trisel, “Futility and the Meaning of Life Debate,” Sorites 14 (October 2002), 70–84. http://www.sorites.org/Issue_14/trisel.htm http://www.sorites.org/Issue_14/trisel.htm of the values underlying the “deep ecology” movement is the principle of “bios- pherical egalitarianism.” He writes: The ecological field-worker acquires a deep-seated respect, or even veneration, for ways and forms of life. He reaches an understanding from within, a kind of understanding that others reserve for fellow men and for a narrow section of ways and forms of life. To the ecological field-worker, the equal right to live and blossom is an intuitively clear and obvious value axiom.17 Paul Taylor outlines a “biocentric outlook” on nature.18 One of the four com- ponents of this outlook is that human beings are members of Earth’s community of life and hold that membership on the same terms as nonhuman members. He expresses the desire to maintain the “integrity of the biosphere” for the good of human and nonhuman members of the community of life. Taylor argues that if human extinction should occur that “not only would the Earth’s commu- nity of life continue to exist, but in all probability, its well-being would be enhanced.”19 As Taylor’s goal extends beyond humanity to include animals and plants, pur- suing this goal would not be pointless even if humanity will become extinct because achieving this goal does not depend on the continued existence of human- ity. In fact, as he argues, the continued existence of humanity actually makes it more difficult to achieve the goal that animals will survive. Those who argue that our lives would be pointless without future generations falsely assume that every- one’s goals revolve around and are limited to human beings. For the preceding reasons, it is an overstatement to claim that our efforts would be pointless without future generations. If one’s goals do not extend beyond one’s lifetime or are directed at nonhuman life, then it may be possible to achieve these goals even if there will be no future generations. Wanting to influence humanity forever would be pointless without future gen- erations, but this should not concern us. Trying to run a marathon in five minutes, and attempting to jump to the moon from Earth, are also pointless. These latter two activities are pointless because these goals exceed human capabilities and are unachievable. No matter how much effort is expended, one could never achieve these goals. Wanting to leave an everlasting trace of ourselves also exceeds human capabilities and is unachievable. If a person would try to jump to the moon or to leave a trace that will last forever, then this person’s efforts related to these goals HUMAN EXTINCTION AND THE VALUE OF OUR EFFORTS 377 17 Arne Naess, “The Shallow and the Deep, Long-Range Ecology Movement: A Summary,” Inquiry 16 (1973), 95–100. 18 Paul W. Taylor, “The Ethics of Respect for Nature,” Environmental Philosophy: From Animal Rights to Radical Ecology, ed. Michael E. Zimmerman (Upper Saddle River, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, Inc. 1998), 71–86. 19 Ibid., 76. will be futile. However, they would not be justified in feeling distressed about this because they chose unrealistic goals, which primarily is why their efforts toward achieving these goals would be futile. It does not concern us that we cannot jump to the moon because we under- stand that human beings have limits and that a jump of this magnitude far exceeds our capabilities. We accept this limitation and do not fret about it, yet some people resist accepting the limitation that they cannot leave an everlasting, appreciable trace of themselves. By accepting this limitation and adopting realistic goals, it will help assure that our efforts will not be pointless. In addition to claiming that our lives would be pointless without future gener- ations, Partridge also claims that our lives would be “empty” and “bleak” without future generations because purportedly we could not satisfy the desire or goal to leave an enduring trace of ourselves without them. This, however, falsely assumes that having and achieving goals are the only experiences that make living worth- while. Even more incorrect, it assumes that being able to achieve one kind of goal, namely a goal that extends beyond one’s life and is directed at future persons, is the only experience that makes life worth living. Having and achieving goals can give us a sense of purpose, direction, and sat- isfaction, but these are not the only experiences that make living worthwhile. There are other commendable aspects of life, such as aesthetic appreciation and being with family and friends, which may have little or nothing to do with goal- directed activity. Therefore, it is untrue that our lives would be empty and bleak without future generations. In contrast to those who have goals that extend beyond their lives, people who are not achievement-oriented, or are achievement-oriented but who set realistic goals, may not care whether humanity will persist for a long time. Having goals that extend beyond the end of their lives may be common among those who produce creative works such as writers and artists, but are these goals that preva- lent among ordinary people, as those who long for future generations suggest? It is doubtful that individuals whose profession involves providing a service, such as delivering the mail, or caring for a patient in the hospital, really care whether they will leave a trace of their existence that will last thousands of years. Their goals and interests may not extend much, if any, beyond the point at which they, and those that they love, will cease living. Consequently, it may not matter to them whether humanity will persist for a long time. What if there are objective values independent of human subjective evaluation, as some believe? If there are objective values, then a discrepancy could occur between what we think is important and what is important according to this objec- tive standard. We could conclude that it does not matter how long humanity will continue to exist when it really does matter or that it does matter when it really does not. BROOKE ALAN TRISEL 378 Let us suppose that there is a god who has given us objective standards declar- ing what is right and wrong and what is significant and insignificant and that we have somehow discovered the following standard: a. The things that human beings create are significant regardless of how long they will last. If there were such an objective standard, then our creations would be significant regardless of what we think of them and regardless of whether future persons val- idate that they are significant. Even if humanity would be wiped out next month, creating things would not be pointless since the significance of these creations does not depend on how long they will last. If there are no objective standards, as I believe, then the question becomes what criteria should be selected to decide what is and what is not significant. With the standard considered above, we do not know why this god considers our creations significant, but we do know that the length of time that our creations will last is not one of the criteria used by this god to judge significance. The standards that we adopt are based upon our desires and goals. Reflecting their goals, some people adopt the following standard to judge significance: b. My creations are significant only if they will be appreciated by others for a long time. If people adopt this standard, then whether or not their creations are considered significant will depend on how long these creations will be appreciated which, in turn, will depend on how long humanity will last. This raises the fundamental question of whether long-lastingness should be part of a standard for judging sig- nificance. As will be argued in greater detail later, including long-lastingness as one of the criteria for judging the significance of our efforts is unreasonable and unwise. THE END OF THE UNIVERSE It is important to distinguish the end of humanity from the end of the universe since the universe may continue to exist and be habitable to life for a long time after humanity becomes extinct. At a time at which a few scientists were pre- dicting that the universe would ultimately end in “heat death”—a prediction based upon generalizing (inappropriately, some would argue) the Second Law of Thermodynamics to the whole universe—Bertrand Russell wrote the following famous words: HUMAN EXTINCTION AND THE VALUE OF OUR EFFORTS 379 all the labors of the ages, all the devotion, all the inspiration, all the noonday brightness of human genius, are destined to extinction in the vast death of the solar system, and that the whole temple of man’s achievement must inevitably be buried beneath the debris of a universe in ruins—all these things, if not quite beyond dispute, are yet so nearly certain that no philosophy which rejects them can hope to stand.20 Despite these gloomy words, Russell did not conclude that living is pointless or bleak if humanity or the universe will eventually end. However, some people do reach this conclusion. John Barrow and Frank Tipler, in outlining the much-debated “Anthropic Cos- mological Principle,” and in reaction to Russell’s comments quoted above, write: Though our species is doomed, our civilization and indeed the values we care about may not be. We emphasized . . . that from the behavioral point of view intelligent machines can be regarded as people. These machines may be our ultimate heirs, our ultimate descendants, because under certain circumstances they could survive forever the extreme conditions near the Final State. Our civilization may be continued indefinitely by them, and the values of humankind may thus be transmitted to an arbitrarily distant futurity.21 We realize that we will die long before the universe will end. Nevertheless, some people are distressed with the thought that the universe may end one way or another. In fact, they may feel more distress thinking about the end of the uni- verse than about the extinction of humankind. What is the explanation for this? It will be hypothesized that the level of distress that one feels about the possi- bility that the universe will end varies with the nature of one’s goals (e.g., whether one wants to leave an everlasting trace), one’s theory of value, and one’s religious beliefs. Before exploring these relations, it will be useful to clarify what the “end” of the universe means, as the “end” could be thought of in many different ways. The end of the universe could be thought of as the last event. It might also be thought of as a point at which the universe vanishes into nothingness, if one assumed this was possible. For the purposes of this discussion, the end of the universe will be defined as a point at which the universe has become irreversibly inhospitable to life and has irreversibly lost all traces of its prior states. As discussed in the previous section, some people have goals that are not dependent on the continued existence of humanity. However, achieving these BROOKE ALAN TRISEL 380 20 Bertrand Russell, “A Free Man’s Worship,” Why I Am Not a Christian, and Other Essays on Religion and Related Subjects, ed. Paul Edwards (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1957), 107. Originally published in The Independent Review, 1903. 21 John D. Barrow & Frank J. Tipler, The Anthropic Cosmological Principle (Oxford: Oxford UP, 1986), 615. goals may be dependent on the universe having certain characteristics, such as being habitable to life. For example, it would not be possible for animals or ecosystems to survive after the extinction of humankind if the universe ends shortly after humanity does. If people think of animals as having only instru- mental value to human beings, then this scenario will not concern them. However, if they believe that certain aspects of nature, such as animals, are intrinsically valuable,22 then the destruction of the universe would signify the loss of these values. Some people want to leave an enduring, appreciable trace and do not believe that there is a god who will outlast the universe or that there are objective … © 2002 University of Southern California and Blackwell Publishers Ltd. ON BECOMING EXTINCT 253 Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 83 (2002) 253–269 0279 – 0750/00/0100 – 0000 © 2002 University of Southern California and Blackwell Publishers Ltd. Published by Blackwell Publishers, 108 Cowley Road, Oxford OX4 1JF, UK and 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA. 253 ON BECOMING EXTINCT  JAMES LENMAN Abstract: From an impersonal, timeless perspective it is hard to identify good reasons why it should matter that human extinction comes later rather than sooner, particularly if we accept that it does not matter how many human beings there are. We cannot appeal to the natural narrative shape of human history for there is no such thing. We have more local and particular concerns to which we can better appeal but only if an impersonal, timeless perspective is abandoned: only from a generation-centred perspective do such concerns help to make sense of our concern for the timing of our own extinction. 1. Everybody dies. Perhaps, though there are grounds for doubt1, this is a bad thing. There are fewer grounds for doubting that, given that we all die, it is a bad thing when we die prematurely, before we have lived out the natural span of a human life. A long life, for one thing, is something that we all tend to want. Not only do we want this but we want many other things that presuppose it: to bring certain projects to completion, to support our children – if we have them – until they grow to independ- ence, and so on. Of course we may also want things that would presup- pose a two or three hundred year life-span but we want these latter things more or less idly. The tragedy of not living to be twenty-five or twelve is of a different order from the tragedy of not living to be five hundred: the difference is that between wanting to be happy human beings and wanting to be something else. When we think of human wellbeing – as I suspect we should – in terms of the constitutive goods of human life we see clearly what is tragic in an early death. These constitutive goods may include the pleasures of play- ing with our grandchildren and witnessing their early development, of PAPQ83.3C04 7/31/02, 1:03 PM253 © 2002 University of Southern California and Blackwell Publishers Ltd. 254 PACIFIC PHILOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY relaxation in retirement after the longer-term analogue to a hard day’s work and other good things that belong properly to the later years of a life no less than the goods and pleasures that may attach more naturally to childhood and youth.2 Up to a point then, and other things being equal, we may sensibly think that, while human lives must end, it is better to prolong them, when possible, to their full span. Only up to a point perhaps, because sometimes the quality of someone’s life may become so irreversibly bad that it becomes at least unclear whether it would be a good thing to prolong it further. And only other things being equal, because most of us believe there may be things worth dying for. But so qualified, there seems little to argue with in the thought that it is better if our lives are longer rather than shorter. At work here perhaps is some notion of the narrative shape of a full human life. Such a life has a certain narrative structure: a beginning, comprising childhood and youth, where we spend much of our energy in learning and developing in ways that will stand us in good stead for what comes afterwards; then there is adult life where we may make some con- tribution to society through work or assemble a family and raise children; and then there is old age when (if we are fortunate) we may relax in the fruition of all this. To have one’s life truncated is to miss out on parts of this progress in ways it makes great sense for us not to welcome. 2. It is not only individuals who die. Species also die or die out. Today there are no longer any sabre-tooth tigers or Irish elk and, one day, certainly, there will be no human beings. Perhaps that is a bad thing but, if so, it is a bad thing we had better learn to live with. The Second Law of Thermodynamics will get us in the end in the fantastically unlikely event that nothing else does first. We might perhaps argue about whether and how much this inevitability should distress us but that it not my present purpose. Rather I want to ask whether, given that any given species will at some time disappear, it is better that it disappear later rather than sooner. More particularly, given that it is inevitable that our own species will only endure for a finite time, does it matter how soon that end comes? We are naturally disposed to think it would be a bad thing were our extinction imminent. In popular movies like Armageddon, everyone is very unhappy with this prospect for an obvious and extremely under- standable reason – they are all going to die very soon. The trouble is that if we take a timeless and impersonal perspective, this might seem to be no big deal. For, on such a perspective, future people matter no less than do present people. And this fate is waiting for some generation or other. PAPQ83.3C04 7/31/02, 1:03 PM254 © 2002 University of Southern California and Blackwell Publishers Ltd. ON BECOMING EXTINCT 255 Of course it needn’t be quite this fate. Rather than getting wiped out in a nasty catastrophe, we might just fade away. Something in the water might make us all less fertile with the result that human population dwindles away, over a few generations, to nothing. Even this would not be painless: it would mean loneliness and hardship in the last years as the final generation grew old without the emotional and material support of their children. Or if the catastrophe were unexpected and killed us all outright, there would be no pain or suffering but many lives would be prematurely cut off – a real harm, on any plausible view, to those concerned.3 To isolate the central question, let us simplify things. Suppose it is written in The Book of Fate that one day we will be wiped out in a nasty catastrophe. Many millions of people will die in terrifying circumstances involving great pain and distress. The only thing the Book of Fate is silent about is when this is going to happen. It may be next year or it may be many thousands of years from now. The question is – Should we care? Does it matter how soon this happens? One natural thought here is that the existence of human beings has intrinsic value, impersonally regarded.4 And that therefore it is a good thing that human beings should continue to exist for as long as possible. This thought, though natural, is problematic. For one thing, it is not easy to be very clear what the premise means – but as I want the conclusion of this essay to lend some modest support to such scepticism, I’ll let this pass for now and beg no questions. For another, it is by no means obvious that the conclusion follows from it. It may be intrinsically good that great works of music or literature should exist. But it is by no means obvious that these works contribute more value by being longer. To take a nearer analogy, consider some other species than our own – the white rhino say. Suppose we are agreed that it is intrinsically good that there are white rhinos. Does it follow that it is good if there continue to be white rhinos for as long as possible? It is by no means clear that it does. Imagine a bizarre possible world in which white rhinos are the only living things – bizarre because impossible on both ecological and evolu- tionary grounds but for the sake of argument let that pass. (In those worlds where there is a God, God can do what he likes. In this world, God miraculously brings white rhinos into being and miraculously stops them from starving.) Let’s agree, again for the sake of argument, that this is a good thing: this world is better for having white rhinos. Given that, is there any reason to suppose this world better if there continue to be white rhinos for longer – say for five billion rather than five million years? It is hard to see that it does. Consider after all a simpler question. Does it matter, independently of how long white rhinos go on existing, how large their population is? We can distinguish here the claims: PAPQ83.3C04 7/31/02, 1:03 PM255 © 2002 University of Southern California and Blackwell Publishers Ltd. 256 PACIFIC PHILOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY A. It is better if there continue to be things of type F for as long as possible. B. It is better if there are as many things of type F as possible. B is different from A given that there are both synchronic and diachronic ways of being numerous. Making things better according to A in par- ticular might be preferred if we suppose that, other things equal, the diachronic ways are better. Alternatively we might suppose making things better according to A is simply a means to doing so according to B – a way to have more Fs is to have more and more generations of Fs stretch- ing out into future time. But of course this is not the only way. However many Fs there are one can always have more Fs without having to have Fs for longer: one can simply have more Fs at a given time. When we consider synchronically the size of the white rhino population it is not clear that it matters how large that population is. If what matters is the instantiation of the universal – white rhino or whatever – that is already, as it were, taken care of. Of course, if there were fewer white rhinos, it might be said that individuals of that species that might have existed will fail to exist and perhaps those individuals have intrinsic value.5 But it is unclear that anything follows from this. No matter what happens, we can always suppose there to be an infinity of possible individuals who never get to exist. But it is hard to make much sense of the thought that this a bad thing – either for those individuals themselves or otherwise.6 If it is unclear how it would make things better to stretch out, synchronically, in a single generation, the numbers of white rhinos, it is unclear why it should make things better to stretch them out diachronically by having more generations. Given that B is not very compelling, why suppose that A is?7 The suggestion might be made8 that, if we allow that a world is made better by the presence in it of some valued thing such as white rhinos, we might motivate the thought that A has plausibility independently from B by thinking of temporal parts of the world as, in effect, new worlds. Maybe; but now the burden is surely on friends of this suggestion to say a great deal more before it starts to look at all promising. For very evidently temporal parts of worlds are not worlds. It might nonetheless be claimed that temporal parts of worlds are in some relevant way world- like for axiological purposes. But what is supposed to motivate this thought? And, crucially, it stands in need not only of motivation but of some motivation that would not generalize to our also so viewing spatial parts of worlds. For that would, in the first place, restore A and B to an equal footing and, in the second place, be deeply implausible. Many people might view with regret the absence from a world of white rhinos but it is a hugely doubtful basis for regret that there are no white rhinos in northern Scotland.9 Indeed the plausibility of the temporal parts claim PAPQ83.3C04 7/31/02, 1:03 PM256 © 2002 University of Southern California and Blackwell Publishers Ltd. ON BECOMING EXTINCT 257 is questionable in similar ways. We may think it a wonderful thing that the world contains many examples of jazz music, but how much should we regret its absence from, say, the world in the sixteenth century? It does not follow from these considerations that it is not a bad thing if, in the actual world, the white rhino becomes extinct sooner rather than later. For one thing, we may attach value to natural biodiversity.10 Given that there are living species in existence at a given time, perhaps it is better if there are a rich diversity of species rather than only a few. This diversity is diluted when the white rhino, say, disappears and that is why the extinction of the white rhino would be a bad thing. If we focus on natural biodiversity, we can make some sense of why the ongoing extinction of countless species is to be regretted. Assuming this explanation is convincing, it does have a couple of limitations. For one thing, we cannot in this way make any sense of the thought that the eventual extinction of every species is an event that is better postponed. The value of natural biodiversity implies that, while there is life on earth, it is good that there should be a significant natural diversity of such life. It need not be read as implying that the inevitable disappearance of all life on earth is something that is better happening later rather than sooner. Moreover the appeal to natural biodiversity is quite unpromising when we try to apply it to human beings. For the contribution to natural bio- diversity of human beings has, in recent times, been overwhelmingly negat- ive. Those who stress the value of natural biodiversity are alarmed in particular at the sort of catastrophically rapid mass extinction over which they fear we are presiding. As far as this good is concerned it would plau- sibly be just wonderful if human beings disappeared as soon as possible.11 Another quite general reason for regretting the extinction of any spe- cies might appeal to the more abstract – and more doubtful – value of plenitude. Perhaps we want to say it is a bad thing when possibilities go unrealized. Think in particular of the huge space of genetic possibilities, Dennett’s “Library of Mendel”.12 Were we to disappear from the scene, countless possibilities in this library would be cut off including perhaps many that might contribute great value in the world. I doubt if this thought is at all promising in the present context. In the first place, at the most abstract level, it is unclear whether the principle is remotely plausible. In the vast logical space of possible chess games there are huge numbers that will never be played, a number of them no doubt rather beautiful (if you like that sort of thing). Do we really think this matters very much? It doesn’t amount to much of a reason why you and I, right now, should play a game of chess. And it would certainly be a reason altogether disconnected from the reasons that ordinarily actuate real chess players. Turning to the specific biological version of the claim, even if it is plaus- ible, it is unclear how it would speak against our own extinction precisely PAPQ83.3C04 7/31/02, 1:03 PM257 © 2002 University of Southern California and Blackwell Publishers Ltd. 258 PACIFIC PHILOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY because, as I just now observed, our own extinction would very likely do more good than harm to natural biodiversity and consequently to the range of genetic possibilities likely to turn up in the future course of evolution- ary history. Even were we not so remarkably destructive a species, our extinction coming not as part of a mass extinction but as an isolated event would make a large difference to which genetic possibilities the future saw realized but plausibly very little or none to how many were realized. Indeed it is strictly false that any as yet unrealized possibilities in Mendel’s library would be foreclosed by our extinction. There is no point in the logical space of possible genotypes accessible some day to our descendants that is not likewise accessible in principle to, say, the descendants of other animals. Of course for very many such points it is astronomically improb- able that the descendants of other animals will ever attain it but the same can be said of most such points with respect to our own descendants. 3. These general considerations of biodiversity, plenitude or raw intrinsic value that might be brought to bear to urge regret at the extinction of any biological species do not then get us very far in considering the fate of our own. We might reasonably then turn to the things that are special about our species, things that distinguish us from white rhinos, cacti or plankton. There are plenty of candidates, to be sure: that we are rational, that we have language, that we are self-conscious, that we are capable of moral agency, that we are made in God’s image or simply that we are human. With all but the last of these it is of course questionable whether we are unique satisfiers of these descriptions and with all of them it is questionable how much is supposed to follow morally if we are. So it is hard to know where to start. Here it will help to recall again the distinction between A and B above. We want to distinguish the question Does it matter how long humanity lasts? – from the question Does it matter, in absolute terms, how many human beings there are? Considered synchron- ically, the overwhelmingly plausible answer to the latter question is: No. Within the utilitarian tradition this answer is controversial, but it is plaus- ible enough for it to be widely taken as a reductio of total utilitarianism that it appears to imply otherwise.13 In any case, I will here assume a negative answer as it is not my present aim to add to the considerable literature on the issue.14 But if B is not compelling, why should A be? Focusing on this helps us to see what not to focus on in terms of what is special to human beings. If beings with reversible thumbs are intrinsically valuable in ways that make it better the more of them there are, that would support both A and B. And that is not the result we want. So we want to look for something that makes sense of our regarding A and B differently. PAPQ83.3C04 7/31/02, 1:03 PM258 © 2002 University of Southern California and Blackwell Publishers Ltd. ON BECOMING EXTINCT 259 There is one aspect in particular of human beings that looks rather more promising here, an aspect in which human beings differ markedly from other species. Not only do individual human lives have a certain narrative structure but so too, given our unique endowment with lan- guage, writing and culture does human history. And when we think of the prospect of human extinction, perhaps we think of it as an evil in the same way as we think of the premature death of an individual as an evil. If we have read our Wells or Stapledon or Asimov we may be caught up in some capitalized vision of The Future and think of extinction as tragic- ally robbing us of that future much as the death of a child might tragically rob her of her future. Certainly, if we have such a future, our descendants will then look back on our own times as, in a sense, the childhood of our race much as we, from our perspective, might so view the time of the early hominids. The thought is not novel. Jonathan Bennett has classed the career of Homo Sapiens among those “great long adventures which it would be a shame to have broken off short.”15 And Gregory Kavka has highlighted the analogy between the narrative structure of our species’ history and that of an individual life.16 But it is vital to appreciate how fragile the analogy is in one crucial respect. If someone dies aged twenty-five, that is tragic because it cheats them of the normal and natural span of a human life. If someone dies aged ninety-five, though we mourn their passing, their death is not tragic in the same way or for the same reason. But it is implausible to suppose that human history – or that of any species – has a natural narrative structure in the same way as a human life. We might have taken it to have such a structure if we had some large philosophical vision of human history as making sense in terms of some readily discernible goal which it might be tragic not to attain. I take it very few of us today are gripped by such a vision. If human beings go on for countless millennia, today will seem to have been the childhood of our species. If we disappear tomorrow today will seem (to some imagin- ary observing aliens) to have been its old age. If we reject grand philo- sophical pictures that endow human history with some essential pattern, all that can be meant by metaphorical talk of our species’ childhood is those times that are relatively early in its career whenever they may turn out to be. The individual human tragedy of dying young has no obvious analogue in the career of our species as a whole.17 Perhaps we still want to insist on the big narrative – perhaps we might be attracted by a large conception of human historical purpose without understanding this in terms of some final end point furnishing a goal we should seek to attain; but rather in terms of some overarching ideal of progress, some ladder we see ourselves ascending on which we should aim to maximize the height we will attain. This would break any close analogy with the good of individual human longevity but might allow us PAPQ83.3C04 7/31/02, 1:03 PM259 © 2002 University of Southern California and Blackwell Publishers Ltd. 260 PACIFIC PHILOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY to make sense of the thought that our extinction is something better postponed. It is not clear however that there is any convincing way for this ideal of progress to be filled out. Those that look most tempting are liable to grow less so on close inspection. Thus some have been gripped by a view of biological evolution – whether by natural or artificial selection – as a meliorative progress whose advancement gives meaning and value to our history, but there seem to be abundant grounds for scepticism about both the moral and the scientific credibility of any such picture. Or, on a cultural level, we might cite the advancement of knowledge and science as giving our species a purpose that warrants belief in the impersonal value of its maximally long continuance. Undoubtedly we often do invest value in just this large and abstract project though plausibly the real lifeblood of scientific motivation lies in more local manifestations of curiosity, in more particular intellectual projects, in the desire to know this or that rather than the bare desire to know – the desire (de dicto!) to know lots of stuff. Nor can any such grand scientific project plausibly be anything like the whole story – for science is only one of many human projects and commitments, and one at whose cutting edge the vast major- ity of those whose lives we value are not significantly engaged. And other human projects and commitments tend to subsume still less readily in any analogously conceived overarching master project. It might still be insisted here that we want human beings to be all they can be, fully to develop and explore their capacities. But let us note the ambiguity in this thought: who is understood here by ‘human beings’? To view the matter in microcosm, suppose I want my children to be all they can be. How can I better promote this end? Well, I can do more to create educational and other opportunities for them and encourage them to take them. Or I can simply seek to have more and more children. We naturally want to have children and when we have them, we naturally want the children we have to excel. But we do not naturally want – and it would be odd to say we should – the excellence of our children in any way that might sensibly motivate me to keep on procreating until an Olympic athlete turns up. Similarly with human beings it is one – very natural – thing to want all the human beings there will in fact be to make the most of themselves, another – far less natural – to want there to be more and more human beings so that, collectively, we can the more maximally exhaust the possibilities before us.18 4. Recall that our question was not Is it a bad thing that we will one day become extinct? but Given that we will become extinct, is it a bad thing if PAPQ83.3C04 7/31/02, 1:03 PM260 © 2002 University of Southern California and Blackwell Publishers Ltd. ON BECOMING EXTINCT 261 this happens sooner rather than later? Given that this is what we are asking it is not clear that considerations of how awful extinction will be for those to whom it actually happens are any help at all. For this is going to happen anyway. All we can say is that we do not want these bad things to happen sooner rather than later. But, from an impersonal standpoint, it makes no very obvious difference, given that they will happen some- time, when they happen. A natural rejoinder is that this consideration does not move us much because we do not occupy so impersonal a standpoint.19 There will be some generation, sometime, that will be overtaken by these terrible events. I know this but I do not want it to be my generation; to be the generation of those I most care for. Nor do I want it to be the generation of my children – if I have any – or grandchildren or the children and grandchildren of people who matter to me. When I con- template the possibility that humans might soon die out, all kinds of de re sentimental attachments may inform the alarm I might feel at this. The thought of the streets I walk to work along emptied of human life and the people who live there killed is one I naturally find peculiarly distressing – or would if circumstances arose that made such a danger feel imminent. The thought of a like fate overtaking the unimaginable science fiction landscape that might be those same streets in the ninth millennium might inspire in me a certain distant sadness. But it is a very distant sadness at the prospect of a distant tragedy, very like the distant sadness one might feel on reading about some cataclysm in the ancient world. Plausibly, I wish to propose, wanting there to be a next generation and wanting it to thrive is a sentiment akin to and continuous with wanting to have children and wanting them to thrive. The desire to have children is a selfish sort of sentiment, to be sure, but in a peculiar and complicated way. Partly it is a matter of wanting there to be a constituency for that range of our moral and altruistic instincts that we bring to bear on our immediate successors. If there is no such constituency, our lives are impoverished in central and vital ways. The desire for – as the song has it – somebody to love is that peculiarly sociable form of selfishness that is fundamental to human moral community.20 Given that there will inevit- ably be some generation for which there is no successor generation, I nonetheless do not want it to be mine – ascending to something closer to a moral point of view, I do not want it to be ours. I suggested above that it did not matter, in absolute terms, how many human beings there are. I can now explain the qualification. It may mat- ter greatly to Bill and Mary that they have children. And if this matters, it matters that the number of human beings there have been to date gets larger than it presently is. For it must do if Bill and Mary are to have the children they want. But while such concerns are important, no value PAPQ83.3C04 7/31/02, 1:03 PM261 © 2002 University of Southern California and Blackwell Publishers Ltd. 262 PACIFIC PHILOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY attaches to the absolute numbers involved. The value in Bill and Mary having children is not a matter of its taking the species as a whole beyond, say, that crucial 20 billion watershed. Likewise it may matter to every- body – or almost everybody – in the present – or in any – generation that there be a next generation. Consider that old favourite of the literature on average utilitarianism – the reasons Adam and Eve might have to have children.21 I would doubt that they have reasons of a quite general and impersonal kind. I would doubt too that they have reasons stemming from the narrative shape of human history as a whole. But they do have the familiar reasons we all – or most of us – have to have children. They may aim to enrich their own lives by having something beyond their own happiness to shape and give direction to their concerns, capacities and energies.22 It would surely be a bizarre misunderstanding to call such reasons selfish in any sense which contrasts them starkly with more ethical forms of motivation. None- theless we are not here in the domain of narrowly moral reasons, where these are understood as bound up with obligation.23 Let us note here too that, while the overall narrative structure of human history has little work to do here, much greater relevance may attach to all manner of more intermediate narratives.24 For Adam and Eve may have all manner of projects and commitments that cannot be contained in a single life and that call for the cooperation of successor generations. Adam, Eve or both may be deeply concerned with the com- pletion of the projects of turning that bit of space behind the house into a garden, of getting the details right on that fancy new ploughing device they were working on, of figuring out just how plants breed or of solving Fermat’s last theorem. Such projects widen our interests beyond our own lifetimes. It was good for Darwin that his ideas on evolution were vindic- ated by modern genetics; good for Mallory that Everest was eventually climbed and good for those who died fighting the Nazis that the Nazis were finally defeated.25 Such intermediate narrative structures, like the structures of … Philosophy of Death: DUE TOMORROW! Answer the following question in a 4 FULL pages (NOT including cover page & citation page) TimesNewRoman, 12, double-spaced essay. Only use citation from the 2 pdf articles attached. Given the readings about the 2 pdf files attached, Would human extinction be bad? Go in Depth and remember it’s a philosophy paper! Have the thesis sentence underline in INTRO Is it bad that the human race will someday become extinct? How does the badness of human extinction (if you think it would be bad) relate to the badness of the death of an individual person (if you think that would be bad)? Your answers should reflect a familiarity with the material of the 2 PDF files attached, and all quotes must be properly cited for ONLY the pdf files attached Use the checklist below: A good paper is more than the sum of its parts, but the parts matter. Here’s a list of some things to check for before turning in your paper: · There is an introduction. · The introduction clearly states the thesis of your paper—that is, the introduction says what your ultimate answer to the paper’s question will be. · The introduction clearly states what the outline of your paper will be. · You thoroughly explain the relevant parts of the philosophers you’re talking about. · The explanation of the philosophers is written such that someone who had not read them could understand it. · There’s a clear distinction between the parts of your paper where you’re explaining what a philosopher said and where you’re interpreting or evaluating what they said. · You clearly state your own answer to the question (or questions) of the paper. · You give reasons for why your answer is correct, and why it’s better than the alternative. These reasons would make sense to any reasonable person who read them. · There are appropriate quotes from the article used (about one per page is good). · All quotes are properly cited with author and page in parentheses. · There’s a Work Cited section at the end of your paper with an entry for each person your quote, including: Author, Title, Publisher / Journal name, Year. · Each paragraph discusses only one idea. · Transitions between paragraphs make sense. · The final draft was spell-checked / grammar-checked. Philosophy of Death : DUE TOMORROW! Answer the following question in a 4 FULL pages (NOT including cover page & citation page) TimesNewRoman, 12, double - spaced essay. Only use citation from the 2 pdf articles attached. Given the readings about the 2 pdf file s attached, Would human extinction be bad? Go in Depth and remembe r it’s a philosophy paper! Have the thesis se ntence underline in INTRO Is it bad that the human race will someday become extinct? How does the badness of human extinction (if you think it would be bad) relate to the badness of the death of an individual person (if you think that would be bad)? Your answers should reflect a familiarity with the material of the 2 PDF files attached , and all quotes must be properly cited for ONLY the pdf files attached Use the checklist below: A good paper is more than the sum of its parts, but the parts matter. Here’s a list of some things to check for before turning in your paper: ¨ There is an introduction. ¨ The introduction clearly states the thesis of your paper — that is, the introduction says what your ultimate answer to the paper’s question will be. ¨ The int roduction clearly states what the outline of your paper will be. ¨ You thoroughly explain the relevant parts of the philosophers you’re talking about. ¨ The explanation of the philosophers is written such that someone who had not read them could understand i t. ¨ There’s a clear distinction between the parts of your paper where you’re explaining what a philosopher said and where you’re interpreting or evaluating what they said. ¨ You clearly state your own answer to the question (or questions) of the paper. Philosophy of Death: DUE TOMORROW! Answer the following question in a 4 FULL pages (NOT including cover page & citation page) TimesNewRoman, 12, double-spaced essay. Only use citation from the 2 pdf articles attached. Given the readings about the 2 pdf files attached, Would human extinction be bad? Go in Depth and remember it’s a philosophy paper! Have the thesis sentence underline in INTRO Is it bad that the human race will someday become extinct? How does the badness of human extinction (if you think it would be bad) relate to the badness of the death of an individual person (if you think that would be bad)? Your answers should reflect a familiarity with the material of the 2 PDF files attached, and all quotes must be properly cited for ONLY the pdf files attached Use the checklist below: A good paper is more than the sum of its parts, but the parts matter. Here’s a list of some things to check for before turning in your paper:  There is an introduction.  The introduction clearly states the thesis of your paper—that is, the introduction says what your ultimate answer to the paper’s question will be.  The introduction clearly states what the outline of your paper will be.  You thoroughly explain the relevant parts of the philosophers you’re talking about.  The explanation of the philosophers is written such that someone who had not read them could understand it.  There’s a clear distinction between the parts of your paper where you’re explaining what a philosopher said and where you’re interpreting or evaluating what they said.  You clearly state your own answer to the question (or questions) of the paper.