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Say the apocalypse was coming. What 10,000 people would IJBM save if IJBM was put in charge?
Assume something was going to end the earth and we had ships capable of interplanetary travel, but only enough room to save about 10,000 people. Assume that it is 10,000 people after us and 5 guests for each of us so there is no, "well family comes first!" or something like that
I'm curious about what decision we can all come to
Also, no going, "No choosing anyone" as it could be assumed that you'd be kicked out of the position and somebody who doesn't want humans to go extinct was selected
I'm curious about what decision we can all come to
Also, no going, "No choosing anyone" as it could be assumed that you'd be kicked out of the position and somebody who doesn't want humans to go extinct was selected
Comments
I can picture Alex breaking his head over whether John Clements is worthy of saving.
What I'd say, mhm, perhaps a hard "no politicians on board" policy?
Nothing like a hypothetical apocalypse to to let people gush about eugenic programs and outright totalitarian mindsets.
I wouldn't feel comfortable making that call. I resign.
I enjoy revenge fantasies of sending the virtuous (I and people who think like me) to heaven while having the rest of humanity left below as much as the next guy, but realistically, if terraforming hasn't been well under way already, we're all screwed anyway. Since we rejected the environment, we must all suffer through the apocalypse.
Personally, I don't believe any hypothetical apocalypse will be much like it's portrayed in media. In all likelihood, humankind will continue to exist with adjusted economies and systems of leadership. We adapt,
In any case, ten thousand people is enough for a small city, I guess. I'd have to think about what kind of economy would be best suited to providing for that scale and what system of government would mesh with said economy and provide the maximum amount of reasonable social justice. We'd need enough farming to provide surplus resources and a location with good access to lots of water. Medical experts would be a necessity. Somewhere with iron deposits would be good, too; steel is a very versatile substance that can be used for swords building frames, tools, reinforcement and other technical requirements.
After providing for basic consumption needs, medical care and shelter, I suppose anything else would be peripheral. The survival necessities are taken care of, and with only ten thousand people, everyone would be pretty close geographically. If say, 500 of those people were farmers, 500 were medical experts of some description and 1000 were labourers and craftsmen of some description (at least, I suppose, perhaps more), that leaves me with about 80% of the population doing other things.
I suppose a fair few of those people should be academically inclined, particularly when it comes to research. I'd want librarians, too, to safeguard as much knowledge as possible. Architects would also be a necessity.
So, I've covered
And probably not even used half of the ten thousand limit. I guess the rest of that number could do things that were preferential to me, but that's trivialising the lives of other human beings. On the other hand, I can't escape some bias. I'd want to save a decent number of martial artists (SUPER SECRET JOHN CLEMENTS NOT INVITED), the knowledge and expertise of swordsmithing and that kind of thing, but those are secondary concerns and very personal. That call would be more justified if this were a mook apocalypse with bad guys roaming the outskirts and stuff.
But I listed the necessities above, and they don't require the full ten thousand. So I guess it's "that stuff, plus whatever extras". I have certain things I'd like to keep going in the event of an apocalypse, but those are too subjective to say that I'd write it in stone.
Because a wide variety of genetic information can be found in people of any profession. Plus, genetic diversity isn't necessarily related to race -- someone who looks similar to you might be less genetically similar to you than an individual of a different race. Things like skin colour and hair colour are easily noticable because of how visually striking they are, but there's a lot of internal factors to consider as well, such as build, metabolism, immunity to illness and a host of other considerations.
While diversity is certainly a factor and should be accounted for, it can't be measured by stuff like race alone. Racial diversity is a strong choice for social reasons, but less so for genetic reasons. After all, race is a matter of social perception more than any strong science and can be safely discounted as a priority insofar as safeguarding genetic diversity is concerned.
Given that, I'd be more concerned with ensuring that there's a good compromise between cultural diversity -- to a point -- and cultural homogeneousness. We don't want the different cultures and races so different that sects emerge, but we don't want utter similarity, either. That would necessitate some kind of common cultural factors between everyone chosen while ensuring that there's also a level of diversity that allows the community to grow. Obviously, there also has to be enough diversity and balance to ensure that no one race, cultural group or what-have-you emerges as a socially dominating force.
tl;dr It's a consideration on many grounds and I have no concrete answers.
>MFW Alex didn't just say "juan" and got done with it
I was gonna offer you the post of Post-Apocalyptic Batman privately, but hey I guess I can always count on you to blow our cover.
Every time.
Question: who would have been Alfred?
Ah-ha-ha-ha.
Malk!
I thought so.
But Malk can't be a surrogate father :<
If Juan's Batman then do I get to be Red Hood?
You can be Red Riding Hood. Close enough?
Everybody in the world draws straws.
While we're at it: since race is done, what of sexual orientation? And by the way, less politically incorrect issues, like simply not wanting kids. If we've got ten thousand to rebuild humanity, what if a tenth of them says they don't want kids or are uninterested in making them? Hweh heh.
Here's the thing about social diversity: we are all biased towards our own social networks, so by instinct we're going to choose people similar to who we know. Given the majority demographic of our forum, we're probably leaning towards some degree of Anglophone culture influence. Something about the notion of common cultural factors bugs me (does that mean we prioritize anglophones?), but I guess due to globalization, we all live in America anyways. Obviously there's no easy answer, and while no one here has stooped to that level yet, these kinds of threads do tend to bring out the worst in people.
And putting a focus on reproduction seems like an invitation for misogyny.
Yeah, sending civil rights back to antiquity doesn't seem particularly productive in any case.
It might be a necessary side effect of an altered economy, though. Ten thousand people doing everything that needs to be done doesn't lend itself strongly to the needs of industrial production, which in turns provides the foundation for contemporary civil rights.
"It might be a necessary side effect of an altered economy, though. Ten thousand people doing everything that needs to be done doesn't lend itself strongly to the needs of industrial production, which in turns provides the foundation for contemporary civil rights."
Hence why these kinds of threads tend to be totalitarian wank fantasies for a lot of people. We're handling it reasonably well all things considered.
Why can't we try to save each and everyone?
I'd save the 10,000 people that would give me a chance of creating and maintaining a city and the best possible genetic variety.