Where is humanity headed in the very long run? Will we one day live out the dream of Star Trek, exploring the universe, colonizing multiple planets and at last living among the stars? On the other hand, will the terror of nuclear armageddon bring to life the fears of our worst nightmares? Or will it be something else?

As I wonder about the purpose of my own life and the things I should be working on, I sometimes think about this bigger picture. Though I obviously will never live to see the very long term, I like to think about how what I might do aligns with a trajectory that makes sense for humanity. A few years ago I read Humanity: the Chimpanzees Who Would Be Ants by Russell Genet. This fascinating book has been a key inspiration for me as I have thought about this topic. It talks about humans in the context of two other species whose traits we exhibit: the individual behaviors of the chimps and the collective behaviors of the ants. Interesting and thought-provoking stuff.

But for me the most interesting concept in the book is the description of the four potential end states for humanity that Genet describes*. They really struck me when I first read them, and I continue to mull them over. I’ve modified them slightly and come up with the following list that’s instructive for me and accurately captures the range of possibilities in my view:

1. Star Trek–our descendents inherit the universe. We continue to thrive on Earth but also break the bonds of our home planet and colonize other worlds, and humanity lives on and on and on.
2. Armageddon–we don’t survive the misuse of our own innovations. Humanity extinguishes itself through an intentional calamity (e.g., nuclear war) or an unintended but foreseeable event (e.g., the release of a man-made super-virus).
3. Boom and bust–human population grows until it collapses, then begins again. We over-consume the resources of our planet, resulting in a dramatic decline in population (i.e., drops by 80-90%). Then humanity takes one of two paths. One option is that the population stays at about this level (500 million to 1 billion people) and continues an existence that is very sustainable relative to the resources of Earth but never expands. Another option is that the population gradually grows again to the point that it becomes environmentally unstable, and the cycle repeats. Humanity never leaves Earth, but doesn’t extinguish itself, and is caught in an endless cycle without progressing because it never solves the problem of long-term environmental sustainability.
4. Global superorganism–humanity develops a long-term environmentally sustainable structure. We dominate the globe, but achieve a steady state in which we have sufficient resources to sustain our population for the long term without a collapse in population. We never leave Earth, but continue to thrive at scale, with ongoing innovation leading to improvements in life (whatever that may mean over thousands of generations).

As I consider these scenarios,  I wish for Star Trek, I guess I always have. But I worry it may simply be impossible. If we want to make it happen, we need to make significant investments into research in physics, space exploration, and many other expensive sectors where the near-term return on investment is likely negligible. I don’t think this will happen unless research is prompted by the same thing that has motivated it for most of the last century: war.

But that leads us to Armageddon. I’m afraid I see this as most likely, and for the sake of humanity I just hope it doesn’t happen for many, many generations. It’s hard to see what I could do about this, except maybe share my various ideas and hope they help in some way. But nothing tangible.

I worry about Boom and bust, and think this could be relevant later in my own lifetime, but particularly for my children and especially my grandchildren. I hope to see the year 2050, and I expect that some crazy stuff will have happened by then. But imagine 2100 or 2150. What will have happened by then? I worry that we won’t solve the population, economic, and environmental challenges required to avoid a boom and bust cycle, and things could get ugly.

But if we can solve these problems, we end up as the Global superorganism. And I guess this is what we should shoot for. I still feel the pull of Star Trek, and I hope we find a way to make that happen. But in the meantime, I think our focus as a species needs to be on becoming a global superorganism and making it sustainable.

So this kind of framing of the alternatives for humanity in the very long run has been helpful and illuminating for me. My main conclusions are that I should help humanity either establish a sustainable future or improve the quality of life on Earth. I tend to lean towards the latter, though I’m not quite sure why. Maybe I secretly doubt we’ll be able to solve the environmental sustainability challenge in time. So I think about how we can build a better society. And in my heart I still hope that something enables us to make the amazing leap to the stars–I would love to see it!

If this framing is interesting and helpful for you, I encourage you to take a look at Humanity and its perspective on the journey we’ve been on so far and where we may be headed. It has been inspiring for me.