Chapter -9- Optimism (Part 1)

According to Martin Rees humanity was very lucky to survive the 19th century. During the Cold War there was possibility that another war would start, but this time fought with hydrogen bombs instead and would wipe out the whole civilization. Now that we have entered 21st century Martin says that according to given circumstances there is only 50 percent chance that we would survive this century. This danger has been predicted by predicting consequences that newly created knowledge might cause to happen. Each time new knowledge is created we suspect the dangers that might follow. Martin Rees compared this prediction tendency with playing Russian roulette.

But there are many differences between Russian roulette and humans creating knowledge. Russian roulette is a pure game of chance; but in case of humans and creating knowledge, our future depends on what we think, what we do and how we use that knowledge. If the civilization is oblitrated, that would be result of choices we make; and if we survive, that would mean we succeeded in solving problems through our knowledge. Neither of the consequences would be by mere chance.

Russian roulette and future of humanity, both are unpredictable — but in different ways. Russian roulette is not as random as it seems. We know the possible outcomes and probability of those outcomes, given that the rules of game are abided by. But in case of future of civilization, we don’t know what kind of knowledge would be created and how that might or might not affect us. So we can’t even foretell the probabilities and possible outcomes. In words of David, “No explanation has enough reach to predict the outcome of its own successor — or their effects.”

There is no good explanation that can predict the outcome or probability of outcomes of something for which knowledge is yet to be created. This is a fundamental limitation on the reach of scientific prediction when it comes to planning something for future. Trying to know the unknowable can only lead to error and creates a bias towards pessimism.

All observation is theory-laden. We have no way of telling whether an observation would fix some parochial error or revolutionize the whole respective field. Only with the aid of right explanations could we achieve that. We have no way to see the world other than through our existing explanations, which inevitably, also contains our misconceptions. Such misconceptions not only bias our explanations, they also inhibit us from perceiving significant future changes.

When we are not capable of predicting major characteristics of future events, how could we hope to prepare for them? Some of those characteristics are beyond the reach of scientific prediction. So what is the right approach for those unknowable events? What kind of philosophy should one adopt? Quest to finding answers to these questions headline our current discussion.

Optimism and Pessimism have been used to refer to future. Optimism means believing that everything is as good as it can get. Use of the word optimism dates back to the Leibniz when he said, God being perfect can only create the best of all possible worlds. He proposed that if something is good, its positive consequences outweigh its negative outcomes. All the good events that fail to happen are made to fail so that their bad consequences shouldn’t outweigh the good ones. We have already established that consequences are determined by the laws of physics. We have already established that consequences are determined by the laws of physics, as also pointed out by Leibniz, the creator would abide by laws of physics as well.Thus, in words of Leibniz’s claim, laws of physics would be the best possible explanations. So if there were some theory or alternative law which would have made any suffering from a disaster a little less or made a disease a little more bearable etc. it would’ve create a very irregular imbalance of good and bad consequences in terms of Leibniz’s theory.

This theory is a bad explanation.

Why is that a bad explanation? It is because, with this theory we can easily claim any sequence of events to be the best explanation. Alternatively, Leibniz could also have claimed that we live in the worst of all possible worlds and every good event being happening is preventing something better to happen. This an example of “philosophical pessimism” and it was claimed by philosophers like Arthur Schopenhauer. There are some who claim that we live in between the best and worst of all possible worlds.

If any of such theories had been true, there would be no way for rational thought to discover true explanations. Our observations can led us astray no matter how good our explanations are. For example, if there are some circumstances which seem better than we observe them to be, no matter how good our explanations are we wont see them as they are and vice versa. In a world like this there is no place for good explanations. In the world of Leibniz, his optimistic world view in particular, when we are faced with a problem and in solving it we fail, it is claimed to be due to a power of intelligence which is beyond our perception to comprehend and that power determined that it were in our best interest to fail in that specific situation. This is worse than a bad observation, because here one rejects reason and relies on bad explanations and fallacies instead. Relying on those bad explanations, they perceive that they achieve better outcomes than when they are relying on good explanations because they have been led astray by bad explanations. So relying on those outcomes is a wishful result.

There are phrases in everyday life which represent optimistic and pessimistic attitudes. For instance an optimist calls a “glass half full” while a pessimist calls a “glass half empty”. We are mistaken by these terms. They are not a matter of philosophy but of psychology. These phrases can depict moods like happiness or sadness, but they do not give us any explanation about future.

There are two more approaches towards future — blind optimism and blind pessimism. The former assumes that bad outcomes would never happen. The latter, which is also called precautionary principle, tries to stay clear of disasters but avoiding the outcomes which are not know to be safe — hence avoiding taking any risks at all.

Blind optimism can also be referred to as “overconfidence” or “recklessness”. Maiden voyage of titanic is an example of that. It was designed to face many foreseeable disasters but no one predicted that it would sink after a collision with an iceberg. A blind pessimist would argue that there is a symmetry between good and bad consequences. They argue a successful maiden voyage would not have done anything good as much the failed one did. As Rees has pointed out, it is possible that a single bad consequence of a useful innovation can put an end to the progress of humanity. So in terms of blind pessimism, people would refrain from building something new by pushing their limits, but would just remain contented with old designs.

When we talk about blind pessimism, we must consider a twist to it. Blind optimism is actually a blindly optimistic doctrine. It advocates that unforeseen tragedies or disasters cannot be a consequence of present innovation or knowledge. But we should also know that all the disasters are not caused by physics experiments or new technology. There is one thing which is for certain: in order to prevent a disaster or to recover from a disaster, we require knowledge and knowledge has to be created. If harm comes of some innovations, that does not destroy the growth of knowledge. Thus, harm is always finite, whereas good can be unlimited. There would be no present innovation if no one had ever violated the precautionary principle.

In order to stand against criticism, pessimism needs to encounter precautionary principle. This is because, in all pessimistic theories, exceptional catastrophes are always imminent. It was claimed that mid 20th century were the time when technology became capable of destruction. But that is not correct. Primitive things like fire and swords also destroyed civilizations. Many civilizations were destroyed by natural disasters and plagues. Those catastrophes could have been saved if there had a some knowledge of economies, technology, medicine and hygiene etc. But it was not the case because they were all following precautionary principle.

So David says :“More generally, what they lacked was a certain combination of abstract knowledge and knowledge embodied in technological artefacts, namely sufficient wealth. Let me define that in a non-parochial way, as the repertoire of physical transformations that they would be capable of causing.”

Trying to make our planet unobtrusive, for the fear of extraterrestrial civilizations, is blindly pessimistic. Since we have already established that blind pessimism is blind optimism in disguise. So keeping with precautionary principle, if we make our planet unobtrusive for other space civilizations, we would be able to avoid the bad consequences that could follow a miscommunication or them consuming our resources. But a point to ponder is that if there were civilizations that are able to reach us through space, why would they even need our planet’s resources? They are certainly be more advanced than us, since they reached us through space before we could reach them, that our resources could be acquired from elsewhere. In reaching us, they must have become more aware of chemical processes than we are. If they wished to build a black hole by capturing our source of the energy — the sun, they could do that by reaching any star or planet. Since inhabited solar systems which are possibly in a very small number, they would not be inconvenienced in the least to leave our solar system be and move on to the next one. The idea that there are beings that are to us as we are to animals is like believing in supernatural, because we are universal constructors. So, if something is out there, it is definitely explicable. And it is up to us to create right explanations for anything that exists in the known universe.