Deep time
How Humanity Communicates Across Millennia
by Gregory Benford · first published 1999
11mentions
7recommended by
8HN commenters
2011–2021first – last mentioned
88% recommend13% neutral
Why HN recommends it
Explores how humanity might communicate across millennia, using the nuclear waste marker problem as a case study. It addresses long-term messaging and the scale of deep time.
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
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The concept that you are interested in is known as deep time (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_time) and there is a book by the same name by Gregory Benford (http://www.amazon.com/Deep-Time-Humanity-Communicates-Millen...) that explores the idea in greater depth.
on “Built for Eternity: The Hoover Dam” ↗…archaeologists digging there because they think it is a tomb or monument. Gregory Benford also talks about it (and some other interesting topics related to communicating over long time intervals) in his book Deep Time[2]. It's an interesting read. [1] http://www.wipp.energy.gov/picsprog/articles/wipp%20exhibit%... [2] https://smile.amazon.com/Deep-Time-Humanity-Communicates-Mil...
on “A Monument to Outlast Humanity” ↗There's a great discussion of this project in Deep Time by Gregory Benford, which is where I first learned about it. http://www.amazon.com/Deep-Time-Humanity-Communicates-Millen...
on “Warning signs for the year 10,000” ↗If you found that article interesting, you might want to read Gregory Benford's "Deep Time" (978-0380975372). Benford was part of the same panel (though in a different group), and the first half of the book is in-depth discussion of the various aspects of the problem that they had to consider.
on “McDonald’s Universal Icons for 109 Countries [pdf]” ↗For anyone interested in things like this, I'd recommend "Deep Time" by Gregory Benford[1]. It has a chapter devoted to WIPP[2] and this messaging. [1] Amazon link: https://www.amazon.com/Deep-Time-Humanity-Communicates-Mille... [2] Seems to be online, albeit poorly…
on “This Place Is Not a Place of Honor (1992)” ↗Deep Time: How Humanity Communicates Across Millennia Paperback by Gregory Benford explores some of those questions. It comes into practical questions when trying to mark nuclear waste dumps.
on “Low-Background Steel” ↗If you're interested in it - get a copy of Deep Time - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2014020.Deep_Time > Human civilization has evolved to the point at which we have begun consciously sending messages into the far future. How should we communicate…
on “The American Bumblebee Has Vanished from Eight States” ↗One book more than any other: The Book of the New Sun by Gene Wolfe. Why? Darwin opens up the door of Deep Time when he explained his discovery. An appreciation of the immensity of time happens to be linked to explanations of how and why things are. Wolfe also deals with Deep Time but in the context of society.…
on “Ask HN: What books have made the biggest impact on your mental models?” ↗…something I find intriguing. In my wildest dreams this new phase will attain stability and the descendents will look back on our current phase like we now do with mitochondria. (Suffice to say I'm a fan of "Deep Time").
on “The search for better ways of storing electricity is hotting up” ↗Regarding the RFC - check out the publication date. From my impressions on the Long Now (and I found Deep Time a rather interesting read) the issue is not just sticking a zero on to say "think about the future" but rather that our current culture doesn't think about the future beyond the next news cycle, quarterly…
on “The American Bumblebee Has Vanished from Eight States” ↗…into the WIPP marker design was an effort to pre-empt objections to it being built. Gregory Benford (a physicist and science fiction author) was part of the design team, and he devoted part of a book, Deep Time [1], to his experience. Whatever the ultimate motivation of the US DOE and others, it seems like the design team took the ethical component of their task seriously. [1] http://www.physics.uci.edu/~silverma/benford.html
on “Built for Eternity: The Hoover Dam” ↗