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A comment on Type III Societies (Apparently) Do Not Exist. Parent comment

Re:Type III Societies (Apparently) Do Not Exist by stcredzero on Thursday April 28, 2016 @04:42PM (#11591760)
There are very strong reasons to believe that all civilizations (multitudes of independent, individualistic semi-cooperating sentient creatures) are inherently chaotic and therefore unstable. There are loads of arguments as to why they are doomed to fail, or to try to expand exponentially. If we take a cold and realistic eye to technological civilizations, they do seem doomed to self-destruct or "sublime" into something incomprehensible. There aren't many examples in nature of things that are the confluence of two or more super-exponential processes that are long-term stable. (In our case, those would be population, energy use, and technological change.) In fact, I think there are basically none.
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Re:Type III Societies (Apparently) Do Not Exist by tremon on Thursday April 28, 2016 @05:29PM (#11592038)
I think you take a particularly narrow view of what constitutes a "society". Arguably, current human society is the product of over 10,000 years of continuous development. Yes, there have been numerous changes in structure and power, but our fundamental "human" identity hasn't really changed in that time.

I would also argue that life itself has proven remarkably long-term stable on our planet. Granted, it has not been stable enough to produce a type-III society, but if we remove homo sapiens from the planet for a thought experiment, there exist other species that are developing communication or tool-use skills and might succeed us even on the technological path.

So my view is that, unless we continue to fail spectacularly, life will still continue without us. Even if we do not reach type-III, that does not necessarily preclude Earth from producing a type-III society in the future.

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Re:Type III Societies (Apparently) Do Not Exist by stcredzero on Thursday April 28, 2016 @07:48PM (#11592758)
I think you take a particularly narrow view of what constitutes a "society". Arguably, current human society is the product of over 10,000 years of continuous development. Yes, there have been numerous changes in structure and power, but our fundamental "human" identity hasn't really changed in that time.

Sounds like you are the one who has a narrow view of "society," rather. In the abstract, it only need be something like "a multitude of cooperating but competing, independent self-preserving, self-advocating sentient interests." That's fairly abstract while still being a sure recipe for highly non-linear and chaotic effects.

Even if we do not reach type-III, that does not necessarily preclude Earth from producing a type-III society in the future.

But then you're setting up a situation where a series of chaotic and unstable arrangements snuff themselves out or flare-out in a puff of singularity-colored smoke, ending with the appearance of the first stable meta-societal form.

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