Summer Newsletter: New Publications

Post Date August 21, 2014
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Dear friends,

There have been a number of interesting new publications coming out of the GCR research community recently, both from GCRI and elsewhere. They cover a range of topics, from environmental risks to artificial intelligence to refuges for protecting against unknown threats. For your interest, I’m putting a summary of the publications down at the bottom of the newsletter. These are good times for GCR research, and they are about to get better next year when the Futures special issue comes out. That is, assuming …

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May Newsletter: Report From The United Nations

Post Date June 02, 2014
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This was sent via email on 13 May. Click here to subscribe to the email newsletter.

Dear friends,

Last month I gave two talks at the United Nations. The first was a small meeting of experts from the P5, i.e. the permanent members of the UN Security Council: China, France, Russia, UK, and USA. I presented new research on nuclear winter risk. The second was at the big annual meeting for the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). I presented the paper Analyzing and reducing the risks of inadvertent …

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March-April 2014 Newsletter

Post Date April 23, 2014
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Dear friends,

I am pleased to announce the call for papers for a new special issue of the journal Futures titled Confronting Future Catastrophic Threats To Humanity. I will be co-editing this together with my colleague Bruce Tonn of the University of Tennessee. Over the years, Futures has probably published more research on global catastrophic risk than any other journal, including a special issue on human extinction that Tonn co-edited in 2009. It is an honor to be working with Tonn and Futures on a new …

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January-February 2014 Newsletter

Post Date February 28, 2014
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Dear friends,

2014 is shaping up to be a busy year for the GCR community. It is encouraging that GCR is getting increasing attention, and that leaders of the GCR community are getting increasing recognition for our work. I personally have been honored by several prestigious speaking opportunities and a full profile in a new Scientific American Blogs article Evaluating the Risk of Events That Could End Civilization. The speaking opportunities will send me flying around the world in March, for events in Stockholm and Tokyo. …

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November-December 2013 Newsletter

Post Date December 04, 2013
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Category events, integrated assessment, interaction effects, newsletter, research priorities, response options

Dear friends,

GCRI is actively shifting its focus towards activities related to our four GCR synthesis research topics: integrated assessment, interaction effects, research priorities, and response options. Some other activities, including online lectures, will pause as the shift proceeds. We expect that increased attention to the synthesis topics will help us prioritize further work on the most important GCR issues. I look forward to sharing more details when they are ready for public distribution. Please contact me if you would like to discuss privately.

Meanwhile, Robert de …

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October 2013 Newsletter

Post Date October 11, 2013
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Dear friends,

The saying “anything is possible” isn’t quite true, but much more is possible than we sometimes might think. For example, it is now clear that United States Treasury bonds are not the risk-free investments they were long assumed to be. The risk-free assumption was rooted in a failure of imagination, a failure to recognize the possibilities of divided government. So too for many global catastrophic risks. Recent research on the economics of climate change has emphasized the importance of catastrophic outcomes outside the range …

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September 2013 Newsletter

Post Date September 05, 2013
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Dear friends,

Seth Baum is out of the office now, so I am sending the newsletter in his absence. This month, I would like to talk a bit about geoengineering. Geoengineering is the large-scale manipulation of the climate, particularly to alleviate the effects of climate change (also called “climate engineering”). Geoengineering epitomizes how many distinct global catastrophic risks have a dynamic relationship. For example, in one possible scenario, society decides to lower the planet’s temperature by engaging in stratospheric aerosol injection (SAI)—a technology that essentially blankets …

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August 2013 Newsletter

Post Date August 07, 2013
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Dear friends,

We have some exciting and important news this month. As of 29 July, GCRI is now part of the fiscal sponsorship organization Social & Environmental Entrepreneurs (SEE). SEE is an established fiscal sponsor organization based in Los Angeles. They sponsor about 100 projects from around the country across a wide range of issues. Joining SEE gives GCRI access to some great resources and also gives us 501c3 status for our fundraising. The switch also means we’re no longer part of Blue Marble Space (BMS). While the …

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July 2013 Newsletter

Post Date July 03, 2013
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Dear friends,

Happy Independence Day to all the Americans on the list. (And happy Canada Day/Fête du Canada, and everyone else now celebrating a National Day). It is an interesting and important moment for American democracy. Last month’s leak of information about the US National Security Agency’s large-scale surveillance program (here’s a good overview) provides a stark reminder of how communication and information technologies can be used to support those in power. But it is also a reminder that power exists in many forms, and that …

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June 2013 Newsletter

Post Date June 05, 2013
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Dear friends,

We took the opportunity over the past month to jumpstart our online lectures, which previously hadn’t gotten the attention they deserve. We’re now announcing six new lectures over the next three months, with more in the works. It’s a wonderful mix of topics, ranging from chemical pollution to pandemics to artificial intelligence, and including original natural and social science, legal and policy analysis, and more. This breadth is what makes global catastrophic risk so challenging and exciting. We hope you’ll join us for some of …

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