How to Evaluate the Risk of Nuclear War

View the article “How to evaluate the risk of nuclear war”.

This article, published in BBC Future, discusses the quantitative analysis of nuclear war risk. It is written in the context of the Russian invasion of Ukraine and also discusses more general analytical issues, such as found in GCRI’s nuclear war research.

See also the GCRI Statement on the Russian Invasion of Ukraine.

The article begins as follows:

One day last week, I woke up in the morning and looked out the window to see the Sun was shining. My neighbourhood …

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Why Catastrophes Can Change the Course of Humanity

BBC Future just published an essay by GCRI Executive Director Seth Baum titled “Why Catastrophes Can Change the Course of Humanity” on global catastrophes and the long-term fate of human civilization. The essay argues that we need to consider the impact of potential catastrophes not just on people alive today but also on the long-term future of humanity.

The essay draws on a paper Dr. Baum wrote with a group of scholars including Olle Häggström, Robin Hanson, Karin Kuhlemann, Anders Sandberg, and Roman …

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BBC On Short-Termism And Long-Term Trajectories

Richard Fisher of the BBC has published a detailed and thoughtful article The perils of short-termism: Civilisation’s greatest threat. The article covers the widespread tendency across contemporary society to focus on very short-term issues and several efforts to promote more long-term thinking and action. The article includes a detailed discussion of the research paper Long-term trajectories of human civilization, which I am lead author of. The BBC article includes each of the four types of trajectories covered in the Long-term trajectories paper (and illustrated in …

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