Is Civilization on the Brink of Collapse?

What We Owe The Future is available now — you can get it wherever you get your (audio)books or here: www.amazon.com/What-Owe-Future-William-MacAskill/d… This video was sponsored by the author, Will MacAskill. Thanks a lot for the support.

if the question is "is civilization about to collapse?" then an answer of "don't worry, humanity will probably survive to rebuild over the following centuries" is maybe not the most reassuring answer.

"We just need to actually do it." If history has proven anything it's that societies never prepare for problems until they're already collapsing from them. EDIT: Since this got so much of a response I'll add to this - society goes through cycles. The people that solve the problems are the ones that had to live with the collapse and have no choice. Sadly we're seeing the death of a golden age as the system we're in can no longer adapt to the problems we face. I like Kurzgesagt's optimism, but systems either work or they don't. Every system works until it breaks because it cannot change and ours is no different. I hope I'm wrong but if we match the pattern of history I will not be.

“Humanity is like a teenager speeding around blind corners drunk and without a seatbelt” -Kurzgesagt

Is modern civilization about to collapse? -No one knows for sure but most historians would say no, not yet. Will modern civilization collapse? -Yes. Will we recover? -Yes.

I think this video needs a title change. It doesn't answer if we're on the brink of collapse at all. It simply talks about how civilization would recover if it does collapse.

As an electrician I get overwhelmed with work after a simple thunderstorm.. I couldn't imagine how stressed out I would be trying to rebuild society (assuming I live through the collapse)

The problem isn’t that society might collapse it’s that a large portion of the population looks forward to it

America is done. All signs suggest that 2023 will be a year of severe economic pain all over the nation. Put those money to work now to make it grow. I knew I had to invest. I didn't think a few Thousand dollars a month would add up. But it is. From 2020 to date, I have made around $600,000

I'm not worried about whether civilization can recover, I'm worried about having to recover. I'm personally not that keen on experiencing civilizational collapse, and knowing that those who make it through will rebuild doesn't really change that. The bronze age collapse is a curious bit of history to us, but to the people living through it, it might as well have been the end of the world. In relation to the bronze age collapse, I'm one of the people learning about it via unfathomable technologies 3000 years later, but in relation to whatever happens in our time, collapse or no, I'm that bronze age rando who would much rather have reliable access to food and not have to go to war.

Interesting that you guys didn't mention the Bronze Age Collapse, which is often the event that many people point to as the defining societal collapse. However, even the Bronze Age Collapse didn't entirely erase civilization, as major civilizations like Assyria, Egypt, and Babylonia were able to weather the storm and survive into classical times. I think the collapse of the Roman Empire was simplified here, because while the empire in Italy itself fell, the eastern half of the empire survived, all the way until 1453, and Italy, Spain, France, England, and North Africa were taken over by new kingdoms of Ostrogoths, Visigoths, Franks, Anglo-Saxons, and Vandals rather than falling into total societal collapse. In fact, Italy in particular would see a resurgence under king Theodoric the Great. If anything, it was the Byzantines' invasion and reconquest of Italy that actually caused the bigger societal collapse than the fall of Rome itself.

You guys are awesome, placing some good vibes in the end despite the disaster presented so well in the video that could happen anytime. Thanks for the hope!

"Humanity is like a teenager, speeding around blind corners, drunk, without a seat belt." Maybe the best quote in the whole video.

as always I absolutely loved this video, but just personally I feel like it more answered “can civilization recover from a collapse” than “how likely is it for civilization to collapse?” Cuz honestly im worried more about the latter

Today's fact: Ancient Greeks came up with the idea of cyclops after they found a fossil of a mammoth, and had no idea what it was.

2:27 they really tried to sneak among us in this sneaky bastards

I'm not worried about the survival of humanity, I'm worried about my civilization crumbling around me

It's harrowing how we've gone from "hey, humanity is doing all kinds of things to help secure our future, its not all bad!" to "hey, not all of us will die, we're like cockroaches!" I appreciate these videos and the message they try and give us but damn I hate that our potential futures look so grim now.

The past couple of years has really given me this sense that the world is more unstable than just a few years ago. Maybe we aren't facing extinction, but it does feel like there is a real chance of civilization stumbling. I hope that is just a worst case scenario. But I can't help but feel a tension, a sense of fear.

Civilization has already collapsed, that should be obvious. The complexity scrambled the eggs and we are now watching the demise of it's organization. We peaked some time ago but we didn't realize the shift to downturn. The closest analogy we glimpsed was entropy.