Update 4: NOVEMBER 6, 2019
The Final Push
In 10 days the initial Superstruct experiment will be over, and we will be able to take stock of the new forms of progress we have created. According to GEAS we have improved humanity's survivial horizon by almost a decade in less than five weeks, which by any measure must be considered a tremendous success.
Nonetheless, we set ourselves the even more ambitious target of pushing the horizon back by a generation, so we need to really focus our energies in these last days. Those who contribute the most will also be eligible for GEAS honours.
New stories, old stories
In so many ways the challenges we are facing today and the solutions we are inventing have never been seen before, but as they say, the more things change, the more they stay the same.
Ancient questions like how to stimulate cooperation continue to haunt us. Countries like Russia are still failing to acknowledge that climate change and peak oil simply demand collective attention, or that all the superthreats are intertwined - in a sense we simply face one metathreat. On-the-ground problems that appear to naturally sit within Generation Exile are clearly exacerbated by resource/energy shortages and the fear of infection and/or the unknown engendered by the other superthreats. Without cooperation and coordination we do not have the power to change our future, yet without moral judgment the use of that power itself can be deadly, as the development of Xhydra and the fear it is engendering remind us.
Innovation is not just technology
With this in mind, it seems an apposite moment to remember that innovation can take many forms. As ever, the panacea technofix is 'just around the corner', but I am put in mind of the old saying about nuclear fusion - "it's the energy source of the future and it always will be".
In the meantime, SEHIs are getting on with applying their abilities to ingenious feats of engineering, reducing their need to travel (simply a necessity in the post-car parts of America), collaborating with industry to reduce their need for manufactured goods and creating essential new ways of organising the Superstruct effort (props to ubik2019 for this one).
Deeper thoughts
Others are exploring deeper themes, from questioning the very point of extending humanity's life expectancy to keeping hope alive, from challenging the vestiges of conspicuous consumption to finding happiness in festivity and community.
In that vein Marco Antonio's story of The Tangible Shop brought back a few memories for me from my long-ago visit there, and made me realise that human contact is so important to us that in its absence we even miss grouchiness!
On that note I will take my leave of you to go and enjoy a late dinner with my housemates, but this week I would like to leave you with a quote that for me sums up the importance and power of the Superstruct project as we move into these critical next 10 days:
"This is the true joy in life, the being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one; the being a force of nature instead of a feverish, selfish little clod of ailments and grievances complaining that the world will not deliver itself to making you happy.
I am of the opinion that my life belongs to the whole community and as long as I live it is my privilege to do for it whatever I can.
I want to be thoroughly used up when I die; for the harder I work the more I live. I rejoice in life for its own sake. Life is no brief candle to me. It is a sort of splendid torch which I have got hold of for the moment, and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it on to future generations." – George Bernard Shaw
~ DarkOptimism (Shaun, Santa Maria, Azores) and csven (Sven, New England), November 6th, 2019
PREVIOUS REPORTS FROM AROUND 2019:
Week 4 Reports: RAVENOUS, GENERATION EXILE
Week 3 Reports: QUARANTINE, RAVENOUS, POWER STRUGGLE, OUTLAW PLANET, GENERATION EXILE
Week 2 Reports: QUARANTINE, RAVENOUS, POWER STRUGGLE, OUTLAW PLANET, GENERATION EXILE
Week 1 Reports: QUARANTINE, RAVENOUS, POWER STRUGGLE, OUTLAW PLANET, GENERATION EXILE