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Civ­i­liza­tional collapse

TagLast edit: Sep 13, 2023, 7:13 AM by Vasco Grilo🔸

A civilizational collapse (sometimes called a social collapse or a societal collapse) is a drastic decrease in human population size or in political, economic or social complexity across essentially the entire world, for an extended period of time. Civilizational resilience is humanity’s capacity to resist, or recover from, civilizational collapse.

In Toby Ord’s typology, unrecoverable civilizational collapse constitutes one of the three main types of existential catastrophe.[1]

Evaluation

80,000 Hours rates civilizational resilience a “potential highest priority area”: an issue that, if more thoroughly examined, could rank as a top global challenge.[2]

Further reading

Aird, Michael (2020a) Collection of sources that seem very relevant to the topic of civilizational collapse and/​or recovery, Effective Altruism Forum, February 24.
Many additional resources on this topic.

Aird, Michael (2020b) Civilization re-emerging after a catastrophic collapse, Effective Altruism Forum, June 27.

Denkenberger, David & Jeffrey Ladish (2019) Civilizational collapse: scenarios, prevention, responses, Foresight Institute, June 24.

Hanson, Robin (2008) Catastrophe, social collapse, and human extinction, in Nick Bostrom & Milan M. Ćirković (eds.) Global Catastrophic Risks, Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 363–377.

Jebari, Karim (2019) Civilization re-emerging after a catastrophic collapse, EAGxNordics, April 7.

Ladish, Jeffrey (2020) Update on civilizational collapse research, Effective Altruism Forum, February 10.

Manheim, David (2020) A (very) short history of the collapse of civilizations, and why it matters, Effective Altruism Forum, August 30.

Rodriguez, Luisa (2020) What is the likelihood that civilizational collapse would directly lead to human extinction (within decades)?, Effective Altruism Forum, December 24, 2020.

Tainter, Joseph A. (1989) The Collapse of Complex Societies, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Wiblin, Robert & Arden Koehler (2020) Mark Lynas on climate change, societal collapse & nuclear energy, 80,000 Hours, August 20.

Wiblin, Robert & Keiran Harris (2021) Luisa Rodriguez on why global catastrophes seem unlikely to kill us all, 80,000 Hours, November 19.

Wiblin, Robert, Luisa Rodriguez & Keiran Harris (2022) Lewis Dartnell on getting humanity to bounce back faster in a post-apocalyptic world

Related entries

broad vs. narrow interventions | dystopia | existential catastrophe | existential risk | existential risk factor | movement collapse

  1. ^

    Ord, Toby (2020) The Precipice: Existential Risk and the Future of Humanity, London: Bloomsbury Publishing, fig. 5.2.

  2. ^

    80,000 Hours (2022) Our current list of pressing world problems, 80,000 Hours.

What is the like­li­hood that civ­i­liza­tional col­lapse would di­rectly lead to hu­man ex­tinc­tion (within decades)?

Luisa_RodriguezDec 24, 2020, 10:10 PM
296 points
37 comments50 min readEA link

Model­ling the odds of re­cov­ery from civ­i­liza­tional collapse

MichaelA🔸Sep 17, 2020, 11:58 AM
41 points
10 comments2 min readEA link

The end of the Bronze Age as an ex­am­ple of a sud­den col­lapse of civilization

FJehnOct 28, 2020, 12:55 PM
53 points
7 comments7 min readEA link

Trade col­lapse: Cas­cad­ing risks in our global sup­ply chains

FJehnApr 25, 2024, 7:02 AM
9 points
1 comment8 min readEA link
(existentialcrunch.substack.com)

What fac­tors al­low so­cieties to sur­vive a crisis?

FJehnApr 9, 2024, 8:05 AM
23 points
1 comment10 min readEA link
(existentialcrunch.substack.com)

A (Very) Short His­tory of the Col­lapse of Civ­i­liza­tions, and Why it Matters

DavidmanheimAug 30, 2020, 7:49 AM
53 points
16 comments2 min readEA link

On Col­lapse Risk (C-Risk)

Pawntoe4Jan 2, 2020, 5:10 AM
39 points
10 comments8 min readEA link

Up­date on civ­i­liza­tional col­lapse research

Jeffrey LadishFeb 10, 2020, 11:40 PM
56 points
7 comments3 min readEA link

Map­ping out col­lapse research

FJehnJun 7, 2023, 12:10 PM
18 points
2 comments11 min readEA link
(existentialcrunch.substack.com)

How much food is there?

FJehnSep 2, 2024, 6:29 AM
40 points
3 comments5 min readEA link
(existentialcrunch.substack.com)

Demo­cratic Resilience

FJehnJul 26, 2024, 7:50 AM
22 points
3 comments8 min readEA link
(existentialcrunch.substack.com)

Miti­gat­ing x-risk through modularity

Toby NewberryDec 17, 2020, 7:54 PM
103 points
6 comments14 min readEA link

The Odyssean Process

Odyssean InstituteNov 24, 2023, 1:48 PM
25 points
6 comments1 min readEA link
(www.odysseaninstitute.org)

Si­mu­lat­ing the end of the world: Ex­plor­ing the cur­rent state of so­cietal dy­nam­ics modeling

FJehnNov 15, 2023, 12:53 PM
11 points
2 comments10 min readEA link
(existentialcrunch.substack.com)

How long un­til re­cov­ery af­ter col­lapse?

FJehnSep 24, 2024, 8:43 AM
12 points
3 comments7 min readEA link
(existentialcrunch.substack.com)

Civ­i­liza­tion Re-Emerg­ing After a Catas­trophic Collapse

MichaelA🔸Jun 27, 2020, 3:22 AM
32 points
18 comments2 min readEA link
(www.youtube.com)

Im­prov­ing dis­aster shelters to in­crease the chances of re­cov­ery from a global catastrophe

Nick_BecksteadFeb 19, 2014, 10:17 PM
24 points
5 comments26 min readEA link

What If 99% of Hu­man­ity Van­ished? (A Hap­pier World video)

Jeroen Willems🔸Feb 16, 2023, 5:10 PM
16 points
1 comment3 min readEA link

The Cred­i­bil­ity of Apoca­lyp­tic Claims: A Cri­tique of Techno-Fu­tur­ism within Ex­is­ten­tial Risk

EmberAug 16, 2022, 7:48 PM
25 points
35 comments17 min readEA link

Cli­mate anoma­lies and so­cietal collapse

FJehnFeb 8, 2024, 9:49 AM
13 points
6 comments10 min readEA link
(existentialcrunch.substack.com)

What is the like­li­hood that civ­i­liza­tional col­lapse would cause tech­nolog­i­cal stag­na­tion? (out­dated re­search)

Luisa_RodriguezOct 19, 2022, 5:35 PM
83 points
13 comments32 min readEA link

AGI safety and los­ing elec­tric­ity/​in­dus­try re­silience cost-effectiveness

Ross_TiemanNov 17, 2019, 8:42 AM
31 points
10 comments37 min readEA link

The Case for a Strate­gic U.S. Coal Re­serve for Cli­mate and Catastrophes

ColdButtonIssuesMay 5, 2022, 1:24 AM
30 points
3 comments5 min readEA link

Sav­ing ex­pected lives at $10 apiece?

Denkenberger🔸Dec 14, 2016, 3:38 PM
15 points
23 comments2 min readEA link

[Question] Why doesn’t WWOTF men­tion the Bronze Age Col­lapse?

Eevee🔹Sep 19, 2022, 6:29 AM
16 points
4 comments1 min readEA link

Cost-Effec­tive­ness of Foods for Global Catas­tro­phes: Even Bet­ter than Be­fore?

Denkenberger🔸Nov 19, 2018, 9:57 PM
29 points
5 comments10 min readEA link

Ja­cob Cates and Aron Mill: Scal­ing in­dus­trial food pro­duc­tion in nu­clear winter

EA GlobalOct 18, 2019, 6:05 PM
9 points
0 comments1 min readEA link
(www.youtube.com)

Some his­tory top­ics it might be very valuable to investigate

MichaelA🔸Jul 8, 2020, 2:40 AM
91 points
34 comments6 min readEA link

Things usu­ally end slowly

OllieBaseJun 7, 2022, 5:00 PM
76 points
14 comments7 min readEA link

Notes on Hen­rich’s “The WEIRDest Peo­ple in the World” (2020)

MichaelA🔸Mar 25, 2021, 5:04 AM
44 points
4 comments3 min readEA link

Luisa Ro­driguez: Do­ing em­piri­cal global pri­ori­ties re­search — the ques­tion of civ­i­liza­tional col­lapse and recovery

EA GlobalOct 25, 2020, 5:48 AM
11 points
0 comments1 min readEA link
(www.youtube.com)

Notes on “Bioter­ror and Biowar­fare” (2006)

MichaelA🔸Mar 1, 2021, 9:42 AM
29 points
6 comments4 min readEA link

Quan­tify­ing the prob­a­bil­ity of ex­is­ten­tial catas­tro­phe: A re­ply to Beard et al.

MichaelA🔸Aug 10, 2020, 5:56 AM
21 points
3 comments3 min readEA link
(gcrinstitute.org)

ALLFED 2019 An­nual Re­port and Fundrais­ing Appeal

AronMNov 23, 2019, 2:05 AM
42 points
12 comments21 min readEA link

[Question] Is there a sub­field of eco­nomics de­voted to “frag­ility vs re­silience”?

steve6320Jul 21, 2020, 2:21 AM
23 points
5 comments1 min readEA link

My Cause Selec­tion: Dave Denkenberger

Denkenberger🔸Aug 16, 2015, 3:06 PM
13 points
7 comments3 min readEA link

David Denken­berger: Loss of In­dus­trial Civ­i­liza­tion and Re­cov­ery (Work­shop)

Denkenberger🔸Feb 19, 2019, 3:58 PM
27 points
1 comment15 min readEA link

Should we buy coal mines?

John G. HalsteadMay 4, 2022, 7:28 AM
216 points
31 comments7 min readEA link

2021 ALLFED Highlights

Ross_TiemanNov 17, 2021, 3:24 PM
45 points
1 comment16 min readEA link

Is­lands, nu­clear win­ter, and trade dis­rup­tion as a hu­man ex­is­ten­tial risk factor

Matt BoydAug 7, 2022, 2:18 AM
36 points
6 comments19 min readEA link

EA and the Pos­si­ble De­cline of the US: Very Rough Thoughts

Cullen 🔸Jan 8, 2021, 7:30 AM
56 points
19 comments4 min readEA link

How you can save ex­pected lives for $0.20-$400 each and re­duce X risk

Denkenberger🔸Nov 27, 2017, 2:23 AM
24 points
5 comments8 min readEA link

Alli­ance to Feed the Earth in Disasters (ALLFED) Progress Re­port & Giv­ing Tues­day Appeal

Denkenberger🔸Nov 21, 2018, 5:20 AM
21 points
3 comments8 min readEA link

Ground­wa­ter De­ple­tion: con­trib­u­tor to global civ­i­liza­tion col­lapse.

RickJSDec 3, 2022, 7:09 AM
11 points
6 comments3 min readEA link
(drive.google.com)

William Mar­shall: Lu­nar colony

EA GlobalAug 11, 2017, 8:19 AM
7 points
0 comments1 min readEA link
(www.youtube.com)

Hu­man­i­ties Re­search Ideas for Longtermists

LizkaJun 9, 2021, 4:39 AM
151 points
13 comments13 min readEA link

EA re­silience to catas­tro­phes & ALLFED’s case study

Sonia_CassidyMar 23, 2022, 7:03 AM
91 points
10 comments13 min readEA link

Should we be spend­ing no less on al­ter­nate foods than AI now?

Denkenberger🔸Oct 29, 2017, 11:28 PM
38 points
9 comments16 min readEA link

Venn di­a­grams of ex­is­ten­tial, global, and suffer­ing catastrophes

MichaelA🔸Jul 15, 2020, 12:28 PM
81 points
7 comments7 min readEA link

Juan Gar­cía Martínez: In­dus­trial al­ter­na­tive foods for global catas­trophic risks

EA GlobalNov 21, 2020, 8:12 AM
12 points
0 comments1 min readEA link
(www.youtube.com)

[Question] Book on Civil­i­sa­tional Col­lapse?

MiltonOct 7, 2020, 8:51 AM
9 points
6 comments1 min readEA link

The great en­ergy de­scent (short ver­sion) - An im­por­tant thing EA might have missed

CB🔸Aug 31, 2022, 9:50 PM
67 points
94 comments10 min readEA link

The most im­por­tant cli­mate change uncertainty

cwaJul 26, 2022, 3:15 PM
144 points
28 comments13 min readEA link

Art Recom­men­da­tion: Dr. Stone

Devin KalishJul 9, 2022, 10:53 AM
15 points
2 comments1 min readEA link
(www.crunchyroll.com)

Causal di­a­grams of the paths to ex­is­ten­tial catastrophe

MichaelA🔸Mar 1, 2020, 2:08 PM
51 points
11 comments13 min readEA link

Is Civ­i­liza­tion on the Brink of Col­lapse? - Kurzgesagt

GabeMAug 16, 2022, 8:06 PM
29 points
5 comments1 min readEA link
(www.youtube.com)

Some EA Fo­rum Posts I’d like to write

LinchFeb 23, 2021, 5:27 AM
100 points
10 comments5 min readEA link

ALLFED 2020 Highlights

AronMNov 19, 2020, 10:06 PM
51 points
5 comments26 min readEA link

Start­ing the sec­ond Green Revolution

freedomandutilityJun 29, 2023, 12:23 PM
30 points
3 comments1 min readEA link

An­nounc­ing the EA Archive

Aaron BergmanJul 6, 2023, 1:49 PM
70 points
18 comments2 min readEA link

Nu­clear war tail risk has been ex­ag­ger­ated?

Vasco Grilo🔸Feb 25, 2024, 9:14 AM
48 points
22 comments28 min readEA link

A Gen­tle In­tro­duc­tion to Risk Frame­works Beyond Forecasting

pending_survivalApr 11, 2024, 9:15 AM
81 points
4 comments27 min readEA link

Two tools for re­think­ing ex­is­ten­tial risk

ArepoApr 5, 2024, 9:25 PM
82 points
14 comments25 min readEA link

Assess­ing Cli­mate Change’s Con­tri­bu­tion to Global Catas­trophic Risk

HaydnBelfieldFeb 19, 2021, 4:26 PM
27 points
8 comments37 min readEA link

ALLFED needs your sup­port for global catas­tro­phe preparedness

JuanGarciaNov 11, 2024, 10:50 PM
31 points
5 comments4 min readEA link

[Question] What’s the like­li­hood of ir­recov­er­able civ­i­liza­tional col­lapse if 90% of the pop­u­la­tion dies?

simeon_cAug 7, 2022, 7:47 PM
21 points
3 comments1 min readEA link

How democ­racy ends: a re­view and reevaluation

richard_ngoNov 24, 2018, 5:41 PM
27 points
2 comments6 min readEA link
(thinkingcomplete.blogspot.com)

On the as­sess­ment of vol­canic erup­tions as global catas­trophic or ex­is­ten­tial risks

Mike CassidyOct 13, 2021, 2:32 PM
112 points
18 comments19 min readEA link

2022 ALLFED highlights

Ross_TiemanNov 28, 2022, 5:37 AM
85 points
1 comment18 min readEA link

In­ter­re­lat­ed­ness of x-risks and sys­temic fragilities

NaryanSep 4, 2022, 9:36 PM
26 points
7 comments2 min readEA link

13 Re­cent Publi­ca­tions on Ex­is­ten­tial Risk (Jan 2021 up­date)

HaydnBelfieldFeb 8, 2021, 12:42 PM
7 points
2 comments10 min readEA link

[Question] Is there an or­ga­ni­za­tion or in­di­vi­d­u­als work­ing on how to boot­strap in­dus­trial civ­i­liza­tion?

steve6320Oct 21, 2022, 3:36 AM
15 points
8 comments1 min readEA link

Mili­tary sup­port in a global catastrophe

Tom GardinerJan 24, 2023, 4:30 PM
37 points
0 comments3 min readEA link

Philan­thropy to the Right of Boom [Founders Pledge]

christian.rFeb 14, 2023, 5:08 PM
83 points
11 comments20 min readEA link

Speedrun: De­mon­strate the abil­ity to rapidly scale food pro­duc­tion in the case of nu­clear winter

BuhlFeb 13, 2023, 7:00 PM
39 points
2 comments16 min readEA link

Ad­vice Wanted on Ex­pand­ing an EA Project

Denkenberger🔸Apr 23, 2016, 11:20 PM
4 points
3 comments2 min readEA link

Pre­serv­ing our her­i­tage: Build­ing a move­ment and a knowl­edge ark for cur­rent and fu­ture generations

rnk8Nov 30, 2023, 10:15 AM
−9 points
0 comments12 min readEA link

The great en­ergy de­scent—Post 3: What we can do, what we can’t do

CB🔸Aug 31, 2022, 9:51 PM
17 points
3 comments22 min readEA link

2023 ALLFED Marginal Fund­ing Appeal

JuanGarciaNov 17, 2023, 10:55 AM
32 points
2 comments3 min readEA link

The great en­ergy de­scent—Part 2: Limits to growth and why we prob­a­bly won’t reach the stars

CB🔸Aug 31, 2022, 9:51 PM
19 points
0 comments25 min readEA link

Coun­ter­fac­tual catastrophes

FJehnNov 20, 2024, 7:12 PM
14 points
1 comment8 min readEA link
(existentialcrunch.substack.com)

Nu­clear Risk and Philan­thropic Strat­egy [Founders Pledge]

christian.rJul 25, 2023, 8:22 PM
83 points
15 comments76 min readEA link
(www.founderspledge.com)

[Question] What longter­mist pro­jects would you like to see im­ple­mented?

BuhlMar 28, 2023, 6:41 PM
55 points
6 comments1 min readEA link

Phy­to­min­ing for Effec­tive Altruism

Benjamin M.Sep 10, 2023, 9:03 PM
17 points
3 comments29 min readEA link

Mar­i­time ca­pa­bil­ity and post-catas­tro­phe re­silience.

Tom GardinerJul 14, 2022, 11:29 AM
32 points
7 comments6 min readEA link

X-Risk Re­searchers Sur­vey

NitaSanghaApr 24, 2023, 8:06 AM
12 points
1 comment1 min readEA link

How Eng­ineers can Con­tribute to Civil­i­sa­tion Resilience

Jessica WenMay 3, 2023, 2:22 PM
41 points
3 comments8 min readEA link

Why I think there’s a one-in-six chance of an im­mi­nent global nu­clear war

TegmarkOct 8, 2022, 11:25 PM
53 points
24 comments1 min readEA link

Luisa Ro­driguez: How to do em­piri­cal cause pri­ori­ti­za­tion re­search

EA GlobalNov 21, 2020, 8:12 AM
7 points
0 comments1 min readEA link
(www.youtube.com)

Ok Doomer! SRM and Catas­trophic Risk Podcast

Gideon FutermanAug 20, 2022, 12:22 PM
10 points
4 comments1 min readEA link
(open.spotify.com)

Les­sons from the past for our global civilization

FJehnAug 10, 2023, 9:54 AM
4 points
0 comments7 min readEA link
(existentialcrunch.substack.com)

Civ­i­liza­tion Re­cov­ery Kits

Soof GolanSep 21, 2022, 9:26 AM
25 points
9 comments2 min readEA link

[Question] Odds of re­cov­er­ing val­ues af­ter col­lapse?

Will AldredJul 24, 2022, 6:20 PM
66 points
13 comments3 min readEA link

Re­silient foods: How to feed ev­ery­one, even in the worst of times

FJehnDec 19, 2024, 11:12 AM
11 points
1 comment7 min readEA link
(existentialcrunch.substack.com)

[Question] Has any­one done an anal­y­sis on the im­por­tance, tractabil­ity, and ne­glect­ed­ness of keep­ing hu­man-di­gestible calories in the ocean in case we need it af­ter some global catas­tro­phe?

Mati_RoyFeb 17, 2020, 7:47 AM
9 points
5 comments1 min readEA link

Pos­si­ble im­por­tance of Effec­tive Altru­ism in the civ­i­liz­ing process

idea21Jan 8, 2025, 12:56 AM
1 point
0 comments1 min readEA link

Nu­clear Pre­pared­ness Guide

FinMar 8, 2022, 5:04 PM
106 points
13 comments11 min readEA link

Water Pre­pared­ness for Disasters

FinMar 8, 2022, 5:03 PM
13 points
0 comments3 min readEA link

Bu­gout Bags for Disasters

FinMar 8, 2022, 5:03 PM
10 points
0 comments4 min readEA link

Short­en­ing & en­light­en­ing dark ages as a sub-area of catas­trophic risk reduction

JpmosMar 5, 2022, 7:43 AM
27 points
7 comments5 min readEA link

Food Pre­pared­ness for Disasters

FinMar 8, 2022, 5:03 PM
20 points
1 comment4 min readEA link

Model­ling civil­i­sa­tion be­yond a catastrophe

ArepoOct 30, 2022, 4:26 PM
58 points
5 comments13 min readEA link

Bioweapons shelter pro­ject launch

Benevolent_RainJun 14, 2022, 3:44 AM
75 points
19 comments8 min readEA link

Prepar­ing for Power Ou­tages in Disasters

FinMar 8, 2022, 5:04 PM
9 points
0 comments4 min readEA link

Beyond Sim­ple Ex­is­ten­tial Risk: Sur­vival in a Com­plex In­ter­con­nected World

Gideon FutermanNov 21, 2022, 2:35 PM
84 points
67 comments21 min readEA link

W-Risk and the Tech­nolog­i­cal Wavefront (Nell Wat­son)

Aaron Gertler 🔸Nov 11, 2018, 11:22 PM
9 points
1 comment1 min readEA link

Pre­serv­ing and con­tin­u­ing al­ign­ment re­search through a se­vere global catastrophe

A_donorMar 6, 2022, 6:43 PM
40 points
11 comments5 min readEA link

Base Rates on United States Regime Collapse

AppliedDivinityStudiesApr 5, 2021, 5:14 PM
15 points
3 comments9 min readEA link