Living on the Third Planet
by Hannes and Kerstin Alfven
translated by Eric Johnson
(San Francisco: W.H. Freeman and Co., 1972)
For several billion years the sun has remained at about the same temperature.
Page 1.
One of the major results of space research has been the recognition that it is highly improbably that life exists on any other celestial body int eh neighborhood of the sun. we are alone; we are unique, at least in this region of space.
Page 2.
When the earth originated, it was sterile. Only after some time did it, lie a ripening cheese, become moldy.
Page 2.
Carbon atoms have a remarkable capability to combine into long chains or rings, which contain other elements.
Page 2.
The flow of energy producing these changes came from solar radiation, which originated from the giant fusion reactor at the center of the sun.
Page 2.
Life … originated in this way. A special type of molecular compound, capable of self-reproduction, rapidly multiplied until it became quite common.
Page 3.
As a result … a number of different species originated.
Page 3.
Life preserved its initial tendency - population explosion leading to death, or almost to death.
Page 4.
A complicated animal (for example, a mammal) is in essence a huge colony of cells, and the same law holds true for those cells. At the moment a spermatozoan penetrates an egg cell, a population explosion of cells starts.
Page 4.
The outermost layer of skin consists essentially of cell corpses.
Page 6.
No highly developed species can exist if it lacks either the instinct for self-preservation - consisting of hunger, fear and other self-protective sensations; or the reproductive instinct - sexuality and child care. These properties have progressively evolved in the course of millions of years.
Pages 6-7.
Death always looms in the neighborhood of life. To live is to change, and the ultimate change is death.
Page 7.
In spite of the fact that reproduction is essential for the existence of a given species, it must be inhibited. A population explosion that is not stopped in time necessarily leads to mass death.
Pages 7-8.
If the population explosion continues, it is a mathematical certainty that mass death will result. This is the essence of Malthusianism..
Page 8.
No species can long survive unless its average rate of population increase is not much more than zero for each succeeding generation.
In the long run, life and death must balance one another on the scale of collective survival.
Page 9.
The scale of life can outbalance the scale of death for a few generations, causing the species to increase rapidly. But very soon the equilibrium must be restored.
Page 9.
Every surviving species has two main alternatives. Its ratio of reproduction to death may be roughly constant at one to one, without much variation from that figure, so that the existence of the species remains stable; or it can follow the pattern of population explosion, which leads to mass death.
Page 10.
Each individual is his own center in his own world.
Page 11.
The uncertainty principle … states that it is impossible to ascertain simultaneously the position and the momentum of a particle, because the more accurately one can be measured the less accurately the other can be determined.
Page 11.
We all know, theoretically, that other people have the same soul and inner life as we ourselves possess, but it is often difficult to comprehend it. We ma agree that we should love our neighbors but it is too big a task for any individual to identify himself with everybody, to understand deep in his heart that everyone else faces problems of life as difficult as his own.
Page 12.
We must understand life itself from two aspects simultaneously.
Page 13.
The great religions which evolved between two and four thousand years ago were an expression of the results of man’s introspection. The human condition, the possibility for the human soul to find peace, the ethical aspects of human interrelations had already at that time been analyzed with an acumen and depth of insight which can hardly be surpassed today.
Page 13.
The study of life from the outside is made through such disciplines as statistics, sociology, and neural physiology.
Page 14.
Millions of years of the most fantastic escapes do not give any guarantees of immortality.
Page 16.
Man has become the master of nature. But does this mean that he is no longer subject to the general conditions of life?
Page 16.
Life is much too complicated, much too wonderful to be fully captured and understood by simple models.
Page 16.
The two most important mechanisms that regulate a population: starvation and violent death. A third mechanism is of course disease. For man, and for a very few other species, another is war.
Page 17.
Very few animals, with the exception of man, kill members of their own species.
Pages 17-18.
A lake, a wood, a prairie: all constitute ecological systems. Such systems with time - trees may begin to grow on a prairie, changing it to a forest - but often a region retains its character for a long time, remaining populated for many years or centuries by the same kinds of species in approximately the same numbers.
Page 20.
When the life span of a man is at an end, the biological processes in is body are self-destructive.
Page 22.
All animals and plants have certain mechanisms to preserve their individual lives, and every species has a mechanism for continuing the life of the species. But an ecosystem does not have this property.
Page 23.
It is … the desperate fight for individual survival, and for the survival of the species, that causes the conditions for life to deteriorate. The lust for life of everybody means the death of everybody.
Pages 23-24.
Today man is without any doubt the master of the earth. They only real danger to man is man himself.
Page 25.
Collectively, we have acquired an enormous amount of experience. In a way, we can say that every cell in our body has taken part in the whole biological evolution, because every cell w consist of is in a sense billions of years old.
This is so because, when the cell divides, the same life processes continue in both parts of it. Hence, the life of the cells is an unbroken continuity from one generation to another.
Pages 25-26.
Every cell in the body lives a life which is a direct continuation of the life of the fertilized egg.
Page 26.
These life processes constitute a direct bridge between some original cell in the dawn of time and those cells which constitute our bodies today. In this sense, every cell that is alive today has experienced the whole biological evolution.
Page 26.
In the course of successive generations in the sea, our ancestors developed into increasingly complicated animals. Finally a remarkable event occurred: the first lung fish crawled up on land. We participated in that event in the sense that the cells of which we consist are offsprings of an egg cell in that lung fish.
Page 26.
Our own ancestors, however, mutated in such a way as to develop bigger and better brains than other animals. This made it possible for them to dominate the earth and to introduce a new epoch in the history of life.
Page 28.
The experience in the art of surviving, which has been gained in the course of millions of years, has ben stored in “improves,” but that is a very slow process the code of the genes. This genetic code has a remarkable stability, which insures the reproduction of the species. It is true that it changes and
Page 29.
The synaptic memory dies with the individual. Thus it is only the genetic memory that the species conserves from one generation to the other.
Page 29.
Some knowledge - for example, sucking the breast of the mother, familiarising oneself with things by putting the into the mouth to find out whether they are edible, fleeing when threatened, and copulating - is stored in the genetic memory, which constitutes dome of the experience of millions of generations. Other knowledge - how to make fire, how to fabricate tools, how to plow a field an domesticate animals, how to use weapons for defense or attack, and how to construct atomic bombs and travel in space - is information that mankind has acquired in a short time.
Page 30.
The quantity of knowledge increased like an avalanche, and soon there was too much for any human brain to store. Then the brain was supplemented by libraries. Thus today it is surely reasonable to suggest that the key to our mastery of the earth is stored in our libraries.
Page 31.
During the first phase we lived in symbiosis with nature. We used it, enslaving the animals and exploiting the earth. Yet at the same time we were completely dependent on nature. We were part of it. But in the past one hundred years we have embarked upon a new phase, the technological or cybernetic era. This means that in the course of the past century we have broken our collaborative bonds with nature and produced a new milieu, which is more and more a product of ourselves.
Page 31.
An advanced country must eventually cultivate industry, lest it risk economic impoverishment in the modern world.
Page 31.
The house is a machine to live in, and if the electricity goes wrong, it becomes uninhabitable.
Page 32.
The transition from water to land required thousands or hundreds of thousands, of generations, whereas the transition form symbiosis with nature to the symbiosis with our own technology may take only a couple of generations.
Page 33.
Even if we wanted to, we could not return to the pretechnical life.
Page 34.
When biological evolution became mingled with the more rapid stream of cultural evolution, we began an adventure which may be either successful or catastrophic, and the outcome depends solely upon ourselves.
Page 34.
In our technological era we are bombarded with so many demands on our attention that it is difficult indeed to distinguish between the essential and the unimportant. In fact, this distinction must always be dependent upon who the observer is.
Page 35.
Many of today’s news items will be forgotten tomorrow; almost all of them, within a year. But this does not mean that they are without significance.
Page 35.
But “major” events are balanced by collections of “minor” events. … We see that overwhelming numbers of these minor events create a drift in the historical current that no leader, no matter how great, can swim against for long.
Page 36.
We really cannot avoid being concerned about tomorrow.
Page 37.
Often we implicitly postulate that progress has attained its zenith in our time and so come to a halt; we assume that no new devices or processes will be invented, that no new significant ideas will be advanced.
Page 38.
Most of us who lack the consolation of believing in personal immortality feel it is essential that something of us will survive our death: if we have children, we think of them as a continuation of ourselves; if we do not, we hope that something that we have done in life will survive us.
Page 43.
We have begun to understand the cosmic forces so well that we can exploit them.
Page 44.
When life originated on earth the atmosphere consisted of nitrogen and carbon dioxide, and it is probable that no oxygen existed at all.
Page 45.
It is the microorganisms and the plants which have made the earth inhabitable for biological creatures like ourselves.
Pages 45-46.
Since the beginning of the industrial revolution we have burned so much coal and oil that the amount of carbon dioxide in the air has increased so greatly that it may be one reason why climatic changes, for instance, have occurred.
Page 46.
Our activity on earth is perhaps eventually going to make it uninhabitable.
Page 46.
Life in space will probably differ less from our accustomed existence today than does today’s existence from life in the agrarian era.
Page 48.
All the display of imagination in science-fiction literature notwithstanding, it is doubtful that we can successfully imagine what space life will be like in the not too distant future.
Page 48.
The total energy consumption by technology is am almost negligible fraction of the energy the sun delivers to the earth.
Page 49.
When we can construct a fusion reactor, we will be able to reproduce the nuclear burning that now takes place only int eh central parts of the stars.
Page 50.
Our species is potentially immortal.
Page 51.
We are very seriously threatened, but the only real danger to man is man himself. We may annihilate ourselves.
Page 51.
The politicians seem hardly to realize that a new era has dawned.
Page 55.
The industrial revolution in technologically advanced countries has drastically changed not only the outer life of man, but the inner life as well. In other words, man’s view of himself has altered.
Page 55.
Political conflict and warfare have now assumed global proportions, and people everywhere feel the existence of humanity in danger whenever political conflicts threaten the outbreak of yet another war. This world-wide danger necessarily causes us to begin to feel, think, and plan on a global scale and to recognize that global cooperation is a necessary condition for our continued existence.
Page 55.
The development of missile technology from military missiles to space ships has not been made exclusively for military reasons, because the Moon, Venus, and Mars have very little value as military bases.
Page 57.
The accomplishments of the jet age, then, have made the earth shrink. They have made it easy for us to meet our friends, even if they live on the other side of the planet. They have also made it impossible for us to escape our enemies, even if these too live on the planet’s other side.
Page 59.
The synthetic age may be said to symbolize the way in which man is ceasing his symbiosis with nature, and his exploitation of plants and animals, and is instead beginning a collaboration with his won technology.
Page 61.
Our technology, which is helping to make us independent of nature, is also, unfortunately, causing the deviation and pollution of nature.
Page 62.
Computers have proven indispensable because of the rapidity with which they work and their enormous capacity for storing information.
Page 62.
In a modern nation, more information about every citizen will be compiled and stored each year.
Page 63.
The present sharp increase in the earth’s population is partly a result of the advances in medicine that have made it possible to cure illness and lower the risk of death at an early age.
Page 64.
One of the most important problems we face today is how to optimize the population of the earth.
Page 65.
War is actually an organized social enterprise. In reality there is very little difference between compelling a group of people to build pyramids, the Great Wall of China, Roman aqueducts, or the Panama Canal, and inducing them to live in trenches.
Page 73.
A modern ruler need not represent the people any more than rulers of earlier times represented Bod. The power of both types of ruler is founded on an organization which is controlled largely by the ruler himself.
Page 84.
Democracy brought … much better conditions for most of the people. However, it is doubtful that it has changed the structure of power essentially, for the power still belongs to self-recruiting groups who govern or compete for political control.
Page 85.
In countries with many parties, the people have in theory the freedom to elect whoever they want to be their ruler. This is a noble principle, but unfortunately reality has not made room for it. Only those who belong to a party machine, and, of these only those who have been approved as candidates have any chance to be elected.
Page 85.
Only in part is an election a contest between differing ideologies. More and more it is becoming a struggle between different advertising agencies or similar firms.
Page 86.
With all due respect to the well coached talents of today’s smiling presidents and prime ministers, it is doubtful that any of them have surpassed the modern dictators in their apparent contact with the people.
Page 87.
In today’s nations, with millions or hundred of millions of inhabitants … personal contact between ruler and citizen is impossible.
Page 88.
The greater the number of people, the more numerous the levels between the chief director and the majority of the workers. Every additional level causes the chief director to become that much more isolated.
Page 89.
The political games with the destinies of mankind are like those of ancient time, not because they have to be, but rather because too many of us think they have to be.
Page 91.
Whether it is a general, a powerful businessman, or a leading labor leader who g rasps the reins of political power, he is still a man bound by the general rules of power politics. Boxed in by personal and national pressures which result from these rules, such a man will be unable to effect the changes needed in the structure of global politics.
Page 97.
All politicians, it seems, find it necessary to plod along in the well worn tracks of the world’s political systems.
Page 97.
The United Nations is unable to challenge the moral, political, and military autonomy of modern national powers, which therefore remain free to dominate the world’s political scene.
Page 98.
The reason our ignorance increases along with our collected knowledge is that we need so much knowledge in order to exist in an increasingly complicated world. Since our knowledge does not increase as rapidly as our need for it, the result is what we can call increasing ignorance.
Pages 101-102.
Although it is true that the number of people who can read is increasing (so that the percentage of the world’s population that can read today is larger than that of, say, ten years ago), it is also true that the population is increasing even more rapidly. Consequently the total number of illiterates in the world is increasing.
Page 102.
Today most of us are completely helpless without specialists and technicians of various kinds.
Page 106.
Our ignorance of the workings of items within our own homes has increased enormously, and this ignorance makes us helpless without the skilled hands of specialists.
Page 106.
The more knowledge mankind gathers, the greater the individual’s ignorance of essential facts.
Page 107.
It is a general rule that power crates servility, and it applies not only in the palace of an oriental despot, but also in the corridors of power in a Western democracy.
Page 109.
According to the democratic principle, a government is responsible to its people for its decisions. But the government with a well trained administration, including an efficient propaganda organization, stands a good chance of not being held responsible. It is only in more dramatic situations, for example during a war, that governmental mistakes become evident to everyone.
Page 110.
It is only because the syntax of \Japanese and Chinese sentences is quite different f rom ours that a literal translation of them can convey an impression of illogic.
Page 117.
Although the primary aim of science is to increase the storehouse of human knowledge, its secondary aim - the improvement of man’s material conditions - has proved to be of immense and incalculable importance.
Page 119.
Even the cavemen knew that knowledge is power. And certainly the desire for power - for economic, political, and social power - has had a significant influence on the development of science.
Pages 120-121.
The immense industrial expansion of the nineteenth century … received great impetus from the direct participation by the scientists themselves in the industrial process.
Page 121.
The vast economic power of the United States has therefore enabled her to establish what are almost monopolies in advanced aviation, computer technology, and the creation of new materials.
Pages 125-126.
It has often been said that the reason the science of the Renaissance led to a breakthrough while that of the Greeks withered on the vine was that the Renaissance discoveries found technological outlets. Greek science, mostly because of its close bond with philosophy, was kept locked in the study, so to speak, since it was only of limited practical use.
Page 127.
There is no rule without exceptions.
Page 135.
The great nations of today have grown with a long tradition of population expansion, and consequently both the leaders and the people have an ingrown feeling about the importance of an increasing population.
Page 138.
As long as large parts of the earth were uninhabited and could be cultivated the population expansion was a boon for the human species. The domination by man became possible largely because the species became numerous. No culture can be developed by a group of people that is too small.
Page 138.
Without reservation, we can predict that the present population expansion will end within a few generations.
Page 142.
Wars of the type we are “accustomed to” are of negligible significance in population reduction. All the victims of the two world wars were not more numerous than the present increase int world population in the course of half a year. Hence in order to limit the population by war we need two world wars every year.
Page 142.
The population explosion is not a consequence of an irrevocable law of nature or of any other inevitable process. It is technically possible, even technically easy, to bring it to a halt in a couple of years. But the people in power do not view it as an important problem. Many of them - and this is what is really serious - hope for an increase in their country’s population, though not in the world’s. they are of the opinion that such an increase will enhance their power, and they are especially afraid that their power will diminish if the people of other nations increase more rapidly than their own people.
Page 146.
Many analysts agree that Japan’s imperialist expansion was associated with the rapid increase in population, which forced the nation’s prewar leaders to seek space to accommodate the expanding numbers. One should also note that in the decades since Japan stabilized its population she has enjoyed the most rapid rise in prosperity which any nation has ever been able to report.
Page 147.
It is technically easier to rule poor and ignorant people than educate, prosperous people.
Page 148.
Spiritual leaders have more power if their followers are numerous and docile. The virtues they emphasize are humility, obedience, and acceptance of poverty. The larger the number of poor and obedient people in the congregation, the less the religious authority of the spiritual institution is questioned.
Page 148.
A large population and a rapid increase in the population have often been utilized as the rationale for expansion or imperialism. One arms by producing both guns and manpower to handle the guns.
Page 149.
Man is master of the atoms and is on his way to becoming the equal of the cosmic forces.
Page 151.
Life promoted life, and the biosphere expanded to cove most of the planet.
Page 158.
The dreams of starry-eyed utopians have very little relevance in practical life.
Page 159.
The series of economic catastrophes wrought by depressions could not be averted until a theoretical analysis of the possibility of stabilizing the economy had been made.
Page 160.
Only through a stroke of luck does it happen that a person who comes into power has such qualities that he can and wants to use his authority to serve humanity.
Page 161.
Only rarely have politicians themselves been the sources of constructive new thinking of a fundamental sort. Rather, when politicians usher in sweeping changes they do so by putting into practice the systems that philosophers and scientists (both physical and social) have formulated.
Page 162.
It is possible that the process through which life started on earth was completely normal, in the sense that its occurrence was inevitable, given the chemical and physical conditions which prevailed on the earth some billion years ago. … Possibly the origin of life, too, was a necessary consequence of a certain set of conditions. If so, then life must have started a thousand times in different places on the earth as soon as conditions became ripe for its outburst.
Page 168.
Life probably exists wherever the conditions are favorable. Every inhabitable planet must be inhabited.
Page 168.
Our understanding of biological evolution is too scant for us to determine where it is heading.
Page 170.
If we were to find that somewhere in the universe there was indeed a technological culture equivalent to ours we would immediately know much more about ourselves. First of all such a finding would confirm the theory that life is a normal occurrence and also that biological evolution has a high probability of leading to some type of life form that is at least as highly developed as man.
Page 171.
Both the Chinese and the Indian cultures were in most respects superior to the Western culture as recently as the eighteenth century and perhaps even the beginning of the nineteenth century. It was not until the middle of the nineteenth century that the Western men made the technological leap that gave them the keys to world domination. The reason they were able to make this leap was that as early as the Renaissance they had begun to cultivate science in a way which gradually led to the technological evolution. The one man most responsible for this development was Galileo.
Page 173.
Why was there no Chinese or Indian Galileo?
Page 173.
If life has appeared on another planet, and if a life form to man has evolved, is it inevitable that these beings will produce a Galileo? Or will our fellows there produce highly civilized cultures that forever remain mute and unknown to us because they have developed no radios and lasers.
Page 174.
Before we can decide whether we are unique in the universe, before we can answer the question of whether there are foreign cultures for us to contact, we must answer four fundamental questions about ourselves: Is life a result of chance? IOs man a result of chance? Was Galileo a result of chance? Is a global Hiroshima unavoidable? Thus we find that the question whether we are unique is closely connected with the destiny of life on the third planet.
Page 175.
In spite of or ignorance of mankind’s origin and purpose, it is essential that we clarify our present situation, that we devise a strategy which may perhaps give us a chance to master our destiny.
Page 176.