our greed and failings make it hard to look at  our species with a lot of optimism and so many  

我們的貪婪和失敗使我們很難以樂觀的態度來看待我們的物種，所以很多人

people think our end is in sight. But humans have  always thought they lived in the end times. Every  

人們認為我們的末日就在眼前。但人類一直認為他們生活在末世。每一個

generation assumes they're important enough to  witness the apocalypse and then life just goes on.

這一代人認為他們足夠重要，可以見證啟示錄，然後生活就這樣繼續下去。

This is a problem because it  leads to short term thinking  

這是一個問題，因為它導致了短期的思考

and prevents us from creating the best world  for ourselves and our descendents. What makes  

並阻止我們為自己和我們的後代創造最好的世界。是什麼讓

this worse is that we may actually BE living at  an extremely critical moment in human history.  

這更糟糕的是，我們實際上可能生活在人類歷史上一個極其關鍵的時刻。

To understand why, let us look at the  temporal window of humanity and ask:

為了瞭解原因，讓我們看看人類的時間窗口並問道。

When will the last human be born and  how many people will there ever be?

最後一個人什麼時候出生，會有多少人？

These sorts of estimates come with a  lot of uncertainties, so please take  

這類估計有很多不確定因素，所以請注意。

them with a gigantic grain of salt. To get  a sense of how many people there will be,  

他們有一個巨大的鹽粒。為了瞭解將有多少人。

let us see how many have already lived. Modern  humans arose some 200 thousand years ago.  

讓我們看看有多少人已經活過了。現代人產生於大約20萬年前。

They were uniquely good at  making tools, telling stories,  

他們在製造工具、講述故事方面有獨特的優勢。

thinking abstractly, planning and working together  in large groups beyond their close family.

抽象思維，計劃和在近親以外的大群體中共同工作。

Still there were not that many of us. Surpluses  in food were sparse, survival was hard,  

但我們的人數仍然不多。剩餘的食物很稀少，生存很困難。

life expectancy was low. It took us 150,000  years to grow to a population of 2 million.  

預期壽命很低。我們花了15萬年才發展到200萬人口。

Improvements were gradual and eventually  led to the agricultural revolution,  

改進是逐步進行的，最終導致了農業革命。

arguably the biggest change in our history.  This was when our numbers really started  

可以說，這是我們歷史上最大的變化。 這時我們的數字才真正開始

growing. It took ten thousand more years to get  to 300 million. But that increase was dwarfed  

越來越多。又過了一萬年才達到3億。但這一增長是相形見絀的

by the industrial revolution. In 1800 there  were a billion of us. The human population  

由工業革命。1800年，我們有10億人。人類人口

doubled in just 120 years and then again in  fifty. Today, we number around 8 billion.

在短短120年內翻了一番，然後在50年內又翻了一番。今天，我們的人數約為80億。

In total, over the last two hundred thousand years  about 117 billion humans were born and lived,  

在過去的20萬年裡，總共有大約1170億人出生和生活。

and 109 billion also died. Which means that  about 7% of all humans that ever lived are alive  

和1090億人也死了。這意味著有史以來所有人類中約有7%活著

right now. As many as were born in the first  150,000 years of human history. Every minute,  

現在就有。與人類歷史上前15萬年出生的人一樣多。每一分鐘都是如此。

270 babies join the party. But there are not just  more people, never before have we been as healthy  

270名嬰兒加入了這一行列。但是，不僅僅是人多了，我們從未像現在這樣健康

and well off, or lived longer. With growing  living standards our birth rates collapsed.  

和富裕，或者活得更久。隨著生活水準的提高，我們的出生率崩潰了。

The UN estimates that around the year 2100  we will hit our population peak and there  

聯合國估計，在2100年左右，我們將達到我們的人口高峰，並且有

will be 125 million people born each year.  It is pretty unlikely that birth rates will  

每年將有1.25億人出生。 出生率相當不可能是

stay stable forever, but let's pretend  to make our thought experiment simpler.

永遠保持穩定，但讓我們假裝讓我們的思想實驗更簡單。

How many people there will be in the future  depends on when our species will die out.  

未來會有多少人取決於我們的物種何時滅亡。

And here we find a lot of uncertainties.  We are able to destroy ourselves through  

而在這裡，我們發現有很多不確定因素。 我們能夠通過以下方式毀滅自己

our own inventions – but we are also able to  find solutions to avert catastrophic risk.

我們自己的發明 - 但我們也能夠找到避免災難性風險的解決方案。

We can change the direction of planet killer  asteroids but we've also invented nuclear weapons.  

我們可以改變行星殺手小行星的方向，但我們也發明了核武器。

We discovered antibiotics but also carry diseases  across the globe in a matter of days. Our  

我們發現了抗生素，但也在幾天內將疾病帶到全球各地。我們的

industrial system gave us an incredible standard  of living but also changed the atmosphere in the  

工業體系給了我們一個令人難以置信的生活標準，但也改變了我們的氣氛。

process. It is very hard to say if human ingenuity  will prolong or shorten our species' lifespan.

過程。很難說人類的聰明才智會延長還是縮短我們物種的壽命。

If things go badly our end could come  suddenly. But if we manage to avoid that,  

如果事情發展得不好，我們的結局可能會突然到來。但如果我們設法避免這種情況。

we could conceivably stick around for a long  time. So every day we don't destroy ourselves  

可以想象，我們可以在這裡堅持很長時間。是以，每一天我們都不會毀滅自己

may mean life for an unfathomable number of  humans. How many people are we talking about?  

可能意味著數量深不可測的人類的生命。我們在談論的是多少人？

It depends on how far our  species is going to expand.

這取決於我們的物種要擴張到什麼程度。

Scenario 1: Humans will never leave Earth

情景1：人類將永遠不會離開地球

If we stay on our home planet, a good metric  to look at is the extinction rate of animals  

如果我們留在我們的母星上，一個很好的衡量標準是動物的滅絕率

that we get from the fossil record. The  average lifespan of mammalian species is  

我們從化石記錄中得到的。哺乳動物物種的平均壽命是

in the region of 1 million years, with  some surviving up to 10 million years.  

在100萬年的區域內，一些生存時間長達1000萬年。

Our close relative homo erectus  survived for about 1.9 million years.

我們的近親直立人存活了大約190萬年。

Let us be conservative and assume that humans  will survive for a million years, which leaves  

讓我們保守一點，假設人類將生存一百萬年，這就意味著

us 800,000 more years to dawdle away. Assuming a  stable birth rate of 125 million people each year,  

我們還有80萬年可以磨蹭。假設每年的出生率穩定在1.25億人。

this means there are roughly 100  TRILLION humans waiting to be born.  

這意味著大約有100萬億人在等待出生。

850 times greater than the number  of people that have ever lived.  

比有史以來的人的數量多850倍。

This would make everybody alive today only  0.008% of all people that will ever live.

這將使今天活著的每個人只佔所有將活著的人的0.008%。

Think about where this leaves you. Instead  of putting you at the end of the chaotic  

想一想這讓你的處境。與其把你放在混亂的末端

mess that was our past, it would mean you  live at the very beginning of something big.  

這就是我們的過去，這將意味著你生活在大事件的開始。

The start of the human story rather than the  end. Doesn't this feel incredibly different?

人類故事的開始而不是結束。這難道不感覺到難以置信的不同嗎？

And now consider that this may be  an extremely pessimistic estimate.  

而現在考慮到這可能是一個極其悲觀的估計。

If we match the survival time of the most  successful mammals, then our future numbers  

如果我們與最成功的哺乳動物的生存時間相匹配，那麼我們未來的數字

rise to 1.2 quadrillion people that have yet to be  born. And even this seems far from our potential:  

增長到1.2萬億尚未出生的人。而即使是這樣，似乎也離我們的潛力很遠。

As the sun slowly gets hotter and brighter, earth  will remain habitable for about 500 million years,  

隨著太陽慢慢變得更熱、更亮，地球將在大約5億年內保持適宜居住。

giving so many more potential people  the chance to become actual people.

讓更多有潛力的人有機會成為真正的人。

And now let's begin to think big.

而現在，讓我們開始思考大問題。

Scenario 2: Humans will leave Earth

情景2：人類將離開地球

We went from humans worshipping  the moon, to humans walking on it,  

我們從人類對月亮的崇拜，到人類在月亮上行走。

so who knows how much farther we can go? If we  don't die out within the next few hundred years,  

所以誰知道我們能走多遠？如果我們沒有在未來幾百年內滅亡的話。

ideas that seem outlandish right  now become serious considerations.

現在看起來離奇的想法會成為嚴肅的考慮。

If we believe that we have a chance of  surviving for maybe millions of years,  

如果我們相信，我們有機會存活也許幾百萬年。

then we could expand onto the other planets  or into our own artificial worlds. Life needs  

然後我們可以擴展到其他星球或我們自己的人造世界。生命需要

three things: a surface, resources and energy.  

三樣東西：一個表面、資源和能源。

Our Sun provides energy for billions of years and  there is so much water and material floating in  

我們的太陽提供了數十億年的能量，有這麼多的水和物質漂浮在

the asteroid and kuiper belt that we could  sustain many times our current population.

在小行星和柯伊伯帶，我們可以維持許多倍於我們目前的人口。

Instead of living on planets, we could decide to  construct our own artificial worlds and habitats.  

我們可以決定建造我們自己的人造世界和棲息地，而不是生活在行星上。

With resources and energy so abundant, we could  try out different types of society and ways of  

由於資源和能源如此豐富，我們可以嘗試不同類型的社會和方式。

life. An interconnected civilization spanning the  solar system would create the basis of existence  

生命。一個跨越太陽系的相互聯繫的文明將創造存在的基礎

for an absurd number of individuals, orders of  magnitude more than if we stick to earth, even  

荒謬的數量，比我們堅持在地球上的數量級更多，甚至是更多。

if it only existed for a few million years. This  future doesn't have to be grim and dark as science  

如果它只存在了幾百萬年。這個未來不一定是嚴峻和黑暗的，因為科學

fiction likes to paint it. With quadrillions of  people waiting to be born, we will have billions  

小說喜歡描繪它。隨著四百億人等待出生，我們將有數十億人

of doctors working on curing cancer, billions  of problem solvers working on ending poverty and  

致力於治癒癌症的醫生、致力於結束貧困的數十億名問題解決者以及

billions of video game developers making life  fun. More humans may actually mean more progress.

數以億計的視頻遊戲開發者讓生活充滿樂趣。更多的人類可能實際上意味著更多的進步。

Another upside of leaving earth and spreading  out is that it becomes much harder for us to  

離開地球並分散開來的另一個好處是，我們變得更難

become extinct, as you need a solar system  wide catastrophe to catch everybody.  

滅絕，因為你需要一個太陽系範圍內的災難來抓住所有人。

So aside from nearby supernovae  or Gamma Rays bursts,  

所以除了附近的超新星或伽馬射線爆發之外。

humanity would be relatively safe from  extinction, maybe for billions of years.

人類將相對安全地免於滅絕，也許有幾十億年的時間。

If we manage to survive for that long, slow  evolution or genetic engineering might split us  

如果我們設法生存了那麼久，緩慢的進化或基因工程可能會分裂我們

into multiple species, or we might intentionally  keep ourselves the same as we are now.  

變成多個物種，或者我們可能有意讓自己保持現在的樣子。

So to account for that, we'll just talk  about people from now on, instead of humans.

所以為了說明這一點，我們從現在開始只談人，而不是人類。

Ok. Now let us think really big.

好的。現在讓我們想想真正的大問題。

Szenario 3: People leave the Solar System

第3種情況：人們離開太陽系

As enormous as the solar system is, it is just  one star system among billions in the milky way.  

儘管太陽系很龐大，但它只是銀河系數十億個恆星系統中的一個。

If future people can colonize, say, 100 billion  stars and live there for 10 billion years, while  

如果未來的人們可以在比如說1000億顆恆星上殖民，並在那裡生活100億年，而

each generating 100 million births per year, then  we can expect something like a hundred Octillion  

每個人每年產生1億個新生兒，那麼我們就可以預計到大約有1億個Octillion

lives to be lived in the future. This is a 1 with  29 zeros, a hundred thousand trillion, trillion.

未來要過的生活。這是一個有29個零的1，十萬億，萬億。

We can spin this up as much as we like. The  Andromeda Galaxy will merge with the Milky way,  

我們可以隨心所欲地旋轉這個問題。仙女座星系將與銀河系合併。

adding another trillion stars for us to settle.  Red Dwarfs stay active for up to a trillion  

再增加一萬億顆恆星供我們定居。 紅矮星保持活躍的時間長達一萬億年

years and future civilizations might even find  energy for their habitats around black holes.  

年，未來的文明甚至可能為它們在黑洞周圍的居住地找到能量。

A sufficiently advanced civilization of our  descendants might even try to reach other  

我們的後代有足夠先進的文明，甚至可以嘗試到達其他國家。

galaxy groups. While these numbers are mind  blowing, they may underestimate the number of  

星系群。雖然這些數字令人震驚，但它們可能低估了以下的數量

unborn people by many orders of magnitude. If we  divide the total energy available in a galaxy by  

未出生的人的數量級。如果我們把一個星系中可用的總能量除以

the average energy needs of a single person,  then we get a tredecillion potential lives.  

一個人的平均能源需求，那麼我們就得到了幾十億個潛在的生命。

A million, trillion, trillion,  trillion potential people.

一百萬、一萬億、一萬億、一萬億的潛在人口。

Conclusion

總結

Hopefully what has become evident is that  if we don't kill ourselves in the next  

希望已經變得明顯的是，如果我們不在接下來的時間裡殺死自己

few centuries or millennia, almost all humans  that will ever exist, will live in the future.  

幾個世紀或幾千年後，幾乎所有將存在的人類，都將生活在未來。

Which brings us back to us, in the present.  We exist at a highpoint of human history,  

這使我們回到了我們自己，在現在。 我們存在於人類歷史的一個高點。

with incredible possibilities at our grasp.  Technological, environmental and societal.  

我們掌握著難以置信的可能性。 技術、環境和社會。

What we do matters for all the  people who do not exist yet.

我們所做的事情對所有還不存在的人都很重要。

So while it is not en vogue to think  about humanity's long term future with  

是以，雖然現在不流行考慮人類的長期未來，但也要考慮到人類的未來。

optimism – or to think about it at all –,  maybe this has given you a bit of perspective.  

樂觀--或者說根本不需要考慮這個問題--也許這讓你有了一點看法。

If we screw up the present, so many  people may never come to exist.  

如果我們搞砸了現在，那麼很多人可能永遠不會出現。

Quadrillions of unborn humans are at our mercy. Even if we go with fairly conservative estimates,  

數以千億計的未出生的人類任由我們擺佈。即使我們採用相當保守的估計。

the unborn are by far the largest group of people  – and the most disenfranchised. Somebody who might  

到目前為止，未出生的人是最大的群體--也是最被剝奪權利的群體。有人可能

be born in a thousand or even a million years  deeply depends on us today for their existence.

在一千年甚至一百萬年後出生的人，他們的存在深深依賴於我們今天。

This is why it is important to think about the  distant future and why our presence is so crucial,  

這就是為什麼要考慮到遙遠的未來，以及為什麼我們的存在是如此關鍵。

why it matters what we do today. One day the  last human will be born. We don't know when.  

為什麼我們今天做什麼很重要？有一天，最後一個人類會出生。我們不知道什麼時候。

But if we change our perspective from  us living at the end of the human story,  

但如果我們改變視角，從我們生活在人類故事的盡頭。

to us living at the very beginning we can  not only build a wonderful world for us  

對我們來說，生活在最開始，我們不僅可以為我們建立一個美好的世界

and for them but also for  countless numbers of others.

為他們，也為無數的其他人。

HUGE announcement: we are launching Kurzgesagt in  six more languages! Arabic, Brazilian Portuguese,  

巨大的公告：我們正在推出Kurzgesagt的另外六種語言!阿拉伯語、巴西葡萄牙語。

French, Hindi, Japanese and Korean, on top of our  English, German and Spanish channels. To bring  

在我們的英語、德語和西班牙語頻道之外，還有法語、印地語、日語和韓語。為了使

new perspectives and a love for science to as  many people as possible – especially to some  

向儘可能多的人提供新的視角和對科學的熱愛--特別是向一些

languages that are underserved because  it is not profitable to translate to.  

因翻譯無利可圖而服務不足的語言。

If enough people watch our new channels, we  hopefully can run them for many years to come!

如果有足夠多的人觀看我們的新頻道，我們希望能在未來的許多年裡都能運行這些頻道!

This is where we need YOUR help. It takes us a  lot of time, effort and yes, money to translate  

這就是我們需要你幫助的地方。我們需要花費大量的時間、精力，是的，還有金錢來翻譯。

our videos properly and run so many channels  – so to make this sustainable, please help  

我們的視頻，並運行這麼多的管道 - 是以，為了使這一工作持續下去，請幫助

us spread the word!If you are a native in one of  these languages, share our videos on social media  

如果你是這些語言的母語者，請在社交媒體上分享我們的視頻。

and tell your friends and family – make people  in your native language aware that it exists.

並告訴你的朋友和家人--讓你母語的人知道它的存在。

This multi language expansion is  supported by Open Philanthropy,  

這一多語言擴展得到了開放慈善組織的支持。

an organization that tries to do as much good as  possible. They want to help us spread awareness  

一個試圖儘可能多做善事的組織。他們希望幫助我們傳播意識

of science, and ideas for how YOU can help  humanity thrive. Their values align with  

科學，以及關於你如何幫助人類繁榮的想法。他們的價值觀符合

ours in many fundamental ways so we are going to  work with them on more projects in the future.

我們在許多基本方面都是如此，所以我們將來會在更多項目上與他們合作。

So please help us spread the word  – and thank you for watching.

是以，請幫助我們傳播這個消息--並感謝您的觀看。