What are the worst outcomes that were avoided in pre 20th century history?

Another volcanic eruption on the scale of Mt. Toba could have done us in pretty easily, if not at least delayed the rise of civilization for a few millennia.
 
According to the "Western misinterpretation" as formulated by Gibbon this was a turning point which stopped Islamic conquests, etc. Of course, many of Gibbon's ideas are considered obsolete by now so it is probably safe to characterize this one as "obsolete Western misinterpretation" and not to take it too seriously. :cool: It is more or less in the same group as Ottoman conquest of all Europe if they won at Vienna or Mongolian conquest of Europe if Ogdai did not die.

Yeah this is true.

In a reality, the next Umayyad invasion happened in 735: the invaders occupied Provence and stayed there for 4 years carrying raids to Lyons, Burgundy, and Piedmont. Anyway, the Muslims stayed in Narbonne and Septimania for another 27 years. Probably the more important part of the whole story is that Charles Martel presumably (my impression is that a lot of guesses is involved) used existing experience (Islamic, if it will make someone feel better ;)), adopted stirrups and started forming heavy cavalry which, in combination with the Frankish traditional infantry, allowed him to start winning the victories. Details on any of these battles, including one of the Tours, are rather vague.

I think it's necessary to iterate upon what I said. The goal of Al-Andalus was not to take over France nor Europe. That wasn't the intention whatsoever. These occupations you are referring to aren't occupations as we currently understand them. This isn't Germany taking over France, it's a couple of troops take over a stronghold or a strategically viable place where raids or invasions can be initiated from. Had Al-Andalus actually conquered such areas, the political system and social stratification that existed in Al-Andalus would we brought over to those newly conquered territories. We would also see Andalusian settlers building colonies or settling in France but there are no reports of this, both from Islamic and Carolingian sources.
 
@Aviennca's Pupil

To be completely fair, though, just because something started as a raid doesn’t mean it couldn’t become something more. Arab incursions into Egypt began as raids, after all, and then became something more permanant after they realized the lack of organized resistance.
 
@cmakk1012

The difference between raids which initiate expansion and raids which turn out to be nothing is objective. The Arabs had always planned to conquer Egypt, it was part of their goal to break Byzantine influence in the region and place the Levant under their domain. The intrusions had the objective of both weakening the Roman's hold on Egypt while providing a safe area for experimentation with different techniques so that, when the time came to conquer Egypt, the Caliphate had a basic idea as to how to do so. The Umayyads had no such intention. The Umayyads were more concerned about how to take Constantinople than they were about some province in France. The gains there were purely for defensibly rather than any attempt to take over France or Europe.
 

apollo11

Banned
@metalinvader665 - You made some good counterpoints regarding the probability of such an entity coming into existence in the first place. Our perspectives will likely continue to diverge in the likelihood of such a regime coming about even if I did a point by point response. I'm interested in your thoughts on my post, #204.
 
@metalinvader665 - You made some good counterpoints regarding the probability of such an entity coming into existence in the first place. Our perspectives will likely continue to diverge in the likelihood of such a regime coming about even if I did a point by point response. I'm interested in your thoughts on my post, #204.

Even worse for our hypothetical evil empire, since they still have to obey physics (namely the speed of light). How can they enforce their will on even Proxima Centauri, let alone a colony on the other side of the galaxy? How will their ideology not diverge when it will take them over 4 years to talk to their neighbours around the nearest star? How many people can escape even further, to the point of leaving the galaxy entirely? Even if you have an utterly oppressive ideology, there will always be people who disagree with it. Look at ISIS, who has killed members who had too radical of a view of Islam even for them and has killed fighters who were too compromising.

And even if they have FTL, why not just go to the ends of the universe to flee from them? It's a big universe after all.
 
An interesting difference would be admiral Yi of Korea was executed prior to the Japanese invasion. He was the only competent Korean leader in the war who wasn’t corrupt. Wihout him, Korea would have certainly fell. I am certain the Japanese defeat against the Ming would be spectacular but I wonder if the my would be driven back out of Korea with their navy left intact. Especially when the Ming are very bad at naval warfare.
 

apollo11

Banned
Even worse for our hypothetical evil empire, since they still have to obey physics (namely the speed of light). How can they enforce their will on even Proxima Centauri, let alone a colony on the other side of the galaxy?
I should start of saying that the non or post-human entity/entities could have a vastly different sociology and/or physiology than us. As such ideological fragmentation due to distances in spacetime might not be an issue. Now every organism within a larger population is separated from other members due to spacetime distances. The same holds true on a galactic level but the difference is merely one in scale not kind. For a species that has a long term and collective outlook due to its physiology, say trillions of trillions of years, it isn't clear they'd view even hundreds of light years as a major inconvenience to galactic administration.

Let's say for some reason, say evolution, a large number of creatures, even a hive minded one, can't expand to a galactic level without decentralizing fragmentation. The solution is fairly simple, namely expansion to the level that such a thing can be avoided, say a section of the galaxy, with intelligent agents and harvest the rest with relatively dumb automated ones. Furthermore such a civilization would likely spam the Local Group with monitoring devices to detect new lifeforms or potentially habitable planets and preemptively destroy them. There are a finite amount of habitable planets in the Local Group and no chances would be taken. If any new ones are created from star formation they can also be destroyed.

With the Local Group freed from any external pressures to resource extraction this civilization would then have a free hand to simply deconstruct our galaxies at its leisure. You don't need more than ONE advanced A.I./Hive Mind to do such a thing. For any physical tasks that need to be done dumb A.I. and robotics (although still more advanced than our current level of technology) would do the job. Thus there would be no threat of internal collapse short of said creature or civilization choosing to commit suicide.
How will their ideology not diverge when it will take them over 4 years to talk to their neighbours around the nearest star?
Ideological mutation is not a given when discussing creatures with a different physiology and time perspective.
How many people can escape even further, to the point of leaving the galaxy entirely?
None. I can explain further but really the answer is none.
Even if you have an utterly oppressive ideology, there will always be people who disagree with it
The humans kept around as pets' opinions would hardly matter, unless said creature(s) decided to become empathic towards humanity. Of course that may occur a trillions years from now after uncountable human generations went through unimaginable torture.
And even if they have FTL
No FTL or physics breaking required for this scenario.

Also I feel like you're missing the forest for the trees. If we are imaging a worse case ATL I can't picture one worse than the creation of a new Apex species by humanity that isn't utopian or at least neutral towards us. If our future timeline or an alternative timeline creates such a thing the Type 3 Civ portions or the expansion to include the entire Local Group are superfluous to the broader issue for homo sapiens proper. Namely that their fate is in the hands of a foreign intelligence that in a worse case scenario would be outright sadistic towards humanity and wouldn't allow us to simply go extinct. Given the possibility of Black Hole Based civilizations lasting trillions of years and them being what we would consider to be evil and sadistic towards us, whether or not they take over the Local Group or just go chill at the edge of the Milky Way to optimize computing power and take us with them, is immaterial to the humans under their control.
 
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apollo11

Banned
Let's not even go full on evil apex creature. Let's imagine a post-homo sapiens species that takes over due to a manmade singularity in this ATL and it is largely benevolent. Maybe this time the species are a group of cyber-humans or genetically enhanced humans. In any case the difference in genetic code due to technological evolution is vast enough for them to no longer be homo sapiens. Like I said they're relatively benign so they treat us about how we house pets.

Now let's they've got a proper solar system wide civilization(s) going, with a hundred trillion individuals. 1 percent of those have a family of four humans as house pets. 1 percent of those aren't good owners no need to elaborate. Even ignoring the fact we've been displaced as the apex and have lost our agency as a species, that's 4 trillion humans as pets and 40 billion in hellish conditions. Any ATL that leads to such a future is by far the worst.
 

ccdsah

Donor
19th century European powers (UK, France, Germany, Austro-Hungary and Russia) and US are allied to make the rest of the world their "bitch". Colonialism would be extented be a couple of centuries at least.
 
19th century European powers (UK, France, Germany, Austro-Hungary and Russia) and US are allied to make the rest of the world their "bitch". Colonialism would be extented be a couple of centuries at least.
That's already happened. Why do you think NATO is united in bombing into oblivion and invading everybody in the middle East who doesn't kowtow to them? Libya, Syria, Iraq in 2003, constant insults and threats against Iran, and maybe Russia counts too. It's nothing to do with human rights (look at Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib, black sites, US allied Israel and Saudi abuses, etc.), that's just a cover. They're important but used in this way are just an excuse
 

ccdsah

Donor
That's already happened. Why do you think NATO is united in bombing into oblivion and invading everybody in the middle East who doesn't kowtow to them? Libya, Syria, Iraq in 2003, constant insults and threats against Iran, and maybe Russia counts too. It's nothing to do with human rights (look at Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib, black sites, US allied Israel and Saudi abuses, etc.), that's just a cover. They're important but used in this way are just an excuse
You don't get it! Imagine Tsarist Russia allied with Kaiser and UK and US all with WMD which have no qualms about using them to suppress rebellions. Basically and extended A4 from Calbear'a AANW timeline only more evil and with no counterparts as India or Cabal China.
In OTL not even US/NATO can claim to command everything on Earth. China and Russia are major players that can get their will done when they want to. In my ATL there's no state actor that can effectively resist an European-US alliance.
 
You don't get it! Imagine Tsarist Russia allied with Kaiser and UK and US all with WMD which have no qualms about using them to suppress rebellions. Basically and extended A4 from Calbear'a AANW timeline only more evil and with no counterparts as India or Cabal China.
In OTL not even US/NATO can claim to command everything on Earth. China and Russia are major players that can get their will done when they want to. In my ATL there's no state actor that can effectively resist an European-US alliance.
Then that's impossible. US and Russia won't accept scraps after UK, Portugal, France, Spain, and Germany have taken the best colonies. Easier for them to ally with some Europeans and defeat other Europeans and take their colonies.
 
I should start of saying that the non or post-human entity/entities could have a vastly different sociology and/or physiology than us. As such ideological fragmentation due to distances in spacetime might not be an issue. Now every organism within a larger population is separated from other members due to spacetime distances. The same holds true on a galactic level but the difference is merely one in scale not kind. For a species that has a long term and collective outlook due to its physiology, say trillions of trillions of years, it isn't clear they'd view even hundreds of light years as a major inconvenience to galactic administration.

You aren't totally wrong, but purging Alpha Centauri of "wrongthink" would be far different than purging our Solar System of wrongthink. Using OTL examples, it's the difference in Strasserism vs Nazism or Stalinism vs Maoism. Physiology, well, there's a limit as to how different they can be from humans OTL given the limited time they have to evolve and fully make their species digital or whatever.

Let's say for some reason, say evolution, a large number of creatures, even a hive minded one, can't expand to a galactic level without decentralizing fragmentation. The solution is fairly simple, namely expansion to the level that such a thing can be avoided, say a section of the galaxy, with intelligent agents and harvest the rest with relatively dumb automated ones. Furthermore such a civilization would likely spam the Local Group with monitoring devices to detect new lifeforms or potentially habitable planets and preemptively destroy them. There are a finite amount of habitable planets in the Local Group and no chances would be taken. If any new ones are created from star formation they can also be destroyed.

With the Local Group freed from any external pressures to resource extraction this civilization would then have a free hand to simply deconstruct our galaxies at its leisure. You don't need more than ONE advanced A.I./Hive Mind to do such a thing. For any physical tasks that need to be done dumb A.I. and robotics (although still more advanced than our current level of technology) would do the job. Thus there would be no threat of internal collapse short of said creature or civilization choosing to commit suicide.

It isn't aliens who would stop them, it's other humans. Totalitarians can't agree on how to govern, the same way democratic governments can't agree on how to govern. And planets aren't an issue when people fleeing from the big bad genocidal slavery species (if only because they want to kill/enslave for different reasons, again, Strasserism vs Hitlerism) presumably can build O'Neill cylinders or similar habitats as homes or even bases. Eventually, they'd flee so far that the totalitarians of Earth weren't a problem since they couldn't do a thing about them.

Ideological mutation is not a given when discussing creatures with a different physiology and time perspective.

But we're talking about a species evolved from humans. Nowadays humans living to be immortals or something nowadays humans might program might as well have ideological mutation. It might be pretty simple, again, Strasserism vs Hitlerism, but why should all of these humans or human created AI agree with each other?

None. I can explain further but really the answer is none.

The humans kept around as pets' opinions would hardly matter, unless said creature(s) decided to become empathic towards humanity. Of course that may occur a trillions years from now after uncountable human generations went through unimaginable torture.

None can escape? In that case, we're going from the lower end of "likely" to the absolute worst case scenario, which we can otherwise say is mostly ASB. Evil AI aren't a unified entity, since AI can choose other ideology, and if a group of ideology doesn't agree with the evil AI, then it appears you have a scenario where the "good guys" escape. I think we're getting far too into the thereotical here.

No FTL or physics breaking required for this scenario.

Type 3 civs almost certainly cannot exist. A Type 3 civ can only exist as a collection of Type 2 civs. Maybe if you build a Birch planet around a supermassive black hole or make a galaxy full of matrioshka brains all set to the same subjective time (meaning no matrioshka brain network is any more than a year or so out of reach of the most distant network) you could make a Type 3 civ. But that's going to be pretty hard to do, especially in the scenario you laid out.

Also I feel like you're missing the forest for the trees. If we are imaging a worse case ATL I can't picture one worse than the creation of a new Apex species by humanity that isn't utopian or at least neutral towards us. If our future timeline or an alternative timeline creates such a thing the Type 3 Civ portions or the expansion to include the entire Local Group are superfluous to the broader issue for homo sapiens proper. Namely that their fate is in the hands of a foreign intelligence that in a worse case scenario would be outright sadistic towards humanity and wouldn't allow us to simply go extinct. Given the possibility of Black Hole Based civilizations lasting trillions of years and them being what we would consider to be evil and sadistic towards us, whether or not they take over the Local Group or just go chill at the edge of the Milky Way to optimize computing power and take us with them, is immaterial to the humans under their control.

So they use the Local Group's resources to make more of themselves, exactly as OTL humans might? But as a sentient species, they aren't immune to ideological drift, and some members of their species might question whether torture of random primitives (who made them to begin with) is worth it, or whether the gods they sacrifice the primitives to are real/care. I'm not convinced Roko's Basilisk or similar evil AI are necessarily that dangerous of a problem, so I'm not convinced your scenario of evil AI would exist for the same reason I'm not convinced your dystopian Earth civilisation makes sense.

The universe is too big of a place for people not to flee too, and intelligent life--be it biological or artificial--too diverse that infinite torture of random primitives to be that great of a concern. Especially since this scenario posits such a computer to be created by humans to begin with.
 
In the 20th century the very worst hypothetical outcomes are often discussed like if the Nazis won in Europe and managed to enact Generalplan Ost or if a nuclear exchange occurred between the US and the USSR.

What are the worst plausible outcomes that were avoided in pre 20th century history whether in terms of body count or damage to society as a whole?

The 20th century was the greatest catastrophe in human history. It is literally hard to imagine how things could possibly have gone any worse, short of all out nuclear war and the extinction of the human species.

Edit - I misread the question. Nevermind.
 
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apollo11

Banned
You aren't totally wrong, but purging Alpha Centauri of "wrongthink" would be far different than purging our Solar System of wrongthink. Using OTL examples, it's the difference in Strasserism vs Nazism or Stalinism vs Maoism.
I see no practical difference in purging life in this Solar System or Alpha Centauri or in the Andromeda Galaxy. The boundaries you are constructing are artificial. Really without FTL the only boundary that matters are the points outside of the Local Group life can never reach.
Physiology, well, there's a limit as to how different they can be from humans OTL given the limited time they have to evolve and fully make their species digital or whatever.
There is a limit but you are underestimating it. Firstly this post/non-human entity would have been created from "artificial" circumstances not normal evolution. Let's not pretend that this species we are referring to would have taken billions of years to climb out of the muck and so would be bound by normal evolutionary trends.

Secondly considering that a General A.I. or what have you would have the ability to direct their own evolution in a manner a normal homo sapiens couldn't it's misleading to hark on time as a limitation especially since we are talking about a potential ATL civilization having hundreds of years of having A.I. or whatever equivalent post-human beings around.

Thirdly bodies matter. They change perspective. A human mind in a dog's body isn't the same as a mind in a human's body isn't the same as a human mind running on a computer. A being that is physically different and sees the world differently from humans is going to change its actions compared to us.

Fourth subjective time, as you noted in your detailing of a Type 3 civilization, is a thing. So a being that in "real-time" has lived a hundred years could have experienced tens of thousands of years.
It isn't aliens who would stop them, it's other humans.
You're making the assumption that humans, when faced with a new apex species, would be ABLE to stop them. Which is a bit like assuming the ants outside my house can stop me from going to work. We are talking about beings with intelligence orders of magnitude higher than humanity. With subjective time experiences giving them a large breath of simulated experience. Sure in some ATL humanity would win against such beings but there will be many in which humanity does not.
Totalitarians can't agree on how to govern, the same way democratic governments can't agree on how to govern.
And here you are making the assumption again that this species sociology would be the same as ours. It could easily be a hive mind with no such issues.
And planets aren't an issue when people fleeing from the big bad genocidal slavery species (if only because they want to kill/enslave for different reasons, again, Strasserism vs Hitlerism) presumably can build O'Neill cylinders or similar habitats as homes or even bases.
You're assuming that in ATL humanity has easy interstellar space travel before advanced A.I., biology, genetics, or cybernetics. Why are you assuming that humans would ever be in a position to outrun such an apex? Every timeline isn't going to develop interstellar travel before they create a species that can be their doom.
But we're talking about a species evolved from humans.
That doesn't mean it would stay human for long or that it was even designed to be very human like to begin with. Just because something was created by humans doesn't mean it will act like one or was even created to be like one.
Nowadays humans living to be immortals or something nowadays humans might program might as well have ideological mutation.
Or it might not. In fact a being that can decide on its own evolutionary course would probably choose not too to reduce competition for resources. One possible end state for such a creature would simply to be to keep other life from evolving the Local Group and amass as many resources as possible to exist for as long as possible. Having other equals to yourself to fight for resources doesn't benefit you in any way.
It might be pretty simple, again, Strasserism vs Hitlerism, but why should all of these humans or human created AI agree with each other?
Now this is a good point. Of course the first move advantage due to the subjective experience issue I've mentioned above could lend itself to a situation in which the first A.I. has such a large advantage they tend to sweep the floor with the rest of competition. Still this alternate scenario you've pitched here doesn't change the fundamental issue for us regular homo sapiens, namely that we aren't the top of the food chain, that we are subservient to this new race of beings. Only this time apparently with two or more super being groups in perpetual war over petty ideological differences.

That's pretty grimdark too.
None can escape? In that case, we're going from the lower end of "likely" to the absolute worst case scenario, which we can otherwise say is mostly ASB.
Not really. Like I mentioned earlier you're assuming that in the "Song Empire industrializes" timeline easy interstellar travel occurs before the rise of post-human beings. And it should be noted it's not even clear if in OUR timeline that is the case.
Evil AI aren't a unified entity, since AI can choose other ideology, and if a group of ideology doesn't agree with the evil AI, then it appears you have a scenario where the "good guys" escape. I think we're getting far too into the thereotical here.
See my earlier point about higher beings still reduce human agency and all that.

Type 3 civs almost certainly cannot exist. A Type 3 civ can only exist as a collection of Type 2 civs. Maybe if you build a Birch planet around a supermassive black hole or make a galaxy full of matrioshka brains all set to the same subjective time (meaning no matrioshka brain network is any more than a year or so out of reach of the most distant network) you could make a Type 3 civ. But that's going to be pretty hard to do, especially in the scenario you laid out.
Or just push all the matter in a galaxy into black holes and harvest them. Bam Type 3 civilization. In fact once star formation stops in one hundred trillion years a Type 3 style civilization would be the only game in town.
So they use the Local Group's resources to make more of themselves, exactly as OTL humans might? But as a sentient species, they aren't immune to ideological drift,
I've already noted it could be a hive mind or just one entity. No reason to make more copies. Unless you count the digital copies within the virtual simulations I'd imagine such a creature would run. But that's a whole different thread saved for another part of this forum.
and some members of their species might question whether torture of random primitives (who made them to begin with) is worth it, or whether the gods they sacrifice the primitives to are real/care. I'm not convinced Roko's Basilisk or similar evil AI are necessarily that dangerous of a problem, so I'm not convinced your scenario of evil AI would exist for the same reason I'm not convinced your dystopian Earth civilisation makes sense.

The universe is too big of a place for people not to flee too, and intelligent life--be it biological or artificial--too diverse that infinite torture of random primitives to be that great of a concern. Especially since this scenario posits such a computer to be created by humans to begin with.
The bolded portion of your response leaves me scratching my head. Humans are primates. We kill, rape, torture, steal, destroy and do said things on massive scales. For all the moral good humans do we also regularly and daily engage in horrific behavior. If your hypothesis is that a being made by humans will be human-like behaviors then you should fear a Roko's Basilisk situation FAR more than I do given that I think they will have fairly alien psychology.
 
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