This program is written for all songs to be singalongs. Please have everyone join in on all the songs that you're able to.
For a small group, I suggest taking turns reading the speeches, either paragraph-by-paragraph or speech-by-speech.
Each song has a short introduction which you may also want to read.
Consider having some lights that can be turned down partially, and be ready to turn all the lights off at the darkest point in the program.
If you have musical accompaniment, that's great, but the songs have been chosen in part because they should be enjoyable even with none.
[This is a children's song about the original centerpiece of all Solstice celebrations: the sun. Sing along!]
[Optional: choose one person to do the spoken-word parts, in italics.]
The sun is a mass of incandescent gas
A gigantic nuclear furnace
Where hydrogen is built into helium
At a temperature of millions of degrees
Yo ho, it's hot, the sun is not
A place where we could live
But here on earth there'd be no life
Without the light it gives
We need its light
We need its heat
We need its energy
Without the sun, without a doubt
There'd be no you and me
The sun is a mass of incandescent gas
A gigantic nuclear furnace
Where hydrogen is built into helium
At a temperature of millions of degrees
The sun is hot
It is so hot that everything on it is a gas: iron, copper, aluminum, and many others.
The sun is large
If the sun were hollow, a million earths could fit inside. and yet, the sun is only a middle-sized star.
The sun is far away
About 93 million miles away, and that's why it looks so small.
And even when it's out of sight
The sun shines night and day
The sun gives heat
The sun gives light
The sunlight that we see
The sunlight comes from our own sun's
Atomic energy
Scientists have found that the sun is a huge atom-smashing machine. the heat and light of the sun come from the nuclear reactions of hydrogen, carbon, nitrogen, and helium.
The sun is a mass of incandescent gas
A gigantic nuclear furnace
Where hydrogen is built into helium
At a temperature of millions of degrees
[Select one speaker for this part.]
Before we continue with the musical part of our program, let us speak the Litany of Gendlin together.
What is true is already so.
Owning up to it doesn't make it worse.
Not being open about it doesn't make it go away.
And because it's true, it is what is there to be interacted with.
Anything untrue isn't there to be lived.
People can stand what is true,
for they are already enduring it.
And now, our first Litany of Tarski of the program. Repeat after me.
If the sky is blue, then I desire to believe the sky is blue.
If the sky is not blue, then I desire to believe the sky is not blue.
Let me not become attached to beliefs I may not want.
[The speaker now ceremoniously checks the color of the sky and reports on it for the audience, or the audience may participate if the sky is visible to them.]
[And now, for a lighthearted song about existential risk.] (to the tune of "12 days of Christmas")
On the first day of X-Risk I suddenly could see:
The end of humanity
On the second day of X-Risk I suddenly could see
Nuclear War!
And the end of humanity
On the third day of X-Risk I suddenly could see
Pandemic Plagues
Nuclear War
And the end of humanity
On the fourth day of X-Risk I suddenly could see
Bioengineering
Pandemic Plagues
Nuclear War
And the end of humanity
On the fifth day of X-Risk I suddenly could see
Unfriendly AI...
Bioengineering
Pandemic Plagues
Nuclear War
And the end of humanity
On the sixth day of X-Risk I suddenly could see
One nanite making two nanites making...
Unfriendly AI...
Bioengineering
Pandemic Plagues
Nuclear War
And the end of humanity
[by Maia Werbos]
Let’s take a second to ask: how many of us here have been to a Secular Winter Solstice before? Raise your hands.
(pause)
And how many have not?
(pause)
As an introduction for the new people, and a reminder to everyone else, we're going to talk a bit about what Solstice is and its history.
The first-ever Solstice was a gathering at Raymond Arnold’s house in 2011, but the first official event was in 2013, two years later.
Here’s a description of Solstice from Ray:
This holiday was created for people with a worldview rooted in both science, progress and compassion. Who want to make the world a better place, and who understand that sometimes this means learning new things that challenge your worldview.
The Secular Solstice is a time when we tell inspiring stories that remind us we’re not alone. That challenge us to work to make a better future. But, crucially, those stories have a firm grounding in our latest, best understanding of the world. (Sometimes this even means taking a second look at the stories that were foundational to solstice).
Ray has sometimes said that he was trying to make a holiday that resembled his family holiday celebrations, but actually reflected his own deep values and up-to-date beliefs. A more accurate holiday was necessarily more depressing, because there are some depressing truths to confront in this world: We humans are out here alone. Nihil supernum. Only nothingness above. Yet, it’s worth looking down, too. We’re alone with ourselves, but that’s not actually the same thing as alone. We have each other. And through the long dark of winter, we can help each other. We can make the world better.
Solstice has an arc, an emotional journey that we go on together. Ray describes it like this:
It begins light, enthusiastic and joyful. It transitions into somber contemplation. Candles are gradually extinguished, until a single candle remains. Someone tells a personal, vulnerable story about the hardships they or the community have faced. The story ends by finding good reasons to hope, to keep trying, even in the face of absolute darkness.
Then the lights are reignited. You sing together about the world humanity has built together, and the future you will help create.
Solstice has changed a lot since it was first conceived. Existential risk has become a greater theme in recent years; COVID changed our sense of ourselves as a community and also gave us new things to mourn for. Death as a tragedy and an enemy is a constant theme, but we've also explored courage, when to give up and when to fight, and how to learn from failure. We've confronted the hard and the transcendent and corrected our mistakes, even in the Solstice program itself.
Since that first celebration in 2013, people have been celebrating Secular Solstice in more and more cities and even countries; these days, the Bay Area celebration is the largest, followed by New York, but there have also been celebrations in numerous US cities, Canada, Australia, the UK, and Germany.
It’s worth thinking about that. We’re here together, not only with the people in this room, but with many others throughout the world, who share these things with us.
Tonight we are going on a journey to face the darkness together. That, in a nutshell, is our Solstice.
[This next song is a classic Solstice song about the human struggle to transcend our limitations.]
Hands chip the flint, light the fire, skin the kill
Feet move the tribe, track the herd with a will
Humankind struggles, on the edge of history
Time to settle down, time to grow, time to breed..
Plow tills the soil, plants the seed, pray for rain
Scythe reaps the wheat, to the mill, to grind the grain
Towns and cities spread to empire overnight
Hands keep building as we chant the ancient rite...
Coal heats the steam, push the piston, turns the wheel
Cogs spin the wool, drives the horses made of steel
Lightning harnessed does our will and lights the dark
Keep rising higher, set our goal, hit the mark...
[Bridge]
Crawl.. out.. of... the mud.
On... go... ing... but slow.
For the path... that is easy
Ain't the one... that... makes us grow
Light push the sails, read the data, cities glow
Hands type the keys, tap the screen, out we go!
Our voices carry round the world and into space
Send us out to colonize another place.
Tools, make the tools, light the fire, plant the grain
Drones, track the herd. Build a world. Begin again...
[The next song, Bold Orion, is in part about how winter will kill you if you’re unprepared, which is a central theme of Solstice. Some notes on the accuracy of the song, since that is important to us. It is actually written from the perspective of early fall, “when the days are getting shorter”-- at that time of year, you may see Orion towards the east at midnight. At other times of year, such as the winter solstice, it appears at a different time and location during the night.
And there has been one change to the lyrics recently for accuracy. Orion is not in fact older than the continents; although stars last a very long time, the patterns of stars in our sky do not. Constellations shift on a timescale of tens to hundreds of thousands of years. So rather than “kings and continents and all,” this year, we are singing “kings and commonwealths and all.”]
When the days are gettin' shorter, and the nights are growin' long,
And the north wind puts a tear into your eye,
If you're out about 'round midnight and you look off to the east,
There you may see bold Orion on the rise.
You may know him by his stance or the starry shield he holds,
As he rises silent in a clear cold sky.
Young Jack Frost and Old Man Winter, they both beckon to the call
Of their master bold Orion on the rise.
CHORUS: Bold Orion, mighty hunter, rising in a clear cold sky,
See the summer fall before him. Bold Orion is on the rise.
For seven starry ages, he has ruled the winter skies
With the fires of lost eons in his eyes.
He has seen the rise and fall of kings and commonwealths and all,
Rising silent, bold Orion on the rise.
When he ascends, no hesitation; when he moves, no turnin' round,
Like a soul been called to glory, earthly born but heavenly bound.
Now the bird is on the wing, and it's southward that she flies,
Hastened on by bold Orion on the rise. CHORUS
Summer comes on all too slowly, and it passes far too fast,
And you wonder, is there nothin' that can last?
Here today and gone tomorrow as the green leaves turn to red,
As the present quickly turns into the past.
Cut the wood and stack it high now. Stoke the fires in your home.
Burnin' nightly send the smoke up to the sky.
Keep the winter at your door and keep the summer in your heart.
Drink a toast to bold Orion on the rise. CHORUS 2X
[This song was originally written as an atheist's reaction to inaccuracies in Christian beliefs, but can be read with a more general meaning as well: The map is not the territory. The truth is out there to be found, and it's up to us to try to find it.]
From desert cliff and mountaintop we trace the wide design,
Strikeslip fault and overthrust and syn and anticline. . .
We gaze upon creation where erosion makes it known,
And count the countless aeons in the banding of the stone.
Odd long vanished creatures & their tracks & shells are found
Where truth has left its sketches on the slate below the ground.
The patient stone can speak, if we but listen when it talks.
Humans wrote the book of earth... time wrote the rocks.
There are those who name the stars, who watch the sky by night,
Seeking out the darkest place, to better see the light.
Long ago, when threats and trials broke his weary will,
Galileo recanted, but the Earth is moving still.
High above the mountaintops, where only distance bars,
The truth has left its footprints in the dust between the stars
We may watch and study or may shudder and deny
Humans wrote the book of night... fire wrote the sky.
By stem and root and branch we trace, by feather, fang and fur,
How the living things that are descend from things that were
The moss, the kelp, the zebrafish, the very mice and flies,
Tiny, humble, wordless things how shall they tell us lies?
We are kin to beasts, no other answer can we bring.
The truth has left its fingerprints on every living thing.
Winnowed by an aimless game of birth and blood and strife.
Humans wrote the book of names... death wrote life.
And we who listen to the stars, or walk the dusty grade,
Or break the very atoms down to see how they are made,
Or study cells or living things, seek truth with open hand
The pro foundest act of worship is to try to understand.
Deep in flower and in flesh, in star and soil and seed,
The truth has left its living word for anyone to read.
So turn and look where best you think the story is unfurled.
Humans write the book of truth... truth writes the world.
[by Carl Sagan]
In 1977, humanity sent a small extension of itself into the cosmos. A tiny metal avatar of our curiosity and our goodwill.
Thirteen years later, as the Voyager 1 probe left our solar system, Carl Sagan asked NASA to take one final photograph of the Earth before it disappeared into the darkness.
The photo was taken, and transmitted 6 billion kilometers back to Earth. Sagan had this to say about it:
Look at that.
That’s here. That’s home. That’s us.
That is everyone you love, everyone you know, Everyone you ever heard of, Every human being who ever was, lived out their lives.
The aggregate of our joy and suffering. Thousands of confident religions, ideologies and economic doctrines.
Every hunter and forager Every hero and coward, Every creator and destroyer of civilization.
Every king, and peasant. Every young couple in love. Every mother and father, Hopeful child Inventor and explorer.
Every teacher of morals. Every corrupt politician. Every “superstar”. Every “supreme leader.” Every saint and sinner in the history of our species, lived there, on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.
The Earth is a very small stage in a vast, cosmic arena.
Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors, so that in glory and triumph, they could become momentary masters of a fraction of a dot.
Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel, On the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner.
How frequent their misunderstandings. How eager they are to kill one another, How fervent their hatreds
Our posturings, our imagined self-importance The delusion that we have some privileged position in the universe, Are challenged by this point of pale light.
Our planet is a lovely speck, in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness There is no hint that help will come from elsewhere, To save us from ourselves.
The earth is the only world known, so far, to harbor life. There is nowhere else, in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet.
Like it or not, for the moment, the Earth is where we make our stand.
[The next song, Song of Artesian Water, is a poem by Banjo Paterson about drilling for water in the Australian desert. It highlights the Solstice theme of human struggle to survive and thrive in a harsh universe.]
Now the stock have started dying, for the Lord has sent a drought,
But we're sick of prayers and Providence -- we're going to do without,
With the derricks up above us and the solid earth below,
We are waiting at the lever for the word to let her go.
Sinking down, deeper down,
Oh, we'll sink it deeper down:
As the drill is plugging downward at a thousand feet of level,
If the Lord won't send us water, oh, we'll get it from the devil;
Yes, we'll get it from the devil deeper down.
Now, our engine's built in Glasgow by a very canny Scot,
And he marked it twenty horse-power, but he didn't know what’s what.
When Canadian Bill is firing with the sun-dried gidgee logs,
She can equal thirty horses and a score or so of dogs.
Sinking down, deeper down
Oh, we're going deeper down:
If we fail to get the water, then it's ruin to the squatter,
For the drought is on the station and the weather's growing hotter,
But we're bound to get the water deeper down.
But the shaft has started caving and the sinking's very slow,
And the yellow rods are bending in the water down below,
And the tubes are always jamming, and they can't be made to shift
Till we nearly burst the engine with a forty horse-power lift,
Sinking down, deeper down,
Oh, we're going deeper down:
Though the shaft is always caving, and the tubes are always jamming,
Yet we'll fight our way to water while the stubborn drill is ramming-
While the stubborn drill is ramming deeper down.
But there's no artesian water, though we're passed three thousand feet,
And the contract price is growing, and the boss is nearly beat.
But it must be down beneath us, and it's down we've got to go.
Though she's bumping on the solid rock four thousand feet below,
Sinking down, deeper down,
Oh, we're going deeper down:
And it's time they heard us knocking on the roof of Satan's dwellin',
But we'll get artesian water if we cave the roof of hell in-
Oh we'll get artesian water deeper down.
But it's hark! the whistle's blowing with a wild, exultant blast,
And the boys are madly cheering, for they've struck the flow at last:
And it's rushing up the tubing from four thousand feet below,
Till it spouts above the casing in a million-gallon flow.
And it's down, deeper down-
Oh, it comes from deeper down:
It is flowing, ever flowing, in a free, unstinted measure
From the silent hidden places where the old earth hides her treasure-
Where the old earth hides her treasure deeper down.
And it's clear away the timber and it's let the water run,
How it glimmers in the shadow, how it flashes in the sun!
By the silent belts of timber, by the miles of blazing plain
It is bringing hope and comfort to the thirsty land again.
Flowing down, further down:
It is flowing further down
To the tortured thirsty cattle, bringing gladness in its going;
Through the droughty days of summer it is flowing, ever flowing-
It is flowing, ever flowing, further down.
[The next song, Hymn of Breaking Strain, is one of the most enduring Solstice songs, as well as a poem by Rudyard Kipling. It is an atheist song about God-- a reflection on how, if we had a true creator god, perhaps they would give us a clear purpose and respect our limits, unlike what we actually observe in the world.]
The careful text-books measure - Let all who build beware!
The load, the shock, the pressure material can bear
So, when the buckled girder lets down the grinding span
The blame of loss, or murder, is laid upon the man
Not on the Steel - the Man!
But, in our daily dealing with stone and steel, we find
The Gods have no such feeling of justice toward mankind
To no set gauge they make us, for no laid course prepare -
In time they overtake us with loads we cannot bear:
Too merciless to bear
The prudent text-books give it in tables at the end -
The stress that shears a rivet, or makes a tie-bar bend -
What traffic wrecks macadam - what concrete should endure -
But we, poor Sons of Adam, have no such literature
To warn us or make sure!
We hold all Earth to plunder - all Time and Space as well -
Too wonder-stale to wonder at each new miracle;
Till in the mid-illusion of Godhood 'neath our hand
Falls multiple confusion on all we did or planned -
The mighty works we planned
We only in Creation - how much luckier the bridge and rail! -
Abide the twin-damnation, to fail and know we fail
Yet we - by which sole token we know we once were Gods -
Take shame in being broken, however great the odds -
The Burden or the Odds
Oh, veiled and secret Power, whose paths we seek in vain
Be with us in our hour of overthrow and pain
That we - by which sure token we know Thy ways are true -
In spite of being broken, or because of being broken
May rise and build anew
Stand up and build anew!
[At this point in the program, dim the lights if you can.]
[This is a song about death, both solemn and light.]
They may bury my body when I die (when I die)
They may bury my body when I die (when I die)
Near some grave site I'd be found, simply rotting in the ground
If they bury my body when I die
They may burn my body when I die (when I die)
They may burn my body when I die (when I die)
When the fiery furnace flashes, I'll be nothing left but ashes
If they burn my body when I die
They may use my body when I die (when I die)
They may use my body when I die (when I die)
As the doctors ply their arts, I'll be in a hundred parts
If they use my body when I die
They may freeze my body when I die (when I die)
They may freeze my body when I die (when I die)
Though I may well be mis- taken I would hope to re-a waken
If they freeze my body when I die
They may eat my body when I die (when I die)
They may eat my body when I die (when I die)
If a zombie horde re- mains, they'll be hankering for brains
If they eat my body when I die
There's a chance: I'll never die at all ...
There's a chance: I'll never die at all ...
Cheating death is such a rarity, it would take a singu- larity
To per- mit, I never die at all
They may bury my body when I die (when I die)
They may bury my body when I die (when I die)
Near some grave site I'd be found, simply rotting in the ground
If they bury my body when I die
[by Eliezer Yudkowsky, edited by Raymond Arnold]
I remember, from distant childhood, what it’s like to live in the world where God exists. Really exists, the way that children and rationalists take all their beliefs at face value.
In the world where God exists, he doesn’t intervene to optimize everything. God won’t make you a sandwich. Parents don’t do everything their children ask. There are good arguments against always giving someone what they desire.
I don’t want to become a simple wanting-thing, that never has to plan or act or think.
But clearly, there’s some threshold of horror, awful enough that God will intervene. I remember that being true, when I believed after the fashion of a child. The God who never intervenes - that’s an obvious attempt to avoid falsification, to protect a belief-in-belief. The beliefs of young children really shape their expectations - they honestly expect to see the dragon in their garage. They have no reason to imagine a loving God who never acts. No loving parents, desiring their child to grow up strong and self-reliant, would let their toddler be run over by a car.
But what if you built a simulated universe? Could you escape the reach of God? Simulate sentient minds, and torture them? If God’s watching everywhere, then of course trying to build an unfair world results in the God intervening - stepping in to modify your transistors. God is omnipresent. There’s no refuge anywhere for true horror.
Life is fair.
But suppose you ask the question: Given such-and-such initial conditions, and given such-and-such rules, what would be the mathematical result?
Not even God can change the answer to that question.
What does life look like, in this imaginary world, where each step follows only from its immediate predecessor? Where things only ever happen, or don’t happen, because of mathematical rules? And where the rules don’t describe a God that checks over each state? What does it look like, the world of pure math, beyond the reach of God?
That world wouldn’t be fair. If the initial state contained the seeds of something that could self-replicate, natural selection might or might not take place. Complex life might or might not evolve. That life might or might not become sentient. That world might have the equivalent of conscious cows, that lacked hands or brains to improve their condition. Maybe they would be eaten by conscious wolves who never thought that they were doing wrong, or cared.
If something like humans evolved, then they would suffer from diseases - not to teach them any lessons, but only because viruses happened to evolve as well. If the people of that world are happy, or unhappy, it might have nothing to do with good or bad choices they made. Nothing to do with free will or lessons learned. In the what-if world, Genghis Khan can murder a million people, and laugh, and be rich, and never be punished, and live his life much happier than the average. Who would prevents it?
And if the Khan tortures people to death, for his own amusement? They might call out for help, perhaps imagining a God. And if you really wrote the program, God would intervene, of course. But in the what-if question, there isn’t any God in the system. The victims will be saved only if the right cells happen to be 0 or 1. And it’s not likely that anyone will defy the Khan; if they did, someone would strike them with a sword, and the sword would disrupt their organs and they would die, and that would be the end of that.
So the victims die, screaming, and no one helps them. That is the answer to the what-if question.
…is this world starting to sound familiar?
Could it really be that sentient beings have died, absolutely, for millions of years…. with no soul and no afterlife… not as any grand plan of Nature. Not to teach us about the meaning of life. Not even to teach a profound lesson about what is impossible.
Just dead. Just because.
Once upon a time, I believed that the extinction of humanity was not allowed. And others, who call themselves rationalists, may yet have things they trust. They might be called “positive-sum games”, or “democracy”, or “capitalism”, or “technology”, but they’re sacred. They can’t lead to anything really bad, not without a silver lining. The unfolding history of Earth can’t ever turn from its positive-sum trend to a negative-sum trend. Democracies won’t ever legalize torture. Technology has done so much good, that there can’t possibly be a black swan that breaks the trend and does more harm than all the good up until this point.
Anyone listening, who still thinks that being happy counts for more than anything in life, well, maybe they shouldn’t ponder the unprotectedness of their existence. Maybe think of it just long enough to sign up themselves and their family for cryonics, or write a check to an existential-risk-mitigation agency now and then. Or at least wear a seatbelt and get health insurance and all those other dreary necessary things that can destroy your life if you miss that one step… but aside from that, if you want to be happy, meditating on the fragility of life isn’t going to help.
But I’m speaking now to those who have something to protect.
What can a twelfth-century peasant do to save themselves from annihilation? Nothing. Nature’s challenges aren’t always fair. When you run into a challenge that’s too difficult, you suffer the penalty; when you run into a lethal penalty, you die. That’s how it is for people, and it isn’t any different for planets. Someone who wants to dance the deadly dance with Nature needs to understand what they’re up against: Absolute, utter, exceptionless neutrality.
And knowing this might not save you. It wouldn’t save a twelfth-century peasant, even if they knew. If you think that a rationalist who fully understands the mess they’re in, must be able to find a way out - well, then you trust rationality. Enough said.
Still, I don’t want to create needless despair, so I will say a few hopeful words at this point:
If humanity’s future unfolds in the right way, we might be able to make our future fair(er). We can’t change physics. But we can build some guardrails, and put down some padding.
Someday, maybe, minds will be sheltered. Children might burn a finger or lose a toy, but they won’t ever be run over by cars. A super-intelligence would not be intimidated by a challenge where death is the price of a single failure. The raw universe wouldn’t seem so harsh, would be only another problem to be solved.
The problem is that building an adult is itself an adult challenge. That’s what I finally realized, years ago.
If there is a fair(er) universe, we have to get there starting from this world - the neutral world, the world of hard concrete with no padding. The world where challenges are not calibrated to your skills, and you can die for failing them.
What does a child need to do, to solve an adult problem?
[One speaker says:]
Repeat after me.
If I should abandon my plans, I desire to believe that I should abandon my plans.
If I should NOT abandon my plans, I desire to believe that I should NOT abandon my plans.
Let me not become attached to beliefs I may not want.
[This next song is about staying together through dark times.]
[Song leader says: This song is call-and response for each line. Please repeat after me.]
Beneath midwinter midnight moon
Told you I'd be coming soon
I wish somehow, I wish you knew
that you are not alone.
You are not alone.
Beneath midwinter midnight snow
There's no sign pointing where to go
No single sign that life could grow
But still, you're not alone.
You are not alone.
Beneath midwinter midnight sky
Sometimes people say goodbye,
And no one's here to tell us why
But we are not alone.
But we are not alone.
Beneath midwinter morning light
Getting hard to know what's right
But take my hand and hold on tight
Cause we are not alone.
We are not alone
We are not alone
[Someone set a silent timer for one minute. Turn off all the lights. Announce:]
We will now have a minute of silence.
[Turn the lights back on.]
[And now to come out of the darkness, let us all sing Brighter than Today.]
[Verse]
Countless winter nights ago,
A woman shivered in the cold.
Cursed the skies, and wondered why
The gods invented pain.
Aching angry flesh and bone,
Bitterly she struck the stone
Till she saw the sudden spark
Of light, and golden flame.
She showed the others, but they told her
She was not fit to control
The primal forces that the gods
Had cloaked in mystery
But she would not be satisfied,
And though she trembled, she defied them
Took her torch and raised it high
Set afire history.
[Chorus]
Tomorrow can be brighter than to-day,
although the night is cold.
The stars may seem so very far a-way...
But courage, hope and reason burn,
In every mind, each lesson learned,
Shining light to guide our way
Make tomorrow brighter than to-day...
Oh, tomorrow can be brighter than to-day.
[Verse]
Ages long forgotten now,
We built the wheel and then the plough.
Tilled the earth and proved our worth,
Against the drought and snow.
Soon we had the time to fathom
Mountain peaks and tiny atoms,
Beating hearts electric sparks
So much more to know.
[Chorus]
Tomorrow can be brighter than to-day,
although the night is cold.
The stars may seem so very far a-way...
But courage, hope and reason grow
With every passing season so we’ll
Drive the darkness far away
Make tomorrow brighter than to-day...
Oh, tomorrow can be brighter than to-day.
[Verse]
The universe may seem unfair.
The laws of nature may not care.
The storms and quakes, our own mistakes,
They nearly doused our flame.
But all these trials we’ve endured
The lessons learned, diseases cured
Against our herculean task
We’ve risen to proclaim.
[Chorus]
Tomorrow can be brighter than to-day,
although the night is cold.
The stars may seem so very far a-way...
But courage, hope and reason bloom
Across the world and one day soon, we’ll
Rise up to the stars and say:
Make tomorrow brighter than today
Oh, tomorrow can be brighter than today.
[The next song, Endless Lights, was written to be a second Solstice centerpiece, a companion to Brighter than Today. It’s a song about, well… what if we get the bad ending? How can we still make meaning for ourselves with our families and friends, without glorifying the death of the human race, which is, in fact, bad? And what it says is: by treasuring and extending the time we have, as much as we possibly can.]
[Verse]
Mama's been waiting, huddled outside.
Brother is quietly holding her tight
Hurrying home and I hope there's still time for
One... more... night...
Slowly she turns... opens her eyes
Struggles to stand... points to the sky
Barely can breathe but she's telling the stories
One... last... time...
[Prechorus]
And she whispers of hunters and dragons and gods
Wanderers roaming the stars up above
Holding her hand in that moment I wonder,
Can't help but wonder at all... those...
[Chorus]
Endless lights, burning with untold stories,
Each of them one more reason to wonder
Is anyone out there, is anyone out there?
Anyone out there tonight?
[Verse]
Father is waiting for sister and me
Thousands of miles away, over the sea; and we’re
Flying as fast as the Boeing'll carry us
One... last... time...
Thinking of stories he told from the war
Terrible jokes that he made us endure
Daylight is ending, the plane is descending
Just... in... time...
[Prechorus]
As the clouds part around us, a dazzling city
Shines like a jewel in the night.
And I look at our home and its lights all a glow'n and I
can't help but wonder at all... those...
[Chorus]
Endless lights, burning with untold stories,
Each of them one more reason to wonder
Is anyone out there, is anyone out there?
Endless night, cradling countless voices,
Reaching across the vastness…
With beautiful stories, lasting as long as they can...
...beautiful stories lasting as long as they can...
[Verse]
Grandma's been waiting for clues in the dark, and I'm
Traveling millions of miles to take part.
And finally I see her glint in the viewing port,
Right... on... time...
Weightless embrace as the airlock reseals,
Space station turning and slowly reveals:
Rows upon rows of her telescopes listening
Deep... through... time...
[Prechorus]
And maybe there's some kind of somebody out there
Listening in on our radio calls
Or maybe there's not there's just one pale blue dot to give
Meaning and beauty and worth to it all.
But holding her hand in that moment I wonder,
Can't help but wonder at all wonder at all... those...
[Chorus]
Endless lights, burning with untold stories,
Each of them one more reason to wonder
Is anyone out there, is anyone out there?
Endless night, cradling countless voices,
Reaching across the vastness…
With beautiful stories, lasting as long as they can...
...beautiful stories lasting as as long as they can...
...lasting as as long as they can...
[by Eliezer Yudkowsky, edited by Raymond Arnold]
[Written for two voices, or you could take turns in a larger group.]
How, oh how could the universe,
itself unloving, and mindless,
cough up creatures capable of love?
No mystery in that.
It’s just a matter
of natural selection.
But natural selection is cruel. Bloody.
And bloody stupid!
Even when organisms aren’t directly tearing at each other’s throats…
…there’s a deeper competition, going on between the genes.
A species could evolve to extinction,
if the winning genes were playing negative sum games
How could a process,
Cruel as Azathoth,
Create minds that were capable of love?
No mystery.
Mystery is a property of questions.
Not answers.
A mother’s child shares her genes,
And so a mother loves her child.
But mothers can adopt their children.
And still, come to love them.
Still no mystery.
Evolutionary psychology isn’t about deliberately maximizing fitness.
Through most of human history,
we didn’t know genes existed.
Even subconsciously.
Well, fine. But still:
Humans form friendships,
even with non-relatives.
How can that be?
No mystery.
Ancient hunter-gatherers would often play the Iterated Prisoner’s Dilemma.
There could be profit in betrayal.
But the best solution:
was reciprocal altruism.
Sometimes,
the most dangerous human is not the strongest,
the prettiest,
or even the smartest:
But the one who has the most allies.
But not all friends are fair-weather friends;
there are true friends -
those who would sacrifice their lives for another.
Shouldn’t that kind of devotion
remove itself from the gene pool?
You said it yourself:
We have a concept of true friendship and fair-weather friendship.
We wouldn’t be true friends with someone who we didn’t think was a true friend to us.
And one with many true friends?
They are far more formidable
than one with mere fair-weather allies.
And Mohandas Gandhi,
who really did turn the other cheek?
Those who try to serve all humanity,
whether or not all humanity serves them in turn?
That’s a more complex story.
Humans aren’t just social animals.
We’re political animals.
Sometimes the formidable human is not the strongest,
but the one who skillfully argues that their preferred policies
match the preferences of others.
Um… what?
How does that explain Gandhi?
The point is that we can argue about ‘What should be done?’
We can make those arguments and respond to them.
Without that, politics couldn’t take place.
Okay… but Gandhi?
Believed certain complicated propositions about ‘What should be done?’
Then did them.
That sounds suspiciously like it could explain any possible human behavior.
If we traced back the chain of causality,
through all the arguments…
We’d find a moral architecture.
The ability to argue abstract propositions.
A preference for simple ideas.
An appeal to hardwired intuitions about fairness.
A concept of duty. Aversion to pain.
Empathy.
Filtered by memetic selection,
all of this resulted in a concept:
“You should not hurt people,”
In full generality.
And that gets you Gandhi?
What else would you suggest?
Some godlike figure?
Reaching out from behind the scenes,
directing evolution?
Definitely not. But -
Because then I’d would have to ask :
How did that god originally decide that love was even desirable.
How it got preferences that included things like friendship, loyalty, and fairness.
Call it ‘surprising’ all you like.
But through evolutionary psychology,
You can see how parental love, romance, honor,
even true altruism and moral arguments,
all bear the specific design signature of natural selection.
If there were some benevolent god,
reaching out to create a world of loving humans,
it too must have evolved,
defeating the point of postulating it at all.
I’m not postulating a god!
I’m just asking how human beings ended up so nice.
Nice?
Have you looked at this planet lately?
We bear all those other emotions that evolved as well.
Which should make it very clear that we evolved,
should you begin to doubt it.
Humans aren’t always nice.
But, still, come on…
doesn’t it seem a little…
amazing?
That nothing but millions of years of a cosmic death tournament…
could cough up mothers and fathers,
sisters and brothers,
husbands and wives,
steadfast friends,
honorable enemies,
true altruists and guardians of causes,
police officers and loyal defenders,
even artists, sacrificing themselves for their art?
All practicing so many kinds of love?
For so many things other than genes?
Doing their part to make their world less ugly,
something besides a sea of blood and violence and mindless replication?
Are you honestly surprised by this?
If so, question your underlying model.
For it’s led you to be surprised by the true state of affairs.
Since the very beginning,
not one unusual thing
has ever happened.
…
But how are you not amazed?
Maybe there’s no surprise from a causal viewpoint.
But still, it seems to me,
in the creation of humans by evolution,
something happened that is precious and marvelous and wonderful.
If we can’t call it a physical miracle, then call it a moral miracle.
Because it was only a miracle from the perspective of the morality that was produced?
Explaining away all the apparent coincidence,
from a causal and physical perspective?
Well… yeah. I suppose you could interpret it that way.
I just meant that something was immensely surprising and wonderful on a moral level,
even if it’s not really surprising,
on a physical level.
I think that’s what I said.
It just seems to me that in your view, somehow you explain that wonder away.
No.
I explain it.
Of course there’s a story behind love.
Behind all ordered events, one finds ordered stories.
And that which has no story is nothing but random noise.
Hardly any better.
If you can’t take joy in things with true stories behind them,
your life will be empty.
Love has to begin somehow.
It has to enter the universe somewhere.
It’s like asking how life itself begins.
Though you were born of your father and mother,
and though they arose from their living parents in turn,
if you go far and far and far away back,
you’ll finally come to a replicator that arose by pure accident.
The border between life and unlife.
So too with love.
A complex pattern must be explained by a cause
that’s not already that complex pattern.
For love to enter the universe,
it has to arise from something that is not love.
If that weren’t possible, then love could not be.
Just as life itself required that first replicator,
to come about by accident,
parentless,
but still caused:
far, far back in the causal chain that led to you:
3.8 billion years ago,
in some little tidal pool.
Perhaps your children’s children will ask,
how it is that they are capable of love.
And their parents will say:
Because we, who also love, created you to love.
And your children’s children may ask:
But how is it that you love?
And their parents will reply:
Because our own parents,
who loved as well,
created us to love in turn.
And then your children’s children will ask:
But where did it all begin?
Where does the recursion end?
And their parents will say:
Once upon a time,
long ago and far away,
there were intelligent beings who were not themselves intelligently designed.
Once upon a time,
there were lovers,
created by something that did not love.
Once upon a time,
when all of civilization was a single galaxy,
A single star.
A single planet.
A place called Earth.
Long ago,
Far away,
Ever So Long Ago.
[This song is about our moral circle, the group of beings we care about, expanding to contain more and more over time. It starts with those closest to us -- our families -- and moves outward to neighbors, strangers, and perhaps even farther afield.]
Raise a song, and so commence
Circle, grow and grow.
in praise of all Benevolence!
Circle, grow and grow.
Once a cold and silent night
did the loveless stars pervade;
yet we here, of star-stuff made,
cast a circle of warmer Light!
Circle, circle, grow and grow.
So will we bring our families in,
Circle, grow and grow.
those whom Nature made our kin?
Circle, grow and grow.
Countless likenesses we find,
by our common blood bestowed.
What a debt of care is owed;
what a blesséd tie that binds!
Circle, circle, grow and grow.
And will we bring our neighbors in,
Circle, grow and grow.
our expansion to begin?
Circle, grow and grow.
Bounty of the harvest sun,
shelter from all hazards dire,
share with each, as each require,
doing as you would be done.
Circle, circle, grow and grow.
And will we bring the stranger in,
Circle, grow and grow.
every state and speech and skin?
Circle, grow and grow.
Think upon the mystery:
how alike is Humankind!
Tho' manifold in face and mind,
conspecific sisters we!
Circle, circle, grow and grow.
And will we bring the far ones in,
Circle, grow and grow.
all who distant-born have been?
Circle, grow and grow.
Hands that you will never hold,
Names that you will never learn,
for all far-off hearts that yearn,
let compassion boundless roll!
Circle, circle, grow and grow.
And will we bring all creatures in,
Circle, grow and grow.
feather, fur, or silicon?
Circle, grow and grow.
Though their unseen thought confound —
strange the substrate they employ —
all who suffer or enjoy
are brother soul, in friendship bound.
Circle, circle, grow and grow.
And will we bring the future in?
Circle, grow and grow.
All of time is ours to win!
Circle, grow and grow.
Will our children rise in power?
overwhelm the starry deep?
Lights unborn, for you we keep
will and hope, though dark the hour.
Circle, circle, grow and grow.
[This next song has been described by its author, Vienna Teng, as "a love letter to technology."]
Landsailor
Landsailor, sail on time
Rain or shine, I know you can
Cloudraker
Cloudraker, share your finds
All your wonders at my demand
Lightbringer
Tamer of night
Blossom of hours unleashed
Make me a lawbender
All equalized
Safe from the chill and heat
Your power flows through me transformed
Here's where I was born
Landsailor
Deep-winter strawberry
Endless summer, ever spring
A vast preserve
Aisle after aisle in reach
Every commoner made a king
Earthbreaker
Noble and prized
Feed me beyond my means
Hello, Worldmaker
Never denied
Build all my wildest dreams
But there's a storm outside your door
And I'm a child no more
[Second voice]
Headless and faceless
Tireless and seamless behind these walls
This is my progress
When you don't notice my lines at all
I split the world open
Delve ever deeper in my alchemic arts
I crack the ciphers to free up your mind, your life, your heart
Oh Landsailor (I'm your Landsailor)
In the bed that we've made
May every nail be shown
Great Lifebringer
The price that we pay
Time that you made it known
I want to be your bride in full (Oh be my bride in full)
Shield my eyes no more (Shield your eyes no more)
Oh I am altered now for good (Altered now for good)
Shield these eyes no more
[by Jai Dhyani]
We will never know their names.
The first victim could not have been recorded, for there was no written language to record it. They were someone’s daughter, or son, and someone’s friend, and they were loved by those around them. And they were in pain, covered in rashes, confused, scared, not knowing why this was happening to them or what they could do about it – victim of a mad, inhuman god. There was nothing to be done – humanity was not strong enough, not aware enough, not knowledgeable enough, to fight back against a monster that could not be seen.
It was in Ancient Egypt, where it attacked slave and pharaoh alike. In Rome, it effortlessly decimated armies. It killed in Syria. It killed in Moscow. In India, five million dead. It killed a thousand Europeans every day in the 18th century. It killed more than fifty million Native Americans. From the Peloponnesian War to the Civil War, it slew more soldiers and civilians than any weapon, any soldier, any army (Not that this stopped the most foolish and empty souls from attempting to harness the demon as a weapon against their enemies).
Cultures grew and faltered, and it remained. Empires rose and fell, and it thrived. Ideologies waxed and waned, but it did not care. Kill. Maim. Spread. An ancient, mad god, hidden from view, that could not be fought, could not be confronted, could not even be comprehended. Not the only one of its kind, but the most devastating.
For a long time, there was no hope – only the bitter, hollow endurance of survivors.
In China, in the 10th century, humanity began to fight back.
It was observed that survivors of the mad god’s curse would never be touched again: they had taken a portion of that power into themselves, and were so protected from it. Not only that, but this power could be shared by consuming a remnant of the wounds. There was a price, for you could not take the god’s power without first defeating it – but a smaller battle, on humanity’s terms. By the 16th century, the technique spread, to India, across Asia, the Ottoman Empire and, in the 18th century, Europe. In 1796, a more powerful technique was discovered by Edward Jenner.
An idea began to take hold: Perhaps the ancient god could be killed.
A whisper became a voice; a voice became a call; a call became a battle cry, sweeping across villages, cities, nations. Humanity began to cooperate, spreading the protective power across the globe, dispatching masters of the craft to protect whole populations. People who had once been sworn enemies joined in common cause for this one battle. Governments mandated that all citizens protect themselves, for giving the ancient enemy a single life would put millions in danger.
And, inch by inch, humanity drove its enemy back. Fewer friends wept; Fewer neighbors were crippled; Fewer parents had to bury their children.
At the dawn of the 20th century, for the first time, humanity banished the enemy from entire regions of the world. Humanity faltered many times in its efforts, but there individuals who never gave up, who fought for the dream of a world where no child or loved one would ever fear the demon ever again. Viktor Zhdanov, who called for humanity to unite in a final push against the demon; The great tactician Karel Raška, who conceived of a strategy to annihilate the enemy; Donald Henderson, who led the efforts of those final days.
The enemy grew weaker. Millions became thousands, thousands became dozens. And then, when the enemy did strike, scores of humans came forth to defy it, protecting all those whom it might endanger.
The enemy’s last attack in the wild was on Ali Maow Maalin, in 1977. For months afterwards, dedicated humans swept the surrounding area, seeking out any last, desperate hiding place where the enemy might yet remain.
They found none.
35 years ago, on December 9th, 1979, humanity declared victory.
This one evil, the horror from beyond memory, the monster that took 500 million people from this world – was destroyed.
You are a member of the species that did that. Never forget what we are capable of, when we band together and declare battle on what is broken in the world.
[One speaker says:]
Repeat after me.
If reciting this litany is useful, I desire to believe that reciting this litany is useful.
If reciting this litany is NOT useful, I desire to believe that reciting this litany is NOT useful.
Let me not become attached to beliefs I may not want.
[The next song is about one possible future we might hope for. It’s wacky to show that we aren’t sure about any of it.]
[to the tune of Big Rock Candy Mountain; lyrics by Alicorn Blume]
One evening as the sun went down
That big old fire was wasteful,
A coder looked up from his work,
And he said, “Folks, that’s distasteful,
But in another twenty years
With some big old computer
You and I will flourish in
The Great Transhumanist Future.
In the Great Transhumanist Future,
There are worlds all fair and bright,
We’ll be constrained by nothing but
The latency of light
When the hospitals are empty
And the sun’s a battery
Making it a breeze
To get outta deep freeze
To give humans wings
And some other things
In the Great Transhumanist Future.
In the Great Transhumanist Future,
You never have to sleep
Run forks on computronium
And speed them up for cheap
The galaxy is full of stars
And the world is full of space
Oh I long to see
An eternity
Spreading far and wide
And we’re all carefree
In the Great Transhumanist Future.
In the Great Transhumanist Future,
You never go without
And giant streams of data
Are flowing all about
There’s a cure for your depression
And a fix for all badbrains
There’s a trillion years
With immortal peers
All the people who are working
Are volunteers
In the Great Transhumanist Future.
In the Great Transhumanist Future,
We learn all about the world
Physics, math, psychology
Are suddenly unfurled
You can see a billion colors
You can hear just like a bat
Hope I live to go
Where we get to grow
Give me VR porn
And a unicorn
In the Great Transhumanist Future!
I'll see you nigh
If we don't die
In the Great Transhumanist Future!
[This parody was written by Scott Alexander for a Bay Area Solstice and became an instant classic.]
[To the tune of The Battle Hymn of the Republic.]
Mine eyes have seen the glory of the works of humankind
We have lifted up whole countries through the labors of the mind
Faiths and empires rise and crumble, in the end we always find
The truth is marching on!
Glory, glory hallelujah! Glory, glory hallelujah!
Glory, glory hallelujah!
The truth is marching on!
They murdered Archimedes with his circles still undone
How much loftier now the circles where his children's children run
They arrested Galileo, but they couldn't arrest the Sun
The truth is marching on!
Glory, glory hallelujah! Glory, glory hallelujah!
Glory, glory hallelujah!
The truth is marching on!
They tore down Alexandria, of libraries the first
And the Mongol hordes razed Baghdad, and its learning was dispersed
But now there’s Wikipedia, so Genghis, do your worst!
The truth keeps marching on!
Glory, glory hallelujah! Glory, glory hallelujah!
Glory, glory hallelujah!
The truth is marching on!
So despite the many setbacks we encounter on our way
We still believe tomorrow can be brighter than today
The quest is not forgotten, we continue, come what may
As truth goes marching on!
[by Piet Hein]
The road to wisdom? — Well, it’s plain and simple to express:
Err
and err
and err again
but less
and less
and less.