Can Deep Altruism Sustain Space Settlement?

TL;DR

This paper explores how deep altruism, focused on creating lasting informational value, can support long-term space settlement efforts through new governance and funding models that span generations.

Contribution

It introduces the concept of deep altruism as a framework for sustaining intergenerational space settlement projects and compares it to historical long-term initiatives using the time capsule analogy.

Findings

Deep altruism emphasizes informational value for future well-being.

Governance models are needed to support intergenerational projects.

Historical examples illustrate potential pathways for space settlement support.

Abstract

Space settlement represents a long-term human effort that requires unprecedented coordination across successive generations. In this chapter, I develop a comparative hierarchy for the value of long-term projects based upon their benefits to culture, their development of infrastructure, and their contributions to lasting information. I next draw upon the concept of the time capsule as an analogy, which enables a comparison of historical examples of projects across generational, intergenerational, and deep time. The concept of deep altruism can then be defined as the selfless pursuit of informational value for the well-being of others in the distant future. The first steps toward supporting an effort like space settlement through deep altruism would establish governance and funding models that begin to support ambitions with intergenerational succession.