The Precipice

What existential threats does humanity face? And how can we secure our future?

"The Precipice" is a powerful book. Toby Ord's love for humanity and hope for its future are infectious. Ord's analysis of science is exemplary and compellingly written. We live in the most important era in human history. In the twentieth century, we developed the means to destroy ourselves without creating the moral framework to ensure that we do not. That is the precipice, and how we respond to it will be the most crucial decision of our time.

Oxford moral philosopher Toby Ord examines the risks to the future of humanity, from familiar man-made threats like climate change and nuclear war to potentially greater, unknown threats from engineered pandemics and advanced artificial intelligence.

With clear and rigorous thinking, Ord calculates the various levels of risk and shows how our own time fits into the larger story of humanity. We can say with certainty that the novel coronavirus does not pose such a risk. But could the next pandemic? And what can we do in our present moment to directly address these risks?

A significant work that brings together the disciplines of physics, biology, earth sciences, computer science, history, anthropology, statistics, international relations, political science, and moral philosophy, "The Precipice" is a call for a new understanding of our time: a fundamental realignment in the way we view the world, our history, and the role we play in it.