Choose Your Own Dystopia

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The year is 20XX (you are not Mega Man.)

Times are tough; following a horrendous global disaster, you emerge from your hidey-hole to find that you and everyone close to you (including friends, lovers, family, but not casual acquaintances or random coworkers) has survived the holocaust. For some bizarre reason, you appear to have emerged relatively unscathed. Others in your group have suffered some injuries, and some seem to have mild ailments of various types: radiation burns, infections, but nothing fatal.

Unfortunately, mother earth has not fared quite as well as you have. Massive portions of the earth's surface are unlivable, resources and infrastructure have been destroyed/polluted/corrupted, and the human race is in quite the tough spot.

(Sound interesting? Read More for Fun in the Future!)

You see, plenty of people died, but given the state of the earth, not quite enough people died. With few resources to spare and a couple centuries to go before the biosphere recovers from the shock, the human race's propensity to spread like a virus will undoubtedly be its downfall; there's just enough technology left to let us rape the bleeding earth real good, but not nearly enough to let us live as we once did without causing immediate and irreparable harm to our future chances of survival.

In light of this unfortunate state of affairs, the remaining vestiges of global authority move to consolidate their power. Having gripped their guns tightly and not let them go, they are in a rather superior position that the everyday folk cannot hope to overcome. They devise a plan to save the human race....

* * * * * * *

You are escorted into a room.

"Congratulations," a chilly, antiseptic voice intones, "you have been designated as the optimal socio-genetic sample from your social subunit. Because of this, your survival is assured."

[Phew, well, so far so good.]

"In order to maximize inter-unit harmony, maintain an adequate short-term labor force, and balance genetic diversity with short-term adaptivity, the Archons ask you to make a choice."

[Uh-oh.]

"You may either:

"1) Attain full citizenship in the new order, entitling you to travel, socialize, and procreate, or

"2) Give up travel, inter-unit socialization, and procreation rights for your entire sub-unit, and dedicate them (and you) to laboring to improve a pre-determined geographic area.

"If you choose 1, the remainder of your sub-unit will be terminated, as their resource consumption will be redirected towards stabilizing other, better areas for full citizens and their progeny to live, intermingle and breed.

"If you choose 2, the Archons will instead utilize your superior leadership [and/or technical, organizational, physical] skills to lead the restoration project in your area. The work will be difficult and hazardous, but with care, no one need die an unnatural death."

Well, what are you waiting for? Choose. Justify.

poot's blog
Ideas

The tough decisions.
Submitted by tenacity on 11 February, 2005 - 10:53pm.

Choice 1. No question.

My sole purpose as an organism is to pass on my genes. There are two ways I can do this:

1) Procreate (obvious)

2) Kin selection: insuring the procreation of someone closely related to me.

Because my entire "sub-unit" (including all of my close relatives) relinquishes their right to procreate in scenario 2, there is absolutely no mechanism by which I get to pass on my genes. This is unacceptable.

For my family members at least, chosing option 1 places them in a position of altruism, where their sacrifice means that some of their genes will be passed on.

This new society needs people who can make the tough decisions. People like me will become full citizens, and we will rely on the sentimentality of those who have made choice 2, thus failing as organisms.

At least worker bees are related to the queen.

an unfortunate scenario
Submitted by thinksinpictures on 12 February, 2005 - 5:55am.

I live my life with a singular aim – to always be enjoying it. I think most people might say the same thing, so I'll elaborate. Some people put themselves through periods of lesser enjoyment with the aim of greater enjoyment at a later time. Working a high paying job with long hours in an effort to retire early would be an extreme example of this. In almost all cases I would rather be enjoying my time now rather than putting off present pleasure on the promise of later pleasure, even if that later pleasure is purported to be greater. An economist would say that I apply a high discount rate to my personal pleasure.

Within this framework both options are still perfectly rational, but one's choice is now nothing more than a function of preference: would you rather travel the world, partying and screwing your hedonic little brain out, or spend the rest of your years toiling away with your friends and family? I suppose that from the point of view of a college freshman the choice is clear. It is for me as well, but unlike that drug-addled undergraduate, I feel no strong desire to live out my remaining years socializing (or even reproducing) with people that I don't know and probably wouldn't like. So no matter how bumpin' the party is, I can only choose option 2.

I appreciate that from an intellectual perspective, my choice is not evolutionarily optimal. Unfortunately, poot has created a scenario in which traits that have historically been advantageous to mammals, such as the formation of cohorts that go beyond biological kinship or the desire to care for loved ones, do not put the protagonist in a position to reproduce. Shame, that.

Option 2
Submitted by Longinus (not verified) on 26 February, 2005 - 11:53am.

To go through choice number one would be psychological suicide in my opinion. Personally, I could not choose that option even if I had never met the people who would die because of it. The guilt alone would drive me mad.
Don't get me wrong, I'm 21 and would love to be screwing my brains out. I also have no problem with taking life for the right reasons. The cost of pleasure in this case however, is far too high. Many of you may feel that I am goverend by romantic notions. I ask you though to consider what brought on this cataclysm in the first place.
It probably would have been people willing to sacrifce others to get what they want. In today's world... that's not survival; it's suicide.