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Comment by monkeynotes | Hacker News Reader

COVID was mindblowing. For the first time in recorded history the entire planet coordinated a response to an existential threat. And we survived.

In a matter of just three years we rethought how we work, live, travel, and socialize. The global community came up with a vaccine in an extraordinarily short amount of time, and then coordinated a roll out.

We've seen how humanity can adapt at scale when we are motivated. I don't know what answer we will have to the ecological ruin we have layed out. Maybe we don't have an answer to it, that will be a truly humbling moment.

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"For the first time in recorded history the entire planet coordinated a response to an existential threat"

Umm... - Smallpox eradication was a global effort. - Polio eradication was a global effort.(unfortunately delayed by religious fanatics in a small number of countries)

I agree with all that you said. It is a great feat to witness. But just imagine, multiple viruses like Covid-19 cropping up all at once. That’s where we will fail.

We were already shifting to different working patterns before COVID hit. Had it been 10 years earlier it would have been much more impactful but the concept of working from home wasn’t novel in a great many industries before COVID. And those that couldn’t function remotely continued operate largely like they did before the pandemic.

Also it’s worth noting that the vaccines were already years into development before COVID hit. We knew there was a risk of a Coronavirus outbreak (by virtue of the fact that we had dodged two Coronavirus pandemics a decade earlier). Granted the increased funding and urgency of COVID helped speed things along; but they weren’t exactly starting from scratch.

So it’s still not really clear how we would cope with a more dramatic or unknown situation.

What I did learn about the pandemic was normal folk will completely disregard their own safety just to stick a middle finger to the government. Which is not only concerning for the future survival of our species but also a direct contradiction to your point about civilisation banding together.

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