Collection of long-duration efforts

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This pages collects human efforts of long duration and attempts to structure them. Please add what is missing and omprove the structure.

Collection of human efforts spanning a lifetime or longer

Art involving time / long-term development

  • Nathan Witstock’s Primebot (2013- the heat death of the universe)
  • Juha van Ingen’s ASLAP, Helsinki & 5 clones (2017-3017, repeating)
  • Hans Haacke’s ‘Der Bevölkerung’, Berlin (2000- for as long as representatives meet in the building)
  • Jem Finer’s Score for a hole in the ground (2005- )
  • Jonathon Keats’ Millenium cameras, (2015-3015), Century cameras Jonathon Keats Berlin (2014-2114) – find out how it is ensured that these are kept in place and how recovered and evaluat
  • The Corpus clock, Cambridge, UK
  • Antony Gormley’s Another Place (100 “iron men” statutes) on Crosby Beach / Merseyside, UK (2007 / some fallen statues were recovered and repositioned in 2021) (2007- ongoing)
  • FILM1/ASAP a documentary film 600 years in the making by Patrick Shen and Brandon Vedder (2020-2640)
  • Roni Horn’s Vatnasafn/Library of Water (2007- ongoing)
  • Paul Hauptmeier, Martin Recker, Julian Rieken: Decay – a 20.000 year project turning radioactive decay into music (2022- ca. 22000)
  • 100 Years – experimental science fiction film written by John Malkovich, directed by Robert Rodriguez, advertised in 2015, to be released November 18, 2115
  • Peter Dean and Michael Ogden’s 2269 – preparations for a celebration 6 June 2269 (2019-2269)


Art involving time / long-term development not mentioned above

Concepts for not-yet-realized projects involving the long term

  • Greg Blonder’s TiWalkMe
  • Open Architect’s Burial Belt
  • Seti’s / Jonathon Keat’s Library of the Great Silence
  • Open Architect’s Burial Belt
  • Letters to the Future book to last 1000 years



Deep space probes

  • Voyager probes (1977) and Pioneer 10&11 probes that left our solar system with messages and will take millions of years to pass other stars. Voyager’s golden disk is accompa-nied by Jimmy Carter’s message: “We are attempting to survive our time so we may live into yours. We hope someday, having solved the problems we face, to join a community of galactic civilizations.”)


Nuclear waste storage

Building projects that take a very long time

  • Sagrada familia, Barcelona/Spain

Rebuilding shrines in Japan every so often

  • Grand Ise Shrine, every 20 years
  • Other Shinto shrines

Maintaining old buildings or sites

  • - The Uffington White Horse in Oxfordshire has been kept visible for about 3000 years. Its regular maintenance (scouring) with the help of volunteers has been a tradition since 2009, and had become very popular between 1755 and 1857, when it became too rowdy.
  • Japanese Shrines other than Shinto Shrines
  • Cathedrals
  • Great Wall of China (on tourist sites)
  • Pyramids

Long term timber plantations

  • Lunedesang.com.au


Other

  • Efforts to conserve archaeological artefacts for posterity (e.g., re-burying ancient footprints)
  • Strategies to adapt to climate change (Dutch Delta Works planning for 2m sea level rise by 2200)

Legal and philosophy

    • Legal documents that refer to posterity such as magna carta and US constitu-tion, the Welsh Well Being of Future Generations act of 2015
    • Philosophical and academic work, Tremmel’s theory of intergenerational justice, Jonas Salk’s Good Ancestors, long-term consequentialist / utilitarian work

Efforts to maintain information over long periods

= Time capsules

Decade or century long landscape development projects and land art

  • Freshkills Park in New York/USA,
  • Landschaftspark Duisburg-Nord/Germany,
  • Cornwall Park 100 Year Master Plan Auckland/NZ
  • Roden crater (land art focussing on the per-ception of light from James Turrell in Arizona)
  • Ash Dome David Nash believed that the Ash Dome would survive him, he is now resigned to the inevitability of its fate as the trees that form the dome are infected with Chalara (ash dieback)
  • Land art “City” by Michael Heizer
  • Tree Mountain, a living time capsule (land art by Alan Sonfist, New York City 1978)

Research / communications / organisations caring for the long term or encouraging action

University courses

  • UC Berkley course Thinking like a Good Ancestor (from Syllabus: “we propose to translate the notion of ancestry from the domain of genealogical legacy to the context of techno-logical development and innovation … Through the new concept of Ancestry Thinking, this course will propose ideas to broaden our understanding of the technological ecosystem we live in. Throughout the semester we will discuss ways to internalize what would otherwise remain as externalities or byprod-ucts of tech developments. Our goal is to enable future tech practitioners to build holistic narratives around their developments”)

Old skills

  • Communication, Hunting, Agriculture, ...
  • Oral traditions (the legend of Budj Bim in Australian aboriginal culture recounts a volcanic eruption ~37.000 years ago)
  • Ancient art (Cava de los Manos, Lasceaux, La Ferrassie, Diepkloof, Blombos, Maltravieso, Bhimbetka)
  • Ancient buildings (Stonehenge, Pyramids, …)


Old organisations

Research on organisational continuity - what makes organisations last

  • Alexander Rose in 2020
  • Alexander Rose in 2021, includes lists of old organizations
  • Hanisch and Biermann 2020
    • Catholic church, est. ~30AD
    • Imperial House of Japan, est. end of 4th century (mythically 660BC)
    • Kongō Gumi corporation, Japan, est. ~578
    • Hôtel-Dieu de Paris (Hospital), est. 651
    • University of Al Quaraouiyine, est. 859
    • Freemasonry, est. 1425
    • Cambridge University Press, est. 1534
    • Hamburger Feuerkasse (Insurance), est. 1676
    • Sveriges Riksbank (Bank) 1668
    • Marylebone Cricket Club, est. 1787
    • Royal National Lifeboat Institution, est. 1825
    • Anti-Slavery International, est. 1839
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