Knowledge ark
A knowledge ark (also known as a doomsday ark or doomsday vault) is a collection of knowledge preserved in such a way that future generations would have access to said knowledge if all other copies of it were lost.
Scenarios where access to information (such as the Internet) would become otherwise impossible could be described as existential risks or extinction-level events. A knowledge ark could take the form of a traditional library or a modern computer database. It could also be pictorial in nature, including photographs of important information, or diagrams of critical processes.
A knowledge ark would have to be resistant to the effects of natural or man-made disasters in order to be viable. Such an ark should include, but would not be limited to, information or material relevant to the survival and prosperity of human civilization.
Other types of knowledge arks might include genetic material, such as in a DNA bank. With the potential for widespread personal DNA sequencing becoming a reality, an individual might agree to store their genetic code in a digital or analog storage format which would enable later retrieval of that code. If a species was sequenced before extinction, its genome would still remain available for study.[1][2]
Examples
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/60/Storage_containers_in_Svalbard_Global_Seed_Vault_01.jpg/220px-Storage_containers_in_Svalbard_Global_Seed_Vault_01.jpg)
An example of a DNA bank is the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, a seedbank which is intended to preserve a wide variety of plant seeds (such as important crops) in case of their extinction.[3]
The Memory of Mankind project involves engraving human knowledge on clay tablets and storing it in a salt mine.[4] The engravings are microscopic.[5]
A Lunar ark has been proposed which would store and transmit valuable information to receiver stations on Earth. The success of this would also depend on the availability of compatible receiver equipment on Earth, and adequate knowledge of that equipment's operation.[6][7]
The Arch Mission Foundation sent the Lunar Library, a 30 million page knowledge ark designed to survive for millions or billions of years in space, to the moon on the Israeli Beresheet spacecraft in 2019.[8] The spacecraft experienced a crash landing. However, the library likely survived intact.[9]
The Phoenix Mars lander, which landed on surface of Mars in 2008, included the "Visions of Mars" DVD, a digital library about Mars designed to last for hundreds or thousands of years.[10][11]
On February 22, 2024, the Arch Mission successfully landed a Lunar Library on the Moon, on the Intuitive Machines IM-1 mission's Odysseus lander.[12]
In popular culture
- In 2020 science fiction book Ready Player Two, a spaceship named Vonnegut was launched to Proxima Centauri which also functions as a knowledge ark since it contains backups of humanity’s cultural materials, such as a standalone copy of the virtual universe OASIS which they call ARC@DIA.
See also
- Archive
- Arch Mission Foundation
- Arctic World Archive
- Information repository
- KEO
- Longtermism
- Long Now Foundation
- Memory of Mankind
- Memory of the World Programme
- Noah’s Ark
- Rosetta Project
- Space and survival
- Survivalism
- Time capsule
References
- ^ Parlangeli, Luca. "Transitional Territories". Delft University of Technology. Retrieved 16 June 2024.
- ^ "How the Doomsday Ark Works". HowStuffWorks. 1 January 1970. Retrieved 16 June 2024.
- ^ "Norway's seed vault protecting Africa's food supply – DW – 11/13/2023". dw.com. Retrieved 16 June 2024.
- ^ Kemeny, Richard (January 9, 2017). "All of Human Knowledge Buried in a Salt Mine". The Atlantic. Retrieved September 28, 2021.
- ^ Gray, Richard (October 18, 2016). "The world's knowledge is being buried in a salt mine". BBC News. Retrieved September 28, 2021.
- ^ Chittenden, Maurice (16 June 2024). "Mankind's secrets kept in lunar ark". www.thetimes.com. Retrieved 16 June 2024.
- ^ "Lunar Ark". asteroid.arizona.edu. Retrieved 16 June 2024.
- ^ Powell, Corey S. (February 28, 2019). "A 30-million page library is heading to the moon to help preserve human civilization". NBC News. Retrieved September 28, 2021.
- ^ Oberhaus, Daniel (August 5, 2019). "A Crashed Israeli Lunar Lander Spilled Tardigrades on the Moon". Wired. Retrieved September 28, 2021.
- ^ Kaplan, Mat (May 27, 2008). "Phoenix Takes Image of First Library on Mars". The Planetary Society. Retrieved 2018-03-07.
- ^ "'Lunar Ark' Proposed in Case of Deadly Impact on Earth". National Geographic. Archived from the original on 2018-02-27. Retrieved 2018-03-07.
- ^ updated, Andrew Jones last (2024-02-22). "Here's what just landed on the moon aboard Intuitive Machines' Odysseus lander". Space.com. Retrieved 2024-02-23.
- v
- t
- e
and issues
- Agents of deterioration
- Archival processing
- Archaeological science
- Archaeology
- Archive
- Bioarchaeology
- Calendar (archives)
- Conservation and restoration of cultural property
- Conservation and restoration of immovable cultural property
- Conservation and restoration of movable cultural property
- Conservation science (cultural property)
- Collecting
- Collection (museum)
- Collection catalog
- Collections maintenance
- Collections management
- Collections management system
- Cultural heritage
- Cultural heritage management
- Cultural property
- Cultural property documentation
- Cultural property exhibition
- Cultural property imaging
- Cultural property storage
- Cultural resources management
- Database preservation
- Deaccessioning (museum)
- Digital library
- Digital photograph restoration
- Digital preservation
- Disaster preparedness (cultural property)
- Film preservation
- Finding aid
- Fonds
- Found in collection
- Heritage asset
- Heritage science
- Inherent vice
- Intangible cultural heritage
- Integrated pest management (cultural property)
- Inventory (library and archive)
- Inventory (museum)
- Media preservation
- Midden
- Mold control and prevention (library and archive)
- Museum
- Optical media preservation
- Preservation (library and archive)
- Preservation metadata
- Preservation survey
- Provenance
- Repatriation
- Ruins
- Sustainable preservation
- Treasure
- Web archiving
and expertise
- Archivist
- Art dealer
- Art handler
- Auctioneer
- Collection manager
- Conservator-restorer
- Conservation scientist
- Conservation technician
- Curator
- Exhibition designer
- Mount maker
- Objects conservator
- Paintings conservator
- Photograph conservator
- Preservationist
- Registrar (cultural property)
- Textile conservator
and techniques
- Aging (artwork)
- Anastylosis
- Arrested decay
- Cradling (paintings)
- Cultural property radiography
- Detachment of wall paintings
- Desmet method
- Display case
- Digital repository audit method based on risk assessment
- Historic paint analysis
- Inpainting
- Kintsugi
- Leafcasting
- Lining of paintings
- Mass deacidification
- Overpainting
- Paleo-inspiration
- Paper splitting
- Reconstruction (architecture)
- Rissverklebung
- Textile stabilization
- Transfer of panel paintings
- UVC-based preservation
- VisualAudio
and restoration
of immovable
cultural property
by item type
and restoration
of movable
cultural property
by item type
- Aircraft
- Ancient Greek pottery
- Bone, horn, and antler objects
- Books, manuscripts, documents and ephemera
- Ceramic objects
- Clocks
- Copper-based objects
- Feathers
- Film
- Flags and banners
- Fur objects
- Glass objects
- Herbaria
- Human remains
- Illuminated manuscripts
- Insect specimens
- Iron and steel objects
- Ivory objects
- Judaica
- Lacquerware
- Leather objects
- Lighthouses
- Metals
- Musical instruments
- Neon objects
- New media art
- Paintings
- Painting frames
- Panel paintings
- Papyrus
- Parchment
- Performance art
- Photographs
- Photographic plates
- Plastic objects
- Rail vehicles
- Road vehicles
- Shipwreck artifacts
- Silver objects
- South Asian household shrines
- Stained glass
- Taxidermy
- Textiles
- Tibetan thangkas
- Time-based media art
- Totem poles
- Vinyl discs
- Woodblock prints
- Wooden artifacts
- Wooden furniture
cultural heritage
preservation
- Ancient music
- Applied folklore
- Dance notation
- Early music
- Endangered language
- Ethnochoreology
- Ethnomusicology
- Ethnopoetics
- Family folklore
- Folklore
- Folk art
- Folk dance
- Folk etymology
- Folk instrument
- Folk medicine
- Folk music
- Folk process
- Folk play
- Foodways
- Folklore studies
- Heritage language
- Heritage language learning
- Indigenous intellectual property
- Indigenous culture
- Indigenous language
- Language death
- Language preservation
- Language revitalization
- Living history
- Oral history preservation
- Preservation of meaning
- Primitive music
- Tradition preservation
- Traditional knowledge
projects
- Conservation issues of Pompeii and Herculaneum
- Conservation-restoration of Ecce Homo by Elías García Martínez
- Conservation-restoration of The Gross Clinic by Thomas Eakins
- Conservation-restoration of Leonardo da Vinci's The Last Supper
- Pompeian frescoes
- Conservation-restoration of the Shroud of Turin
- Conservation-restoration of the Sistine Chapel frescoes
- Conservation-restoration of the Statue of Liberty
- Conservation-restoration of the H.L. Hunley
- Conservation response to flood of Arno, Florence
- Modern and Contemporary Art Research Initiative
- Preservation Metadata: Implementation Strategies