Keep Out, Danger, skulls and crossbones; today all recognizable messages of something which could harm us. But what about 10 000 years in the future? That is much longer than human languages and signifiers have existed. Yet this is the lifespan of nuclear waste we’ve created.
Some concern for future generations spurred a group to inquisition how to warn people unfathomably far in the future; known as the Human Interference Task Force
The connundrum to troubleshoot was:
Is it possible to convey where exactly radioactive material resides, and that mere proximity to it is dangerous?
They found that was not so simple.
Language evolves, symbols currently mean different things in other cultures. A radioactive symbol will not retain the same meaning. Study of history shows it's likely that languages will be totally different from their current form; symbols as we know today have had completely opposite meanings in the past.
In the 1980s, the next height of Nuclear controversy after WWII, a group of scientists, linguists, anthropologists began to seek a solution. A proposal for a large site to contain nuclear active waste got them to pondering.
See:Yucca Mountain Nuclear Waste Repository
A discipline called Nuclear Semitoics was created; semiotics as in the combination of verbal and visual communication. Much of symbolism and archetype predominately reigns in the subconscious. How could this be consciously transmitted?
SEMIOTICS: the doctrine, science, or theory of signs; the subject matter of semiotics is the exchange of any messages whatever and of the system of signs which underlie them.
SEMIOSIS: the action of a sign, involving three subjects--a sign, its object, and its interpretant.
One suggested solution was to create a Guardian caste that would take on the responsibility to communicate location and danger of nuclear waste generation to generation. This was based on the premise that centuries old religions have been preserved to this day, surviving through clergy and biblical writing. Contesting this was that religion also deteriorates in meaning. The original version of the Atomic Priesthood could become obfuscated or the entire project abandoned. Given that the formation of religions is mostly mysterious and inexplicable, it is overly ambitious to believe we could make one up from scratch which would stand the test of time.
It was prophesied that through technology we may one day breach the communication-far-future problem.
It is generally believed that the "social function of communcation is the ensuring of continuity in society through access to the experiences and ideas of the past, expressed in [loosely speaking] symbols for transmission across space and through time. This is the 'time-binding' function of social communication" (Neelameghan, 1979:103).
The time-binding ability of human beings arises from their usage of "language, number, gesture, picture, and other symbolic forms" (loc. inherited characteristics and the seemingly insurmountable barrier of "time".
It should be noted, in passing, that an era will come when messages vitally important to the race, affecting its survival, will be transmissible by microsurgical intervention with the human molecular blueprint, but the technology required for this form of temporal communication is far from available as yet. Therefore, in what follows, this theoretical possibility will not be further considered. cit.) enabling them to transcend the limitations of
--"Communication Measures to Bridge Ten Millennia" by Thomas Sebeok
Still today this technology is only burgeoning; such devices as information implants in people, is a controversy of it’s own
Particularily the most curious solution, deemed effective above them all, was to create a song. The viral contagiousness of music transcends culture, language, visual signifiers. It was speculated that a song would morph along with changes in language.
There was one obstacle to this solution; to make a ‘warning song’, signifiers are still needed. What is the way to do this?
Utilize the power of genetic inheritance.
Cats. Glowing cats. WTF. Why would the cats glow? How?
Dubbed "The Ray Cat Solution"
Simply engineer cats to turn colour when near radioactive waste. The catchy tune would sing to future folk how glowing cats indicate danger.
Two mad scientist-poets are responsible for this oddity; Françoise Bastide and Paolo Fabbri,
A modern musician took a stab at writing such a song:
These ideas have since been scrapped by all but a niche goup of people who study it, and the study is based on the semiotics itself, not on any aim to initiate such a clergy.
http://theatomicpriesthoodproject.org/
Conclusions:
We are left with how Nuclear waste faciliated deeper understanding and philosophy about every aspect our comprehension and communication.
Perhaps one day, we will engage in the practice of permanently embedding knowledge in the human subconscious via some form of trauma-imprinting. The effect of birth trauma lingers within our psycheuntil our death; traumatic, emotional events are harder than any to forget. The subconscious is a primary means which we intuit symbolism and signifiers. Though this too is just another speculative, sci-fi style musing. It’s just my favourite as I made it up.
(For more on that topic, read my novel-in-progress only on Steemit; an exploration of trauma, subconscious, through transhumanist fiction = shameless plug)
One final question:
Should we even bother with this level of concern for mankind in a uncertain, indecipherable future?