The Galactic Mutual Species Assurance Company
A Mutual Insurance Company Chartered by the Galactic Federation
Home Office: Liskma, Ransai Cluster, Sector 2

Mr. Secretary:

This office has received the application of the human species for purchase of a standard species survival policy. We have reviewed the documentation on the state of the Earth submitted with the application and further ordered and received a report from a reputable inspection agency. As you know, we are the largest insurer of species survival in the Galaxy, with over 25,000 terrestrial years of experience.

We regret that we must decline to insure the human species under our standard species survival policy. The company cannot assume such a great risk and maintain its solid financial condition. Since the importance of this matter is so great, I will outline the reasons for our declining to insure your species.

Our actuarial staff calculates the survivability index of a species from 1024 separate factors and measurements, based upon the historical experience of the company in insuring over 50,000 different species. The index ranges from 0 to 1, with the higher number being the certainty of survival, the lower the certainty of extinction during the policy period.

The survivability index of the human race at this time is .143 with a standard error of 0.005. In other words, it is probable that species rescue measures would be required within 50 terrestrial years of issuance of the policy. As I am sure you realize, the costs associated with either total planetary evacuation or environmental resuscitation are enormous.

Of the 1024 different factors and measurements, a few are highly significant. I now discuss some of these factors:

1. Spiritual Life - Statistically speaking, this is the most heavily weighted factor in the survivability index. Experience has found that a commitment to spiritual values is a highly significant predictor of species survival.

The dominant human culture of Earth is Western Civilization, and this culture is spreading throughout the entire planet. Several hundred terrestrial years ago, Western Civilization acquired a thoroughly materialistic vision of the Universe, together with a systematic method of applying mathematics to observed phenomena so as to manipulate matter and energy far more efficiently than before. The human species has become enamored of its ability to manipulate the physical world and has come to believe that this process and the knowledge acquired thereby is the only knowledge worth having. This, of course, has separated humans from their biosphere and from each other. They have come to use everything, including themselves, and to love nothing.

Spiritual characteristics are conspicuously absent from the inspection report: cooperation, stewardship, compassion, tolerance, generosity and reverence. This is not to say that Earth is void of these characteristics, only that their occurrence has greatly diminished over the past two hundred terrestrial years. An obsession with material acquisition is directly responsible for this diminution.

2. Political Viability - The Earth is composed of approximately 80 political units (nations) considered sovereign within their borders. There have been at least two armed conflicts occurring simultaneously between nations at any given time during the last hundred terrestrial years. No nation has to answer to a higher sovereignty for any of its acts. The advent of nuclear weapons and their proliferation among a large percentage of the 80 nations has led to the likelihood of a major nuclear war within the next few years. Past experience has shown that for planets similar to Earth, the effects of even a minor nuclear war would gravely diminish the ability of the planet's biosphere to sustain higher forms of life, including members of the human species.

3. Population - Throughout the existence of the Company, no civilized species has survived continuous exponential population growth. The pressure upon resources eventually becomes so great that the systems of the biosphere break down catastrophically. Because of the delay in negative feedback, the damage to the biosphere, once its full import is realized, will have progressed too far for remedial efforts to be effective. At the present time, the human population of Earth, which is already exceeding the capacity of the planet to indefinitely sustain human life, is expanding at an exponential rate and shows no signs of a voluntary slowdown.

4. Pollution - A reliable method of determining the future of life on a planet is by atmospheric analysis. The carbon dioxide content of Earth's atmosphere, and therefore its entropy, is increasing, an indicator which bodes ill for life on the planet. Oxygen, a highly reactive element, rare in the atmospheres of most planets, and therefore an indicator of lower entropy, is declining.

The inspection report also indicated an increase in the concentration of heavy metals, both in the atmosphere and in the liquid portions of the Earth. Again, the long-term effects of these metals and their compounds are known to be detrimental to the types of life found on Earth. Concentrations of these substances have been increasing over the past one hundred terrestrial years, and there is no evidence that humans have taken adequate measures to remedy this problem.

5. Education - Education, for the most part, is confined to the first 21 terrestrial years of life, and constitutes preparation for work in the current industrial culture. There is little teaching of students to think independently or holistically. The primary objects of terrestrial educational institutions are to train a few students in the unlimited acquisition of material possessions and to indoctrinate the remainder to accept a life of squalor and deprivation. What goes by the name of "Education" on Earth therefore reinforces the current direction of the species and lessens the probability of survival.

6. Energy usage - The expenditure of fossil fuels is increasing and there is no evidence, according to our inspection report, that humans will be able to make the transition from non-renewable to renewable sources of energy without serious disruptions, including revolution and war. The human species, in spite of overwhelming evidence that it is headed to disaster, is addicted to the squandering of energy. The company's experience has been that such a denial of reality on the part of an entire population is a strong predictor of self-extermination.

We have attempted to reinsure some of the risk with a reinsurance company located in what you call the Andromeda Galaxy, but that company has had similar experience in its own area, and declined to assume any risk. We also contacted the Inter-Galactic Excessive Risk Insurers' Cooperative (IGERIC), which includes members in twenty-five galaxies, but even those insurers, who specialize in high risks, have expressed no interest.

In short, Mr. Secretary, we have done everything we could possibly do to obtain species survival coverage, but to no avail. We are very sorry that no one in twenty-five galaxies would assume the risk of insuring your species.

We can offer, however, a special contract which may be of some interest to you. In the case of extremely poor risks, and the human species is an extremely poor risk, a Deferred Risk Species Survival Policy is available. Under this policy, Earth submits annual premiums for a period of two hundred terrestrial years, during which the coverage is limited to the return of the premiums. After that period the policy becomes a full standard survival policy.

The actuarial principle behind this offer is that a species such as yours generally becomes extinct within a hundred terrestrial years, and it is only by limiting our potential losses until well after that period that we can issue any contract at all. In addition, if there are no survivors, it will be impossible to return the premiums, and they will be consequently donated to the insurance industry's Agents' Retirement Fund (ARF). If, on the other hand, the human species does not become extinct within the next two hundred years, it will have a better than average prospect for continuation, and the premiums will consequently very likely fall well below our standard rates.

I highly recommend that you purchase the Deferred Risk Species Survival Policy. With the policy certificate and contract comes a checklist for endangered species survival. Wide dissemination of this checklist could go a long way in helping your species survive the next two hundred years.

Please let me know of your decision. And good luck.

Very truly yours,

/s/

Misko Franzee, Chief District Underwriter

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