Gotta say, as much as I hate longtermism and the weird ethics it entails, and some of the cult of the long now affectations like writing every date with an extra leading zero . . . it is a lovely sculpture I can't help but find it beautiful
I would argue that the Clock of the Long Now is the antithesis of the TESCREALists - it supposes both a collapse of the civilization we know and a continuity of a humanity we don't. What amuses me is the narrative everyone tries to wrap around it. I've never seen Brian Eno not mentioned when the fact of the matter is, the chimes are a random number generator but sure, get Brian Eno in there. I've only ever seen Ludwig Oechslin mentioned once - but he's the guy who actually did the calcs to make it a clock. And really - there's no aspect of it that couldn't have been done 100 years ago. Great, it's got a giant torsion pendulum, those date to 1880 (and suck). Great it's got temperature-based reload, that's been around for 400 years. Nitinol compensator? Yeah that's a little slick but also, 60 years old and 100 years ago we just used electricity because nobody back then was going "we'll still need a regulator working when the morlocks and eloi are walking around." I think the thing that annoys me is civilizations used to build these cool things to impress each other, and now richfux hide their shit in the desert.
I feel like we've touched this subject a few times before. This article in particular I found an interesting reflection on the clock.