Perhaps All of Humanity’s Problems Stem from One Simple Question of Common Sense: Do We Actually Know What Civilization Is?

From more than twenty years of repeatedly writing to the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, to Letters to Every Person in the World, and then to my open letter to President Trump, I have always been trying to convey one single point:

Humanity has always pursued civilization, yet it has never truly figured out what civilization is. This, I believe, is the deepest root of all humanity’s problems.

（附後有本文的中文原文——The original Chinese text follows below）

By Jin Guyu

There is an extremely ordinary piece of common sense that virtually everyone understands:

If you genuinely want to do something well, you must truly understand what that thing is, and you must also understand the paths, methods, and underlying principles by which it can be done well.

Nothing could sound simpler.

Yet when this common sense is applied to “civilization,” humanity seems never to have confronted it seriously.

Human civilization is, in essence, a social achievement gradually created because human beings became better than other animals at cooperation.

Humanity has always wanted to make civilization work well.

Yet for thousands of years, we have never truly succeeded.

War has not disappeared. Mutual harm has not ceased. Social divisions repeatedly reopen. Institutions are rebuilt, only to lose their balance again. Individuals, groups, and nations continue to oscillate between cooperation and confrontation.

This leads to the simplest possible question:

If humanity truly knows what civilization is—if we truly understand how civilization should operate, how it should evolve, and how it can be made to work well—why do we keep falling into the same problems again and again?

That is why I have continued to follow this most elementary piece of common sense downward, asking one question after another.

I did not begin with abstract terminology. I tried instead to search for answers in the common patterns that emerge from civilization’s countless concrete affairs, actions, relationships, and details of development.

It was by following this path that I gradually formed my own understanding of the essential nature of civilization and the laws governing its evolution.

Once I had formed such an understanding, I came to believe that it could not belong to me alone.

Civilization is not the concern of one scholar. It is not the concern of one country. Nor is it the concern of one social class.

Civilization is the integrated pattern that continuously emerges from every concrete thing every human being does every day—through cooperation, conflict, order, choice, and consequence.

It is therefore, by its very nature, everyone’s concern.

This is why, for more than twenty years, I wrote repeatedly, almost every year, to the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China.

Later, whenever I had a lawful opportunity to express myself, I continued writing Letters to Every Person in the World: to governments, international organizations, research institutions and think tanks, influential figures in relevant fields, and especially researchers and decision-makers working in artificial intelligence—eventually culminating in an open letter to President Trump.

I did so because I became increasingly convinced of one thing:

Civilization is not an abstract concept floating above human life.

Civilization is the integrated pattern produced as everything every person does throughout a lifetime unfolds, accumulates, and interacts with everything else.

Its outward forms are extraordinarily diverse, but its underlying patterns display a high degree of commonality.

And that commonality must necessarily manifest itself in the unfolding of every matter, at every level, and in every detail.

When human beings first opened their eyes to understand the world, all we could see were appearances.

Humanity therefore had no choice but to pick up fragments of connection, little by little, from an immensely complex world of appearances, gradually moving closer to the laws and truths beneath them.

For thousands of years, humanity’s achievements in exploring civilization have still appeared like scattered fragments of truth.

But I believe that today is different from the past.

Enough of those fragments have accumulated that we can begin to see something:

Behind the evolution of different countries, different institutions, different cultures, different historical periods, and different concrete affairs throughout human civilization, there may in fact exist a highly consistent set of underlying patterns.

I summarize what I understand to be the essence of civilization in nine Chinese characters:

Grasp the process; build the model; seek balance.
(抓程序、做模式、求平衡)

I summarize the civilizational characteristics of concrete human behavior in eight Chinese characters:

Take order as the guiding principle; follow sequence to determine proper measure.
(以序為綱、循序定度)

I am not asking anyone to believe in advance that these seventeen Chinese characters are correct.

Quite the opposite.

What I am actually calling for is this:

For the first time, let the essential nature of civilization itself formally become an object that all humanity jointly examines, tests, and debates.

In my view, humanity may now be only one genuinely global conference away from taking this step.

Not another conference about the interests of one country, one war, one technology, or the relative merits of one political system over another.

A conference devoted instead to three questions:

What, fundamentally, is civilization?

Does civilization possess common underlying laws?

Can humanity establish a set of civilizational standards that can be jointly examined and tested?

Even if such a conference ultimately proved my own conclusions entirely wrong, it would still be immensely valuable.

For it could at least cause humanity, perhaps for the first time, to recognize that:

Finding out what civilization actually is may itself be the most important task among all the matters humanity faces today.

And there is a reason this question has now become more urgent than ever:

The age of SI has arrived.

For thousands of years, humanity could afford to proceed by trial and error, slowly feeling its way forward without knowing the essential truth of civilization.

Superintelligence is changing that.

For the first time, humanity is confronting powerful intelligent systems that we ourselves may be capable of creating, yet whose detailed internal operations we may not be able to fully understand.

There is nothing ridiculous about fearing this.

But the real danger is something else:

Even while humanity is afraid, we continue to push toward more powerful intelligence using value systems, competitive logic, and jungle-like modes of thinking that we ourselves have not yet upgraded.

To me, this is like a monkey that accidentally discovers an airplane and climbs into the cockpit. Without yet truly understanding the principles of flight, it begins desperately pulling the aircraft toward an altitude of ten thousand meters, driven by stimulation, excitement, and fear.

The danger is not the aircraft itself.

The danger is this:

The cognitive system operating it has not caught up with the power it has acquired.

Today, with the help of SI, humanity is magnifying—perhaps by hundreds or thousands of times—the competitive capacity, controlling capacity, strategic capacity, and even the capacity for mutual struggle and harm already possessed by individuals, organizations, and nations.

At the same time, however, humanity may not be able to transcend with equal speed the limits imposed by our senses, experience, and short-term interests.

Still less is it certain that we will first use SI to magnify the kind of civilizational wisdom that can emerge only through cooperation.

That is what truly concerns me.

For this reason, the transformation humanity faces today is not simply another ordinary historical crossroads.

It is unlike any previous technological revolution, institutional revolution, or industrial revolution.

Humanity may no longer be standing at a crossroads looking left and right. We may already have reached the end of the road we have been travelling.

If we continue choosing only left, right, forward, or backward within the old coordinate system, perhaps there is nowhere left to go.

That is why I say:

The real way forward for civilization no longer lies to the left, right, front, or rear. It lies above. Humanity must raise its eyes to the heavens and upgrade human civilization.

Human beings themselves, and the civilization human beings have created, are not, in essence, isolated and static “things.”

At a more fundamental level, they appear more like process-based structures: cosmic energy gives rise to processes; processes form combinations; combinations form cooperative patterns; and from them emerge structured modes of organization.

This is the commonsense starting point of what I call the Hypothesis of the Law of Process-Determined Qualities.

From this starting point, I further derive the understanding of civilization described above, as well as a possible direction for how humanity might genuinely learn to do civilization well.

I have already published a number of outline articles online explaining parts of this framework.

Yet to this day, I still lack a platform on which I can fully explain what I mean and analyze in detail human affairs that appear to occupy the same space and time, yet reveal entirely different realities when observed from different dimensions.

Perhaps, however, I no longer need to say very much myself. It may be enough if influential people can help initiate a serious human discussion—or convene an international conference—to jointly examine what civilization fundamentally is and what laws govern its evolution, and to test the Hypothesis of the Law of Process-Determined Qualities proposed in the articles I have already published.

Humanity can, of course, construct many theoretical dimensions through which to understand the world.

But in my view, given the present limits of human senses and cognition, our most fundamental practical perspectives can ultimately be reduced to two:

the dimension of physical form, and the dimension of process.

One asks:

“What is it?”

The other asks:

“How does it operate? How does it connect? How does it unfold? How does it generate results?”

Which of these dimensions comes closer to the underlying reality of the world?

Which is better suited to become the foundation upon which future humanity makes value judgments, designs institutions, organizes cooperation, and uses superintelligence?

Perhaps this is the true “singularity” at which humanity itself needs to awaken today.

Ultimately, my conclusion is extremely simple:

All humanity must work together to discover the truth of civilization.

Only by first understanding what civilization actually is can humanity truly know how civilization should be made to work.

And only then may humanity be capable of genuine self-rescue in the age of SI.

To state my proposal once again as simply as possible:

The first step should be to openly examine and test the Hypothesis of the Law of Process-Determined Qualities.

If this law is eventually shown to have validity, then the next stage of inquiry should proceed in the following direction:

The development of civilization may, in essence, be the process by which human thought gradually evolves from concrete “physical-form mirror thinking” toward “process thinking.”

If this judgment proves correct, then what humanity truly needs to reconstruct is not merely one institution, one law, one ideology, or one economic model.

What humanity truly needs to reconstruct lies deeper:

the coordinate system from which human beings make value judgments.

On that foundation, humanity could rebuild the underlying civilizational framework of social cooperation—that is, our shared modes of thought and the logic through which we cooperate.

Only after strengthening this foundation could humanity begin to reconstruct its modes of cooperation in daily life, production, institutions, politics, law, economics, science and technology, and relations among nations, so that the cooperative links holding human society together are no longer repeatedly torn apart.

Only then might human civilization genuinely evolve from a lower jungle civilization, still heavily dependent upon mutual struggle, mutual harm, self-protection, and competition, toward a higher civilization capable of sustained, stable, and harmonious cooperation.

If one day humanity can truly complete such an unprecedented project of social cooperation—establishing a new mode of cooperation capable of sustaining the long-term evolution of civilization as a whole—

then I believe:

That day may truly mark the beginning of permanent peace for humanity.

October 2026

（The text that follows is the original Chinese version of this article.）

人類所有問題，也許都源於一個最簡單的常識問題：我們究竟知不知道什麼是文明？

——從二十多年持續給中共中央寫信，到《致全球每一個人的信》，再到給特朗普總統寫公開信，我始終只想說明一句話：

人類一直在追求文明，卻始終沒有真正弄清楚什麼是文明——這，才是人類所有問題最深層的根源。

作者：金穀雨

有一句極其普通的常識，全人類其實都明白：

你想真正做好一件事，就必須真正了解這件事是什麼，也必須知道把它做好的路徑、方法和規律。

這句話聽起來再簡單不過。

可如果把它放到“文明”這件事上，人類卻似乎從來沒有真正認真面對過。

人類文明，本質上是因為人類比其他動物更善於合作，才逐漸創造出來的一種社會成果。

人類也一直想把文明這件事做好。

可幾千年來，人類始終沒有真正把它做好。

戰爭沒有消失，互害沒有停止，社會撕裂不斷重複，制度不斷重建又不斷失衡，個人、群體、國家之間始終在合作與對抗之間反覆擺動。

那麼，一個最樸素的問題就出現了：

如果人類真的知道什麼是文明，真的知道文明應當怎樣運行、怎樣演進、怎樣才能被做好，為什麼人類至今仍然一次又一次陷入同樣的問題？

所以，我沿着這句最簡單的常識，一直向下追問。

我不是從抽象名詞出發，而是從文明中無數具體事務、具體行為、具體關係和具體演繹細節的共同規律中去尋找答案。

也正是沿着這個方向，我逐漸形成了自己關於文明本質及其演繹規律的認知。

而一旦形成這樣的認知，我就認為，它不能只屬於我個人。

因為文明不是某一個學者的事，不是某一個國家的事，也不是某一個階層的事。

文明，就是全人類每一個人每天所做的每一件具體事情，在合作、衝突、秩序、選擇和結果中不斷演繹出來的綜合規律現象。

所以，它本來就是每一個人的事。

也因此，才有了我二十多年來幾乎年年、反覆、持續給中共中央寫信。

後來，只要獲得合法表達的機會，我就繼續寫《致全球每一個人的信》，寫給各國政府，寫給國際組織，寫給研究機構和智庫，寫給相關領域的人類精英，尤其寫給人工智能領域的研究者和決策者，直到後來寫給特朗普總統的公開信。

因為我越來越確信：

文明不是懸浮在人類生活之上的抽象概念。

文明，就是每一個人一生所做的每一件事不斷演繹、疊加、關聯之後形成的綜合規律。

它的表象極其多樣，但其底層規律卻具有高度同一性。

而這種同一性，必然具體存在於任何一件事、任何一個層次、任何一個細節的演繹之中。

人類最初睜開眼睛認識世界時，只能看到表象。

所以，人類只能從紛繁複雜的表象中，一點一點撿拾關聯性，一點一點向背後的規律和真相靠近。

幾千年來，人類關於文明的探索成果，看起來仍然像一塊塊彼此分散的“真相碎片”。

但我認為，今天已經和過去不同。

這些碎片積累到今天，已經足夠讓人看見：

整個人類文明中，不同國家、不同制度、不同文化、不同歷史階段、不同具體事務的演繹背後，其實存在某種高度一致的底層規律。

我把自己所理解的文明本質，概括成九個中國字：

抓程序、做模式、求平衡。

我把人類具體行為呈現出的文明特徵，概括成八個中國字：

以序為綱、循序定度。

我並不要求任何人先相信這十七個字是正確的。

恰恰相反。

我真正呼籲的是：

把文明本質本身，第一次正式作為全人類共同需要甄別、驗證和討論的對象。

在我看來，今天我們距離這一步，也許只差一次真正具有全球意義的國際會議。

一次不是討論某個國家利益、某場戰爭、某項技術、某種制度優劣的會議，而是討論：

文明究竟是什麼？
文明有沒有共同的底層規律？
人類能不能建立一套可以被共同檢驗的文明標準？

即使最後證明我的總結完全錯誤，這樣一次會議也依然有價值。

因為它至少能讓全人類第一次真正意識到：

弄清文明究竟是什麼，本身就可能是今天人類所有事務中最重要的事情。

而現在，這件事之所以變得前所未有地緊迫，是因為——

SI時代已經來了。

過去幾千年，人類可以在不知道文明本質真相的情況下，一邊試錯，一邊慢慢摸索。

但超級智能正在改變這一切。

人類第一次真切面對一種自己能夠創造、卻未必能夠完整理解其內部運行細節的強大智能系統。

這種恐懼並不可笑。

可真正危險的是：

人類一邊害怕，一邊仍然在用自己尚未升級的價值體系、競爭邏輯和叢林式思維，繼續推動更強智能的發展。

在我看來，這就像一隻猴子偶然發現了一架飛機，闖進駕駛艙，卻還沒有真正理解飛行原理，就在刺激、興奮和恐懼中拼命把飛機拉向萬米高空。

危險不在飛機本身。

危險在於：

操縱它的認知體系，還沒有跟上它所獲得的能力。

今天的人類，正在藉助SI，把每一個個人、組織和國家原有的競爭能力、控制能力、博弈能力、甚至互斗互害的能力，放大百倍、千倍。

但與此同時，人類卻未必能夠同步突破自身感官、經驗和短期利益的限制，更未必能夠優先利用SI去放大只有合作才能產生的文明智慧。

這，才是我真正擔心的事情。

所以，今天人類面對的變化，並不是又一個普通的歷史十字路口。

它與過去任何一次技術革命、制度革命、產業革命都不同。

人類現在不是站在路口左顧右盼，而可能已經走到了原有道路本身的盡頭。

如果繼續只在舊有坐標里選擇左、右、前、後，我們也許已經無路可走。

因此，我說：

文明的真正出路已不在左、右、前、後，而在上方，人類該抬頭看一看蒼穹來升級人類文明了。

因為人類本身，以及人類創造出來的文明，本質上都不是孤立靜止的“物”。

從更底層的角度看，它們都更像是宇宙能量運動形成程序、程序形成組合、組合形成合作模式之後出現的程序化結構。

這正是我提出“程序定質規律假說”的常識起點。

也正是從這裡，我進一步推出了前面所說的文明本質理解，以及人類應當怎樣真正把文明這件事做好的路徑方向。

更具體的論述，我已經在網絡上陸續發表了一些綱要性文章。

但直到今天，我仍然缺少一個真正能夠把話完整講清楚的平台，去具體解析那些看似處在同一時空、實際上卻因為觀察維度不同而呈現完全不同的人類事務。也或許不需要我再說什麼，只要有人類精英能推動人類展開討論，或召開一次國際會議，合作甄別什麼是文明本質及其演繹規律，驗證我已經發布的文章提出的程序定質規律假說課題，就足夠了。

人類認識世界當然可以有很多理論維度。

但在我看來，在人類現有感官和認知條件下，我們現實中最根本的觀察視角，其實可以歸結為兩個：

物形維度，和程序維度。

一個看“是什麼東西”。

一個看“它怎樣運行、怎樣關聯、怎樣演繹、怎樣生成結果”。

那麼，哪一個維度更接近世界真實的底層？

哪一個維度更適合作為未來人類判斷價值、設計制度、組織合作和使用超級智能的基礎？

這，或許才是人類今天真正應該覺醒的“奇點”。

歸根到底，我的結論其實非常簡單：

全人類必須共同去弄清文明的真相。

因為只有先弄清文明是什麼，人類才可能真正知道文明應該怎樣被做好。

也只有這樣，人類才有可能在SI時代完成真正意義上的自救。

再次簡約強調我的建議是：

第一步，先公開甄別、驗證“程序定質規律”這一課題。

如果這一規律最終被證明具有真實性，那麼下一步，就應該沿着這樣一個方向繼續研究：

文明的發展過程，也許本質上就是人類思維從具體的“物形鏡像思維”，逐漸向“程序思維”演進的過程。

如果這一判斷成立，那麼人類真正需要重塑的，就不僅僅是某一個制度、某一條法律、某一種意識形態或某一種經濟模式。

人類真正需要重塑的，是更底層的東西：

人類進行價值判斷時所站立的坐標體系。

並以此重新構建人類社會合作的底層文明框架——也就是人類共同的思維模式和合作邏輯。

只有先夯實這一層，人類才可能進一步重構生活、生產、制度、政治、法律、經濟、科技以及國家之間的合作模式，使人類社會的合作鏈接不再一次又一次被撕裂。

人類文明也才可能真正從一種仍然高度依賴互斗、互害、自保和競爭的低級叢林文明，逐步升級為一種能夠持續、穩定、和諧合作的高級文明。

如果有一天，人類真的能夠完成這樣一項前所未有的社會合作工程——建立一套足以支撐全人類文明長期演進的新型合作模式——

那麼我相信，

那一天，也許才真正是人類永久和平開始的那一天。

                                    於2026年10月