On a granite-strewn plain, surrounded by gnarled mountains, sits a giant steel box.

Incongruous in the landscape, much like Kubrick’s black monolith of 2001: A Space Odyssey fame, its alien presence suggests it was put there with intent.

And if those that discover it can decipher the messages it contains, they could get a glimpse of what caused the fall of the civilisation that was there before.

This is Earth’s Black Box.

When an aeroplane crashes, it’s left to investigators to sift through the wreckage to recover the black box.

It’s hoped the recorded contents can be used to help others avoid the same fate.

And so it is with Earth’s Black Box: a 10-metre-by-4-metre-by-3-metre steel monolith that’s intended to be built on a remote outcrop on Tasmania’s west coast.

Chosen for its geopolitical and geological stability, ahead of other candidates like Malta, Norway and Qatar, the idea is that the Tasmanian site can cradle the black box for the benefit of a future civilisation, should catastrophic climate change cause the downfall of ours.

If that sounds unhinged, it’s worth remembering that we’re currently on track for as much as 2.7C of warming this century.

Ask any climate scientist what happens when warming breaches 2C, and they’ll almost invariably tell you it’s not worth thinking about.

Plenty of past civilisations and empires have collapsed in the face of less.

more at abc.net.au

feature image credit earthsblackbox.com