For 100,000 years, peace didn’t exist. And soon we’ll have AGI and cities on the moon and expect everyone to get along. The first conference on not killing each other wasn’t until 1899.

What the hell were we doing before that?

Why did it take humanity so long to sit down and speak about peace? That’s a question for another podcast. For this, let’s rewind the clock and have a story.

The Martens Clause was a legal principle drafted by Russian-Imperial diplomat Fyodor Martens during the first Hague Peace Conference of 1899. It established that even in the absence of specific written law, nations and individuals remain bound by "the laws of humanity and the requirements of public conscience."

In short, don’t be an asshole.

Originally conceived as a compromise to prevent the collapse of early international humanitarian law negotiations - when smaller nations like Belgium objected to being smaller nations - the clause became a foundational backstop in international law.

It was subsequently invoked in some of the most consequential legal proceedings of the twentieth century, including the Nuremberg Trials of 1945-46, the 1949 Corfu Channel dispute and the 1986 ICJ ruling against the United States for mining Nicaraguan harbors and supporting the Contra insurgency.

Now we want to know whether this 127-year-old clause could serve as what Jeremy calls a "minimum viable architecture" for governing emerging technologies.

Please enjoy the show.

And keep the peace.

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(00:00) The First Peace Conference: A Historical Perspective

(07:37) The Martin's Clause: Implications for Modern Governance

(10:05) Space Tech and the Outer Space Treaty

(13:58) AI and the Need for Ethical Frameworks

(17:21) Accountability in Technology Deployment

(22:56) The Future of Humanity: Collaboration vs. Competition