With entire galaxies receding beyond our reach each year, one might think this pushes humanity toward a grand strategy of haste—a desperate rush to reach the technologies of intergalactic travel as soon as possible. But the relative loss each year is actually rather slow—about one part in five billion—and it is this relative reduction in our potential that matters.

Toby Ord, The precipice: existential risk and the future of humanity, London, 2020, p. 243