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I think emergence of life is a start of a ticking time bomb. If someone would look at earth from afar and observe the changes on a compressed time scale, one wo

by sonink 10y ago

I think emergence of life is a start of a ticking time bomb. If someone would look at earth from afar and observe the changes on a compressed time scale, one would see the earth 'lighting' up a bit as soon as intelligent life emerges. Life emerging on a planet is like a bomb's fuse getting lit. The bomb in this case being earth itself with its unique chemical composition. It is only a question of time when this bomb goes off and destroys all life in the process. Maybe the purpose of life is to accelerate and magnify that explosion to achieve the highest possible cosmic reduction of entropy. Some people argue against this by citing how earth has become relatively peaceful over the last century. I think this is a false belief - earth is in a local minima of violence bought about by the emergence of nation states and nuclear weapons. The next level of evolution of intelligent life, which will most likely be AI, will bring with it a new wave of violence. First, when AI takes over and fights the humans for dominance, and next if there are multiple AI which emerge and fight over the resources of this solar system.

pavel_lishin 10y ago
> It is only a question of time when this bomb goes off and destroys all life in the process. Or it only affects the planet enough to destroy civilization, and not all life. Or only all high-order life, leaving insects and fish behind. Etc, etc.
- sonink 10y ago
  The emergence of man has been disastrous for every other life form. We delude ourselves by saving some of them in national parks, but at any point of time they intrude into our living spaces we don't hesitate to wipe them off. When man dropped the bomb on another city, there was no consideration given for the other life forms which died as a result. This consideration has never been given in any wars man has fought till now, and will not be given when we loose against AI.
  - pavel_lishin 10y ago
    It seems to have worked out pretty well for cats, dogs, rats, and just about every life form that lives in or on us.
shkkmo 10y ago
It may not be that hard for us to make the Earth unfit for our society, or even for humans as a life form. However, I think it would be significantly harder for us to wipe out all life on the planet earth. I'm hard pressed to think of anything besides blowing up the planet, or grey goo (and arguably grey goo would just be another form of life).
- sonink 10y ago
  So every life form seeks to fight for survival and guarantee its existence. When the next life form emerge, maybe in the form of AI, it will lock itself in a war for control of the planet Earth. This war will be fundamentally a pursuit of energy and resources, as it has always been. And this pursuit of energy and resources has always been detrimental at an exponentially increasing scale to other life forms which depend on the same. As an example, if there is a nuclear war in the Indian subcontinent, the countries there will only be acting out of their need to guarantee their survival. However, the resulting fallout will have extinguished life forms at a pace that doesnt have any bearing in history.
p1mrx 10y ago
> Maybe the purpose of life is to accelerate and magnify that explosion to achieve the highest possible cosmic reduction of entropy. What mechanism would define that purpose? Earth harboring life for a few billion years, and then snuffing itself out, seems completely irrelevant on the scale of cosmic entropy. Your argument might have merit if intelligent life tends to perform crazy Physics experiments that spawn new universes. Then you'd have an evolutionary feedback loop where universes become tuned for intelligent life.
- sonink 10y ago
  It is just the direction the universe flows. Life is just a more complex incendiary reaction born out of a certain chemical chemical composition and planetary alignment. In that sense it is perhaps similar to a volcano that erupt. Both are emergent from the same forces of entropy, but life just takes a non obvious path. Life seeks to burn itself out, the same way a volcano seeks to cool itself.

by sonink 10y ago

pavel_lishin 10y ago

> It is only a question of time when this bomb goes off and destroys all life in the process. Or it only affects the planet enough to destroy civilization, and not all life. Or only all high-order life, leaving insects and fish behind. Etc, etc.

sonink 10y ago
The emergence of man has been disastrous for every other life form. We delude ourselves by saving some of them in national parks, but at any point of time they intrude into our living spaces we don't hesitate to wipe them off. When man dropped the bomb on another city, there was no consideration given for the other life forms which died as a result. This consideration has never been given in any wars man has fought till now, and will not be given when we loose against AI.
- pavel_lishin 10y ago
  It seems to have worked out pretty well for cats, dogs, rats, and just about every life form that lives in or on us.

shkkmo 10y ago

It may not be that hard for us to make the Earth unfit for our society, or even for humans as a life form. However, I think it would be significantly harder for us to wipe out all life on the planet earth. I'm hard pressed to think of anything besides blowing up the planet, or grey goo (and arguably grey goo would just be another form of life).

sonink 10y ago
So every life form seeks to fight for survival and guarantee its existence. When the next life form emerge, maybe in the form of AI, it will lock itself in a war for control of the planet Earth. This war will be fundamentally a pursuit of energy and resources, as it has always been. And this pursuit of energy and resources has always been detrimental at an exponentially increasing scale to other life forms which depend on the same. As an example, if there is a nuclear war in the Indian subcontinent, the countries there will only be acting out of their need to guarantee their survival. However, the resulting fallout will have extinguished life forms at a pace that doesnt have any bearing in history.

p1mrx 10y ago

> Maybe the purpose of life is to accelerate and magnify that explosion to achieve the highest possible cosmic reduction of entropy. What mechanism would define that purpose? Earth harboring life for a few billion years, and then snuffing itself out, seems completely irrelevant on the scale of cosmic entropy. Your argument might have merit if intelligent life tends to perform crazy Physics experiments that spawn new universes. Then you'd have an evolutionary feedback loop where universes become tuned for intelligent life.

sonink 10y ago
It is just the direction the universe flows. Life is just a more complex incendiary reaction born out of a certain chemical chemical composition and planetary alignment. In that sense it is perhaps similar to a volcano that erupt. Both are emergent from the same forces of entropy, but life just takes a non obvious path. Life seeks to burn itself out, the same way a volcano seeks to cool itself.