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Consuming all available resources and destroying all competing life doesn’t make sense even for us as the dominant species of a single planet. What’s the evide

Consuming all available resources and destroying all competing life doesn’t make sense even for us as the dominant species of a single planet. What’s the evidence that wholesale environmental destruction is a good idea on a galactic scale if it’s already known to be a terrible idea on a planetary scale?

kentonv 6y ago
It's a terrible idea for humans on our planet because we are squishy biological beings whose life is intrinsically dependent on the biosphere around us. Self-replicating hyper-intelligent artificial beings presumably will be able to redesign themselves to match any target environment. Note: This is not a moral judgment. I obviously think it would be awful if some AI gray goo consumed the universe and wiped out all the unique forms of life. But I think that's a rather human value and I don't see why the AI would share it.
- landryraccoon 6y ago
  Here's the problem. It would be astoundingly unlikely that we would still exist if such a civilization existed. For this to have happened, it must have happened much less than a million years ago, otherwise your hypothetical civilization would already have easily consumed the entire galaxy. Since we are still here, if that civilization exists, it must have arrived on the interstellar scene less than one quarter of one tenth of one percent (< 0.025%) of the age of the solar system ago. That seems like a crazy unlikely chance. This is the fundamental problem with Von Neumann probes / AI grey goo in general : They eat the galaxy way, way faster than anyone can imagine. If they exist, why are we still here?
natmaka 6y ago
We commonly consume most available resources and try hard to destroy much competing life... in a given part of what we consider as our territory (our planet), for example when establishing then maintaining/growing a city. Earth may be part of what an alien species consider as their territory.

kentonv 6y ago

It's a terrible idea for humans on our planet because we are squishy biological beings whose life is intrinsically dependent on the biosphere around us. Self-replicating hyper-intelligent artificial beings presumably will be able to redesign themselves to match any target environment. Note: This is not a moral judgment. I obviously think it would be awful if some AI gray goo consumed the universe and wiped out all the unique forms of life. But I think that's a rather human value and I don't see why the AI would share it.

landryraccoon 6y ago
Here's the problem. It would be astoundingly unlikely that we would still exist if such a civilization existed. For this to have happened, it must have happened much less than a million years ago, otherwise your hypothetical civilization would already have easily consumed the entire galaxy. Since we are still here, if that civilization exists, it must have arrived on the interstellar scene less than one quarter of one tenth of one percent (< 0.025%) of the age of the solar system ago. That seems like a crazy unlikely chance. This is the fundamental problem with Von Neumann probes / AI grey goo in general : They eat the galaxy way, way faster than anyone can imagine. If they exist, why are we still here?

natmaka 6y ago

We commonly consume most available resources and try hard to destroy much competing life... in a given part of what we consider as our territory (our planet), for example when establishing then maintaining/growing a city. Earth may be part of what an alien species consider as their territory.