5 ms·

Humans Approaching Intelligence Level Required for Interplanetary Life

1 points by webmaven 4y ago

AnimalMuppet 4y ago
That's not "intelligence". That's science level and technology level.
- giantg2 4y ago
  Pretty sure the biggest blockers are politics and finance - getting enough people to back a single plan and then pay for it.
  - Bubble_Pop_22 4y ago
    Rightfully so. The ISS costed 100bn and produced nothing. The Mars colonization project would be something like 100-500 trillions.
    - giantg2 4y ago
      "Nothing" might be a little harsh. ISS research https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/news/iss-20-years-20-breakthroughs https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/news/iss... General space inventions. https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2019/07/08/space-race-inventions-we-use-every-day-were-created-for-space-exploration/39580591/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2019/07/08/space-race-i...
      - __B_B__ 4y ago
        Would you consider 100 trillion dollars spent on a research base 30 millions miles away which is going to tell you how to make better insulation and grooved pavement to be wisely invested?
        salawat 4y ago
        ...And provides a fallback point in terms of existential threats to the Earth biosphere? Some things no finite money supply can trump the value of.
        giantg2 4y ago
        I think that depends on if someone believes we should be expanding, or that the human race provides some value that's worth preserving.
        webmaven 4y ago
        Those that feel otherwise are free to vote with their feet, their wallets, and their ballots. So far, the "human species has value" faction has been winning for.. well, forever, since we aren't extinct. Yet.
        Bubble_Pop_22 4y ago
        > So far, the "human species has value" faction has been winning for.. well, forever, since we aren't extinct. Yet. No, it was the "my life and the life of my family has value". The human specie wins as byproduct of that
        giantg2 4y ago
        That's basically what I was going for. We have subjective value and mostly self value. I wonder if we provide any objective net benefit when looking from non human centric perspective.
        salawat 4y ago
        Looking at it from an objective, systemic approach, you and yours have zero possibility of survival of an Earth biosphere destabilizing event. A chance can be acquired. If you're going to hide behind the "greedy genes" train of thought, you will need to look elsewhere for a justification on why this would be bad.
- unsupp0rted 4y ago
  There's probably little or no difference. At some level of science and technology a species can make itself smarter a lot faster than biological evolution can. At that point "intelligence" = whatever science and tech can make us, since 99.99% of our intelligence won't be coming from our inborn unaugmented wetware.
  - webmaven 4y ago
    There is also a possibility that over evolutionary timescales we'll become less intelligent, and our tool making and use will become rote and externalized into networks of people (and devices). There is some indication that this has already started. Once it became impossible for a human to know more than a fraction of the knowledge that is relevant to their decisionmaking, bigger brains were no longer unequivocally better, and socially networked brains started making better decisions (early anatomically modern humans had bigger brains and thicker skulls, on average, than we late moderns). Something related seems to have happened much more recently with the advent of widespread literacy that strongly selected for silent reading comprehension and associated minor neuroanatomical changes) while deemphasizing the ability to recall words (and possibly other things) verbatim. We certainly aren't smarter than the ancient Greeks, but we are better at a bunch of skills and abilities like silent reading, and possibly considerably worse off in other ways.
    - Ekaros 4y ago
      On average I think we are smarter due to sufficient nutrition. At least for whole population. On the other hand, specially Internet and extremely easy access to knowledge likely makes us retain less information and thus I think we might be in bit downward trajectory. The information is there, and we have access to it, but on individual level we retain much less of it, even the useful stuff.

1 points by webmaven 4y ago

AnimalMuppet 4y ago

That's not "intelligence". That's science level and technology level.

giantg2 4y ago
Pretty sure the biggest blockers are politics and finance - getting enough people to back a single plan and then pay for it.
- Bubble_Pop_22 4y ago
  Rightfully so. The ISS costed 100bn and produced nothing. The Mars colonization project would be something like 100-500 trillions.
  - giantg2 4y ago
    "Nothing" might be a little harsh. ISS research https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/news/iss-20-years-20-breakthroughs https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/news/iss... General space inventions. https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2019/07/08/space-race-inventions-we-use-every-day-were-created-for-space-exploration/39580591/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2019/07/08/space-race-i...
    - __B_B__ 4y ago
      Would you consider 100 trillion dollars spent on a research base 30 millions miles away which is going to tell you how to make better insulation and grooved pavement to be wisely invested?
      - salawat 4y ago
        ...And provides a fallback point in terms of existential threats to the Earth biosphere? Some things no finite money supply can trump the value of.
        giantg2 4y ago
        I think that depends on if someone believes we should be expanding, or that the human race provides some value that's worth preserving.
        webmaven 4y ago
        Those that feel otherwise are free to vote with their feet, their wallets, and their ballots. So far, the "human species has value" faction has been winning for.. well, forever, since we aren't extinct. Yet.
        Bubble_Pop_22 4y ago
        > So far, the "human species has value" faction has been winning for.. well, forever, since we aren't extinct. Yet. No, it was the "my life and the life of my family has value". The human specie wins as byproduct of that
        giantg2 4y ago
        That's basically what I was going for. We have subjective value and mostly self value. I wonder if we provide any objective net benefit when looking from non human centric perspective.
        salawat 4y ago
        Looking at it from an objective, systemic approach, you and yours have zero possibility of survival of an Earth biosphere destabilizing event. A chance can be acquired. If you're going to hide behind the "greedy genes" train of thought, you will need to look elsewhere for a justification on why this would be bad.
unsupp0rted 4y ago
There's probably little or no difference. At some level of science and technology a species can make itself smarter a lot faster than biological evolution can. At that point "intelligence" = whatever science and tech can make us, since 99.99% of our intelligence won't be coming from our inborn unaugmented wetware.
- webmaven 4y ago
  There is also a possibility that over evolutionary timescales we'll become less intelligent, and our tool making and use will become rote and externalized into networks of people (and devices). There is some indication that this has already started. Once it became impossible for a human to know more than a fraction of the knowledge that is relevant to their decisionmaking, bigger brains were no longer unequivocally better, and socially networked brains started making better decisions (early anatomically modern humans had bigger brains and thicker skulls, on average, than we late moderns). Something related seems to have happened much more recently with the advent of widespread literacy that strongly selected for silent reading comprehension and associated minor neuroanatomical changes) while deemphasizing the ability to recall words (and possibly other things) verbatim. We certainly aren't smarter than the ancient Greeks, but we are better at a bunch of skills and abilities like silent reading, and possibly considerably worse off in other ways.
  - Ekaros 4y ago
    On average I think we are smarter due to sufficient nutrition. At least for whole population. On the other hand, specially Internet and extremely easy access to knowledge likely makes us retain less information and thus I think we might be in bit downward trajectory. The information is there, and we have access to it, but on individual level we retain much less of it, even the useful stuff.