7 ms·

False. Humans are, by default, gonna fuck shit up. I don't care what planet we end up on. We're going to destroy ourselves before the lack of resources destroy

by leak 15y ago

False. Humans are, by default, gonna fuck shit up. I don't care what planet we end up on. We're going to destroy ourselves before the lack of resources destroys us. That's just me tho.

iwwr 15y ago
The point being, space expansion would prevent the sudden eradication of the human technological culture. Politicians, warmongers, prophets and priests will continue to fuck things up, but distributed redundancy means not everything is destroyed at once.
- leak 15y ago
  I'm not sure why I'm being downvoted. Anyways, who says Earth created "Politicians, warmongers, prophets and priests, etc.."? Kids fight among themselves without any of these lovely things to help them. As does everything in the living world.
  - chc 15y ago
    You're being downvoted because you missed the point and continue to do so. Nobody said that earth created those things, or that going into space would somehow make us more compassionate. The point is that being spread out across interplanetary distances reduces the need for bad people to take truly drastic measures, and mitigates the damage that any particular disaster can do. Even if we a madman managed to blow up the entire world, as long as he can't do so to every world that humans are inhabiting simultaneously, humanity will live on.
geon 15y ago
...which is exactly why we need to spread out. Dont put all the eggs in the same basket, etc.
- Rastafarian 15y ago
  On the other side, while we're on one planet we can fix ourself. But once spread across the stars ... wars, fanatical religions, police states, etc. may stay with us forever.
  - kooshball 15y ago
    > we can fix ourself looking at the history of the human race, it seems unlikely we'll ever "fix ourself". > wars, fanatical religions, police states, etc. may stay with us forever. if anything i believe the wars, fanatical religions will stay with us forever since they're a part of human nature. regardless of which planet we're on.
    - Rastafarian 15y ago
      Civilization changes human nature. The same way our civilization produces dogs, caws, sheep, etc. it also changed us into a less aggressive, more cooperative being with way way way higher self control. EDIT: I can give you countless examples. Compare the human reactions in developing countries with those of say a London native. You'll see that just a few centuries of life in big cities have given Englishmen incredible manners and self control.
      - tsotha 15y ago
        Oh yes, we saw that over the summer.
        calebmpeterson 15y ago
        A good point. The question then is "does civilization change human nature itself or just the contract between members of said society?" Extreme circumstances seem to break the social contract of a civilization and reveal that human nature didn't change much if at all.
    - ricree 15y ago
      >looking at the history of the human race, it seems unlikely we'll ever "fix ourself". I disagree. We're barely a couple thousand years away from mass crucifixion as a legitimate punishment by civilizations that were considered advanced for their time. We're only a couple hundred years away from legitimized slavery as the norm. There are probably some human flaws that will never go away unless we deliberately engineer them from our biology. Even so, if you look at history there's been a massive trend towards improvement. Even if our flaws today seem insurmountable, I think history shows a solid track record of improvement.

by leak 15y ago

False. Humans are, by default, gonna fuck shit up. I don't care what planet we end up on. We're going to destroy ourselves before the lack of resources destroys us. That's just me tho.

iwwr 15y ago

The point being, space expansion would prevent the sudden eradication of the human technological culture. Politicians, warmongers, prophets and priests will continue to fuck things up, but distributed redundancy means not everything is destroyed at once.

leak 15y ago
I'm not sure why I'm being downvoted. Anyways, who says Earth created "Politicians, warmongers, prophets and priests, etc.."? Kids fight among themselves without any of these lovely things to help them. As does everything in the living world.
- chc 15y ago
  You're being downvoted because you missed the point and continue to do so. Nobody said that earth created those things, or that going into space would somehow make us more compassionate. The point is that being spread out across interplanetary distances reduces the need for bad people to take truly drastic measures, and mitigates the damage that any particular disaster can do. Even if we a madman managed to blow up the entire world, as long as he can't do so to every world that humans are inhabiting simultaneously, humanity will live on.

geon 15y ago

...which is exactly why we need to spread out. Dont put all the eggs in the same basket, etc.

Rastafarian 15y ago
On the other side, while we're on one planet we can fix ourself. But once spread across the stars ... wars, fanatical religions, police states, etc. may stay with us forever.
- kooshball 15y ago
  > we can fix ourself looking at the history of the human race, it seems unlikely we'll ever "fix ourself". > wars, fanatical religions, police states, etc. may stay with us forever. if anything i believe the wars, fanatical religions will stay with us forever since they're a part of human nature. regardless of which planet we're on.
  - Rastafarian 15y ago
    Civilization changes human nature. The same way our civilization produces dogs, caws, sheep, etc. it also changed us into a less aggressive, more cooperative being with way way way higher self control. EDIT: I can give you countless examples. Compare the human reactions in developing countries with those of say a London native. You'll see that just a few centuries of life in big cities have given Englishmen incredible manners and self control.
    - tsotha 15y ago
      Oh yes, we saw that over the summer.
      - calebmpeterson 15y ago
        A good point. The question then is "does civilization change human nature itself or just the contract between members of said society?" Extreme circumstances seem to break the social contract of a civilization and reveal that human nature didn't change much if at all.
  - ricree 15y ago
    >looking at the history of the human race, it seems unlikely we'll ever "fix ourself". I disagree. We're barely a couple thousand years away from mass crucifixion as a legitimate punishment by civilizations that were considered advanced for their time. We're only a couple hundred years away from legitimized slavery as the norm. There are probably some human flaws that will never go away unless we deliberately engineer them from our biology. Even so, if you look at history there's been a massive trend towards improvement. Even if our flaws today seem insurmountable, I think history shows a solid track record of improvement.