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Assuming we could stabilize the Earth's climate as it is now, and discarding any questions of resources, I wonder if humanity could remain as-is for a billion y

Assuming we could stabilize the Earth's climate as it is now, and discarding any questions of resources, I wonder if humanity could remain as-is for a billion years? We'd still be under (non-natural) evolutionary pressure, unless we learned enough to stop that happening too. If we did become a stable species that decided to stick around the Solar system, maybe we'd be powerful enough to move Earth slowly outwards as Sol expanded? Maybe with the gravitational effects of millions of planetoid flybys. Makes me wonder if we could do the same with stars, lol! Become a shepherd of our local galactic area, carefully keeping stars away from our precious birthplace over timescales of trillions of years...

LorenPechtel 4y ago
I would be astounded if "humanity" exists a million years from now. I wouldn't be surprised if it doesn't exist a thousand years from now. The thing is we are a technological species, we don't need to rely on random chance for evolution. We can already create DNA on demand and insert it into microorganisms. AFIAK we currently only do this with already-known proteins, but that is a limit of knowing what will be useful, not a limit of the technique. As time goes on it seems inconceivable that we will not reach the point we can apply this to human DNA at conception. I expect the first manifestations will be editing out known-bad genes and replacing them with the properly-working equivalents. Next will come replacing ordinary genes with known-superior genes. Then they'll be inventing new superior genes. I expect in almost all cases they'll make the edits backwards-compatible but we've all seen it with software--backwards compatibility only works over a range of generations. Don't expect v20 to play nice with v2. Once the mods reach the point that reproduction with a stock human is no longer possible we have a speciation event--the results can no longer be considered human even if they would not raise an eyebrow if dropped into today's society. As for long-term protection of our solar system--I can't imagine why. It would be a lot easier to protect the Earth by moving it rather than moving anything that might threaten it.
- rbanffy 4y ago
  > Then they'll be inventing new superior genes. The thing is, they only need to do it once in all those billions of years, and they become a totally different species. And that's assuming they'll still be fond of organic bodies and not decide to live in simulated environments that are much easier to move than planets.
  - LorenPechtel 4y ago
    Inventing a superior gene doesn't itself make them a new species. They only become a new species when the result can't breed with a base human. However, even that gets fuzzy--there's a "species" of bird whose name escapes me that lives in high latitudes. They can all breed with the neighbors, but birds from the two ends of the span can't breed with each other. I expect to see the same thing happen with humanity--eventually highly modded individuals won't be able to breed with unmodded individuals. (Although, unless immortality is developed there won't be any unmodded individuals to breed with. Why would the genetic engineers care about compatibility with the old version that's no longer around?)
hotpotamus 4y ago
I mean, large engineering projects for the greater good of humanity don't really seem like our thing as a species, but the answers to most of your questions are yes in theory. If you can surround a star with a Dyson Sphere/Swarm, you can do all kinds of things to it including concentrating all its energy into a beam to destroy a planet like the Earth in seconds (though you can't blow it apart like in Star Wars that easily). There's a youtube channel dedicated to this kind of stuff called "Science and Futurism with Isaac Arthur".
denton-scratch 4y ago
> I wonder if humanity could remain as-is for a billion years? Are you kidding? What was humanity a billion years ago?
- rbanffy 4y ago
  Remember evolution is based on the survival of the fittest. Not necessarily of the smartest.
  - wrycoder 4y ago
    That would be fungi.
    - denton-scratch 4y ago
      There was a book published in the early 70's, called "Musrum", by Thacker and Earnshaw. It inspired in me the idea that Fungus spores are maybe the most-likely way for life to travel star-to-star. That's not what's best about that book, BTW; it's a magical book. I'd love to see a copy. [Edit] Not Bradshaw - Earnshaw.
  - denton-scratch 4y ago
    Not only on "survival of the fittest"; evolution also supposes that species change more-or-less randomly. TBH, I'm not sure what your point is; my point was that whatever evolution is based on, evolution happens, and on these timescales it happens in the blink of an eye.
    - TremendousJudge 4y ago
      No, individual mutations are random. Selection of the mutations in the gene pool happens through environmental constraints. Species don't change randomly, they change in an infinite optimization search for fitness. We humans aren't immune to this just because we have culture and medicine of course.
towaway15463 4y ago
For a good sci-fi take on this, read Dark is the Sun by Philip Jose Farmer
- rbanffy 4y ago
  Also recommended: Palimpsest by Charlie Stross. It's an interesting take on Asimov's End of Eternity that explores deep time like few others.

LorenPechtel 4y ago

I would be astounded if "humanity" exists a million years from now. I wouldn't be surprised if it doesn't exist a thousand years from now. The thing is we are a technological species, we don't need to rely on random chance for evolution. We can already create DNA on demand and insert it into microorganisms. AFIAK we currently only do this with already-known proteins, but that is a limit of knowing what will be useful, not a limit of the technique. As time goes on it seems inconceivable that we will not reach the point we can apply this to human DNA at conception. I expect the first manifestations will be editing out known-bad genes and replacing them with the properly-working equivalents. Next will come replacing ordinary genes with known-superior genes. Then they'll be inventing new superior genes. I expect in almost all cases they'll make the edits backwards-compatible but we've all seen it with software--backwards compatibility only works over a range of generations. Don't expect v20 to play nice with v2. Once the mods reach the point that reproduction with a stock human is no longer possible we have a speciation event--the results can no longer be considered human even if they would not raise an eyebrow if dropped into today's society. As for long-term protection of our solar system--I can't imagine why. It would be a lot easier to protect the Earth by moving it rather than moving anything that might threaten it.

rbanffy 4y ago
> Then they'll be inventing new superior genes. The thing is, they only need to do it once in all those billions of years, and they become a totally different species. And that's assuming they'll still be fond of organic bodies and not decide to live in simulated environments that are much easier to move than planets.
- LorenPechtel 4y ago
  Inventing a superior gene doesn't itself make them a new species. They only become a new species when the result can't breed with a base human. However, even that gets fuzzy--there's a "species" of bird whose name escapes me that lives in high latitudes. They can all breed with the neighbors, but birds from the two ends of the span can't breed with each other. I expect to see the same thing happen with humanity--eventually highly modded individuals won't be able to breed with unmodded individuals. (Although, unless immortality is developed there won't be any unmodded individuals to breed with. Why would the genetic engineers care about compatibility with the old version that's no longer around?)

hotpotamus 4y ago

I mean, large engineering projects for the greater good of humanity don't really seem like our thing as a species, but the answers to most of your questions are yes in theory. If you can surround a star with a Dyson Sphere/Swarm, you can do all kinds of things to it including concentrating all its energy into a beam to destroy a planet like the Earth in seconds (though you can't blow it apart like in Star Wars that easily). There's a youtube channel dedicated to this kind of stuff called "Science and Futurism with Isaac Arthur".

denton-scratch 4y ago

> I wonder if humanity could remain as-is for a billion years? Are you kidding? What was humanity a billion years ago?

rbanffy 4y ago
Remember evolution is based on the survival of the fittest. Not necessarily of the smartest.
- wrycoder 4y ago
  That would be fungi.
  - denton-scratch 4y ago
    There was a book published in the early 70's, called "Musrum", by Thacker and Earnshaw. It inspired in me the idea that Fungus spores are maybe the most-likely way for life to travel star-to-star. That's not what's best about that book, BTW; it's a magical book. I'd love to see a copy. [Edit] Not Bradshaw - Earnshaw.
- denton-scratch 4y ago
  Not only on "survival of the fittest"; evolution also supposes that species change more-or-less randomly. TBH, I'm not sure what your point is; my point was that whatever evolution is based on, evolution happens, and on these timescales it happens in the blink of an eye.
  - TremendousJudge 4y ago
    No, individual mutations are random. Selection of the mutations in the gene pool happens through environmental constraints. Species don't change randomly, they change in an infinite optimization search for fitness. We humans aren't immune to this just because we have culture and medicine of course.

towaway15463 4y ago

For a good sci-fi take on this, read Dark is the Sun by Philip Jose Farmer

rbanffy 4y ago
Also recommended: Palimpsest by Charlie Stross. It's an interesting take on Asimov's End of Eternity that explores deep time like few others.