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I didn't downvote you. However, there are ethical and moral quandaries to doing that. What if you accidentally wipe out existing, undetected life on that planet
by triceratops 9mo ago
I didn't downvote you. However, there are ethical and moral quandaries to doing that. What if you accidentally wipe out existing, undetected life on that planet?
You aren't going to see anything "take hold" on a human timescale. Evolution takes place over geological time. By the time there's something to observe, there might be no one to observe it. Or all knowledge of the experiment might be lost.
- WalterBright 9mo agoThere is no other civilization in the solar system. If it's humans vs alien slime mold, I stand for humans. > ou aren't going to see anything "take hold" on a human timescale Right. Seeding life onto lifeless planets takes a long time, but it is a moral imperative. We are the only life in the solar system, and maybe even in our galaxy. BTW, the Earth is going to fry in 100m years. We'd better learn how to colonize the other planets.
- squibonpig 9mo agoWhat? It isn't a moral imperitive because it doesn't matter at all from a human perspective. It's not human vs slime mold, it's weird-specific-extremeophile-bacteria vs slime mold.
- WalterBright 9mo agoThe purpose of life is to spread and thrive.
- mrguyorama 9mo agoLife is a name we give to arrangements of matter we prefer over others. There is no intrinsic "purpose". The universe itself is perfectly content with dynamics over timescales we cannot even approach comprehension of, and never will. The only driving force in the universe is an evolution from a state with heterogeneous energy densities to one with homogeneous energy density. "Life" isn't even in the equation. Interstellar travel is not possible for humans. Even if we could somehow induce perfect hibernation, scifi style, how do you maintain an engineered vehicle in the abyss for centuries? Meanwhile, we can't even take care of the abundance of resources here on earth.
- WalterBright 9mo agoWhat a sad point of view. Consider that the only reason you exist (and have wonderful things like air conditioning) is because your predecessors did have a purpose. > Interstellar travel is not possible for humans. Yes, it is. Transcribe DNA, put it in probe, probe goes for centuries, orbits a promising planet, then employs nanobots to build humans from the DNA. I.e. a seedship. > abundance of resources here on earth Our solar system is brimming with resources. All we've exploited so far is just pond scum on the Earth's surface.
- squibonpig 9mo agoThe purpose of any particular arrangement could be said to be to proliferate and dominate others, insofar as if it doesn't do that then it doesn't exist and will be overwritten by other arrangements. In this case we humans wouldn't want to spread an extremophile bacteria, we'd want to dominate it and minimize its presence. Human colonization is different from what you're talking about.
- WalterBright 9mo agoIf you can get extremophiles to live on other planets, it becomes much more possible for humans to. It's a necessary precursor.
- squibonpig 9mo agoWhy? For the foreseeable future we'd survive using a bunch of complicated tech. Not so for extremophiles. How's plopping a couple of unicellular organisms on a planet help us learn to do it ourselves?
- triceratops 9mo agoMore like 1-4bn years actually.