[extropy-chat] Survival

[Eugen Leitl]

On Wed, Apr 11, 2007 at 02:37:45PM -0400, Robert Bradbury wrote:

>    I think the assumption that there will be a Singularity "meat grinder"
>    needs serious reexamination.  We don't run around eliminating all of

Fast changes are always challenges to adaptiveness.

>    the nematodes or bacteria on the planet just because they are

Actually, we do a pretty good attempt at it; soil biota biodiversity has plummeted
in intensive agriculture. Sealed terrain has about zero biota diversity.

>    consuming some small fraction of energy and/or matter that we at some
>    point may want.

What is left of the prebiotic ursoup, after life had dined on it?

>    You have to realize that while there is a vector that some may follow
>    for climbing the singularity slope once it goes nearly vertical, there
>    is no reason once it tops out that those who selected to not make that
>    choice will be turned into hamburger.  The difference between a

Not hamburger, but being turned to plasma or frozen in blue snow are certainly
straightforward possibilities.

>    sub-KT-I and a KT-II civilization is at least 13 orders of magnitude
>    in terms of power consumption.  We generally don't interest ourselves
>    in something that is going to involve dealing with 0.00000000001% of
>    our resources.  Hell we rarely pay much attention to anything in the
>    0.1% to 0.01% range.  It could well be the case that the solar system
>    as a whole evolves up the slope while Earth, Mars and Venus remain

When/if postbiology emerges at the bottom of this gravity well, then
you'd get very intense competition, locally. *We* can't just float off
the earth, and live in vacuum happily ever after.

>    meat havens until we get so bored with multi-thousand year lifespans
>    that we go off on some dangerous adventure in a world ship to a
>    distant "dark" galaxy.

-- 
Eugen* Leitl <a href="http://leitl.org">leitl</a> http://leitl.org
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