[ExI] Should we still want biological space colonists?

[Adrian Tymes]

On Sat, Feb 8, 2025 at 9:57 AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat <
extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:

> On Sat, Feb 8, 2025, 9:23 AM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat <
> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>
>> On Sat, Feb 8, 2025 at 7:55 AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat <
>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>>
>>> I agree space habitats make more sense than terraforming. But what
>>> habitat is better than virtual reality whose only limit is imagination?
>>>
>>
>> One that can't simply be unplugged, deleting everyone within.  Also, one
>> with any measurable impact on the universe outside the habitat.
>>
>
> These ships can be designed as resiliently as desired.
>

The attackers in this case have all the time they want, and superior
resources.  They have all the same tools as the defenders, and greater
ability to develop more (again: superior resources).  They especially have
the advantage if the defenders abandon all sensing of and interaction with
the outside environment: the defenders' resources can never improve, but
the attackers' can.


> Looked at objectively, it could be a far more reliable system than
> humanity in its current form, where one nuclear war or one engineered
> pathogen, can unplug us all.
>

Self-sustaining biological human colonies outside of Earth can solve that
problem too, and that is the alternative being compared to here.


> It is true that one could live a blissful eternity in a virtual reality
>> habitat...and literally nobody else would care.
>>
>
> The people having those experiences care.
>

I said "nobody else".


> You could imagine our solar system as a black box, and from the outside
> make those same observation: "what does it matter to anyone what goes on
> inside this black box?"
>

It can.  Signals escape from the box, so it is not black.  Depending on
where you place the box's boundaries, machines (the Voyager probes) may
have already escaped the box.  And there is the potential for more to
escape later - as opposed to the virtual paradise, that has permanently
shunned the outside world.


> But of course this ignores the value and meaning of the trillions of lives
> being lived within it.
>

It does, because the value and meaning to anyone outside it is zero.

I could tell you now of a habitat that you will never interact with,
wherein trillions of people live.  Will you give any of your material
resources to support it?  If not, you are ignoring the value and meaning of
those trillions of lives - just like most people ignore it, because the
value and meaning is zero.


> You could run a million, a billion, a trillion instances of blissful
>> eternities in such a habitat, with not a one communicating outside or
>> otherwise doing anything of consequence to anyone outside.
>>
>
> Nothing prevents communication between the inside or outside. Nothing
> limits travel either, as you could jump into a robot body any time. You
> could upload and watch YouTube videos, join zoom calls and email with
> people outside. It's really no different than life in any place (be it an
> apartment, city, country, or planet earth).
>

The physical universe doesn't run on sped-up virtual time (and most
proposals for such habitats include speeding up, as they see no reason not
to).  Anyone outside would seem impossibly slow to anyone inside.  Hop out
to a robot body, spend enough time to do whatever it is you hopped out to
do, and by the time you return so much time would have passed that you're
basically entering a completely new society, having left all you knew and
loved behind.  Hopefully any loved ones will still be alive, but they will
likely have substantially grown and changed without you.


> Indeed, some versions of the Heaven tale essentially claim that is what
>> Heaven, with God as the highest level system administrator.  (There are
>> similar tales of Hell, save for being far less blissful for the average
>> inhabitant.)  And yet, even for those who fervently believe this is true,
>> in most cases (with notable exceptions for those unable to keep functioning
>> well anyway) given the choice of a longer life on Earth or going
>> immediately to Heaven, they keep choosing the former.  The reason why can
>> be debated, but most people appear to prefer to continue to affect the
>> universe they were born into.
>>
>
> The only actions that matter are those that effect conscious experience.
> If everyone is uploaded, and no one is outside, then no actions taken
> outside (where there is no consciousness) have any purpose or value.
>

There will always be some people outside.  You will never convince 100% of
the people to upload.  Even if you resort to force, those that forcibly
upload others must themselves be outside to do the task.  When it is done,
some of them will prefer to remain outside - and if even one manages to
spawn a substantial number of others, the whole cycle repeats, until
eventually some get far enough away that they can not practically be hunted
down.


> This is what I am envisioning for such a space habitat, not some cube of
> computronium sitting bare on a desk, whose fate is at the whim and mercy of
> those generous enough to keep it repaired and supplied with power.
>

Phrases such as "If everyone is uploaded" suggest that you are in fact
suggesting some cube of computronium sitting bare - floating in space
rather than on a desk, perhaps with autonomous self-repair and maintenance
systems (in particular keeping the power running), but still at the mercy
of those outside.
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/attachments/20250208/57bbc09a/attachment.htm>