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Joined 9 months ago
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Cake day: October 6th, 2023

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  • Um, I think you’re mistaking species with kingdom.

    “Birds” are not a species, “mammals” are not a species. I don’t think viruses are even described in terms of species because they don’t reproduce sexually. I think you’ll find that when you actually consider species, most of my points hold.

    Various species have methods of communicating, from bees dancing to each other to whales having distinct regional dialects. Yes, humans have added some complexity to it by introducing technology, but that’s realy what it comes down to. Technology.

    Yes, many species have some rudimentary way of communicating some kinds of information. But obviously bee dances don’t compare to any human language, of which there are literally hundreds. A bee for instance has no way to express appreciation or derision for the English language. My whole point here was that humans, on hundreds of distinct occasions, developed languages capable of conveying complex ideas. No other species has developed a language half as capable as any of ours.

    Rather than picking the rest of that post apart, I’m just going to stop here. It’s pretty self evident that humans are impressive as hell. Denying that is… pretty dumb, and purely rhetorical.

    As a side note, don’t get too excited about fusion, it’s largely a dead end. I expect it will only be really useful in niche applications (like spacecraft). It will be far more expensive than nuclear fision and not really offer any benefits besides abundance of fuel. There’s still a huge radioactive waste problem. On the other hand, the sun provides all the energy we’ll ever need, and we’re getting better at collecting it. I’m really not concerned about increasing energy demands.




  • I totally agree. I know a teacher who who likes to say:

    “I believe there really is no such thing as a dumb question. As long as it’s an honest question (not rhetorical or sarcastic), then it’s a genuine request for more information. So even if it’s coming from a place of extreme ignorance, asking a question is an attempt to learn something, and the effort should be applauded.”







  • We aren’t even capable of caring for one another, let alone the EASIEST to maintain, most naturally human friendly habitat we would ever encounter in the cosmos as we evolved to fit it.

    I would argue that having 8 billion people in the same place makes earth the hardest place to live in some ways.

    One of the options that space habitats would allow for is smaller communities. What if you lived in a space station with roughly the population of a city? Your community wouldn’t necessarily need to be affiliated with other communities to make up a “country”, but it could be. Your community would have that option. And if the community is not geographically connected to the other members of its nation, there’s no reason they couldn’t change their mind, join a different country if you’re views seem better aligned. For the first time humans would have opt-in governance.

    Would opt-in governance lead to a more stable society? Would not being stuck geographically near communities with opposing views lead to less violent aggression? I don’t know, but I hope so.



  • Yeah, I think that really it wouldn’t be the “global community” that ends up saving the world in an asteroid impact scenario.

    It would likely be an organization that could operate on its own without endless committees. Say, the Chinese space agency, or SpaceX, or the Indian space agency. Someone would decide to just do it, without getting the whole world’s approval for the mission. Then the whole world would complain that the effort was made without any international cooperation or oversight. And the organization that literally saved the world would get chewed out by everyone because inevitably the plan will not have worked perfectly.

    But I’m not worried, because even billionaires don’t want to die. Someone would do something.


  • I don’t think we ruin everything… We’re also the best around at improving things, certainly improving our environments.

    I know it’s easy to be pessimistic about these things, but humans are evolutionary badasses. We’re capable of amazing things. I wouldn’t count us out just yet.

    Besides we haven’t really ruined anything. We haven’t done any damage to the earth that won’t heal eventually. The earth has seen many heating and cooling cycles and plenty of mass extinctions before and it will again (with or without humans).


  • As a species, we aren’t going to spread out there.

    Well not with that attitude!

    Yeah, space is hard and yeah mistakes have been made along the way. But things are definitely changing. Reusable rockets are nearly here… Between spaceX, rocket lab and stoke aerospace, there is real potential for these rockets to work. Hell, SpaceX has already conducted a successful orbital test flight.

    With reusable rockets we’ll start to see a drastic reduction in the cost to get to orbit, probably by two orders of magnitude, but possibly even more. With the cost down people will reassess the value of space and the resources available there. In other words, people will start doing more in space, and getting more from space. Resource collection, refining and specialized manufacturing are three most likely industries to start expanding into space. Once there is work to be done there it will begin to make sense for people to live there.

    As a species, we aren’t going to spread out there.

    Not today, no. But within my lifetime, I expect we will. Remember, change is usually slow and this would constitute the most profound change in human history.



  • It’s hard to feel disappointed about something you don’t really care about. That is to say, the reason I feel disappointed is because I like this community and I want it to be a place for civil discourse. Conversely, I’ve given up on Reddit, so nothing that happens there can really disappoint me any more, I no longer care about it.

    I’m not going to make a fuss about something that doesn’t impact me, but I will make a fuss about something I believe in, like Lemmy.





  • FFS, I’m not actually advocating for eugenics.

    Perfect, then we’re on the same page. So in the future, when you don’t mean it, just don’t say it. The more civil we can keep the conversation, the more likely we are to have any kind of useful discussion and actual understanding.

    Also, this part:

    I’m saying those people are dumbfucks and probably spreading their dumbfuckery to their kids.

    That’s still doubling down on the previous statement… It’s not really more productive.