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Comment by beauzero | Hacker News Reader

We have to colonize more than one planet and become a space civilization. We risk too much if we don't.

I never understand this sentiment. I get that "we" is "the human species" but in practice it just means "some people." A magnetic pole reversal would be nobody's fault, but knowing that some humans survived off-planet wouldn't make me feel better about it.

I in turn don't understand this sentiment. What are you trying to say? That you don't care about the continued survival of humanity beyond your own demise? You would be perfectly happy for everyone to be wiped out the day after you die?

I will be dead. I'll have no feelings.

So why not pollute and burn down the biosphere now if you dont care what happens after you're dead?

you've seen the current biosphere right? I think they have been.

sigh But you have feelings now, and are presumably capable of having feelings about events beyond your immediate experience.

If someone offered you 5 bucks, with the caveat that if you take it then the Earth is destroyed the moment you die - you're a terrible person if you take the money.

(Incidentally, there's not really any difference between not experiencing something because you're dead, and not experiencing it because your back is turned. Are you fine with atrocities in general, provided you don't find out about them?)

> You would be perfectly happy for everyone to be wiped out the day after you die?

No, you would be nothing the day after you die. It is that simple.

The problem was slightly different anyway, that is everyone being wiped out at the same time. Literally no body would care anymore.

Hmm. Something like, "humanity serves humans, not the other way around." If there are no humans around to enjoy the fruits of humanity, I don't assume that something is lost or wasted.

The problem I have with the "eggs in a basket" line of thinking is that it raises extreme moral hazard to say we don't have to care about everyone as long as a few people are saved. Losing a basket of billions of eggs to save a dozen is cold comfort.

(Yes, I realize magnetic pole reversal isn't the same as nuclear holocaust, but I still don't feel my scepticism is misplaced.)

Is it suppose to matter how you feel?

Giving up the human species because zarchose will be unhappy he didn't survive the apocalypse seems a waste.

Perhaps we are descended from such travelers? Is our DNA an interstellar mix from 70k years ago? How would we know?

We are in the middle of the sixth mass extinction and global warming. I fear we may have already run out of time.

If not a planet, at least floating space stations may be a possibility

Honest question: what do we really risk in the grand scheme of things? Extinction? Would that negatively affect anything other than our egos?

(For the record, I’m all for colonizing other locations)

I think it would be a great shame if the only self-aware life in the observable universe dies out before it can find out the mechanisms behind all of this.

Sometimes when I'm trying to doze off at night, I think about how strange our existence is. Not even the smartest people on this planet have any idea how or why the universe exists. We might never find out. We might be a simulation operated by higher beings, but that raises even more questions. Argh, what I would give to know.

It would negatively affect virtually every value system ever created. If human extinction isn't "bad", then nothing is "bad". Anyone that nihilistic clearly lacks any framework to assign value judgements to anything, and therefore has no business participating in any decision-making discussion (such as "should we travel to the stars").

Certainty without humans or other spacefaring life all other species on Earth will go extinct.

Does that really matter in the grand scheme of things or is it just ego?

edit: To take it further, without some super-intelligent / supernatural beings it seems likely all structure in the universe will eventually disappear due to a heat death or a big crunch. Does even that matter?

My take is that we are just too young to have any idea what really matters in the grand scheme so the best approach is just try to survive.

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