Hacker News Reader

Comment by matthewdgreen | Hacker News Reader

Many of those futuristic space defense systems will also double as offensive weapons with terrific ability to do damage to the Earth. Ask yourself whether we're safer in a world where random asteroids are the threat, or one where human beings wielding random asteroids are the threat.

View on HN

This reminds me of the sci-fi aphorism that any space drive powerful enough to be interesting doubles as a weapon of mass destruction. Similarly, so is anything powerful enough to deflect an asteroid which is a danger to the Earth.

So it's technically true, but do you really want to live in a world where we will never explore space or pursue technology that could one day save the species because we're afraid of what the worst of us might do with it? Sounds awfully depressing to me. Might as well consign the rest of humanity to grubbing plants out of the earth for all eternity. I'd prefer to see us blow ourselves to bits with some crazy futuristic technology than have no hope for our future besides running around in fields until the expanding Sun destroys the planet, which we'd have no hope of being able to deal with.

You could take that perspective on every major technological advancement, and yet we undeniably live in a safer, more comfortable world than before those advancements.

We live in a relatively safer and more comfortable world that hides a tiny chance of total destruction every day.

The chance of total destruction has always been the case for most of human history. Prior to our current abilities to predict the weather and mobilize aid internationally, floods, hurricanes, etc, hell, even just particularly heavy rains were all relatively unpredictable existential threats. Sure those weren't the end of the literal world, but they were the end of the world to people affected.

Your last statement invalidates the point you try to make?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com