Martin Rees on Extinction Risk Monday, Apr 28 2008
What happens here on Earth, in this century, could conceivably make the difference between a near eternity filled with ever more complex and subtle forms of life and one filled with nothing but base matter.
– Martin Rees
(Other quotes.)
This quote must be the biggest load of horse manure I’ve ever read, not to mention the fact that it is arrogant to the extreme :-(
I suppose he’s referring specifically to life on this planet, but even so the definition for life itself has yet to be defined…
While it is conceivable that mankind has or will develop the means to deliberately or accidentally wipe out human life (be that suddenly or over time), it is unlikely that we will ever be able to wipe out all forms of life, after all, some forms of life can exist in permafrost and others in scalding undersea thermal vents. Mr. Rees statement would seem to be deliberately sensationalist.
Without human intervention, life will remain restricted to Earth and only last as long as the sun does; with intelligent action, life can spread a lot farther and last a lot longer. So he’s not too far off.
Decided to comment on this one because it needed a little intelligent direction.
The possibility for the occurrence of an Extinction Singularity is very real and might be related in some way to the Fermi Paradox. Imagine an intelligently evolved life form shaped and formed by millions of years of evolution, out competing other life forms in its biosphere for all resources in a non-renewable way. Then imagine that life form drastically altering the very climatic parameters of its biosphere in a way destructive to it and other life forms. Now again imagine the wars that life form has with its own kind, creating weapons of atomic destruction and stock piling them for its own mutually assured destruction. Species insanity, one might conclude…
What are the chances that such a life form would survive another million years? Now imagine that same life form deciding that it needed to make nano devices that could self replicate or genetic organisms programmed to do its bidding. Could one of these tools get out of control? Could there be something like a nanowar? What must this life form do to change itself for long-term survival? Is the transhuman intitiative such an attempt? Do we need Singularity Insurance? The ability to bootstrap humanity back up again in the case of a total self-inflicted extinction event?
For the past three years I have been actively writing a science fiction novel to try and address these very questions in an entertaining and palitable way. Its call The Transhuman Singularity which I am shamelessly plugging at webmac.com Check it out. By the way, great blog!
Thanks -Michael Blade
Michael, I suggest taking a look at the Lifeboat Foundation. It’s an organization devoted to establishing self-sustaining space colonies as insurance against tech risks.
There are probably some risks that actually kill humans even if they’re off-planet. For instance, a human-indifferent recursively self-improving AI would likely have no qualms whatsoever about devouring the moon and integrating it into whatever it considers to be a “value structure”.
Neat book, I suggest you publish it on lulu.com.
This guy is pretty much the most decorated scientist in the UK. He has been Astronomer Royal since 1995 and Master of Trinity College, Cambridge since 2004. He was President of the Royal Society between 2005 and 2010.
It doesn’t mean he’s right, but i’m mentioning it for people who don’t know of him.