[newsbinator]

The sooner we can permanently keep even a couple eggs outside our single basket, the better.

We're currently 1 real plague or 1 big asteroid away from ending our species. Up to now we've been very lucky.

I'd like to see in my lifetime our species able to live outside Earth in a self-sustaining way, with enough resources, infrastructure and know-how to make microchips, edit DNA, etc without calling upon Earth to do it.

That'll require tens of thousands of major innovations, not least of which will be the ability to survive lots more radiation than humans normally get exposed to, plus concerns like how space squishes eyeballs and ruins a person's vision.

If humans end up living on luna or somewhere between here and luna, they'll either be augmented with tech we haven't thought of yet or with DNA we haven't invented yet.

I'm excited to see us try, and I don't care which 21st century nation-state makes it happen.

[bagels]

Why do some people place such importance on humans continuing beyond Earth? Is it not just the ultimate hubris to think that we know that doing so is even a good idea?

[vector_rotcev]

Aside from some major religions mandating the expansion of humanity (or at least their faithful) - which I suppose could be hubris in the religion - why is it excessively prideful to want our species to continue to exist? What moral framework accounts for a desire to continue our existence in the negative column?

[newsbinator]

Why not? Seriously, why wouldn't we try to preserve and upgrade our species for as long as physically possible?

Would we complain if whales said "we don't want our species to end"? Or ants, for that matter?

"No whales, it's the ultimate hubris that you think you have a right to exist and continue existing."

Why is it hubris for humans, like all other species on Earth, to want to exist, propagate, and, since we're intelligent, learn and grow our intelligence, and spread it beyond home base?

[inglor_cz]

We are descendants of people who had strong survival instincts. No surprise here.

An intelligent species consisting of individuals who do not value their continual existence would disappear fairly soon.

[silisili]

Humans seem to be real, real self preserving fkers.

I know a 70 year old in the US who, after the 2020 election, made a survival plan for living in Australia because the world was going to crumble.

All the while I'm thinking... at 70...why...

I barely understand a young person doing it, but definitely don't understand such planning for like 5 extra years of end life.

[MrDresden]

There are a lot of things that we as a species have gotten wrong and are not worth preserving.

There are a lot of things that we as a species have gotten right and are worth preserving.

In the words of Prof. Brian Cox, it would be a tragedy if Earth is the only place in the galaxy where consciousness exists, and it would be wiped out by an asteroid.