If the world dies, and a remnant lives on in tincans in space, that is.. not actually very helpful.
But arguably still vastly better than everybody dying, particularly if that tincan civilization can eventually rebuild and recolonize habitable planets.
Nope. The species has no utility because it has no identity. It would be better to precisely the amount of the sum utility of the very few, very traumatized survivors. So it is a paltry payout on an expensive insurance policy against a hopefully unlikely eventuality with quite a low chance of paying out.
I figure most threats that take out planet earth would end any plausible space presence as well, as they suddenly find that the control chips for the water purifiers need replacing and were all made in the republic of korea or similar outcomes.
.. Look, space industrialization and exploration are cool, useful and interesting. I would really like to see solar gravity lens telescopes, and there may indeed be industrial processes that are most sensibly moved offworld where accidents cant impact any ecosystems. But the whole “Eggs in basket” argument? It is just not very good, and the things worth doing in space cannot meaningfully be considered charity unless you so class the entire scientific endeavor, so this is just one of the many aspects of human existence which fall outside the purview of EA.
Just for amusement value: Consider what it would take for a space presence to survive independently any threat likely to clean out all 7 billion people on earth. - There are no suitable biosphere’s anywhere in reach, so such an outpost would need to build and maintain one with no external resupplies. It also needs to be distant enough, and isolated enough from earth that contagions and conflicts are unlikely to involve them. So, it needs to be a complete industrial society, and it is obligated to be a hermit kingdom/republic. The complete industrial society is kind of a killer problem, because supporting that needs quite a substantial population, so it requires something on the order of moving dozens of millions of people to the moon system of Uranus. So, yhea, not seeing the point
But arguably still vastly better than everybody dying, particularly if that tincan civilization can eventually rebuild and recolonize habitable planets.
Nope. The species has no utility because it has no identity. It would be better to precisely the amount of the sum utility of the very few, very traumatized survivors. So it is a paltry payout on an expensive insurance policy against a hopefully unlikely eventuality with quite a low chance of paying out.
I figure most threats that take out planet earth would end any plausible space presence as well, as they suddenly find that the control chips for the water purifiers need replacing and were all made in the republic of korea or similar outcomes.
.. Look, space industrialization and exploration are cool, useful and interesting. I would really like to see solar gravity lens telescopes, and there may indeed be industrial processes that are most sensibly moved offworld where accidents cant impact any ecosystems. But the whole “Eggs in basket” argument? It is just not very good, and the things worth doing in space cannot meaningfully be considered charity unless you so class the entire scientific endeavor, so this is just one of the many aspects of human existence which fall outside the purview of EA.
The distinction between space presence (hard enough already) and space presence independent of earth (much harder) is worth making.
Just for amusement value: Consider what it would take for a space presence to survive independently any threat likely to clean out all 7 billion people on earth. - There are no suitable biosphere’s anywhere in reach, so such an outpost would need to build and maintain one with no external resupplies. It also needs to be distant enough, and isolated enough from earth that contagions and conflicts are unlikely to involve them. So, it needs to be a complete industrial society, and it is obligated to be a hermit kingdom/republic. The complete industrial society is kind of a killer problem, because supporting that needs quite a substantial population, so it requires something on the order of moving dozens of millions of people to the moon system of Uranus. So, yhea, not seeing the point