Outer Space Thread

[Myles]

When you talk about evolution, the only thing that matters is survival. And cockroaches have us beat big time.

Yes and no.
Ease of survival is more accurate.

I disagree. Ease has nothing to do with it unless by ease you mean more likely to survive. If it just makes it more pleasant or elegant, that doesn't mean anything from an evolutionary perspective.

You don't think humans evolved to make living easier. That then led to a population explosion.
Just like animals have evolved to be able to sustain themselves on plants and prey that thrive in there area of the world.

[jim]

Humans have traits have in this particular moment of time with the conditions that exist have allowed for reproductive success. What I originally meant to say was that there are other species who have weathered changes in their environment throughout time, and humans have not yet done that. It is also possible that the traits that have allowed for reproductive success will be our demise - i.e. climate change, nuclear war, etc..

Evolutionary success is not reaching some point of intelligence. Intelligence is just one tool that can be used for survival, and not necessarily the best. Humanoids have been roaming the earth for about 6 million year (our particular species only about 200,000 years - a blink of an eye), compare that to the stretch dinosaurs had or sharks currently have. Plus, given the number of species roaming the earth, very few of them percentage wise rely on advanced intelligence. If advanced intelligence was such a beneficial characteristic, why aren't there more species using it?

[AWvsCBsteeeerike3]

Right. Humans are good at going to the grocery store, buying houses, and turning on the water. Just because we've made it easy, doesn't mean we can adapt.

Here's a brief history of mass extinction periods....which the humans have not gone through.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/extinction_events

Will the species make it through one of these? I have no idea, but I'm doubtful. Blot out the sun for a couple thousand years or raise the temperature of the sea to 150 degrees with acidic rain every day and see if humans survive that. It's possible, but I highly doubt it.

In fact, a few minor changes could drastically affect human population. At the same time, because we do have intelligence, if we really wanted to guarantee survival of our species, it'd probably behoove us to start looking for other habitable planets because we know at some point in the future the earth will not be able to support us. Sure, in an ideal world it's a long way away, but we're far from finding one. So...you know...maybe we should do that. No one ever accused humans of having too much foresight though. We're too busy warring with one another or aguing about walls to worry about it.

[Myles]

Humans have traits have in this particular moment of time with the conditions that exist have allowed for reproductive success. What I originally meant to say was that there are other species who have weathered changes in their environment throughout time, and humans have not yet done that. It is also possible that the traits that have allowed for reproductive success will be our demise - i.e. climate change, nuclear war, etc..

Evolutionary success is not reaching some point of intelligence. Intelligence is just one tool that can be used for survival, and not necessarily the best. Humanoids have been roaming the earth for about 6 million year (our particular species only about 200,000 years - a blink of an eye), compare that to the stretch dinosaurs had or sharks currently have. Plus, given the number of species roaming the earth, very few of them percentage wise rely on advanced intelligence. If advanced intelligence was such a beneficial characteristic, why aren't there more species using it?

Which would all lend doubt to another life form contacting us.

[Myles]

Right. Humans are good at going to the grocery store, buying houses, and turning on the water. Just because we've made it easy, doesn't mean we can adapt.

.

We've also greatly increased our life span. We've become very good at farming. We've conquered many diseases.
There is no doubt that humans have done many horrible things as well, but there is some great achievements.

[AWvsCBsteeeerike3]

Right. Humans are good at going to the grocery store, buying houses, and turning on the water. Just because we've made it easy, doesn't mean we can adapt.

.

We've also greatly increased our life span. We've become very good at farming. We've conquered many diseases.
There is no doubt that humans have done many horrible things as well, but there is some great achievements.

Agreed. Humans have made life very easy in the conditions we live in. We're efficient at producing food. We're efficient at producing housing. We're efficient at producing water suitable for drinking (see how much news one city not doing this has garnered...it's a given that we have access to ALL these necessities of life). Oxygen is readily available. One thing that is certain, however, is the earth is not a static environment. It will change... we have not lived through a mass extinction event, and if the same set of circumstances occurs that causes a mass extinction event, it's highly unlikely our ability to mass produce food will remain intact. Do you agree with that? If not, I'm not sure we're building a conversation with common footing.

[jim]

Humans have traits have in this particular moment of time with the conditions that exist have allowed for reproductive success. What I originally meant to say was that there are other species who have weathered changes in their environment throughout time, and humans have not yet done that. It is also possible that the traits that have allowed for reproductive success will be our demise - i.e. climate change, nuclear war, etc..

Evolutionary success is not reaching some point of intelligence. Intelligence is just one tool that can be used for survival, and not necessarily the best. Humanoids have been roaming the earth for about 6 million year (our particular species only about 200,000 years - a blink of an eye), compare that to the stretch dinosaurs had or sharks currently have. Plus, given the number of species roaming the earth, very few of them percentage wise rely on advanced intelligence. If advanced intelligence was such a beneficial characteristic, why aren't there more species using it?

Which would all lend doubt to another life form contacting us.

I agree. I'm not all that convinced advanced intelligence is all that effective or abundant in the universe. How many species of life have ever existed on earth? How many of those have what could be called advanced intelligence? Not many, it sure doesn't seem like at least on earth it's all that effective. Compare it for example to flight - look at how many things fly. Mammals, insects, fish ... it's a trait that independently pops up on the evolutionary tree because it's so damn effective. Advanced intelligence - the ability to manipulate and control your environment - seems to me to be a trait that could only pop up sporadically. If you had numerous species all with advanced intelligence, at some point interests are going to collide and it's not going to end well for some species. I don't know that intelligence can co-exist very well. Strong evidence that hints at not even being allowed to have one species with that type of intelligence.

Is it reasonable to extrapolate and think maybe that the universe maybe teeming with life, but not necessarily what we would call advanced intelligent life? I think so.

Mainly what I am saying is I don't think intelligence is necessarily all that special. It's unique, and it does allow us to think about things like this, but in the big picture it's just life trying to survive and finding ways to do so, and I doubt that humans last that long to be honest.

[Myles]

Right. Humans are good at going to the grocery store, buying houses, and turning on the water. Just because we've made it easy, doesn't mean we can adapt.

.

We've also greatly increased our life span. We've become very good at farming. We've conquered many diseases.
There is no doubt that humans have done many horrible things as well, but there is some great achievements.

we have not lived through a mass extinction event, and if the same set of circumstances occurs that causes a mass extinction event, it's highly unlikely our ability to mass produce food will remain intact. Do you agree with that? If not, I'm not sure we're building a conversation with common footing.

I don't think much will survive a mass extinction event.
Of course things would change. I would bet that some humans would survive. Whether in personal shelters or government shelters. Granted, maybe not long enough to withstand a thousand years of darkness like you mentioned.
I'm not really following your point. You question whether humans have evolved because we won't survive if an asteroid destroys the planet?
I do agree that we haven't evolved enough to survive the planet blowing up. We've come a long way though.

[AWvsCBsteeeerike3]

You asked why I said humans are terrible on an evolutionary scale. You proceed to talk about our accomplishments, but none of them indicate humans will succeed in evolving if necessary.

So, yes, I stand by my original point, that on an evolutionary scale, humans are terrible.

[jim]

I can't speak for AW, but the points I was making was in regards to really one statement that you made:

Perhaps we are better than any other life in the universe.

From an evolutionary perspective, I would disagree that we are "better". "Better" means survival, and while humans can lay claim to a population explosion that has taken advantage of conditions at this moment in time very successfully, there are other species that have survived drastic condition changes. Even at this very moment in time, Ant's give us a run for our money in terms of biomass on the earth and bacteria actually counts for 1,000x more biomass than humans. So even from a strict "who takes up the most space" perspective, humans are up there (but below cattle believe it or not, but that's our doing), but not at the top.

Now if you want to say we are "better" from another perspective - religious for example - then it's a different story and what I'm saying doesn't apply.

But from an evolutionary point of view, we aren't better.