Fursnake said:
Why is it that humanity has to fuck with stuff we don't fully understand and could potentially lead to our destruction at some point...cloning, nuclear weapons, genetic and biological experimentation and manipulation, trying to create planetside black holes with super colliders
P), AI...etc etc.
AI doesn't need to be free thinking. Humans are free thinking and we are so deeply flawed even after thousands of years of evolution. Free thinking without emotion is as dangerous as free thinking with emotion.
If we do create free thinking AI, we need to be sure and have it spayed or neutered first....much more docile.
I think you meant to say, why do we fuck with things
you don't understand. The people "fucking" with those things understand them quite well. Well enough, in fact, that they don't automatically respond to them with the hysterical fear that the general public does. If you understood black holes as well as they did, you would know 1) the creation of black holes is unlikely and 2) that a black hole created at the LHC would have only the gravity of a few particles, which is a long, long way from being strong enough to measure. But you don't. You think black holes are magic cosmic vacuum cleaners.
You also probably think, based on your comments, that GM foods will give you extra arms or legs, or that they'll mutate into monsters or something.
As far as nuclear weapons go, the people who invented them aren't the problem. The people who want to use them are, and the people who invented them have spent the last 50 years trying to convince the people who want to use them not to. It's been very difficult occasionally, and risky, as the people who wanted to use them have been so butthurt about not being able to that they've accused the people who invented them of treason or of being communists.
What's so bad about cloning? What if you need a genetically identical transplant someday? Wouldn't it be nice if they could just grow one for you that didn't have to come from a person and which was guaranteed to be compatible?
And humans are not free-thinking. Our thought process is impeded by a broad suite of instinctive reactions to various situations, many of which were useful before we started developing technology but are now obsolete or even harmful. The way people react to GM foods is a good example. Here is one of the surest ways to solve the world hunger problem, but people who have no idea what it is, how it works, or what its consequences are are refusing to support it or allow further development.
It doesn't matter how hard those who do understand try to dispel the myths that the uneducated have come up with. Most people just respond with fear to anything they don't understand and refuse to actually learn about it, and pretend that the Hollywood version of science is the real one. Right. Because there have been so many Frankensteins and zombie apocalypses and portals to hell or other evil dimensions in real life, you know? F those scientists. All they've ever done is end the world.
Never mind that none of that shit ever happened, or that we're still here, or that what science has actually done for you is give you things like computers and antibiotics and cars, and eradicated some of the most horrific diseases of the past so that you'll never have to worry about them. Isn't that nice? They got rid of things like smallpox and polio, so that now you can spend your free time accusing them of getting ready to release make-believe zombie viruses.
That's gratitude for you.
