Science!: ROBOFISH
- Thread starter Lauren Admire
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I agree that if we hadn't been so busy trying to build a phone with more functionality than a home computer we'd've been driving fuel cell cars for the last five years already. But taking it to the extreme of deploying every scientist on one problem is frankly silly.Rakkana said:
Especially if later on a flash heating of the ocean kills off half of the micro-organisms there (who produce some 90% of the osygen) and thus ends up costing three quarters of humanity their lives. Yay, you cured a disease... Bet you wanted to know more about marine ecology at that point.
Aside:
Personally I tend to (romantically) think that AIDS, Cancer and the like are nature's way of trying to curb humanity's number. There's too many of us for this planet to naturally support. Stop one of those gaps and another will open.
I found the thing about the birds to be the most interesting actually. Only showing those birds impressive specimens of their species made them pro-create better. They needn't even mate directly. That's insane. Maybe I can bring it up the next I'm caught with some porn
Not one problem. Just the big ones first. Humanity's survival should some before anything else.Vortigar said:I agree that if we hadn't been so busy trying to build a phone with more functionality than a home computer we'd've been driving fuel cell cars for the last five years already. But taking it to the extreme of deploying every scientist on one problem is frankly silly.Rakkana said:
Especially if later on a flash heating of the ocean kills off half of the micro-organisms there (who produce some 90% of the osygen) and thus ends up costing three quarters of humanity their lives. Yay, you cured a disease... Bet you wanted to know more about marine ecology at that point.
Aside:
Personally I tend to (romantically) think that AIDS, Cancer and the like are nature's way of trying to curb humanity's number. There's too many of us for this planet to naturally support. Stop one of those gaps and another will open.
I found the thing about the birds to be the most interesting actually. Only showing those birds impressive specimens of their species made them pro-create better. They needn't even mate directly. That's insane. Maybe I can bring it up the next I'm caught with some porn
Once we can be assured were safe I couldn't care less what they work on.
We're already in a luxury position on that front. There's absolutely nothing out there that has any real chance of putting a dent in the survival of humanity as a whole.Rakkana said:
Except for the long term matters.
I'd say space-faring and ecologically friendly energy are key-points in allowing our species to survive on the long run. Tragic as it may seem, research into diseases is nothing compared to this planet simply running out. I can't see Cancer or Aids wiping us out. Pollution or the destablization of our society because of lack of resources on the other hand are far more dangerous.
The process of science is also benefitted by cross-polination. Having scientists work on different fields allows a diversity of thoughts and approaches to be developed and increases the chances for accidental discoveries.
On a more practical note: One of the main things cirrently curbing scientists is that the most funding comes from commercial enterprises and they want to see results, things they can sell, on the short term. A base-protein that may lead to some later discovery ages on is uninteresting to them.
Lastly I'd like to note that simply throwing more scientists at a problem isn't a guarantee to solve it, maybe it increases the chances of solving it but it most certainly increases the risk as all those resources ending up being wasted if nothing is discovered and the team disbands because of dissatisfaction or the funding running out. You might have been better off taking small steps in various fields to allow for some future leap instead of trying to break through a wall that may turn out to be unbreakable.
There are plenty of short term matters too. I'm not saying humanity as a whole. I'm saying there are people dieing all the time, which could be saved through further research. Like cancer.Vortigar said:
Also I'd like to add that the resources cannot be wasted. The teams would be very likely to finish faster with more scientists. And when you fail an experiment it helps to take note so you don't make the same mistake or you look at where possible things may have gone right and work of that to create the correct answer. It's not a waste. We'd just get the mistakes done faster and as such reach the end result faster too.
Funding wise, you could have a point. But what you said was that it came of commercial enterprises like selling protein and what not. If this is completely true then how do the people working on the bigger projects make money? The flaw in that argument is so obvious it hurts to put it into words. The fact is those people are the minority. Or their not the ones making the money from it, their employers are.
And you also cannot predict the future. So stop trying.
And I'm not saying all little things are unimportant. They have to be leading up to a bigger problem or I see them as a waste of time and money. Or a way of making money with the good of everyone out of the picture.
Now all we have to do is make ROBOFISH that grow back teeth as well!!U71L7Y_F0RMUL4 said:
EDIT:
That ROBOFSIH story makes me wonder. What if Aliens already did this, but with ROBOHUMANS... Ah wait, lotsa SciFi movies/books about this.