Reply #20: I look forward to this development

[GliderGuider]

with unmitigated dread and revulsion.

We've managed to pretty much trash life on this planet with just the chemical energy from 35 cubic miles of oil and 100 cubic miles of coal (the total amount we've used since we began the Industrial Revolution). I shudder to think of what we would be able to do the remaining life given unlimited energy. Technology does not make us any wiser, you know.

The "going to the stars" argument doesn't cut it, because not everyone could be exported to some extra-planetary environment. Right now we're producing a surplus of 75 million people a year... The ones who would remain behind will still want a Jetsons quality of life, and some of them will even want children (it's the way animals are wired). Even if we could synthesize enough inorganic food capsules out of our own waste for everyone who stayed behind and their children, and grandchildren, and great-grandchildren, they'd still want living room, and playing room. Dolphins? Reindeer? Marmosets? Antelopes? Fuck 'em. They were cute but it's not like we ever really needed them, right?

This technology isn't just genocidal, it's vivocidal.