What's on Your Mind

[Karl Rand]

*sigh* I suppose all of that is valid. I suppose only time will tell whether or not we're a bunch of dumb monkeys that blew themselves up or are actually special.

In an atheistic universe, becoming a space ferrying, multiplanetary, interstellar, or even intergalactic species, with megastructure space habitats, is nothing to do with being special. We can still be a bunch of dumb monkeys who are capable of living in a sci-fi level future. After all, we are a bunch of dumb monkeys who are capable of destroying the entire planet. In fact, in the example I gave of Iain Banks's Culture Series universe, it is canonically atheistic, and Iain Banks was an atheist. In Banks's series, "the Culture" are an interstellar, post-scarcity civilization of mostly *humanoids* that live symbiotically with AI, particularly "the Minds" - hyper-intelligent AI that are incomprehensively more intelligent than biologic lifeforms. They mostly live on starships the size of continents or planets, or space habitats called orbitals that have a surface area hundreds of times that of Earth, complete with oceans, deserts, jungles, etc. You see, the Culture didn't *take to the stars* to become "special," they did it for pure hedonistic reasons. You see, the Culture is, in their own words, hedonists. And when I say hedonists, I mean they have orgies and have genetically engineered themselves to have drug glands that can get them high on a moment's notice.

Humans can and should take to the stars, and it doesn't have to have anything to do with being special, but to satisfy our "dumb monkey" needs. My main fear is if we can take to the stars in-time. It's all a matter of time. The world could end from a nuclear war at this very moment, just now. But if we take to the stars, at least we can fly our space habitats away from any power-hungry faction that thinks it's a good idea to stockpile nukes.

I wonder why you appear to imagine our species won’t take it’s war mongering instincts out into the stars..