MartinB comments on Extraterrestrial paperclip maximizers - Less Wrong

3 Post author: multifoliaterose 08 August 2010 08:35PM

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Comment author: MartinB 09 August 2010 02:29:23AM 3 points [-]

You can catch asteroids by just grabbing them, while on earth you need all kinds of infrastructure just do dig stuff up. There would need to be some item with higher concentration, but even that i would expect to be easier available elsewhere. Not having a hostile biosphere is helpful for mining.

Comment author: timtyler 09 August 2010 07:22:18AM -2 points [-]

Existing living systems seem to prefer resources on earth to resources on asteroids. Aliens may do so too - for very similar reasons.

Comment author: RobinZ 09 August 2010 08:10:21PM 1 point [-]

Alien species are unlikely to be able to live on Earth without terraforming or life support systems. They may want resources on Earth, but probably not for the reasons humans do.

Comment author: Vladimir_Nesov 09 August 2010 08:16:07PM 1 point [-]

"Alien species"? Like little green men? Come on! We are talking interstellar or intergalactic travel here, surely they'd have created their AGI by then. Let's not mix futurism and science fiction.

Comment author: RobinZ 09 August 2010 08:24:42PM 2 points [-]

The reasons humans prefer reasons on Earth to resources on asteroids is because the (a) humans already live on Earth and (b) humans find it inconvenient to live elsewhere. Neither condition would be expected to apply to extrasolar species colonizing this solar system. timtyler's claim is therefore difficult to sustain.

Comment author: Vladimir_Nesov 09 August 2010 08:31:08PM *  -1 points [-]

My point is that the claim is irrelevant, because there can't be any biological aliens. We of course can discuss the fine points of theories about the origin of the blue tentacle, but it's not a reasonable activity.

Comment author: timtyler 09 August 2010 08:19:00PM *  1 point [-]

I expect they could knock up some earth-friendly robots in under five minutes - and then download their brains into them. The Earth has gravity enough to hang on to its liquid water. It seems to be the most obvious place in the solar system for living systems to go for a party.