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rwallace comments on Science vs. art - Less Wrong
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The instrumental value of science is that scientific progress or lack thereof is what will make the difference between a cosmos of life and mind, versus a cosmos of dead matter in which mind was a transient blip on a single dust speck. It's not that it matters which scientist gets there first - it's that it matters whether we get far enough within the time we have.
The time we have is primarily limited by the same scientific progress, so what matters is sanity of what we do, not speed.
Speed matters somewhat, in that we might overpopulate, or use up fossil fuel or helium or other resources, in a way so that the difficulty of escaping Earth continues to be just beyond us.
But this is all talking of instrumental value. I don't want to talk about instrumental value here.