tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26951738.post2762969579927356326..comments2024-03-25T11:49:21.281-07:00Comments on The Splintered Mind: Space Agencies Need, but Don't Appear to Have, Policies Governing Contact with Microbial Life on MarsEric Schwitzgebelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11541402189204286449noreply@blogger.comBlogger7125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26951738.post-46717472973163227122015-06-11T07:37:43.992-07:002015-06-11T07:37:43.992-07:00Michel, my post advocated forming a diversely-cons...Michel, my post advocated forming a diversely-constituted committee to evaluate risks against benefits. How did this become a Schwitzgebel Doctrine that under no conditions should we interfere? (Carl Sagan did once suggest something along those lines, but it seems too radical to me for the reasons you suggest.) Surely, though, there's a lot of truth in your most recent comment about the motivations and reading styles of many administrators. I don't think the establishment of such a committee is a bureaucratic impossibility, though it would never happen because *I* suggested it! I do think that I can make a small contribution toward getting ideas out in the air for consideration, partly through my blog and other academic activities and partly through personal connections with people closer to the centers of power.Eric Schwitzgebelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11541402189204286449noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26951738.post-41266392949528444802015-06-11T01:49:46.615-07:002015-06-11T01:49:46.615-07:00Well, I apologise if my light-hearted tone offends...Well, I apologise if my light-hearted tone offends you. I was trying to point out that the way <i>you</i> have introduced this issue is not as an abstract philosophical discussion of the ethical value of alien microbes. You issued a call to action. Getting humans to act ethically is quite a different proposition from discussing how they should be acting.<br /><br />Within that context, the fine philosophical differences between (1) and (2) are completely irrelevant. You are not going to be dealing with fellow philosophers here, but with hard-headed administrators looking for funding. Politicans interested in winning the next election. Engineers whose interest in alien microbes extends only as far as how it may affect their machinery. These people make university administrators look like saints.<br /><br />Philosophers (and academics generally) tend to be lousy at realpolitik. In my country, I saw academics create one of the most beautifully crafted government policies in the world on how religion should be dealt with in classrooms. It respects diversity, it makes room for sincerely held beliefs, it covers every contingency ... and it has been completely ignored by teachers for the last twenty years. You are setting yourself up for a major disappointment.<br /><br />But, good luck.clasqmhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12812785541545674276noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26951738.post-49674107477159770362015-06-10T13:01:01.261-07:002015-06-10T13:01:01.261-07:00Thanks, folks!
Michel: I agree that "quite i...Thanks, folks!<br /><br />Michel: I agree that "quite independent of contamination" was probably too strong a way to put my point in the original post. Maybe a better way to say it would have been something like "raise issues that go well beyond issues of contamination". Contamination is only part of the picture, I think. I do see (1) and (2) as different, since (2) emphasizes epistemic issues and (1) emphasizes the fact of existing interaction. They're connected but not identical.<br /><br />You write: "Yes, the alien microbes might one day evolve into a large and diverse ecosystem. Or not. Is that the end goal of all life, then? To spread and diversify, perhaps even (whisper it) to develop intelligence? What is wrong with just staying single-celled until your sun blows up? If you are going to go all teleological on us, at least be honest about it."<br /><br />I'm working on those very issues for a follow-up post sometime later this month.<br /><br />I am inclined to be very conservative about interfering with life on other planets, and to think that we should have regulations and/or a diversely-composed committee overseeing it, but the remainder of what you say in your comment seems to caricature my view, so I find it difficult to engage for that reason.Eric Schwitzgebelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11541402189204286449noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26951738.post-76109257477162312172015-06-09T06:07:38.509-07:002015-06-09T06:07:38.509-07:00Well, (1) and (2) are essentially the same argumen...Well, (1) and (2) are essentially the same argument, and they both contradict your statement "These questions are quite independent of existing regulations about sterilization and contamination." It is a matter of how these organisms might affect US. Fair enough, but that is a pragmatic argument. I have a soft spot for pragmatism, but it has its defects as an ethical system. Given effective sterilization procedures, we do not need to worry about these little beasties coming to eat us. You are saying that we should not go there and eat them. Not the same thing at all.<br /><br />(3) is more interesting. Yes, the alien microbes might one day evolve into a large and diverse ecosystem. Or not. Is that the end goal of all life, then? To spread and diversify, perhaps even (whisper it) to develop intelligence? What is wrong with just staying single-celled until your sun blows up? If you are going to go all teleological on us, at least be honest about it. <br /><br />Besides, let's suppose we arrive on a planet and we determine that the conditions there are such that these microbes will NEVER evolve into anything more. The star is cooling, or heating up, and in a million years these microbes will all be dead anyway. Now what? You have only assigned them instrumental value to the extent that they may, perhaps, possibly give rise to something WE happen to find more interesting. You have not made the case that these microbes have an intrinsic worth that entitles them to ethical treatment. You have not, for example, given us a reason to launch a resettlement program for endangered microbes.<br /><br />But if you do come up with one, then can you give any good reason why the last frozen vial of smallpox virus rumoured to be kept by the CDC in Atlanta should not be thawed and released into the wild? The wild being its natural habitat, namely the human body. It is not the virus's fault that it tends to disfigure and kill its habitat. Besides, who knows if the smallpox virus, given half a billion years, might not evolve into a diverse ecosystem? I think you really should volunteer as the first host, to give it a good start.<br /><br />In any case, even if the alien microbes do diverge and spread and turn into the local equivalent of dinosaurs, this is not likely to happen for the next half-billion years or so - a span of time that humans can write down but not really comprehend. Can you see a politician explaining to his voters that yes, we have found this great piece of real estate, but the Schwitzgebel Doctrine forbids us to move in because we would disturb some bacteria that may or may not ever decide to go multi-cellular? Your institute would be de-funded very quickly. ;-)<br /><br />We are incapable of saving the Northern White Rhino. We are incapable of saving other human beings who happen to be of a different religion and/or colour. If you are going to expect us to attach value to alien microbes, well, I predict they will be left alone until oil/uranium/ gold is discovered on Mars. After that, they will be food. <br />clasqmhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12812785541545674276noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26951738.post-76093027329194851992015-06-09T04:54:08.696-07:002015-06-09T04:54:08.696-07:00Richard Greenberg and B. Randall Tufts (2001) Macr...Richard Greenberg and B. Randall Tufts (2001) Macroscope: Infecting Other Worlds<br />American Scientist 89(4): 296-299. They mainly discuss "forward" contamination of Mars or Europa by earthly organisms, but in a general ethical context versus the baseline probability of such damage via natural means (meteorites).David Duffyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12142997170025811780noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26951738.post-78337982674130162252015-06-08T10:52:15.723-07:002015-06-08T10:52:15.723-07:00Hi Michel: You might be right that similar guideli...Hi Michel: You might be right that similar guidelines should apply to Earth and Mars, but I also see a possible case for stricter guidelines. The case might be grounded in one of three ways: (1.) There is already a certain amount of cross-influence among Earthly systems, and putting two different planetary systems into contact when they weren't before is qualitatively different in some important way. (2.) Given our greater ignorance about extraterrestrial life and the possibility that it is even more different from familiar examples of Earthly life than are even Earthly extremophiles, there are more unknown risks in contact. (3.) Life on a different planet might have a different potential than do extremophiles on Earth, if it has the potential eventually to develop into a large and diverse ecosystem very different from the ecosystem on Earth.<br /><br />In any case, I think this is a discussion that should be out in the air, in public, with a higher profile than it currently has, and in advance of actual contact.Eric Schwitzgebelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11541402189204286449noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26951738.post-27813650934502115022015-06-06T11:54:53.848-07:002015-06-06T11:54:53.848-07:00Ethically, how do we treat microbial life here on ...Ethically, how do we treat microbial life here on Earth? We generally leave it alone unless it is life-threatening, or even mildly bothersome. Then we hit it with the heaviest, most toxic drugs we can lay our hands on.<br /><br />You propose extending rights to alien microbes that we do not extend to the common staphylococcus, Escherichia coli or the human immunodeficiency virus. So before you start setting up a bureaucracy, how about telling us what your argument is. <br /><br />clasqmhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12812785541545674276noreply@blogger.com