The great physicist Stephen Hawking, unlike some of the more radical environmental types who scourge us as the AIDS virus afflicting the planet, believes that it is crucial and worth spending untold resources to save human beings from extinction–simply because we are human. From the story (and the above embedded clip):
The physicist called humankind’s survival “a question of touch and go” and referred to the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1963 as one time people narrowly avoided extinction. He also referred to the 22,600 stockpiled nuclear weapons, including 7,770 still operational, scattered around the planet.If that doesn’t drive us off, University of Sussex astrophysicist Dr. Robert Smith said global warming may reach a point “where all of Earth’s water will simply evaporate.” He said life will disappear on Earth long before the 7.6 billion years some say the aging sun will expand and destroy Earth.
CNet news said that Hawking has concerns about how humans “are eating up finite resources” and has claimed man’s genetic code “carries selfish and aggressive instincts” that have helped humanity survive in the past. Hawking suggests that if man can avoid disaster for the next two centuries “our species should be safe as we spread into space.” According to the Daily Mail , Hawking warned earlier this year that humans should be cautious in trying to contact other alien life forms because there is no way to know if they will be friendly. “If we are the only intelligent beings in the galaxy we should make sure we survive and continue,” he said.
It’s not just intelligence. It is our moral agency, our empathy, our desire to find truths and ultimate meaning within and/or beneath the purely material, our unique desire and capability of mitigating the harsh suffering caused by naked Darwinian processes.
Hawking is unquestionably saying we are not merely another animal in the fores Note, he isn’t arguing that we should try to save elephants or field mice, squirrels or dolphins. But us. Indeed, any way you look at it, Hawking believes that it matters morally that we continue to exist, and it seems to me, that can only because we are truly exceptional.
August 9th, 2010 | 12:10 pm
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Vince Humphreys, Stand In The Gap and JustMelinda71, Wesley J. Smith. Wesley J. Smith said: Stephen Hawking Believes in Saving Exceptional Humans Through Space Colonization » Secondhand Smoke A First Things Blog http://shar.es/0mcJU [...]
August 9th, 2010 | 5:56 pm
A desire to survive is moral? How about, “I don’t want to die, yet!” Or, how about “my selfish genes are out there, I want them to survive, whether I consciously acknowledge that or not”
Would spending untold resources include fighting global warming’s reality? Would this include scaling back present fossil fuel usage (anyone look at how hot 2010 has been so far, yikes), increasing taxes/cutting war spending to pay for research and technology using sustainable energy?
Or, do only SOME of the truths we’ve uncovered require action?
Allow prof Hawking to shed some light on the subject of “find[ing] truths”, by the way:
http://www.newser.com/story/92121/stephen-hawking-science-will-win-against-religion.html
Or, maybe he is just too hysterical to be taken seriously:
http://abcnews.go.com/2020/Science/story?id=2319559&page=3
Can someone who called the human species “a chemical scum on a moderately sized planet” simply not be aware that we are super exceptional?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2007/feb/05/thegoldilocksenigma
Or, could it be that because Hawking advocates euthanasia, he should not be considered – no human exceptionalist would support euthanasia:
http://english.people.com.cn/200606/14/eng20060614_273839.html
Hmmm, I’m not so sure how far Hawking is willing to stretch the exceptionalism.
Another faulty appeal to authority resting on a flimsy foundation.
August 9th, 2010 | 9:44 pm
Exceptionalism? Sounds more like the plain old desire to survive as a species.
As for global warming reaching a point where “all of Earth’s water simply evaporates and life on Earth disappears — something seems to be missing. Of course: it’s Wesley’s usual dismissal of that opinion as “global warming hysteria.” What’s going on here? Is it possible that he’s beginning to see that there’s some serious scientific evidence for average temperature increases?
Wesley J. Smith Reply:
August 10th, 2010 at 12:08 am
Good grief, of course that’s hysteria. That wasn’t what the post is about.
August 10th, 2010 | 7:14 am
It seems that Stephen Hawking has seen “PROXIMA” and he made note!!!: http://www.carlosatanes.com/proxima_dickian_scifi_movie.html
August 11th, 2010 | 4:37 pm
I don’t think we have a moral imperative to continue life or intelligence if Earth becomes uninhabitable. It sounds like a religious imperative, and yet I don’t think any religion has said that we have such an imperative. Where does it come from? It actually contributes to thinking that we don’t need to conserve, we don’t need to protect the planet, because we’ll have time to escape and go somewhere else. I think we do have a moral imperative to protect the planet so that life continues on it for as long as possible.
I think Hawking is just angling for more funding for theoretical science and more research for esoteric fields like space travel and cloning and transhumanism. It’s his whole life work under scrutiny now, as we rethink our priorities.
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