If possible, would terraforming Mars be ethical?

[tinyp3nis]

Evolution made us this way, not us. The beaver also destroys, the humans with more efficency. Same thing, accept it

[Sava]

Human beings have never stopped to think about ethics and the environment on Earth, why would Mars be any different?

[General Ludd]

Originally posted by tinyp3nis
Evolution made us this way, not us. The beaver also destroys, the humans with more efficency. Same thing, accept it

Beavers do not destroy, they just play their part. Beavers do not chew down entire forests for abstract and self-made concepts such as currency. They do not create machinery and technology, or completely deplete their enviroment in order to live in extreme decadence and luxury. They do not change their role in the environment every 50 years. They do not build ships and airplanes and transport the world's life to all corners of the world. The list goes on...

No, all beavers do is play the part they have for hundreds of thousands of years. The part that their eco-system relies on them playing.

[tinyp3nis]

Originally posted by Osweld


Beavers do not destroy,

[General Ludd]

Originally posted by tinyp3nis

Very insightful.

[tinyp3nis]

Originally posted by Osweld



Very insightful.

What I am supposed to say something that is simply not true?

[monolith94]

In a very simple-minded sense, beavers do "destroy", but it is a fact that an environment must have a certain level of death and destruction to function. Take for example forest fires and prairie fires - these have existed for hundreds of thousands of years. They 'destroy' overgrown areas and dead wood to make room for new things to live and grow in.

"Evolution does not - can not - happen in the span of a human life."
Yes it does! That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard! Take, for example, diseases - many of those have evolved to adapt to our medecines, and within the span of a human lifetime!

[General Ludd]

Originally posted by tinyp3nis

What I am supposed to say something that is simply not true?

You took it completely out of context. You only quoted the first three words of my post for gods sake. Yes, beavers do "destroy" - they cut down trees to make their homes. But that is a part of the eco-system. The environment is built around it, it is an intrical part of life in their eco-system. It is something that the entire eco-system has evolved with. They do not, as I said, cut down trees for abstract and self-made concepts like humans do, nor do they cut down every freakin' tree in the forest. and they don't go sailing around the world and contaminating other ecosystems. and, as I said in my previous posts, there is a whole hell of alot of things they don't do.

You would have to be insane to think that beavers and humans are comparable in the way they effect the world.



And I have a feeling that maybe you are some how failing to understand the entire concept of this arument and think that I am speaking out against merely cutting down trees and killing things. I am not. Death is a part of life. I am talking about how humans do not behave naturaly.

[General Ludd]

Originally posted by monolith94
"Evolution does not - can not - happen in the span of a human life."
Yes it does! That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard! Take, for example, diseases - many of those have evolved to adapt to our medecines, and within the span of a human lifetime!

Well yes, that's because they have much shorter life spans then humans. It still takes millions of generations (I really have no idea how many) for diseases to adapt, and that is the point I was making. Eco-systems evolve at the same sort of rate.

[tinyp3nis]

Originally posted by Osweld


You took it completely out of context. You only quoted the first three words of my post for gods sake. Yes, beavers do "destroy" - they cut down trees to make their homes. But that is a part of the eco-system. The environment is built around it, it is an intrical part of life in their eco-system. It is something that the entire eco-system has evolved with. They do not, as I said, cut down trees for abstract and self-made concepts like humans do, nor do they cut down every freakin' tree in the forest. and they don't go sailing around the world and contaminating other ecosystems. and, as I said in my previous posts, there is a whole hell of alot of things they don't do.

You would have to be insane to think that beavers and humans are comparable in the way they effect the world.




And I have a feeling that maybe you are some how failing to understand the entire concept of this arument and think that I am speaking out against merely cutting down trees and killing things. I am not. Death is a part of life. I am talking about how humans do not behave naturaly.

Just like I said earlier, humans destroy more. Oh boy.

You would have to be insane to think that beavers and humans are comparable in the way they effect the world.

I'm insane. Not equal however, but comparable yes.
Btw every lifeform is just not a part of the system, it also defines it, and changes it. Modern human just much more than others.

[General Ludd]

Originally posted by tinyp3nis
Just like I said earlier, humans destroy more. Oh boy.

The point you seem to be mising is that a beaver's destruction brings life to the eco-system. Whereas our destruction is greatly fueled by abstract and self-made concepts and does not bring life to eco-systems - we take all the life out of environments, cutting down every single tree and killing every single animal to fuel an incessive need for decadence and luxury.


When a beaver cuts down a tree to make a dam it is making a space for a new tree to grow and as the trees in their dam decay, the nutrients of the trees go into the water and feed new life, it is contributing to the eco-system in countless other ways that I can not even begin to imagine.

When we slash and burn a forest or pave over a swamp, we are giving nothing back to the environment, we are only fueling our own development and never-ending demand for resources, which only runs out quicker the more we use.

[Ozz]

Use the Beavers to Terraform Mars then.

Beavers dams aren't permament, a good snow winter
and a quick thaw, dams' gone.

[Skanky Burns]

I feel that it would be unethical to not terraform Mars.

Assuming there are simple organisms on Mars, these poor buggers have no future. The atmosphere of Mars is slowly being reduced by the sun. Without intervention, they will more than likely die out completely, or remain as simple organisms without the chance to evolve into higher forms.

In the (more likely) case that there is no life on Mars, what good is a prestine chunk of rock? Let life put it to use.

As intelligent life, it is our duty to spread life where we can. We have the knowledge and ability to start terraforming Mars, and we should.

[tinyp3nis]

The point you seem to be mising is that a beaver's destruction brings life to the eco-system. Whereas our destruction is greatly fueled by abstract and self-made concepts and does not bring life to eco-systems - we take all the life out of environments, cutting down every single tree and killing every single animal to fuel an incessive need for decadence and luxury.

We are plenty. I'd like to see what billions of beavers (or even better some big predator) would do, too bad they are not as succesfull. It would be a total mess even without abstract and self-made concepts.
System produced the "flaw" so the eco-system is flawed when it let's something like this (us) happen.

Not to mention the fact that above what you said is not true, atleast not here in Finland. We do take care of our forests, and animals too. I don't mind humans mixing the system a bit, about goddamn time someone brings some sense into this chaos. Humans have not yet done that on large scale, but we have the potential. The thing that makes us different from animals is that we could/might destroy the eco-system, but untill that day we are just a part of it, a big one. When human race takes other lifeforms into consideration, it's good but also unnatural. The only species with brains like these cannot really act natural, if "natural" is the same that the rest of the eco-system does.

When a beaver cuts down a tree to make a dam it is making a space for a new tree to grow and as the trees in their dam decay, the nutrients of the trees go into the water and feed new life, it is contributing to the eco-system in countless other ways that I can not even begin to imagine.

When we slash and burn a forest or pave over a swamp, we are giving nothing back to the environment, we are only fueling our own development and never-ending demand for resources, which only runs out quicker the more we use.

Only the same thing what the beaver gives back, space for new life.

[ravagon]

I wouldn't think it as much a question of ethics as one of understanding. It has taken mankind a long while to accumulate a degree of comprehension of the way the Earth works. Even this is incomplete.
Without the degree of variation in the Martian environment and given that Mars is substantially smaller it shouldn't take anywhere near as long to come to a similar understanding of how the planet works, but it'll still be a fair way off.