Excessive Stimuli

Files from the quiet one.

[billy-reynolds]

Do Extinction Events Lead to Sentience?

In order for sentient intelligence to evolve, it may depend on a few or even many extinction events in its past to take place.  What if evolution adapts species who recover from one mass extinction, to be more fit for the next (my theory, not fact).  At a certain point, evolution finds that the only way to develop a species that can not only survive a mass extinction, one that recovers quickly, or better, prevents it in the first place.  Unless an asteroid takes us by surprise in the next 50 years we will be in a position to not only prevent an extinction event by meteor, we will likely net it and mine it for rare metals.

Other extinction events could easily cripple us at any moment, but at least we have almost checked the dinosaur killer off the list.

[billy-reynolds]

[billy-reynolds]

“We are all born too late to explore the Earth, and too early to explore the stars.” –Saphiric

If you lived in the last couple of centuries, you would (mostly) be too late to explore the Earth, and the idea of exploring the starts must have seemed so impossibly far away as to not be worth thinking about.  But being an adult in the 21st century, one is acutely aware of how true the second clause of that quote is.  We weren’t merely born too early; we were born barely too early.  I am convinced that by the end of this century we will be well on our way to exploring the solar system.  Perhaps in the century or two following, we will have discovered a way to reach other stars in a reasonable amount of time.  Certainly by discovering a local galactic neighborhood teeming with exoplanets, some of which being fantastic potential candidates for colonization, we will have the more adventurous among us falling over themselves to get to the stars.  And when humans want to do something real bad that they don’t currently have the ability to do, they make it possible, physics be damned.

It also seems likely that the human lifespan is about to improve dramatically, but this too the 30-somethings like me might be just a hair too early for.  The day after my death, I picture the headlines will read, “Scientists Discover the Secret to Immortality,” or something to that effect.  And it’s not the ‘immortality’ part that is important to me as much as the ‘explore the galaxy’ part that I fear natural causes will force me to miss.  I blame George Lucas for this, of course.  Perhaps if I hadn’t discovered my parents’ Star Wars box set when I was nine, I wouldn’t have this overwhelming desire to fast forward time until I could witness a living being not of this earth.  

[billy-reynolds]

Looking back, this guy might be a tad aggressive for commuting.

[billy-reynolds]

Commuting

One of the things I always say I’m going to do, but never actually do, is to ride my bike into work.  Whenever I think about it, the logistics just seem like a nightmare.  The train costs $6!?  That’s about how much it will cost in gas.  I have to stand with my bike for the whole 45 minute ride, thus defeating one of the biggest benefits of riding it: reading time?  Not only that, but I have to stand there trying not to make eye contact with a hundred other passengers, all standing way too close to me?  And then, ok, I make it through the train part.  Now do I transfer to the bus that will take me directly to work?  If so, why did I take the bike?  If I ride, where am I going to ride?  3300 south has no bike lanes and the sidewalks are chewed to shit.  Do I really want to be one of those bikers that interrupt the flow of traffic by riding in the right lane?  This is why people see bikers as arrogant pricks: you have to be sometimes.

And then what about when I actually arrive at work?  I’m sweaty and I have helmet hair.  Am I now required to shower?  Also, that must also mean I have to pack my work clothes on my back, no?  I don’t want to think about the stress of trying to shower and change at work.  If there is just one other person trying to do the same thing I’m doing, it’s not going to work out for one of us.  Now I’m walking into work with wrinkly clothes, disheveled hair, and a hint of body odor.

Alternatively, I could take my car.  Yeah, that seems easier.