For all of you excited by the whole 'one-way mission to Mars' idea, you should probably know that this strategy has been around for quite some time now. NASA engineers Robert Zubrin and David Baker originally detailed the Mars Direct plan in 1990 and was later expanded upon in Zubrin's 1996 book, The Case for Mars. It now serves as a staple of Zubrin's speaking engagements and general advocacy as head of the Mars Society, an organization devoted to the colonization of Mars.

Dirk Schulze-Makuch and Paul Davies, in their recent Journal of Cosmology article, are merely riffing off and expanding upon this original idea.

Regardless, it is a very good idea.

We already have the requisite technologies required to pull off such a mission. All we need is the will.

And finding volunteers for a one-way mission shouldn't be a problem. I'm sure there are many hopefuls chomping at the bit over such an opportunity. And it doesn't necessarily have to be a permanently one-way mission; given enough time and infrastructure development, the original team could eventually make their way back home.

I'm also partial to the idea of sending a perpetual chain of supplies to an established Martian base. It makes so much sense; just going to Mars and back (a la Apollo missions) seems a bit ridiculous, wasteful and pointless. As Schulze-Makuch and Davies note in their article, To Boldly Go: A One-Way Human Mission to Mars, the red planet is concealing a a wealth of geological and astronomical data that is almost impossible to access from Earth using robotic probes. “A permanent human presence on Mars would open the way to comparative planetology on a scale unimagined by any former generation," they write, "A Mars base would offer a springboard for human/robotic exploration of the outer solar system and the asteroid belt. And establishing a permanent multicultural and multinational human presence on another world would have major beneficial political and social implications for Earth, and serve as a strong unifying and uplifting theme for all humanity.”

Bingo. Moreover, our survival as a species may depend on it. While I have our doubts about humanity ever becoming in interstellar species, we are clearly on track to becoming intrastellar. There's no reason to believe that we can't (or shouldn't) find ways to inhabit space and other planets in our solar system. The imperative to do so has never been more obvious; all our eggs are in one basket at the dawn of a potential apocalyptic age.

So yes, get your ass to Mars.

Wired contributors Steven Johnson and Kevin Kelly have recently released books on the history of innovation in which they argue that great discoveries typically spring not from individual minds but from the hive mind.

In Johnson's book, Where Good Ideas Come From: The Natural History of Innovation, he draws on seven centuries of scientific and technological progress, from Gutenberg to GPS, to show what sorts of environments nurture ingenuity. Johnson reveals that great creative milieus, whether MIT or Los Alamos, New York City or the World Wide Web, are like coral reefs—teeming, diverse colonies of creators who interact with and influence one another.

Kelly’s book, What Technology Wants, looks back over some 50,000 years of history and peers nearly that far into the future. His argument is similarly sweeping: Technology can be seen as a sort of autonomous life-form, with intrinsic goals toward which it gropes over the course of its long development. Those goals are much like the tendencies of biological life, which over time diversifies, specializes, and (eventually) becomes more sentient.

Wired recently brought the two together for a discussion, and it's a must-read:

Kelly: I think there are a lot of ideas today that are ahead of their time. Human cloning, autopilot cars, patent-free law—all are close technically but too many steps ahead culturally. Innovating is about more than just having the idea yourself; you also have to bring everyone else to where your idea is. And that becomes really difficult if you’re too many steps ahead.

Johnson: The scientist Stuart Kauffman calls this the “adjacent possible.” At any given moment in evolution—of life, of natural systems, or of cultural systems—there’s a space of possibility that surrounds any current configuration of things. Change happens when you take that configuration and arrange it in a new way. But there are limits to how much you can change in a single move.

Kelly: Which is why the great inventions are usually those that take the smallest possible step to unleash the most change. That was the difference between Tim Berners-Lee’s successful HTML code and Ted Nelson’s abortive Xanadu project. Both tried to jump into the same general space—a networked hypertext—but Tim’s approach did it with a dumb half-step, while Ted’s earlier, more elegant design required that everyone take five steps all at once.

Johnson: Also, the steps have to be taken in the right order. You can’t invent the Internet and then the digital computer. This is true of life as well. The building blocks of DNA had to be in place before evolution could build more complex things. One of the key ideas I’ve gotten from you, by the way—when I read your book Out of Control in grad school—is this continuity between biological and technological systems.

Kelly: Both of us have written books on this idea, on the primacy of the evolutionary model for understanding the world. But in What Technology Wants, I’ve actually gone a bit further and come to see technology as an alternative great story, as a different source for understanding where we are in the cosmos. I think technology is something that can give meaning to our lives, particularly in a secular world.

Johnson: One thing I love about your book is that by the end, you’ve moved from discussions of cutting-edge technology to this amazingly grand vista of life and human creation. It’s very rare to have a book about technology that is moving in that way—that has this almost spiritual component to it. Really, it’s kind of the anti-Unabomber manifesto.

Kelly: [Laughs] That’s a great blurb.

Johnson: No, seriously! He had this bleak, soul-sucking vision of technology as an autonomous force for evil. You also present technology as a sort of autonomous force—as wanting something, over the long course of its evolution—but it’s a more balanced and ultimately positive vision, which I find much more appealing than the alternative.

Kelly: [Laughs] That’s a great blurb.

Johnson: No, seriously! He had this bleak, soul-sucking vision of technology as an autonomous force for evil. You also present technology as a sort of autonomous force—as wanting something, over the long course of its evolution—but it’s a more balanced and ultimately positive vision, which I find much more appealing than the alternative.

Kelly: As I started thinking about the history of technology, there did seem to be a sense in which, during any given period, lots of innovations were in the air, as it were. They came simultaneously. It appeared as if they wanted to happen. I should hasten to add that it’s not a conscious agency; it’s a lower form, something like the way an organism or bacterium can be said to have certain tendencies, certain trends, certain urges. But it’s an agency nevertheless.

Johnson: I was particularly taken with your idea that technology wants increasing diversity—which is what I think also happens in biological systems, as the adjacent possible becomes larger with each innovation. As tech critics, I think we have to keep this in mind, because when you expand the diversity of a system, that leads to an increase in great things and an increase in crap.

Read the entire discussion.

For the first time, human cells have been used to create a lab-grown liver.

Chris Kim

Keith Norbury of This Magazine has published a piece called Technology, ethics, and the real meaning of the “Rapture of the Nerds”. I was interviewed for this article and asked questions about the state of transhumanism and singularitarianism today in Toronto and Canada in general. We also discussed the the tendency of the press and the public to roll all transhumanists into the Singularity camp, which, as I pointed out, was a mistake:

Not all people who believe in technology’s power to transform humanity are Singularitarians. Transhumanists, as their name implies, also expect technology to alter the species. “These are two communities that seem to have a connection,” says George Dvorsky, president of the Toronto Transhumanist Association. “It doesn’t necessarily mean that one follows the other. I happen to know many transhumanists who don’t buy into the Singularity at all.”

While both groups believe that rapid technological progress will radically reshape our lives, the Singularitarians believe a unified, superhuman intelligence is a necessary part of that change. Transhumanists believe no such super-intelligent entity is necessary. Either way, both believe that our future will be completely unrecognizable. “We are talking about transforming what it means to be human,” Dvorsky says.

The article also goes on to describe how interest in the TTA and local transhumanist chapters has waned in the past several years. I'm rather frustrated by Norbury's angle on this, which is to suggest that the fringe is getting fringier, and that good work isn't being done in these areas through other channels. The fact of the matter is that these ideas, namely the notion of human enhancement and the unknown potential for a greater-than-human artificial intelligence, are being addressed by a diverse and distributed group of individuals—and just as importantly, these ideas are slowly (but surely) being normalized into our daily discourse.

Indeed, organizing local meet-ups are all fine and well, but that's not where the rubber hits the road. I've made a conscious effort over the past few years to devote most of my time and energy to my blog, Humanity+, and the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies where my outreach is considerably greater and more impactful than through a local chapter alone. Annoyingly, Norbury failed to make mention any of these and chose to focus on the TTA and chapter-level organizing which is no longer of any real interest to me.

The short list and winner of the 2010 Royal Society Prize for Science books has been announced:

A World Without Ice by Henry Pollack (Avery Books, Penguin Group)
Explores the relationship between ice and people – the impact of ice on Earth, its climate, and its human residents, as well as the reciprocal impact that people are now having on ice and the climate.

The judges said: “A thoughtful and refreshing book that brings ice to life. Well researched and with a personal feel this book is an excellent alternative route into understanding the issues around climate change. Fascinating, accessible and very powerful.”

Everyday Practice of Science: Where Intuition and Passion Meet Objectivity and Logic by Frederick Grinnell (Oxford University Press)
An insiders’ view of real-life scientific practice describing how scientists bring their own interests and passions to their work and illustrating the dynamics between researchers and the research community.

The judges said: “How is science done? This book looks behind the scenes and tells the story of what makes scientific minds tick and how scientific theories are made. A fascinating, personal account – essential reading for anyone with an interest in science, from pupil to politician.”

God’s Philosophers: How the medieval world laid the foundations of modern science by James Hannam (Icon Books)
Revives the forgotten philosophers, scientists, scholars and inventors of medieval Europe, revealing the Medieval Age to be responsible for inventions and ideas that would change the world forever.

The judges said: “A vibrant insight into the medieval approach to science, full of wonderful anecdotes and personalities. Dispelling common myths about the ‘dark ages’, this is a very readable book about a neglected era in the history of science. It very much fills a gap, making you realise that the great scientific achievements of the Renaissance are in debt to the "philosophers" prepared to sacrifice long held beliefs and frequently their lives for their ideas.”

Life Ascending by Nick Lane (Profile Books)
Charts the history of life on Earth by describing the ten greatest inventions of life, based on their historical impact, their importance in living organisms and their iconic power.

The judges said: “An elegant and adventurous step-by-step guide to what makes life the way it is. With a pleasing overarching structure, it is a beautifully written book and an extremely rewarding read.”

We Need To Talk About Kelvin by Marcus Chown (Faber and Faber)
Takes familiar features of the world we know and shows how they can be used to explain profound truths about the ultimate nature of reality.

The judges said: “Your everyday world will never look the same again after reading this inspiring book. Reflections in the window, the warm rays of the sun – all are used to explain ideas of advanced physics, from the atom to the big bang, and show how physics forms part of our everyday world.”

Why Does E=mc2? by Brian Cox and Jeff Forshaw (Da Capo Press, Perseus Books Group)
An illuminating journey to the frontier of 21st century science to consider the real meaning behind Einstein’s most famous equation, E = mc2.

The judges said: “This book takes the world’s most famous equation apart and puts it back together again in a way that is lively and understandable. We were delighted to find our knowledge of equations - long forgotten since leaving school for some of us – reinvigorated and felt ourselves rediscovering our enjoyment of mathematics.”

The winner: Life Ascending by Nick Lane.

As an aside, I will soon be receiving all six of these books compliments of New Scientist. I won a contest in which readers were asked to name the most underrated science book written for a general audience. My pick of K. Eric Drexler's Engines of Creation was my choice.

Michael and Susan Anderson have published an article on Machine Ethics (ME) in the October issue of Scientific American. In the article, Robot Be Good: A Call for Ethical Autonomous Machines, they introduce both ME and their recent work programming ethical principles in Nao, a humanoid robot which was developed by the French company Aldebaran Robotics.

Their findings in brief:

• Robots that make autonomous decisions, such as those being designed to assist the elderly, may face ethical dilemmas even in seemingly everyday situations.
• One way to ensure ethical behavior in robots that interact with humans is to program general ethical principles into them and let them use those principles to make decisions on a case-by-case basis.
• Artificial-intelligence techniques can produce the principles themselves by abstracting them from specific cases of ethically acceptable behavior using logic.
• The authors have followed this approach and for the first time programmed a robot to act based on an ethical principle.

It has been 25 years since Donna Haraway published her seminal essay, "A Cyborg Manifesto: Science, Technology, and Socialist-Feminism in the Late Twentieth Century."While largely intended as metaphorical discourse, a number of feminists and futurists, including myself, were inspired by a more literal and technoprogressive interpretation of Haraway's message. The piece was a major influence on my conception of postgenderist theory, inspiring such articles as "Overcoming Gender" and "Postgenderism: Beyond the Gender Binary" (PDF) (the latter of which I co-authored with James Hughes).

In "A Cyborg Manifesto," Haraway issued a challenge to feminists to engage in a politics beyond naturalism and essentialism. She used the concept of the cyborg to offer a political strategy for the seemingly disparate interests of socialism and feminism, writing, "We are all chimeras, theorized and fabricated hybrids of machine and organism; in short, we are cyborgs." Her paper was also an attemnpt to break away from Oedipal narratives and Christian origin myths like Genesis. She writes, "The cyborg does not dream of community on the model of the organic family, this time without the oedipal project. The cyborg would not recognize the Garden of Eden; it is not made of mud and cannot dream of returning to dust."

From another angle, "A Cyborg Manifesto" can be interpreted as a critique of ecofeminism. She argued it was in the eroding boundary between human beings and machines, in the integration of women and machines in particular, that we can find liberation from old patriarchal dualisms. Haraway concludes “I would rather be a cyborg than a goddess,” and suggested that the cyborg serves as a more appropriate liberatory mythos for women.

Now, 25 years later, "A Cyborg Manifesto" can be seen as the inspiration for the emergence of 'cyborgology' and 'cyberfeminism,' subdisciplines made up of culture critics who used the cyborg metaphor and the postmodernist questions Haraway posed to explore the woman-machine interface. And as mentioned earlier, it also brought transhumanists into the discussion, who integrated and re-interpreted Haraway's ideas, resulting in the emergence of postgenderist theory—the suggestion that both females and males should look to be liberated from gendered constraints through the application of advanced biotechnologies.

Founded in 2010 by Emiliano Kargieman and Andrew Fursma, graduates of the NASA Ames based Singularity University’s Graduate Studies Program, Satellogic specializes in the creation and management of off-earth network infrastructure.

The company is developing the airborne communications backbone necessary to open realtime satellite data to the masses. By creating a globally accessible nano-satellite based mesh network in low earth orbit, Satellogic can serve as a virtual ground station for traditional satellites while providing earth observation data recorded by the constellation.

Learn more.

Hieronymus Bosch’s “Garden of Earthly Delights” depicts hundreds of erotic naked figures carrying or eating fruits, but is also full of references to alchemy, the forerunner of chemistry  The figures on the right are embedded in glass tubes typical of a bain-marie, while the two birds supposedly symbolize vapors.

Frans de Waal, in a recent NYT OpEd, argues that we don't need God to create morals:

Perhaps it is just me, but I am wary of anyone whose belief system is the only thing standing between them and repulsive behavior. Why not assume that our humanity, including the self-control needed for livable societies, is built into us? Does anyone truly believe that our ancestors lacked social norms before they had religion? Did they never assist others in need, or complain about an unfair deal? Humans must have worried about the functioning of their communities well before the current religions arose, which is only a few thousand years ago. Not that religion is irrelevant — I will get to this — but it is an add-on rather than the wellspring of morality.

Deep down, creationists realize they will never win factual arguments with science. This is why they have construed their own science-like universe, known as Intelligent Design, and eagerly jump on every tidbit of information that seems to go their way. The most recent opportunity arose with the Hauser affair. A Harvard colleague, Marc Hauser, has been accused of eight counts of scientific misconduct, including making up his own data. Since Hauser studied primate behavior and wrote about morality, Christian Web sites were eager to claim that “all that people like Hauser are left with are unsubstantiated propositions that are contradicted by millennia of human experience” (Chuck Colson, Sept. 8, 2010). A major newspaper asked “Would it be such a bad thing if Hausergate resulted in some intellectual humility among the new scientists of morality?” (Eric Felten, Aug. 27, 2010). Even a linguist could not resist this occasion to reaffirm the gap between human and animal by warning against “naive evolutionary presuppositions.”

These are rearguard battles, however. Whether creationists jump on this scientific scandal or linguists and psychologists keep selling human exceptionalism does not really matter. Fraud has occurred in many fields of science, from epidemiology to physics, all of which are still around. In the field of cognition, the march towards continuity between human and animal has been inexorable — one misconduct case won’t make a difference. True, humanity never runs out of claims of what sets it apart, but it is a rare uniqueness claim that holds up for over a decade. This is why we don’t hear anymore that only humans make tools, imitate, think ahead, have culture, are self-aware, or adopt another’s point of view.

Read the entire article.

Quantified-self junkies, rejoice: BodyMedia recently announced that its armband sensors will be able to communicate wirelessly with smartphones via Bluetooth. Its health sensors will be one of the first devices, other than ear buds, that link to smartphones with Bluetooth short-range communications.

The device is poised to allows users to monitor a collection of nearly 9,000 variables—physical activity, calories burned, body heat, sleep efficiency and others—collected by the sensors in a BodyMedia armband in real-time, as the day goes by.

The Bluetooth-enabled armband will cost $249 and the BodyMedia data service will cost $7 a month. The device is scheduled go on sale this coming November. In the past, BodyMedia users had to consult personal data downloaded to a Web site or observe a few measurements on a special watchband display, sold for $100.

Visitors to the Digital Content Expo in Tokyo last weekend were treated to a choreographed dance routine featuring AIST's feminine HRP-4C robot and four humans. Via Pink Tentacle.

Feast your eyes on Kenn Brown's latest, what will be the final cover illustration for Jamil Moledina’s epic SciFi novel ‘Tearing the Sky’.

Patrick Millard is Pittsburgh-based artist whose work in photography, new media, and sound has resulted in a diversified portfolio that addresses ideas about media, digital culture, technology and the interactions that human beings have within their own synthetic environment. His work has been exhibited nationally and internationally and continues to gain recognition.

In 2008, Patrick began to show his work inside the virtual simulation world Second Life; exhibitions that advance beyond two-dimension work and expand his ideas of simulation, virtual reality, and the synthetic future where the physical object gives way to its virtual counterpart and its presence is valued entirely for its idea rather than its place in space.

In 2009, shortly after becoming a regular exhibitor in the virtual environment, Patrick embarked upon his first photographic series that used the environment and society of Second Life as its subject matter and conceptual theme. Virtual Lens is an artistic and anthropological investigation into the life of the avatar, landscape of the sim environment, and experience of the virtual world. Patrick continues to photograph and exhibit his portfolios as well as spend time with fellow avatars in Second Life.

He currently works as Assistant Professor of Photography at Point Park University in Pittsburgh.

During the month of June, 2010 Patrick will be artist in residence at the Biosphere 2. During his time in residence he will be working on photographic, sound, and digital media portfolios.

Check these out:

• What Does It Mean to Be Human? Humanness, Personhood and the Transhumanist Movement | EBEM
• Blurring the love lines: The legal implications of intimacy with machines | Anna Russell
• Biomechatronics aims to erase the entire concept of 'disability' | Scientific American
• Intelligent Individuals Don’t Make Groups Smarter | Wired
• UI study: IVF does not negatively affect academic achievement | University of Iowa
• Actuaries Insist We’ve Got to Retire Later | Miller-McCune
• Regulatory environment tightens for cognitive enhancers | Neuroethics at the Core

I've been invited to participate in a panel discussion following the screening of Ray Kurzweil's Transcendent Man. The event will be held at the Royal Ontario Museum (ROM) in Toronto on Friday October 15 at 9:30pm. The panel will be hosted by Madeline Ashby (science fiction writer) and I'll be joined by Greg Van Alstyne (design educator).

Hope to see you there.

You can register here.

Inventor Dean Kamen will soon have his own show on Planet Green called Dean of Invention. Check out the trailer for the first show in which he explores the potential for first generation "microbots" -- what looks to be a precursor to molecular-scale nanorobotics. The show is set to premiere on Friday, October 22 at 10 Eastern.

The Economist is reporting on how an obscure group of animals, the rotifer, may reveal the secret of elongating life. It's a study into caloric restriction, which is not surprising, but what's particularly fascinating about this study, however, is that the benefits seem to be passed down to the next generation:

Rotifers are unusual in that they often reproduce by parthenogenesis (some species, indeed, can reproduce only in this way). A parthenogenetic population is, by definition, all female and the result, give or take the odd mutation, is that a rotifer’s daughters are genetically identical to her. That makes rotifers convenient subjects for studies of the controversial idea that characteristics acquired during an individual’s life can be passed down the generations in ways that are independent of mutations in the DNA.

Dr Watabe and his colleagues first looked at whether caloric restriction does, indeed, work its magic on rotifers. It does. Without it, as they report in Functional Ecology, their animals lived for an average of 8.8 days. With it they lived for 13.5 days. The intriguing result came when they did the same thing with the rotifers’ offspring. The daughters of those rotifers which had been fed as much as they could eat lived for 9.5 days if treated likewise (not significantly different from their mothers) and 14.4 if put on short commons. Those born of calorie-restricted mothers lived for 12.7 and 16.8 days respectively. Something, then, is being passed on that is having an effect down the generations.

That something seems to be related to an enzyme called catalase. This enzyme degrades hydrogen peroxide, a highly reactive chemical that creates cellular damage of the sort associated with ageing. Dr Watabe found that the offspring of calorie-restricted mothers have more catalase than those of mothers who were fed without restriction.

So, if inherited epigenetic changes are causing daughter rotifers to produce more catalase, it raises the question of whether a similar thing happens in other species and, if so, whether it might be induced artificially so that people won't have to resort to caloric restriction.

Read the entire article.

Good advice here. Summarized:

• Drink tons of water
• Drink more tea
• Cut out the corn syrup
• Enjoy a fattening breakfast
• Eat slower
• Put leftovers away before eating
• Overload on veggies
• Don't eat and multi-task
• Instead of snacking, brush your teeth
• Buy food with cash
• Make a "veggie section" in your shopping cart
• Listen to music while you work out
• Watch less TV
• Wear comfy clothes
• Weigh yourself

Ronald Bailey tells us what this year's Nobel Prize for a test tube baby pioneer tells us about the moral endorsement of technology:

At long last, in vitro fertilization pioneer Robert Edwards has been awarded a Nobel Prize. Back in 1978, his research with his colleague Patrick Steptoe led to the birth of the world’s first test tube baby, Louise Joy Brown. The public (and makers of public policy) initially reacted to Edwards’ research with moral horror. However, once he and Steptoe had succeeded in producing a healthy baby girl, revulsion swiftly turned into wide approval and ethical acceptance.

In 2001, when Roberts was given the prestigious Lasker Award for medical research, biochemist Joseph Goldstein quipped, "We know that IVF was a great leap because Edwards and Steptoe were immediately attacked by an unlikely trinity—the press, the pope, and prominent Nobel laureates." Edwards’ scientific career traces out the ethical arc that characterizes reaction to much technological progress during the last century—initial fear and loathing followed by a warm embrace. Yuck followed quickly by yippee.

In 1969, a Harris poll found that a majority of Americans believed that producing test-tube babies was "against God's will." In 1970s, the federal government imposed a moratorium on federal funding of in vitro fertilization research and legislation that would have outlawed IVF was considered by Congress. Yet just one month after the birth of Louise Brown, the Gallup poll reported that 60 percent of Americans approved of in vitro fertilization and more than half would consider using it if they were infertile.

Advances in biomedicine—especially those that touch most closely on birth and death—have been the most ethically fraught. A lot of moral struggles have centered on control over reproduction. Let’s set aside the long fight over abortion and look chiefly at a couple of the other moral struggles over fertility control, contraception and artificial insemination, as examples of this process of progressive moral endorsement.

Read the entire article.

I'm finding it very strange that everyone's all a tizzy about the discovery of a potentially habitable planet, Gilese 581. This planet was discovered over three years ago. I remember this because it was an important consideration in the Fermi talk I delivered in Chicago the same year. Its discovery also motivated me to write about the Rare Earth Delusion. I'm not sure I understand all the sudden attention.

** ADDENDUM: 2010.10.05: Okay, everything is now illuminated: As my reader Richard Leis, Jr. points out, "The discovery of Gliese 581 c was announced in 2007. Last week's announcement was Gliese 581 g. C was initially considered a good candidate for potential life, but later calculations suggested it was actually outside the star's habitable zone. G is considered a better candidate because calculations place it more firmly within the habitable zone." **

Well, whatever. What's important to note is that (1) it reaffirms the notion that we (likely) live in a biophilic Universe and (2) its presence deepens the disturbing nature of the Fermi Paradox. As a potential data point that works to increase the value of n in the Drake Equation, it serves to reinforce the suggestion that, while we find ourselves in a Universe that is likely teeming with life, it's not one that's teeming in space-faring civilizations. Consequently, its discovery is not exactly good news.

Here's what I wrote back in April of 2007 when Gilese 581 was first discovered:

Wow, the blogosphere has been absolutely gushing these past few days over the news that an Earth-like planet may have been discovered in the 'hood. This planet may boast a moderate climate that could conceivably support life and is only 20 light years away.

Not surprisingly, this news has caused a number of pundits to fantasize about jumping into their rocketships and bidding adiós to our polluted, war-torn and diseased planet.

But not so fast, amigos. While many have misguidedly jumped on the bandwagon to the stars, a number of bloggers have gotten it right.

In his article, "'Don't Pack Your Bags Just Yet", Jamais Cascio notes that, "By the time we have the technology that would make a 20 light year trip even remotely plausible (the fastest space craft yet made would still take thousands of years to get there), we probably won't be all that interested in living in a watery gravity hole anyway. Nope -- give us some nice, massive gas giants to convert to computronium!"

Michael Anissimov points out that we have a human hospitable planet right here that we’ve barely even begun to use. He also argues that "even if we did need to leave the Earth, there is a tremendous amount of raw materials for space colonies right next door in the form of carbonaceous asteroids, which make up about 75% of known asteroids." Moreover, warns Anissimov, "we should think carefully before sending off colonists to far-away places without ensuring that they’re capable of protecting the fundamental freedoms of their citizens." Specifically, he worries that a blight may come back to haunt us (which also reminds me of the Honored Matres of the Dune series).

And as Tyler Cowen noted, "Are earth-like planets so common? That probably means lots more civilization-supporting planets than I had expected. But where are the alien visitors? As suggested by the Fermi paradox, we must revise our priors along several margins, one of which is the expected duration of an intelligent civilization."

Indeed, Cowen is on the right track. A primary argument used to reconcile the Fermi Paradox is the Rare Earth Hypothesis. This line of reasoning suggests that we haven't been visited by ETI's because life is far too rare in the cosmos.

But if we have discovered an Earth-like planet as little as 20 light years away, it's not unreasonable to suggest that our Galaxy must be absolutely teeming with life. This would seem to be a heavy blow to the REH.

So why is this bad news? It's bad news because our biophilic universe should be saturated with advanced intelligence by now...but it's not. The Fermi Paradox is very much in effect as a profound and disturbing unsolved mystery in astrosociobiology, philosophy and futurism.

Are all civilizations doomed before getting to the Singularity? Or is there something else at work here?