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ESA's Scientist Suggests A Noah's Ark On the Moon
13.7BillionYears writes "Many are familiar with a supermarket tabloid (whose name eludes me) offering ridiculous headlines, one of the most famous being 'Noah's Ark Found on the Moon!' In an ironic twist, that one may yet come to pass. The BBC reports that the European Space Agency's chief scientist, Dr. Bernard Foing, has said that there should be a Noah's Ark on the Moon consisting of a repository for the DNA of every single species of plant and animal, in case the Earth is destroyed by an asteroid or nuclear holocaust. One wonders how you'd go about indexing every life form including undiscovered species and how you'd protect the DNA from radiation."
One wonders how you'd go about indexing every life form...
Two-by-two, of course!
I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate.
It's not that illogical. It's just a little odd. I mean, so we get a bunch of earth DNA up there. So what? Personally I think it makes more sense to populate the moon and mars and beyond with people, instead of just sending DNA. Who's gonna be able to replicate it and recreate the living earth if we're all dead or bombed back into the stone age? Or what if it gets destroyed in the 2112 moon vs. earth war? Seems like more reasons NOT to do it than to do it. And any ET's that happen upon a DNA stash would probably be very wary of bringing it back to life.
Moo.
This is the ultimate off-site backup!
I wish that they would publicize the things that the ESA does well, such as the upcoming Herschel mission, the upcoming Planck space satellite (the successor to WMAP and COBE), etc. Instead all we hear about in the US is a disappointing garbage idea like this (with no scientific merit) and the disaster of the BEAGLE 2. Come on, people. Don't take this seriously (and if you have the power, don't support this) -- this is basically a time capsule. Whatever we do to our Earth, I'm still sure it will provide a better record of life on Earth than whatever we might drop on the moon.
Wouldn't a location (or several) underneath the surface of the earth be better. The rock would protect against a lot of radiation (and getting lead down there would be easier than getting it to the moon) and there are places where the digging has already been done. Any event that can destroy a number of sites located around the world would probably also have a serious affect on the moon wouldn't it?
Decode these
We need something like this soon, anyway.
The next ice age (or whatever you call it when the glaciers are coming, because we've been in an 'ice age' for the past 2-1/2 million years) has been modeled to be in full swing by 2900. Unlike the last one, which lasted a mere 20,000 years, you can bet the Yellowstone supervolcano will go off and deepen this one, and maybe it'll last 100,000 years or more.
In the next 80-150 years, due to global warming, the carrying capacity of the earth is going to be drastically reduced. So we need to put something together while we still have population and resources to do it.
That Dr. Foing was watching the animated film TITAN A.E. while half asleep and upon waking, thought he had some amazingly original idea.
Think again Docta Foing!!
(wow that's fun to say out loud)
By Putting it on the Dark Side of the moon.
He who knows not and knows he knows not is a wise man. He who knows not and knows not he knows not is a fool.
Just get a bunch of mosquitos, and a bunch of tree sap...Then we just need someone to extract them in 65 million years!
I would like to nominate myself and Anna Kournikova as canidates to re-populate the earth. Once funding has been approved the practice sessions can begin.
http://www.kubuntu.org/
DNA by itself does not a creature make. You still have to have a cell to put that DNA in, and that cell has to be able to repsond properly to the protiens that that are transcribed from that DNA, and also be able to produce the proper chemical signals to cause the correct parts of that DNA to be transcribed at the right time.
Until bringing back the Dodo and the Passenger Pigeon becomes feasible, I fail to see how sending DNA from every animal to the moon is any better a way to spend research money than sending a box full of the covers to every O'Reilly book ever publshed tot he moon.
It's no good to just throw a sample of DNA up on the moon. We must have some kind of way to represent the genetic diversity within a species. The diversity itself is the mark of a species and its ability to prosper.
There've been recent articles that indicate that climate change is causing an overall loss in diversity among the world's species. Once the diversity decreases to a certain point, the populations will crash (I've read about computer simulations done on Atlantic salmon populations that bear this out.) In short, simply saving the DNA, either the actual molecules or a printout, will not do anyone any good in the future. Not only will it be impossible to resurrect the species, they future researchers will have only the very limited insight into just one example of a creature that once numbered in the thousands, millions, or billions with the genetic diverity to match.
The project, conceived this way at least, is doomed to failure. The best way to preserve what we've got is to reduce the threat of mass extinction with proper management of the planet we have now.
EPROMS are only good for about 10 years, and thats without all the radiation theyd get from being in space. I think Charles Stross had the right idea with using gold-and-diamond optical discs.
Smoking is an expensive, slow, and unreliable method of suicide.
And the real purpose would be?
...
Say the Earth is destroyed or afflicted by one of the things mentioned, then WHO is going to take advantage of that repository?
Say somehow some people survive. The next question is HOW are they going to use that to rebuild?
Interesting idea but I think just a *little* bit early for its time
A
P.S.: If the Sun goes then that was pointless anyway. I say make it hang-out a nova-safe distance somewhere in space
Fourty-two!
I found his speaking style engaging and intelligent, and his theories to be enlightening. You each owe it to yourself to read an interview with him, which he gave out copies of to participants in the talks at the camp.
The interview details his theory on the whys and hows of what has been termed "the coming technological singularity". Transhumanists here will know what I speak of - all others, please look into it - google is your friend.
One of the ideas presented in the above interview referenced, John Smart lays out the idea that natural disasters do little to impeded evolutionary development, in fact, he contends that such disasters cause leaps in development:
from the above interview
"Catastrophes are to be expected, and they accelerate change whenever immune systems learn from them. In my own research, there has never been a catastrophe in known universal history (supernova, KT-meteorite, plague, civilization collapse, nuclear detonation, reactor meltdown, computer virus, 9/11, you name it) that did not function to accelerate the average distributed complexity (ADC) of the computational network in which it was embedded." - John Smart
The ideas and theory he sets forth in the above interview make a lot of sense. He does, however, always hold that it is a theory, and may be wrong - several times during his talks at Burning Man he was adament in stating this. However, I think his ideas highlight and explain certain domains within the idea of a technological singularity in a logical and consistent manner.
Please note that I am open to debate on this entire issue. If anyone can offer me detailed analysis or references to papers or writings regarding the unlikelyness or impossibility of a technological singularity occurring, I am all ears, so to speak. I want to hear the other side of the story, from the dissenters. All of it is fascinating, but it is hard to determine what the likelyhood of any of it is if you have only heard one side...
Reason is the Path to God - Anon
The unicorns thought the original was a foolish idea, too.
"Prepare for the worst - hope for the best."
CNN is also covering the story.
More information:
The relationship between space and survival has been expressed by many others, such as Carl Sagan, Stephen Hawking, Martin Rees, William Burrows and Robert Shapiro.