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Originally Posted by Janszoon
I just thought it was funny that your last post immediately singled out Africans for exclusion from the ship and that you followed that up by commenting that a lot of your genes' "close family" would be on board. I know you well enough to know that your comment wasn't intended to come off the way it did, which is why it was kind of humorous to me.
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How did I single out Africans for exclusion? Africa represents a wealth of humanity's genetic diversity and that should of course be represented in humanity's survivist colony.
The close family comment may be a little hard to get for people who don't study biology, but evolution rewards the procreation of genes. You give your genes to your kids which pass them on to their kids and so, in a way, some of what makes you you will still exist in the future. This has implications like we tend to be nicer to people whom we share genes with. Because humans are not that genetically diverse, that may well explain in part why we are so seemingly altruistic and good at cooperating and it also means that the people going away on that ship carry with them part of what makes you you. Probably more so if a representative from your nation, ethnic minority, etc, is on that ship.
So, if they are "sufficiently diverse", I would regard the group of colonists going as someone who ensures not just the survival of themselves (which I expect is what leads to comments like "shoot them into a black hole"), but all of us. Family, in a way, even if they aren't. Hence, my genes close family.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Nurse Duckett
Maybe a happy compromise would be if every human being was allowed one vote, you could nominate one person that you wanted to be on the Ark. Some people would nominate themselves, others would nominate people like the Pope or the Dalai Lama, here comes the silver lining, millions of people would vote for Justin Bieber or Lady Gaga and possibly Greenday. I know it doesn't change the fact that you're still getting left behind to face certain death, but it does mean that you no longer have to live on the same planet as some of the people I mentioned earlier, every cloud. What if there's no youtube in space, its not a chance I'm willing to take.
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I understand the wish to have everyone's opinion matter, but in such specific circumstances (one ship to carry X amount of people), I think who gets to go would be better left up to experts rather than popular opinion. You should try to maximize the probability for mission success (humanity's survival) rather than maximize some short-lived satisfaction of having a say for all the people who are soon going to be dead.
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I also know you were not completely serious. In before someone points that out.
