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No Planets.

1 (0.7%)

Dead Planets Only.

11 (7.7%)

Dead Planets and planets that have the potential to support life.

22 (15.5%)

Dead Planets, planets that have the potential to support life, and planets that have microbial life/proto-life.

37 (26.1%)

Dead Planets, planets that have the potential to support life, planets that have microbial life/proto-life, and planets with pre-existing biospheres that lack any sapient species.

43 (30.3%)

Dead Planets, planets that have the potential to support life, planets that have microbial life/proto-life, planets with pre-existing biospheres that lack any sapient species, and planets that are inhabited by other sapient species.

21 (14.8%)

Other.

5 (3.5%)

No Opinion.

2 (1.4%)

Total Members Voted: 142

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Terraforming, the process of making a planet Earthlike, has been the subject of theoretical debate on the ethical implications of radically changing an entire world so that it may be used by humans. While the technology to do such a thing is currently at least extremely impractical and prohibitively expensive, it does say things about how we treat Earth itself.

So, for the purposes of this thread, assume that humanity has advanced to a point where we have both FTL travel of some kind and can profitably terraform virtually all terrestrial planets, including ones that already have inhabitants, sapient or otherwise. The terraforming process would obviously change the planet in question to the point where most/all native lifeforms could not survive, save those conserved by the terraformers to ensure that their species does not go extinct. To what level would this be ethical/moral?

I personally draw the line at planets with only microbial life. Such simple organisims would have a fairly good shot of evolving along with the terraforming process and thus surviving in the terraformed world. Killing 99% of an entire biosphere is...too much. Life that has progressed that far has earned its place in my book.

[Darvi]

Depends whether or not those species die out due to the terraforming. If they do, then I guess anything with less than multicellular life would be okay.

[Zrk2]

Don't you mean sentient, not sapient?

[FuzzyZergling]

Planets up to but not encluding sapient/sentient species.
I personally see little value in life itself, but that's just a personal opinion.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Don't you mean sentient, not sapient?

No. Sentient is "able to feel or perceive", which can apply to dogs. Sapient is, as the word structure suggests, human-level thought.

[Darvi]

Wait, personal opinion? Good thing I haven't voted yet then <_<

Don't you mean sentient, not sapient?

No. Sentient is "able to feel or perceive", which can apply to dogs. Sapient is, as the word structure suggests, human-level thought.

I dunno. Some people feel that dogs have a right to live too, ya know.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Wait, personal opinion? Good thing I haven't voted yet then <_<

Don't you mean sentient, not sapient?

No. Sentient is "able to feel or perceive", which can apply to dogs. Sapient is, as the word structure suggests, human-level thought.

I dunno. Some people feel that dogs have a right to live too, ya know.

I didn't say that dogs didn't have the right to live, but there is a distinction on that point, and thus a distinction in the poll. (Biosphere with/without sapient life.)

[bulborbish]

Well, Terraforming as a whole (all changes from physical constructions to alterations in a planets biosphere and atmosphere) is a thin line to follow. Generally, I approve of terraforming the sense of physical changes up to the point of sentient life, while more major terrorforming (changes in atmoshperic composition, humidity, and biosphere) to only microbial life.

Microbial life takes hundreds of thousands of years to make any significant development, and if it is possible to extend the overall lifespan of humanity by such an action I would approve. But if we destroy a pre-existing and ancient ecosystem for the same reasons, I'm abhored by the concept and would only encourage minor developments to change the enviorment.

[Svarte Troner]

You'd definitely want to avoid a planet with sentient/sapient life. You never know who's watching.

[Bouchart]

Anywhere other than earth.  Don't want to screw up too badly here considering we're all stuck here for the time being.

[Fayrik]

I voted for other.
So here's what I would like to have voted for.

Dead Planets + (Most of) our own solar system.
The only planet I wouldn't want to terraform in our system is Titan. (...Yeah, it's a moon. But I'm going to call it a planet for time's sake. ¬_¬)

The reason however, I'd personally not touch any planet that even has the potential for life to evolve is twofold.
Firstly, it's valuable scientific data. Heck, I'd probably even take this point so far as to try and kickstart the process on a planet like that. Different possible chemical compositions for life make interesting studies.
Secondly...

-- You never know who's watching.

This. There could be life in the next system along that you don't know about, who are watching what you're doing. They'd be more than a little bit pissed off if you waltzed in and destroyed their microbe farm.

[Criptfeind]

I voted for Dead Planets, planets that have the potential to support life, and planets that have microbial life/proto-life.

Although I would not have a issue with minor die off from the next level, so long as something lives.

Also, out of trillions of worlds, eventually we would find two worlds that's ecosystems can coexist in one way, and I would not hugely be against moving one ecosystem off a planet to the other. Or big old zoos would be fine with me as well so long as they keep a viable breeding population with enough extra for a "just in case."

Edit: I am also unsure of the benefits of letting or even making new forums of life, or at least I am unsure of what benefit you get from not just doing that in a lab.

[Leafsnail]

Well, at the moment, every new planet we visit would be radically new and different from anything we've known before.  I'd say that terraforming it prematurely would be losing a brilliant chance for research (it'd be like uncovering an ancient tomb and thinking "Great!  We can build an awesome carpark here!").  I suppose though that, after we've studied the planet in detail and determined there isn't anything there which we might destroy through terraforming, we could begin doing so on some of them.

Incidentally, if we do find a planet with (nonsapient) life on... we absolutely shouldn't release foreign animals there.  It could be that we destroy all kinds of amazing potential innovations, medicines and foods from these animals just because we accidentally released a bunch of rabbits.

[Neonivek]

it'd be like uncovering an ancient tomb and thinking "Great!  We can build an awesome carpark here!

But we do that... already.

[Criptfeind]

How different can planets be? It is not like the laws of physics are just going to change just cause you moved a couple hundred light years away from home.

I mean, I have heard people say that sorta thing several times now, but I am still confused how different they could be.

Also... Although I agree to a certain point that we should not put in invasive critters, I challenge your point that the natives would have anything valuable for us.

Nature is already starting to run out of chemical wonders for us, and we have started making them for ourselves. Since this is going to be at least several hundred years in the future, I really do not think some alien bug with completely different life processes from us will be able to fix super cancer any better then a lab that is trying to do so.