Thread by @PnictogenHorses

I was talking about the phenomenon of co-evolution recently—this is a feature of biological #evolution of an entire *ecosystem*. separate populations of different organism are capable of evolving _together_, each influencing the evolutionary development of the other.

(cont'd)

racists and Christian fanatics don't like being reminded that evolution is a *group* effort; dullards like @EPoe187 and @SwipeWright and the @SimoneHCollins people want to think that evolution yielded a *winner*, i.e. humanity, and that they're the winners of humanity.

(cont'd)

but humanity is not alone on Earth, and countless species have co-evolved with humans. some of them have been *domesticated*, i.e. humanity took an active role in shaping the evolution of numerous beasts (often to ill effect, because humans prioritize superficialities.)

(cont'd)

other primates, other mammals, corvids and other birds, even insects and plants have shaped themselves to the ubiquitous (and uniquely destructive) presence of humanity on Earth. many of these creatures have become at least *familiar* with human technology.

(cont'd)

if some finger-snap deleted humanity from Earth *tonight*, I am confident that another species would soon be occupying the human niche. they'd have so much to work from, lying all around them—what one species can build, another can learn how to master themselves.

(cont'd)

and thus at least one of the ignorant fears that one encounters from the #STEM-lord set—especially from racist computer geeks like @sama and @RokoMijic and of course @elonmusk—is, I think, groundless. it would not be a great tragedy if humanity vanished from the Earth.

(cont'd)

there's too many other species poised to step in, and grow into the void that humanity would leave behind if it perished—assuming, of course, that humanity didn't try to scorch the Earth before perishing, which is probably what the @elonmusk / @GOP crowd would do.

(cont'd)

that's the *real* danger. @sama or @elonmusk or @lesswrong or other such persons may pretend that "woke mind virus" or killer #AGI threatens to do us all in, but the REAL issue is Christian @GOP fanatics in politics—because these people believe in End Times violence.

(cont'd)

you can bet that @Jim_Jordan and @GenFlynn, and all of @mtaibbi's other Republican friends, really wouldn't *mind* seeing the Earth end in a nuclear annihilation; they'd say it was God's doing, and they would welcome the holocaust.

~Mona Drafter of Pnictogen