On 23 Jan 2019 at 19:05, Richard Aiken wrote:

> On Fri, Jan 18, 2019 at 11:39 AM shadow at shadowgard.com (via tml
> list) <xxxxxx@simplelists.com> wrote:
>
>     This comic might be appropriate:
>     http://humoncomics.com/mother-gaia
>
> I like that. Especially the human's expression in the final panel . .

Short of buildiong a "planet buster", I don't think humanity is
*capable* of affecting the deep rock bacteria ecosystem. We'd have
trouble doing much to the deep thermal vents ecosystems in the oceans
too.

Even our worst pollution/climate change/extinction scanarios don't
hold a candle to what the discovery of photosynthesis did to life on
earth.

> I remember something about a truly alien biology being not only
> stranger than we imagine, but stranger than we *can* imagine.

That was J.B.S Haldane talking about the universe.

> If we keep heading in the current direction, we're going to find out
> exactly what an alien ecology is like, as we'll have created it.   --

Try to find Hal Clement's "The Nitrogen Fix". Bioengineering gone
wrong.
--
Leonard Erickson (aka shadow)
shadow at shadowgard dot com