Is There a Responsibility to Create Conscious Beings That Can Suffer?

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To me, the thing I would be worried about is we create life. It's like when you have children, you put creatures into this world that will suffer,. And so now you carry this responsibility for doing your best to alleviate any suffering that might go through. Perhaps bacteria are not capable of suffering, but perhaps it'll create more complex life forms that would be able to suffer. Of course, other people would be concerned. The more obvious concern is like, well, you just created a life form. How do you notice that could be a super deadly virus?

Betül Kaçar is an astrobiologist at University of Wisconsin. Please support this podcast by checking out our sponsors:
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OUTLINE:
Here’s the timestamps for the episode. On some podcast players you should be able to click the timestamp to jump to that time.
(00:00) – Introduction
(08:20) – History of life on Earth
(16:25) – Origin of life
(39:11) – Genetic language of life
(52:08) – Life and energy
(1:02:50) – Ancient DNA
(1:21:48) – Evolution
(1:33:19) – Alien life
(2:01:19) – Panspermia
(2:07:41) – Restarting life on Earth
(2:20:23) – Where ideas come from
(2:27:54) – Science and language
(2:36:31) – Love
(2:37:55) – Advice to young people
(2:42:29) – Meaning of life