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Mirror Life Worries

45 points| etiam | 5 months ago |science.org

20 comments

Please future humans, do not build mirror life.

Thanks.

From the point of view of a newly created colony of opposite-handed bacteria, it would be facing an entire planet of really well established mirror life.

clownpenis_fart|5 months ago

[deleted]

stiiv|5 months ago

For a great sci-fi treatment of the dangers of mirror life, see Fantastic Four 5-6 (2023) by Ryan North. Yes, that Ryan North, and no, it's not your "typical" comic book.

pavel_lishin|5 months ago

I've heard that his Hulk run is also excellent.

Anyway, Peter Watts' Rifters series is another excellent take on the genre, although it's not mirror life per se. (And it's ... not a happy read.)

hermitcrab|5 months ago

Question to any biologists. Do we need to worry about mirror viruses or just mirror bacteria?

Thorondor|5 months ago

A mirror virus would not be able to infect normal cells. Viruses depend on (chiral) host cell machinery such as ribosomes to reproduce.

ajuc|5 months ago

Hopefully mirror antibiotics are earlier in the tech tree than mirror life.