Morphological control can also use other mechanisms that are not bioelectric, so somewhere there could be organisms that don't use water all. Evolution on Earth loves bioelectric hardware because it's super convenient at enabling dynamics we recognize as problem-solving at the earliest steps. If you're going to exploit bioelectricity, I think water is important (but no doubt some future advance in materials science, gels, etc. will show a counterexample).

Yes, nothing is inevitable, if people make specific decisions. What do you think is the probability that all people will decide to ignore the ability to go beyond what the vagaries of cosmic rays (mutation, evolution) have left us with? What is the probability that, if you come back to this planet 100 years from now, and look at a mature human species, you will see the same, unaltered hominid architecture, with its susceptibility to cancer, lower back pain, degenerative disease, and an aging process that caps the amount of wisdom and compassion we can develop to a mere 8 decades? Whatever I may want or not want is irrelevant. I am saying that the probability of any of that is basically 0. And if you don't like post-humanism, which humans? Should we have stopped at Homo habilis? Post-humanism was obvious when the first replicator had an offspring that wasn't identical to it, because there are no "humans" per se, and the lesson of the paradox of change cannot be ignored.

Btw, if anyone is interested in the background to all of this, here is where my stuff lives: - official lab website with all the preprints, papers, software, resources, talks, interviews, etc. Browse around - there are a lot of deep pages. - our Center youtube channel, with not only my talks but also amazing people I've invited to give presentations and participate in discussions. No fancy editing or optimization for views, just ideas (I appreciate the offers to replace my 1999 webcam; sorry - it's got all the pixels I plan to show). - shorter, less rigorous things - haven't figured out exactly what will go here but I've got some AI-relevant things planned. - more personal, public-level musings, 1 click beyond "what we can say strongly" (which is what my lab website sticks with). Sign up there to be notified of new content, book updates, etc. Also nature photos.

Here it is - the official, revised, peer-reviewed version of my Platonic Space paper. Of all the many unpopular positions I’ve taken over the decades - bitter controversies around the origin of left-right asymmetry in embryogenesis, bioelectricity and genetics, diverse intelligence, etc., this one has by far generated the most pushback: serious (grateful for those!) and energetic attempts to move me to other views, pleas to just drop it and not talk about it (for several different reasons), nasty emails and accusations, impacts on reviews of papers that have nothing to do with this, etc. Kind of amazing to me how incendiary this is. What can I say... Our job is to call it as we see it, and right now for me, this is it. Apologies to collaborators and colleagues for any shrapnel! Time will tell if this pans out or not; I've placed my bets. And btw, if you think this stuff is weird and uncomfortable, just wait… There’s much more on the way. The knob turns slowly but as long as the data keep coming, I'm going to say what I think it all means and follow it to the next steps it enables. Buckle up!