It may soon be possible to create "mirror life"

amai

See also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirror-image_life

nemomarx

what exactly would we usefully get from doing it?

boesboes

Or maybe we could focus on something not world ending for once?

mrlonglong

This has the potential to destroy all life.

unddoch

I really doubt a "mirror life" bacteria would be "hidden" from the immune system. Antibodies should have enough search space to be able to detect and neutralise such bacteria?

scotty79

It's nowhere close to being possible. To do anything related to life you need to have a lot of complex molecules. When you do things with normal life you can have genetically modified organisms that will produce whatever substance you need in whatever amount you need. To get mirror substances you need to create them chemically which is PITA even if possible. I highly recommend watching an interview with a person that achieved best results so far with creating artificial normal (for some definitions of normal) almost life from the grounds up. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D4WywVQfIV4 There is a section of whether this kind of work enables creation mirror life as well.

vinni2

Dupe? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49914403

sir_eliah

There's a series of books from Petter Watts that give plenty of good reasons why this might not be the best idea: - "Starfish" - "Maelstrom" - "βehemoth"

vouaobrasil

This sort of thing highlights the most dangerous thing about a high-tech society: people will do ANYTHING to cure a disease they or their loved ones have, even if it means an existential risk that we often have the ability of instantiating. Obviously not worth it, but to the person who themselves face an existential risk, the level of absurd justification from the instinct to survive will always trump sanity.

tomaskafka

Finally, we built a mirror bacteria from the famous "Don't create a mirror bacteria" paper.

otikik

"Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could, they didn’t stop to think if they should"

vulture916

The article about (another) the end of the world is behind a paywall, the tweet about it is behind a login screen - guess I'll find out when it happens! In my world, that'd be illegal.

MadrasTh0rn

So what bsl is mirror life supposed to be locked up in?

veexx103

Laboratory leaks have occurred more than once.

ForHackernews

Hey, finally a world-ending catastrophe that's actually plausible to worry about!

Noaidi

Dear AI, How do we solve the housing crisis?

deaton

Can we please stop trying to kill everyone for like 5 seconds? Mirror life would probably be the fastest, most uncontrollable, path to the extinction of every complex organism on earth, ourselves included. If there is a worse idea than building Roko's Basilisk, it is building mirror life.

acaloiar

Gift link: https://www.economist.com/science-and-technology/2026/09/30/...

mikewarot

How do we actually know that nature hasn't already done this? There don't seem to be any sustained searches for existing "mirror life" to found in the wild.