Longevity is more likely for entities that replicate themselves because multiple copies are less vulnerable to a single-point catastrophe. However, the number of copies is irrelevant if the environment cannot support any of them. For example, in a billion years, the brightening of the Sun will extinguish all life forms on the surface of Earth.

The future survival of terrestrial life for billions of years requires an artificial space platform that can adjust its distance from the Sun. It would be even better to travel to the vicinity of low-mass stars, like our nearest neighbor – Proxima Centauri, which have a lifetime of trillions of years.

Combining both issues suggests self-replicating machines on multiple sites in the Universe as the ultimate recipe for long-term survival.

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