If Ubuntu died, we'd still have the other Debians. For myself, I stopped installing Ubuntu a long time ago and just install Debian. But Redhat is responsible for a helluva lot of core technologies in Linux, and while I find some of their conduct a little irritating, Redhat getting out of the Linux game would have serious implications.

Ubuntu is eminently expendable. I tossed it out of my organization three or four years ago and have not missed it for a second.

Or just nuke the ice caps on Mars. Thicken it up a bit and let it warm up on its own thereafter.

Ya, I'm sure the world wouldn't want us launching warheads in space. They might not trust that they'll all reach Mars.

Chimps plan, use tools and modify their environment.

The idea behind this is that chimps are extremely close relatives of ours, with many of the differences being of degree and not a lack of capacity. P. troglodytes, in particular, are tool users with at least some linguistic ability (far less than humans admittedly), form societies of fairly surprising complexity and size, and show at least some degree of sentience in general. I know this is a shades of gray kind of argument, but being that these are sentient creatures, at some point you have to ask yourself ethical questions about how you treat them.

Yes, Bonobos are sort of the idealized noble hominoid. Chimps and humans, sadly, are the nastiest of the lot.

And in the case of George W. Bush, aspire to the highest office in the world.

Even back then they had submarines with room for nuclear missiles in them. You could certainly remove the armaments from an "ordinary" attack sub and fill the space with an array. It would be nontrivial and expensive, but they're spending our money.

Regarding submarines; all I know is that living quarters and internal mobility is extremely limited. But my knowledge dates back to what I knew from the 80s and 90s. Perhaps technology and miniaturization allowed them to reclaim that space. I honestly don't know.

They may actually be doing that. If I recall correctly the letters said they had been repeatedly trying to contact these customers to arrange the return and the customers had been avoiding the company. I just used the reply paid envelope as the easiest internationally understood analogy for the company being willing to pay. My apologies if that left you confused.

Note that a corporation cannot have a "state of mind".

Through its officers and directors it can.

yup

ok, so they free all the smart animals. what next?
send them back to the wild to fight for food and die fast?

Paging Mr. Randi, Mr. James Randi you have a phone call on the wooscam line.

I think one of the big issues here is that the person receiving the equipment isn't in breach of contract. They aren't the one failing to fulfill a contract, it's the seller that is in that state.

I take it you never had a job that requires you to be available and physically present, but not actively working.

I once spent a week doing nothing because we were installing a monitoring station in the middle of nowhere (literally in the middle of a desert). We needed someone onsite in case something went wrong during testing and getting to and from the site required a helicopter ride. That would get kind of pricy if every 4 hours you had to make 2x 40 minute helicopter flights. Needless to say, I was very thankful for satellite internet access.