I think you're looking at it from the wrong perspective.
If Bioware is concerned more about the impression merging servers gives people *not* playing the game at the cost of punishing players who are playing ... good luck!
Yes, the dreaded "server merge" is usually the first public sign a game is dying but SWTOR is a bit of a special case. They launched with way more servers than necessary hoping to avoid frustrating players at launch. Good for them. But clearly they could have a contingency plan in place in case, gasp, the number of players actually decreases?
Lastly, I don't care what the solution is: Try to fill up servers (however that will work), server transfers, merging, whatever.
I logged in at 4pm ET today and there were 3 people in the Republic Fleet. WZ queues are long and usually end early due to lack of players. There is no market to sell or buy things (many categories are empty). There is no community. Barely anyone looking for groups. It's DEAD. So whatever the solution, I don't really care, just do SOMETHING!