Its arrogant to think we're the only race out there. But, with that being said, if another race knows of our existence and is friendly, they would have already chosen to ignore us. Any race that is capable of spanning the massiveness of space can also survey a planet like ours from far enough away to not be conspicuous. What they'd see is a barbaric infant race that cant even get along with themselves, therefore no reason to go meddling in their affairs.
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Human-alien relationships
- Thread starter SquiddyCracker
- Start date
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It is a bit amazing for me to see so many fear-based ideals about aliens.
At a certain point, advancing a civilization has to come with something that betters the human, to be better than this hoarding, "let others crush if I advance a tiny bit", abuse-driven mentality.
The collection of these primitive urges result in looking at a place like the Mars and imagining "OMG, I TOTALLY NEED TO EXPLOIT THOSE RESOURCES FOR MONEY".
Wtf is money when you can travel around the galaxy?
At a certain point, advancing a civilization has to come with something that betters the human, to be better than this hoarding, "let others crush if I advance a tiny bit", abuse-driven mentality.
The collection of these primitive urges result in looking at a place like the Mars and imagining "OMG, I TOTALLY NEED TO EXPLOIT THOSE RESOURCES FOR MONEY".
Wtf is money when you can travel around the galaxy?
SquiddyCracker
Banned
Complex behaviour isn't unique to intelligent animals here on earth.
Ants have no self-awareness, but can accomplish some pretty complex stuff.
I could imagine similar stuff that result in space travel.
Or maybe they are space whales, who knows.
This is a wild speculation thread, anything that doesn't break the laws of physics is possible!
Nothing, we just have some resources.
Say they're just taking apart every solar system they find, using them all up for resources regardless of how inefficient it is because they intend on using up the entire galaxy eventually. We might just happen be next in line, and instead of taking a detour around us and open up the possibility of us resisting later on or stopping their resource mongering, they might just chose to destroy us.
Or they might mine X material from the Sun without any care for the earthlings on planet earth. We'd just happen to get destroyed because our Sun was next in line.
The point is, they are alien.
We have no idea under what circumstances they evolved and what the end-product might think.
These are all possibilities, and it's prudent to not dismiss any one of them.
Even if we're going to use ourselves as a basis for alien behavior, nothing suggested reason-wise is out of order for an extrapolation of human intelligence.
I think the same way but maybe they see us as a primitive race and start harvesting and researching us as they will be surely highly interested in a new form of life; Who knows what kind of lifeform they could be?
Neuromancer
Member
That wasn't an alien thoughThought this thread was going to be about her/him/it
Good thing it's not
Habitable planets are only important to primitive species. Why even bother terraforming a world? Not far beyond that level of sophistication is the ability to completely tailor physiology to a given environment.
Mars is blue again. Neat.
I'm going to to turn myself into a winged whale and swim through Saturn's atmosphere.
Mars is blue again. Neat.
I'm going to to turn myself into a winged whale and swim through Saturn's atmosphere.
It's not fear based, not at all.
You're transferring your beliefs and opinions onto something that is entirely unknown. If aliens exist, their thought processes may be as different from yours as yours are from a tree sloth.
In short, if there are aliens, they operate as they do, not as you think they might do.
Lovely Salsa
Banned
Yeah....is it worth it? A species living 100 lightyears from us? Imagine the cost
I agree. Sometimes you gotta roll dem galactic dice
Deified Data
Banned
Earth doesn't have any resources that most other planets/asteroids don't already have in abundance, so I doubt we'd ever be "invaded" in the 50's drive-in flick sense. Unless said aliens are looking specifically for "intelligent" life, for slavery or...perhaps they're "humanitarians".
I have a good feeling that aliens exist. Like a 99.9% probability. Larger, surely. I'm just not entirely sure we've encountered any yet. I doubt we've encountered any who are inherently hostile or friendly, per se...if they're here, they're studying us, the same as we'd study a habitat of lesser animals.
Whoever they are, they've either mastered the art of FTL travel between star systems or their colony ships have been speeding towards us for hundreds of thousands of years, countless generations of them being born and dying on the way from point A to point B. Or perhaps they're immortal, or in stasis, and don't care for such things.
For what it's worth, I don't think first contact on a massive scale could just happen "tomorrow". There'd be signs. Those who look for them would likely see them coming years in advance, unless they're utterly god-like in comparison with our technology and could simply teleport from their origin to ours in seconds.
It's an interesting thought. I, for one, would love to live during a time of first contact, whether it was peaceful or hostile. It'd be very interesting.
I have a good feeling that aliens exist. Like a 99.9% probability. Larger, surely. I'm just not entirely sure we've encountered any yet. I doubt we've encountered any who are inherently hostile or friendly, per se...if they're here, they're studying us, the same as we'd study a habitat of lesser animals.
Whoever they are, they've either mastered the art of FTL travel between star systems or their colony ships have been speeding towards us for hundreds of thousands of years, countless generations of them being born and dying on the way from point A to point B. Or perhaps they're immortal, or in stasis, and don't care for such things.
For what it's worth, I don't think first contact on a massive scale could just happen "tomorrow". There'd be signs. Those who look for them would likely see them coming years in advance, unless they're utterly god-like in comparison with our technology and could simply teleport from their origin to ours in seconds.
It's an interesting thought. I, for one, would love to live during a time of first contact, whether it was peaceful or hostile. It'd be very interesting.
Water.
If a society can't learn to be peaceful, they destroy themselves. The cold war is an example of where we had to learn to get along or risk destroying a huge chunk of our society. As resources become more and more scarce we'll have to adapt not only technologically but socially, or else we'll kill ourselves fighting over something like fresh water.
Rentahamster
Rodent Whores
Sure, but what you are suggesting is highly improbable. Either ambiogenesis has to occur within space or on an asteroid or something, or an existing life form has to be ejected from its terrestrial habitat and then just so happen to be strong enough to be able to live and reproduce in space.
In the unlikely even that happens, what possible evolutionary forces are impacting that life form to compel it to evolve into something more complex than a bacterium? And how is a biological life form supposed to evolve light speed travel? Very improbable.
If it's all just random acts, then we're still pretty safe. The galaxy is frickin' huuuuge. The chance that we'd just happen to be "next in line" is very very small. For us to be anywhere on the radar, the aliens would have to be targeting us for some specific reason.
Could they not drain Europa dry?
Deified Data
Banned
I'm inclined to believe this is the case.
Though their pacifism may only be limited to one another. They may have no qualms whatsoever with wiping out a relatively degenerate race such as ours.
But fear-based speculation is pointless. Fun, but pointless. Best not to make assumptians.
Keru_Shiri
Member
While anything is possible, a lot of the conventional reasons for war (resources, territory, safety) seem illogical given the technological capabilities needed to cross the massive distances of space.
Rentahamster
Rodent Whores
Water is all over the place, not just on Earth.
Maybe the earth has a relatively rare recipe for supporting life and they are interested in expanding their territory, fleeing their dying star, or dealing with overpopulation? Maybe their starships can't run forever and this is a good spot to set up shop or for layover flights? Maybe they view us as so primitive that killing us all would be as significant to them as us cleaning the cobwebs out of an attic we want to renovate?
All our history of encountering less technologically developed civilizations has not worked out very well for them.
All our history of encountering less technologically developed civilizations has not worked out very well for them.
One of the theories about why we don't see signs of intelligent life everywhere is that there are aliens out there that actively destroy intelligent life as soon as they start to make too much noise.
I suppose the more popular theory is that making radio noise is simply an inefficiency that goes away with time.
I suppose the more popular theory is that making radio noise is simply an inefficiency that goes away with time.
SquiddyCracker
Banned
Abiogenesis occurring in space or on an asteroid (or a cluster of theM) is a good guess.
As for space travel, it requires some form of complexity and access to materials (the very first space ships we built were for all intents and purposes, stupid boxes with a ton of fuel) and just as ants unconsciously create a relatively complex ant hill with farms, different compartments, sturdy tunnels, all which leads to the colony surviving so much better; an unintelligent space being might gain a reproductive advantage if it can mine an asteroid for material, grow to the biggest mass possible, set off a chemical process that leads to a launch explosion and send out minute spores in asteroid shells in every direction. If the species can hibernate, it might wake up on earth or another planet and repeat the process.
Completely wild hypothesis, as I have no idea about the mechanics of space-organism travel without intelligence, but it's a possibility no matter how far-fetched.
The galaxy is massive, but there are a ton of planets in it, maybe it's filled and teeming with life and the only reason we haven't noticed any is because we've been lucky. The chance might be small that they stumble upon us, which is why I think the destruction-hypothesis is more likely to happen as we do broadcast our existence into every direction.
This.
TheContact
Member
water is abundant throughout the universe, liquid water is the rare, but a fair amount of moons/planets have ice (europa has oceans under ice).
for resources, what is considered common on earth could be extremely rare in other parts of the galaxy. any race that can reach us will only do so by wormholes (if that's possible) and could be in and out quickly. the real problem would be locating us.
for resources, what is considered common on earth could be extremely rare in other parts of the galaxy. any race that can reach us will only do so by wormholes (if that's possible) and could be in and out quickly. the real problem would be locating us.
Unobtainium.
SquiddyCracker
Banned
Everyone loves aliens.
If they do want to kill you, they might just do it by pushing an asteroid our way (or towards our sun, set off some massive solar flare).
Nothing we could do about it if it's big enough - we're sitting ducks.
That's why space programs such as Nasa needs more funding, so that we will eventually be spread out enough for an attack on us not end in our extinction.
What if they're already here, and they know we're straight up marks, ripe for the picking?
(Yes I thought this would be more Captain Kirk than Stephen Hawking too. )
The stakes are too high. We could develop well enough on our own, before we start looking for friends. Hoping for ET to show up with dilithium, energon cubes, and a pizza is so fucking depressing and unrealistic that I have to rethink the whole SETI thing. Calling them HERE, with no way to get rid of them, when they might be fucking crazy, fucking aggro, and fucking hungry, just seems like we're asking for trouble. We're desperate for aliens to help us into the next stage of development, but how logical is the assumption that this is what they would do?
(Yes I thought this would be more Captain Kirk than Stephen Hawking too. )
The stakes are too high. We could develop well enough on our own, before we start looking for friends. Hoping for ET to show up with dilithium, energon cubes, and a pizza is so fucking depressing and unrealistic that I have to rethink the whole SETI thing. Calling them HERE, with no way to get rid of them, when they might be fucking crazy, fucking aggro, and fucking hungry, just seems like we're asking for trouble. We're desperate for aliens to help us into the next stage of development, but how logical is the assumption that this is what they would do?
Mammoth Jones
Member
If that were true wouldn't humanity be less violent than the creatures around us?
I don't know about you but lions don't go fucking shit up just for a giggle.
Mammoth Jones
Member
Seraphinianus
Banned
teruterubozu
Member
It's the "alien messiah" desire. People want a superior entity to make contact and bring us into a new epoch of awareness and understanding, to lift us out of our marginal & miserable lives.
It's a kind of comic book Christianity.
Orrrr they'll learn to cooperate with each other, so then they'll just have to nuke other races and level other planets with ease.
Especially if they don't have to compete against each other for resources, but an alien race is an insult to their God, who created the universe for them alone. Not to mention a threat to their existence.
SquiddyCracker
Banned
They could develop warlikeness after going into space, or only show warlikeness towards aliens (us).
There's also this interesting argument:
Couple this with weaponry that cannot be traced (speed up a missile or asteroid aimed at the race's planet(s) from a point in space nowhere near your home-planet) and you no longer have the incentive to play nice or be labeled a war mongerer by the other species in the galaxy.
Deified Data
Banned
As has been stated, it would be naive to believe they'd extend the same olive branch to other species as they would their own. Humans illustrate this point perfectly. We're generally discouraged from harming our fellow man, but anything we perceive as being "beneath" us is fair game, be they animals or human beings perceived as animals.
When you look at UFO lore, there are multiple species that exist (not saying that is in any way true). That would be our best bet I think, as its a lot easier to do some sketchy stuff when you think nobody else is going to find out. If multiple species found out about us I would think that a "hands off" agreement would be the first order of business.
As far as a single species being hostile to us, the only motive I can see is if they wanted to live here themselves. I imagine it is way easier to steal a planet than it is to teraform a new one, assuming our atmosphere and temperature is even appealing to them. It is also speculating on how rare an Earth-like planet is.
As far as a single species being hostile to us, the only motive I can see is if they wanted to live here themselves. I imagine it is way easier to steal a planet than it is to teraform a new one, assuming our atmosphere and temperature is even appealing to them. It is also speculating on how rare an Earth-like planet is.
SquiddyCracker
Banned
Yeah, using humans as part of any alien argument doesn't really exclude any of the possibilities raised in this thread.
We are still pretty warlike, and are almost space-faring.
Destroy them before they have the opportunity of destroying us is a pretty good reason, purely on a survival basis.
If you are space-faring the odds of you not having the ability to mine your own star are very small. Who needs the insignificant pale blue dot? Not only that, there are other places in our very solar system to mine other minerals if they are stranded close by. That one does not hold water. However, I can't think of a rebuttal right now against them enslaving us.
Because they couldn't digest us. We could well be toxic to them. Although they look different, the biology of cow or chicken really isn't that different from us. Our cell structure and chemical make up are for the most part identical. An alien species, evolving on an alien planet, would have totally different biology and nutritional requirements. Something benign in our make up could well be deadly to them.
I think we're fine. Aliens could well destroy us for some reason or other, but they're almost more likely just to leave us alone altogether. There's nothing we have that they couldn't get easier elsewhere.
I thin Neil Degrasse Tyson put it best.
Look at the difference between a chimp and a human. Chimp DNA is 99% the same as ours. That 1% difference is what stands between throwing your poop at the wall and composing symphonies.
So what if we encounter a race that's 2% or 3% beyond ours? Look at how we view and treat chimps, how would something beyond us view us?
Look at the difference between a chimp and a human. Chimp DNA is 99% the same as ours. That 1% difference is what stands between throwing your poop at the wall and composing symphonies.
So what if we encounter a race that's 2% or 3% beyond ours? Look at how we view and treat chimps, how would something beyond us view us?
DarkHeartedKill
Member
Why do I have a bad feeling of Frezia coming and taking over our planet?
Nature is far more violent and brutal than you give it credit for, we just invented tools to amplify our abilities.
The only reason lions don't regularly go around killing stuff for no reason is because the other organisms in it's environment evolved alongside it and developed defenses against lions that make it risky and not worth the effort to engage in indiscriminate killing. Getting gored by a stray horn is not worth it for a little fun. You take a cat and put it in an environment where animals have not evolved a defense, you get millions of dead songbirds and small rodents every year.
Almost every animal will fight and kill over food or mating rights, they will commit infanticide so a female will be receptive to breeding. Chimps have been known to wage genocidal wars against other groups of chimps.
Not saying humans are superior to animals, but the inverse is clearly not the case.
Our own technology is reaching the point where we will probably be able to replace human laborers with machinery. It's hard to imagine that a more advanced spacefaring civilization would have a need for slaves.
I thought this thread would be about illegals.
The chance of there being an intelligent and technologically-advanced alien species within the radius of our broadcasts is incredibly low.
If there is such a specie, it's not sure they'll be searching for us in any meaningful way.
If they are searching, it's not sure that they'll find us - as much as you think we are SCREAMING into the void of space, there's a lot of radio sources in the Universe and finding one and correctly identifying it as a signature of intelligent life is very hard and requires luck.
If they find us, it's not sure that they care.
If they care, it's not sure that they can do anything about it - Modern physics doesn't allow faster than light travel and, science fiction hopes aside, it maybe completely impossible. In that case, the only way aliens can travel effectively through interstellar space is at relativistic speeds (a significant percentage of the speed of light). It will take them years to complete the journey and even accelerating spaceships to relativistic speeds requires technology that doesn't exist yet and may never exist.
If they can do something about it using undiscovered magical alien tech, it's not sure they'll want to destroy us rather than interact with us peacefully.
If they want to destroy us it's not sure they'll succeed. We have nukes and we have the advantage of actually living on this planet - sure this is a pretty dismal scenario for humanity but I wouldn't say we stand no chance.
The bottom line is that you don't need to worry. The chances of humanity ever encountering another intelligent specie are incredibly slim - especially during our life time.
If there is such a specie, it's not sure they'll be searching for us in any meaningful way.
If they are searching, it's not sure that they'll find us - as much as you think we are SCREAMING into the void of space, there's a lot of radio sources in the Universe and finding one and correctly identifying it as a signature of intelligent life is very hard and requires luck.
If they find us, it's not sure that they care.
If they care, it's not sure that they can do anything about it - Modern physics doesn't allow faster than light travel and, science fiction hopes aside, it maybe completely impossible. In that case, the only way aliens can travel effectively through interstellar space is at relativistic speeds (a significant percentage of the speed of light). It will take them years to complete the journey and even accelerating spaceships to relativistic speeds requires technology that doesn't exist yet and may never exist.
If they can do something about it using undiscovered magical alien tech, it's not sure they'll want to destroy us rather than interact with us peacefully.
If they want to destroy us it's not sure they'll succeed. We have nukes and we have the advantage of actually living on this planet - sure this is a pretty dismal scenario for humanity but I wouldn't say we stand no chance.
The bottom line is that you don't need to worry. The chances of humanity ever encountering another intelligent specie are incredibly slim - especially during our life time.
Gemüsepizza
Member
Humanity kills 50.000.000.000 animals and 2.000.000 humans every year. Aliens would consider us a threat and act accordingly.
Spiffy_1st
Member
But wouldn't a super intelligent race understand that all life is important? Obviously we don't because humans suck, but the aliens would be better than us.
dinazimmerman
Incurious Bastard
I fear intelligent machines created by aliens more than the aliens themselves, e.g. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berserker_(Saberhagen)
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