A realistic view of what would happen if extraterrestrial life visted our planet

[A Satanic Panda]

If an alien race could reach us, they could destroy us, it would literally take less than a day, we wouldn't stand a chance, but this is only if they decide to kill us, which I doubt they would. If they really have to technology to reach us, from wherever they are from, chances are they will have forms of alternate energy, and won't need our resources, which we really don't have to much of anyway. I believe only good things would come from contact.

Except we have an abundance of water and minerals and a habitable planet. If they can jump from system to system they can probably transform an atmosphere to their liking.

Funny scenario I just came up with:

The white house gets a message from a UFO, casually presenting a charter from some galactic government that gives them permission to mine on mars, and request we not interfere. Then everyone loses their shit and freaks out.

"Look where those humans placed Earth, it's right next to all our star bases. They're just asking for war."

 

[ElPatron]

A lot of people say that if they are so advanced that they traveled all the way here then they must be a peaceful race and all they want to do is further extended their knowledge along with ours about the universe.

Technology advancement comes from warfare, not peace.

If aliens were able to get here, I figure they might have wiped entire civilizations by that point.

 

[renegade7]

In my opinion they may not want to spare the effort of removing (or at least neutralizing) an entire sentient civilization while leaving the bulk of the planet's resources intact, if they even wanted our resources. There are plenty of other planets out their, not to mention their own.

Disease. Diseases would likely ravage both populations when foreign microbes are introduced. This has happened in the past with humans, although European invaders weren't affected quite as much since they knew a little more about the nature of communicable infection. Disease will either ravage both populations, or limit virtually all direct contact for a very long time.

Slavery-this notion is nonsense. Justifying the enslavement of their own people makes far more sense than traveling hundreds of light years.

Combat, if it comes to it. Humanity isn't quite as defenseless as some seem to think. Should it come to it, there is not a single limitation to us strapping a few fusion bombs on a rocket to let them know we're not interested. We may not have quite the same tech but we could still put up a fight. We may not win, but the potential for damage to themselves would be enough to give them reason to reconsider invasion, I think.

Contact will be very passing at first. Firstly, there is no common communication. Our languages here on Earth all trace back to a handful of root languages. There would be absolutely no way to communicate, except in extremely basic fashion. We may end up agreeing on a binary, numeric, or other logical communication system, since they will likely understand math the same way we do.

Except we have an abundance of water and minerals and a habitable planet. If they can jump from system to system they can probably transform an atmosphere to their liking.

Minerals could be mined far more easily from asteroids or other planets...they wouldn't have to dig nearly as much. And there is plenty of water frozen on other planets in the solar system. There are risks to them and effort they would need to expend to take our resources which don't make sense when Mars or the asteroid belt aren't much further away.

 

[beyondbrainmatter]

Impossible to say really, since alot of that contact depends on them, with them being the more advanced species and all... As for us humans, I expect alot of interstellar racism and xenophobia coming from our side...

 

[Laughing Man]

No idea the ramifications of alien attack would be larger in the more immediate area of Earth politics than the potential threat of the aliens attacking. Can you imagine the political, religious and xenophobic explosion that would come from countires all demanding access or communication with the Aliens (if it were possible.) The xenophobic backlash from the various 'organisations' that already have a hard enough time accepting members of their own species who just happen to be a different colour, creed, race or religion let alone an alien and the anti god vs god backlash.

The damage may not be intentional and may not come directly from the aliens but mankind is, as a group, vastly stupid enough to do enough damage by itself to itself as a result.

 

[razor343]

I guess it will be some kind of a ' 'MERICUHHH, FUCK YEAH ' scenario where America shows up no matter where (if) the aliens land and present themselves as ambassadors of humanity. From that point it will just keep derailing.

 

[Twilight_guy]

I think its very selfish to assume their society would be just like ours and as hopelessly violent. Considering that they are alines and thus Alien its inherently impossible for us to guess what they would be like.

 

[Rule Britannia]

I just watched the Falling Skies season 2 Finale...

They would attack us and kill all but a few of us to "cleanse" us because that seems to be what aliens like to do in movies, tv series and books.

 

[kortin]

I guess it will be some kind of a ' 'MERICUHHH, FUCK YEAH ' scenario where America shows up no matter where (if) the aliens land and present themselves as ambassadors of humanity. From that point it will just keep derailing.

Uggggggh.


OT: I'd imagine nothing good could come of extraterrestrial contact. We still are full of people who hate one another for SKIN COLOR. Until we can cut back on that, I do not wish to go anywhere close to contact with extraterrestrial beings.

 

[waj9876]

Hm...I honestly can't see an alien race invading unless that's exactly what they were out traveling the universe intending to do. And even then, they would only be doing it in some sick pleasure from watching planets die. As the only other logical reason for an invasion is for not us, but our planet. But there are so many other untapped resources for them to use in our very own solar system anyway.

So yeah, if we ever come into contact with an alien species, it will most likely either be on peaceful terms, or we're the war-mongering assholes.

 

[ReinWeisserRitter]

The argument makes the mistake of assuming everything in the universe is as hideously flawed as a human being. If anything, we'd be the ones that ruined things.

 

[DarthSka]

There's whole myriad of possibilities:
-Leave us alone once they realize what level we're at so we can progress naturally.
-Study us from a distance
-Destruction/War
-Help us progress with their knowledge
-Adopt us into the galactic community Mass Effect style
-Trade resources

That's just some I can think of. If they are all about war and whotnot, I'm kind of hoping for a Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers scenario where other aliens got here first without telling us and would equip a few humans with technology to combat the invaders if need be. I'm really hoping they choose me. Robotic Tyrannosaurus, here I come.

 

[Xanadu84]

People are selfish, and aliens would be too. Maybe they would be a little more collective, but that only goes so far. However, realistically, why would aliens invade and murder us, waste all that time and put themselves in some amount of risk. Do they need resources? What resources do they NEED on earth that they can't get elsewhere, and that it is more practical to transport huge, interstellar distances then just make with there vast technology? If they need space, they can terraform something more easily. They might do some studies on the biology, or obtain information, knowledge and culture (As well as satisfy idle curiosity), but it would be far more effective to just trade, never mind the fact that advanced and successful species would naturally feel at least sort of, kind of bad about exterminating sentient races. Sure, maybe they are afraid that humans will pose a risk in the future, but genocide would be resource intensive for a vauge payoff of preventing disaster at some point in the distant future. Very unlikely a race that advanced would violate such basic tenents of risk management.

If we find aliens, there hypothetically would be a toss up between being peaceful and going to war, but peaceful trade is more efficient and long term sustainable, plus involves fewer unpleasant atrocities, and less collateral damage. The real kicker of course is that the vast distances mean that we would probably only be trading intangibles, like knowledge and cultural creations. A battle between aliens and Humans would more likely resemble copyright infringement cases then Enders Game. People have intellectual property, but how exactly to exchange it would be a cause for serious debate.

 

[Drops a Sweet Katana]

A good amount of toss all for a while. Then everyone dies from everyone else's diseases and a generally bad time is had by most.

 

[Bara_no_Hime]

I was recently thinking that the most likely way we would encounter alien life was via radio waves.

While not certain, it certainly seems likely that any advanced society would eventually discover and make use of radio waves. Right now, our radio waves from radio and television are creating a giant beacon saying "look, here, there is life here" - so logically any alien culture using radio would do the same. Eventually, if their signal is strong enough and they're near enough, and if we could recognize and decode them, then we would be able to listen in on alien radio and watch alien TV - or whatever they use radio for.

Everyone always assumes that alien encounters would be with more advanced (where they come to us) or less advanced (where we have the space travel, and go to them) but what about similar technological levels where all we can do is listen to one another's transmissions from years (even centuries) ago?

... that'd make for a pretty boring movie, I guess. Interesting concept, though.

 

[Dr. Cakey]

The idea that more advanced civilizations would be more enlightened wasn't just made up by optimists. A sufficiently advanced civilization has the power to destroy itself (a power we have come very close to reaching) and, taking ourselves as an example, they could very well do so. The hypothesis goes that either a civilization is forced to 'wise up' due to its own power, or it will wipe itself out. Alternatively, the aggressive civilizations destroy themselves, and only the peaceful ones survive.

It's not exactly sound logic, but it deserves more credence than a lot of people seem willing to give it.

Peaceful or otherwise, I sincerely hope a race capable of traveling hundreds of light-years knows what to do when a nuclear bomb is lobbed their way, even if they do what we do: shoot it. Based on my limited understanding of xenotech, I believe the armor of most alien doomships is vulnerable to fighter planes armed with drunk rednecks.

 

[squidface]

... so we're all assuming that they haven't already visited our planet?

 

[Nemesis729]

If an alien race could reach us, they could destroy us, it would literally take less than a day, we wouldn't stand a chance, but this is only if they decide to kill us, which I doubt they would. If they really have to technology to reach us, from wherever they are from, chances are they will have forms of alternate energy, and won't need our resources, which we really don't have to much of anyway. I believe only good things would come from contact.

Except we have an abundance of water and minerals and a habitable planet. If they can jump from system to system they can probably transform an atmosphere to their liking.

Well ya useless water, we have so little fresh water it laughable, they can take all the salt water they want, And to aliens earth would be about as habitable as the moon is to us, they wouldn't want to live here.