Poll: "The METI Controversy": Should Detection by an Exo Civilization Be Viewed as a Threat?

[resultsmayvary]

Historically speaking, whenever two civilizations encounter each other for the first time, the civilization that gets found usually ends up wiped out or enslaved.

 

[BehattedWanderer]

Can't they detect all the EM signals we've been throwing out for 100 years? If its going to happen it will happen.

There is always the possibility that they can detect signals but are too far to do anything about it.

In which case they're likely as evolved as us asd far as travel goes so whats the harm in communication?

Even better would be if they did take over and forced the smartest of us to breed constantly...

Gah...Constantly? That's a lot of stress on those individuals. In the words of the most idiotic captain who hasn't yet tried to destroy the universe, Zapp Brannigan, "The spirit is willing, but the flesh is spongy, and bruised."

Retort to a Futurama reference with a Futurama reference, well played sir...

Had to be done. Thanks for the Farnsworthian hope, though...maybe he'll be right...

 

[Eclectic Dreck]

We already pump out tremendous amounts of EM radiation without regard to who might listen in, so the argumetnis mostly moot. Besides, thanks to that whole "finite speed of light" nonsense, even if we did answer back, unless they were shockingly close it could potential take decades (or longer) for them to recieve a reply.

Of course, as a simple thought exercise it's a good question. Really, what you're asking is how a person views human nature because our natural inclination would be to pin human motivations on any ET's anyhow.

 

[Abedeus]

I think that when aliens come, all the pollution, radiation and lack of ozone layer will kill them faster than any ray gun.

 

[Samurai Goomba]

Doesn't matter how advanced our machines are when aliens arrive, if people in authority are still stupid, petty and obsessed with self-gain. Technological advancements don't count for crap if people can't stop being jerks and rise out of their own bile and filth.

Excuse me, I think I'm gonna go watch a few David Fincher movies now.

 

[El Poncho]

Did anyone else read what stephen hawking said like he does?But yes it's logical that we don't reply everytime someone from europe came to the americas it didn't do them any good, like the aztects , the spanish wiped them out.

 

[Zand88]

YOU SAID THERE WOULD BE A POLL.

WHERE IS THE POLL, WAR-DOG?

 

[Shock and Awe]

YOU SAID THERE WOULD BE A POLL.

WHERE IS THE POLL, WAR-DOG?

I never said such a thing.

 

[johnman]

I can't wait for them. Maybe they can get rid of a good amount of idiots surrounding me...

Yes but what if they decide, that by their standards, your also an idiot, along with the rest of Humanity, and they destory us before we damage the galaxy further?
Take a look at the world. The rich west reliant on oil, the third world countries, the unrest in the middle east, the oppression of China, Japan.
We need to sort our own issues before even thinking about other species and the issues they will bring.

 

[Khedive Rex]

YOU SAID THERE WOULD BE A POLL.

WHERE IS THE POLL, WAR-DOG?

You're caps-lock is on and, despite conventional knowledge, it is not cruise control for cool.

As far as the subject at hand goes I think there is a serious logistical problem that people are over looking. Assuming that the alien species we contact has not advanced far enough to break the speed of light (which Hawkings himself would say is impossible), depending on where this species resides it could take hundreds of years for them to get here. This makes dominating the planet kind of difficult and not really cost effective.

What could a species want with our planet?

1) Slaves*: Not the most logical option in my opinion (if they're as advanced as everyone says, they'd have robots to do their bidding. Slaves are superflous.) but certainly one of the more popular complaints. Firstly, a human who had been enlaved would not survive the trip back to the home planet hundreds of light years away. If you believe in cryogenics it's possible to make the argument that they would but, again, it's vital to look at cost effectiveness. Traveling half a millenia to acquire a boatload of slaves who may or may not be able to survive on your planet without expensive machines in order to make one sale on the home planet is not an ineffective way to do business. Adding to the fact that a human could never be as apt a worker as a machine (even at our technology level) and that, therefore, a machine must reach a higher price at market and we have a situation that makes human slaves an entirely unrealistic business venture.

2) Resources*: One of the more likely rationales but once again unrealistic in application. First of all they couldn't take anything radioactive because the half-lives of the substances would drastically reduce the amount and quality of the resource as they traveled the hundreds of years back to their home planet (I choose hundreds of years as a concession to the oppossition. If their planet was, for example 700 light years from earth than it would be a 1,400 year round trip. Hundreds of years is the smallest reasonable guess, the minimal travel time). They also could not take anything biological because it would completely decompose by the time they got it to their home planet. Perhaps the most damning refutation is, once again, cost effectiveness. Their transport ship would have a maximum capacity, there is only so much it could carry, and any resources they take would be balanced by resources lost through propelling the ship across hundreds of light years of empty space. The more they carried, the more the ship would weigh, the more fuel they would lose to space as they tried to get the ship back home. Overall it's far simplier to mine on their home planet or adjacent planets in their solar system than to travel to an inhabited world on the far reaches of the galaxy.

3) Territory*: I respect this option for being one of the few that actually provides a rationale for aliens traveling half the galaxy to meet us. Assuming they live on a planet like ours, and are therefore capable of inhabiting ours, planets like Earth are few and far between. It's possible that an alien species suffering from over-population would send hive ships to earth simply because earth is the closest inhabitable planet. However, under this circumstance making our presence known is not detrimental to us. Announcing that there are humans on Earth would not incite an invasion that wasn't already coming. Simply knowing that there are weird fleshy creatures on a rock half way across the galaxy doesn't suddenly bump it to the top of your conquer list. An alien species would conquer planets on the basis of return on investment (How many of our kind can the planet support? What resources are present? Does control of this planet give our species more influence in the region?), and on that basis knowing that the planet in question is already populated does not factor into your decision to rule it. If anything it makes conquering the planet more costly as you have to send an extermination force along with your settlers. The only reason to assume that announcing our presence would call unwanted attention to our planet would be that all alien creatures lived in the same sort of environment and, therefore, knowing that some species inhabits earth means that your species will be able to inhabit earth as well. I feel this assumption is flawed. If there is alien life it is vast and varied and may survive in entirely different climes than ours.

So, in summary, there is no cost-effective rationale for taking slaves or resources from earth and if aliens species are planning to conquer the planet to ease their over-population problems knowing that we're here isn't going to get them any more interested in the planet than they already would be and may in fact shift the return on investment ratio far enough for them to invest in a different planet. I don't think that Hawking is the Einstein of our century and (at the very least) he is a poor economist.

*contentions may vary if you believe in teleportation, time travel or other soft-sciences.

 

[Doug]

Spoiler: Space saving

YOU SAID THERE WOULD BE A POLL.

WHERE IS THE POLL, WAR-DOG?

You're caps-lock is on and, despite conventional knowledge, it is not cruise control for cool.

As far as the subject at hand goes I think there is a serious logistical problem that people are over looking. Assuming that the alien species we contact has not advanced far enough to break the speed of light (which Hawkings himself would say is impossible), depending on where this species resides it could take hundreds of years for them to get here. This makes dominating the planet kind of difficult and not really cost effective.

What could a species want with our planet?

1) Slaves*: Not the most logical option in my opinion (if they're as advanced as everyone says, they'd have robots to do their bidding. Slaves are superflous.) but certainly one of the more popular complaints. Firstly, a human who had been enlaved would not survive the trip back to the home planet hundreds of light years away. If you believe in cryogenics it's possible to make the argument that they would but, again, it's vital to look at cost effectiveness. Traveling half a millenia to acquire a boatload of slaves who may or may not be able to survive on your planet without expensive machines in order to make one sale on the home planet is not an ineffective way to do business. Adding to the fact that a human could never be as apt a worker as a machine (even at our technology level) and that, therefore, a machine must reach a higher price at market and we have a situation that makes human slaves an entirely unrealistic business venture.

2) Resources*: One of the more likely rationales but once again unrealistic in application. First of all they couldn't take anything radioactive because the half-lives of the substances would drastically reduce the amount and quality of the resource as they traveled the hundreds of years back to their home planet (I choose hundreds of years as a concession to the oppossition. If their planet was, for example 700 light years from earth than it would be a 1,400 year round trip. Hundreds of years is the smallest reasonable guess, the minimal travel time). They also could not take anything biological because it would completely decompose by the time they got it to their home planet. Perhaps the most damning refutation is, once again, cost effectiveness. Their transport ship would have a maximum capacity, there is only so much it could carry, and any resources they take would be balanced by resources lost through propelling the ship across hundreds of light years of empty space. The more they carried, the more the ship would weigh, the more fuel they would lose to space as they tried to get the ship back home. Overall it's far simplier to mine on their home planet or adjacent planets in their solar system than to travel to an inhabited world on the far reaches of the galaxy.

3) Territory*: I respect this option for being one of the few that actually provides a rationale for aliens traveling half the galaxy to meet us. Assuming they live on a planet like ours, and are therefore capable of inhabiting ours, planets like Earth are few and far between. It's possible that an alien species suffering from over-population would send hive ships to earth simply because earth is the closest inhabitable planet. However, under this circumstance making our presence known is not detrimental to us. Announcing that there are humans on Earth would not incite an invasion that wasn't already coming. Simply knowing that there are weird fleshy creatures on a rock half way across the galaxy doesn't suddenly bump it to the top of your conquer list. An alien species would conquer planets on the basis of return on investment (How many of our kind can the planet support? What resources are present? Does control of this planet give our species more influence in the region?), and on that basis knowing that the planet in question is already populated does not factor into your decision to rule it. If anything it makes conquering the planet more costly as you have to send an extermination force along with your settlers. The only reason to assume that announcing our presence would call unwanted attention to our planet would be that all alien creatures lived in the same sort of environment and, therefore, knowing that some species inhabits earth means that your species will be able to inhabit earth as well. I feel this assumption is flawed. If there is alien life it is vast and varied and may survive in entirely different climes than ours.

So, in summary, there is no cost-effective rationale for taking slaves or resources from earth and if aliens species are planning to conquer the planet to ease their over-population problems knowing that we're here isn't going to get them any more interested in the planet than they already would be and may in fact shift the return on investment ratio far enough for them to invest in a different planet. I don't think that Hawking is the Einstein of our century and (at the very least) he is a poor economist.

*contentions may very if you believe in teleportation, time travel or other soft-sciences.

Nicely summarised, and I agree with the rationale, although there is one big problem I see with trying to predict alien behaviour:- They are, by definition, alien to our understanding.

We assume that most of the Galaxy and/or Universe is like here - fair enough, I say, we can see lot of stars similar to ours, and the Universe looks fairly uniform. However, to take that assumption and apply to it alien sentients is, in my opinion, a mistake. We only know of ourselves as a sentient technological species (Dolphins, Chimps, Whales, Dogs, Pigs, etc, etc, probably are sentient but not technological). As such, we only have ourselves as a sample point - and hence, we don't know if we are a typical sentient species or an oddity or if every species acts differently. Hence, to take our values and understanding of concepts, even basic ones we assume are oblivious and Universal, such as cost-effectiveness, is unproven. It might be that the aliens are just inheriantly 'evil' like the Dregnin from galactic civilizations. Of course, this might just be my fancyful thinking, and not apply to reality, heh.

As for FTL, according to our current (and incomplete) understanding of physics, it seems impossible. But do bare in mind our understanding of the world around is very incomplete (see Quantum Physic vs General Relativity - both are 'true' and yet they are mutually incompatible). And hence, FTL might be lurking in the 'here be dragons' areas of the map of the 'theory of everything'.

 

[Shock and Awe]

YOU SAID THERE WOULD BE A POLL.

WHERE IS THE POLL, WAR-DOG?

You're caps-lock is on and, despite conventional knowledge, it is not cruise control for cool.

As far as the subject at hand goes I think there is a serious logistical problem that people are over looking. Assuming that the alien species we contact has not advanced far enough to break the speed of light (which Hawkings himself would say is impossible), depending on where this species resides it could take hundreds of years for them to get here. This makes dominating the planet kind of difficult and not really cost effective.

What could a species want with our planet?

1) Slaves*: Not the most logical option in my opinion (if they're as advanced as everyone says, they'd have robots to do their bidding. Slaves are superflous.) but certainly one of the more popular complaints. Firstly, a human who had been enlaved would not survive the trip back to the home planet hundreds of light years away. If you believe in cryogenics it's possible to make the argument that they would but, again, it's vital to look at cost effectiveness. Traveling half a millenia to acquire a boatload of slaves who may or may not be able to survive on your planet without expensive machines in order to make one sale on the home planet is not an ineffective way to do business. Adding to the fact that a human could never be as apt a worker as a machine (even at our technology level) and that, therefore, a machine must reach a higher price at market and we have a situation that makes human slaves an entirely unrealistic business venture.

2) Resources*: One of the more likely rationales but once again unrealistic in application. First of all they couldn't take anything radioactive because the half-lives of the substances would drastically reduce the amount and quality of the resource as they traveled the hundreds of years back to their home planet (I choose hundreds of years as a concession to the oppossition. If their planet was, for example 700 light years from earth than it would be a 1,400 year round trip. Hundreds of years is the smallest reasonable guess, the minimal travel time). They also could not take anything biological because it would completely decompose by the time they got it to their home planet. Perhaps the most damning refutation is, once again, cost effectiveness. Their transport ship would have a maximum capacity, there is only so much it could carry, and any resources they take would be balanced by resources lost through propelling the ship across hundreds of light years of empty space. The more they carried, the more the ship would weigh, the more fuel they would lose to space as they tried to get the ship back home. Overall it's far simplier to mine on their home planet or adjacent planets in their solar system than to travel to an inhabited world on the far reaches of the galaxy.

3) Territory*: I respect this option for being one of the few that actually provides a rationale for aliens traveling half the galaxy to meet us. Assuming they live on a planet like ours, and are therefore capable of inhabiting ours, planets like Earth are few and far between. It's possible that an alien species suffering from over-population would send hive ships to earth simply because earth is the closest inhabitable planet. However, under this circumstance making our presence known is not detrimental to us. Announcing that there are humans on Earth would not incite an invasion that wasn't already coming. Simply knowing that there are weird fleshy creatures on a rock half way across the galaxy doesn't suddenly bump it to the top of your conquer list. An alien species would conquer planets on the basis of return on investment (How many of our kind can the planet support? What resources are present? Does control of this planet give our species more influence in the region?), and on that basis knowing that the planet in question is already populated does not factor into your decision to rule it. If anything it makes conquering the planet more costly as you have to send an extermination force along with your settlers. The only reason to assume that announcing our presence would call unwanted attention to our planet would be that all alien creatures lived in the same sort of environment and, therefore, knowing that some species inhabits earth means that your species will be able to inhabit earth as well. I feel this assumption is flawed. If there is alien life it is vast and varied and may survive in entirely different climes than ours.

So, in summary, there is no cost-effective rationale for taking slaves or resources from earth and if aliens species are planning to conquer the planet to ease their over-population problems knowing that we're here isn't going to get them any more interested in the planet than they already would be and may in fact shift the return on investment ratio far enough for them to invest in a different planet. I don't think that Hawking is the Einstein of our century and (at the very least) he is a poor economist.

*contentions may vary if you believe in teleportation, time travel or other soft-sciences.

True, there is no rational reason for ETs to do anything with this planet because they have very little or nothing to gain, but we are assuming they are rational, possibly, and I know that im going off in the deep end here, similar to the covenant in Halo, genocidal, and want us dead for a irrational reason. But, the chances of that are also slim, but we dont know.

 

[101194]

Well i would be inclined to go with what Stephen Hawking suggested. Either way its something that should be considered thoroughly before a response comes about from us.

Just had a thought, could aliens even survive here? I know this sounds lame, but wouldent our sicknesses kill them all off?

Yes, And no. Aliens that would want our planet and could get here could cure any diseases and sickness with there extreamly advanced technology, Mostly they would just kill us all off with a biochemical disease, Spreading fast and killing many. That way the planet wouldn't be damnaged by warfair A.K.A Nukes and Whatever the hell they have.

 

[Khedive Rex]

Spoiler: Space saving

YOU SAID THERE WOULD BE A POLL.

WHERE IS THE POLL, WAR-DOG?

You're caps-lock is on and, despite conventional knowledge, it is not cruise control for cool.

As far as the subject at hand goes I think there is a serious logistical problem that people are over looking. Assuming that the alien species we contact has not advanced far enough to break the speed of light (which Hawkings himself would say is impossible), depending on where this species resides it could take hundreds of years for them to get here. This makes dominating the planet kind of difficult and not really cost effective.

What could a species want with our planet?

1) Slaves*: Not the most logical option in my opinion (if they're as advanced as everyone says, they'd have robots to do their bidding. Slaves are superflous.) but certainly one of the more popular complaints. Firstly, a human who had been enlaved would not survive the trip back to the home planet hundreds of light years away. If you believe in cryogenics it's possible to make the argument that they would but, again, it's vital to look at cost effectiveness. Traveling half a millenia to acquire a boatload of slaves who may or may not be able to survive on your planet without expensive machines in order to make one sale on the home planet is not an ineffective way to do business. Adding to the fact that a human could never be as apt a worker as a machine (even at our technology level) and that, therefore, a machine must reach a higher price at market and we have a situation that makes human slaves an entirely unrealistic business venture.

2) Resources*: One of the more likely rationales but once again unrealistic in application. First of all they couldn't take anything radioactive because the half-lives of the substances would drastically reduce the amount and quality of the resource as they traveled the hundreds of years back to their home planet (I choose hundreds of years as a concession to the oppossition. If their planet was, for example 700 light years from earth than it would be a 1,400 year round trip. Hundreds of years is the smallest reasonable guess, the minimal travel time). They also could not take anything biological because it would completely decompose by the time they got it to their home planet. Perhaps the most damning refutation is, once again, cost effectiveness. Their transport ship would have a maximum capacity, there is only so much it could carry, and any resources they take would be balanced by resources lost through propelling the ship across hundreds of light years of empty space. The more they carried, the more the ship would weigh, the more fuel they would lose to space as they tried to get the ship back home. Overall it's far simplier to mine on their home planet or adjacent planets in their solar system than to travel to an inhabited world on the far reaches of the galaxy.

3) Territory*: I respect this option for being one of the few that actually provides a rationale for aliens traveling half the galaxy to meet us. Assuming they live on a planet like ours, and are therefore capable of inhabiting ours, planets like Earth are few and far between. It's possible that an alien species suffering from over-population would send hive ships to earth simply because earth is the closest inhabitable planet. However, under this circumstance making our presence known is not detrimental to us. Announcing that there are humans on Earth would not incite an invasion that wasn't already coming. Simply knowing that there are weird fleshy creatures on a rock half way across the galaxy doesn't suddenly bump it to the top of your conquer list. An alien species would conquer planets on the basis of return on investment (How many of our kind can the planet support? What resources are present? Does control of this planet give our species more influence in the region?), and on that basis knowing that the planet in question is already populated does not factor into your decision to rule it. If anything it makes conquering the planet more costly as you have to send an extermination force along with your settlers. The only reason to assume that announcing our presence would call unwanted attention to our planet would be that all alien creatures lived in the same sort of environment and, therefore, knowing that some species inhabits earth means that your species will be able to inhabit earth as well. I feel this assumption is flawed. If there is alien life it is vast and varied and may survive in entirely different climes than ours.

So, in summary, there is no cost-effective rationale for taking slaves or resources from earth and if aliens species are planning to conquer the planet to ease their over-population problems knowing that we're here isn't going to get them any more interested in the planet than they already would be and may in fact shift the return on investment ratio far enough for them to invest in a different planet. I don't think that Hawking is the Einstein of our century and (at the very least) he is a poor economist.

*contentions may very if you believe in teleportation, time travel or other soft-sciences.

Nicely summarised, and I agree with the rationale, although there is one big problem I see with trying to predict alien behaviour:- They are, by definition, alien to our understanding.

We assume that most of the Galaxy and/or Universe is like here - fair enough, I say, we can see lot of stars similar to ours, and the Universe looks fairly uniform. However, to take that assumption and apply to it alien sentients is, in my opinion, a mistake. We only know of ourselves as a sentient technological species (Dolphins, Chimps, Whales, Dogs, Pigs, etc, etc, probably are sentient but not technological). As such, we only have ourselves as a sample point - and hence, we don't know if we are a typical sentient species or an oddity or if every species acts differently. Hence, to take our values and understanding of concepts, even basic ones we assume are oblivious and Universal, such as cost-effectiveness, is unproven. It might be that the aliens are just inheriantly 'evil' like the Dregnin from galactic civilizations. Of course, this might just be my fancyful thinking, and not apply to reality, heh.

As for FTL, according to our current (and incomplete) understanding of physics, it seems impossible. But do bare in mind our understanding of the world around is very incomplete (see Quantum Physic vs General Relativity - both are 'true' and yet they are mutually incompatible). And hence, FTL might be lurking in the 'here be dragons' areas of the map of the 'theory of everything'.

It's a valid point that we can't accurately predict the behavior of other technological species because we haven't encountered any, but I think there are a few basic assumptions you can make about them working solely from the criteria that they are technological.

I associate (perhaps wrongly) a recognition of cost-effectiveness with the drive to produce continually advancing technology. From the start when people realized that it was easier and provided a larger long term return on investment to create wheels and carts to push around things rather than carry them by hand to today where people debate the merits of nuclear power over wind energy as they relate to cost effectiveness and, most importantly, their individual advantages over current energy producing techniques. Again, that is unfortunately based solely on observation of our own species and therefore could have a bias but I can't help but feel that a species that didn't recognize ideas like cost effectiveness and return on investment wouldn't have the incentive to improve their technology. I think they'd be happy with whatever they were using at the time because it worked and it wouldn't be necessarily useful to research superior methods.

That aside, I suppose it's possible they would try to wipe us out for illogical reasons. Whether it be via a crusade or as a xenophobic measure or simply because one of our translators misspoke and the aliens have a highly elevated sense of honor (particularly when it comes to defending it). All of those are possible but I can't help but feel that a species more advanced than ourselves would have mastered impulses like this. I don't think all of those factors would make for a very stable civilization and I think you'd need a pretty steady homefront before you could debate the merits of conquering civilizations halfway across the galaxy.

As for FTL I personally wouldn't be surprised if we found a way to make it happen at some point in the future. Honestly, it wouldn't shock me much if we found a way to make it happen during my lifetime. But I set out to debunk Hawking's conclusion using the same assumptions he would have made and that includes the impossibility of faster than light travel.

 

[John Smyth]

Lets face it if we found aliens we would conquer them, steal their technology and perform experiments on them. Aliens probably should attack first in defence against our cruelty, that said we should start working on an army to combat the aliens as they attempt to defend themselves from us as we attempt to enslave them.

We will be ready to respond once we successfully cross-bred pirates with ninjas, give the pirate-ninjas bionic implants and then grow them in a nuclear reactor. Then we could combat the aliens with radioactive cyborg-ninja-pirates.

 

[cleverlymadeup]

The native Americans weren't on the brink of dooming themselves so bring on the alien intervention.

well they weren't almost decimated by disease, paraded around as a side show, forced into poverty and drug addiction, hunted for sport and many other things. before the white man came over here they had a pretty good life

we brought them death and generally ruined their way of life

 

[clicketycrack]

As far as I know, Stephen Hawking is really fucking smart so I think I'm just going to go with whatever he says.

 

[Gerazzi]

Well i would be inclined to go with what Stephen Hawking suggested. Either way its something that should be considered thoroughly before a response comes about from us.

Just had a thought, could aliens even survive here? I know this sounds lame, but wouldent our sicknesses kill them all off?

Depends i suppose, were you thinking of the ending from War of the Worlds? They may not even be able to survive in such an oxygen rich enviroment. All that is besides the point since all they would need to do is park a safe distance away and bombard the planet. Of course this is all such an implausible probability.

Well, Hawking also said that it is highly unlikely that there are any ETs at or above our level within around 100 light years because we havnt intercepted any radio waves.

You are entirely ignoring the idea that maybe they're thinking the exact same thing and don't want to send any radio waves back.

Or perhaps they find us insane.

Spoiler: or maybe... they're already here!

MUAHAHAHAAAA [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rr5fkqhsvoI]

 

[Motti]

We worry about an alien civilisation finding and conquering us, but i a funny feeling that one day we will be looking down on a planet, wondering how best to intervene before the species below dooms itself to extinction.